Sea of Love

When I read that Accessorize

1) Not only came up with a makeup range which included nail polish, which,

2) Had an almost exact dupe for Mac's Pink Fairy,

I was sold. I had to get my hands on them. I would go through means to find its way to Singapore (we don't carry their makeup range at the mo). I was kind of lucky in the sense that they were having a free-shipping Christmas Promotion, so I got it sent to the US and V-posted it home. If they didnt have the free shipping thing, there probably was no way on earth I would have parted with my money. So anyway, I got a few things, two of their nail colours, Mermaid, and Pink Spice (their dupe for Bad Fairy), and a Purplish/Fuchsia lipgloss. Even then, I had to dig deep in my pockets because Vpost was a killer.

Mermaid and Pink Spice (which I'm saving for Chinese New year!) are from Accessorize's Illusion range, which in my opinion, together with the Rock Star range, are the only ranges worth checking out because they're the only 'original' or interesting range. If you liked any other colour, you're better off buying China Glaze, OPI or Orly. More bang for buck, and better quality too. Unless of course, you lived in the UK!

So, first up in line, was Mermaid worth all that shipping trouble?

Take a look at this:

Gasp! Notice the DIFFERENCE in quantity! Mermaid cost me about $14 SGD, but was TINY. Like 10ml. -_-" Well, I was kind of expecting it, anyway. But still, I felt a little cheated 'cause, y'know, I get Orly for about $12 SGD, and Orly's 18ml!

So, as you can see, teeny tiny, short stubby cap, an annoyance to hold with an even more annoying excuse of a brush! But I trudged on, and here is the result:

Without flash

This is a mighty pretty one! The name Mermaid does its shade justice as the duo-chrome flashes from an Aqua blue-glitter-mermaid scales to a gorgeous sea green that leaves you wanting to stare into the depths of the ocean present on your nails. I know alot of others have reviewed this colour out there, but this is truly a stunning shade, that MAYBE justifies the $14 needed to bring it to the sunny shores of Singapore where this colour can thrive!

You can sort of see the duo-chrome effect in this pic

Application: Was not bad at all! Three coats, over my horrid Sally Hansen base, followed by my cheapy Face shop top coat, but easy to work with! Now, IF ONLY the brush were more decent, it would have been perfect!

With flash

I'm liking it, and I like rocking this colour. Wears quite well, too. Minor tipwear, but I think it lasted without chipping till I removed it (a few days? can't remember!) It was a bitch to remove though! Partly typical glitter behaviour but also partly because of the base coat (ugh!)

Sali, when you go to the UK, I'm making you bring more of these stuff home for me!

'Dry your dity little eyes, my water turns to turpentine'

I'm in love with Space Cadet!!!

I've been showing off this colour, the dupe-that-is-better than MAC's Mean and Green from their Venomous Villains collection.

This is Space Cadet from Orly's Cosmic FX collection, and man is it cosmic!!!

No pictures for now, because I made a horrible mani of it.Mainly because I used a horrible base coat. NEVER use that sally Hansen shit as a base coat. It does not promise. I'm also not used to Orly's think brush =( I miss the thick awesome coverage OPI brushes have!

Many people have been saying that they have no idea how to describe the colour, and I think I will attempt to. I think it the main colour is this glitterly rose-purple base which can appear like a dark purple glitter in the night. Then there's the Green/gold bit to it, which is sort of a well, dirt green glitter. Someone once called it 'petrol coloured' and I think thats semi-accurate.

And when the rose-purple and green mix hues its just... mind blowing.

Also the pigment isn't the best around,it needs 3-4 coats, and even after that, one needs an awesome top coat to finish it off because the formula is so damn unstable.

That aside, this colour is WORTH all its pains. I will make an effort and fight for this colour. And to think the MAC formula is worse, has a worse brush and yet is still so highly sought after! So I'll post pics of this awesome baby once i get my hands on that Seche.

Awhile back I tried my Mermaid colour from accessorize, another awesome colour which I am late on updating so catch up on that soon!

My first Classic Manicure/ Pedicure

Okay, okay, I know this post is loooong overdue. I apologise for the tardiness, but lets get started!

Awhile ago (last month?) I bought a deal from a Bigdeals for a mani/pedi. Admittedly this started my love affair with nail colours and the urge to paint every bare nail in sight (yikes), but let me show you what I got!

All colours were painted in this order: OPI Natural base, OPI Colour (2 Coats), Seche Vite fast dry (Can you believe they made me pay four extra dollars for Seche?! Incredulous!)

I wanted a Hot Pink for my toes, and ended up settling for this, which I felt was fun, girly and not to Aunty-looking.

So, this is OPI's DC Cherry Blossom (I forgot the code) ! Unfortunately, it looks like a really orangey base under artificial light, which I hate.

But, under natural lighting I love it! Will I get this colour again though? Maybe not! I really don't like its orange undertones at times! I'll check out shorts story sometime and see how that compares to this.

For my hands, I wanted a light shade of pink (still on the search for my Miwako Sakuarda), and though its not Miwako, I still like this colour fairly well! I had no idea what this colour was because I asked the manicurist to recommend me a light pink and she suggested this, which when I tried to sneak a peek at the bottle was labelled R31. Later found out that this is a shade called 'Sweet memories' and its pretty old... can anyone place this colour?

This is it with flash...

And without flash. I absolutely love this pigment. It stayed on for ONE WEEK without chipping/white tips showing. And I loved how she filed my nails, lol. Lessons, anyone?

Thats it! I'm gonna be purchasing Sweet Memories soon because I really love how sweet yet natural this color looks. Overall it was a good Manicure... something I need to aspire to!

Ta-dah!

My Miwako Sakurada wig from Gothic Lolita wigs.

I loveeee the curls, and its really soft! So what do you think? Be honest now!

I'm so tempted to do a wig haul with them, ugh!!

Nail Crazy Wishlist #2

China Glaze

1. Platinum Gold

2. Ingrid (swoons loves)

3. Second hand silk

4. For Audrey

Orly

5. Iron Butterfly (donations, anyone? D: )

6. Lemonade

7. Lollipop

8. Snowcone

9. Cashmere Cardigan

OPI

10. Midnight in Moscow (can't decide if I like this or not, lol)

11. Sweet Memories (R31)

12. Got a date to knight (actually I just want to see how this compares with R31 lol)

13. Shorts story

14. Nail Envy Original

15. Nubar Diamont topcoat (they look really good in pictures, so far!)

sigh, someone save me, please

I'm also still on a lookout for a strawberry milkshake pink! any recommendations?

I'm going to do a post on a manicure I'd done a few days ago soon. Just to say that OPI R31 + Seche Vite has lasted me 5 whole days so far, woo hooooo!

Update:

4th March 2011 - Have gotten Nubar Diamont and Midnight in Moscow, just havent had the opportunity to photograph them nicely, yet! But I'm happy with them!

My First OPI- Do you lilac it? B29 NOT!

** UPDATE ** 13th Jan 2011

I have been duped!!! This colour isn't B29 at all, but another call Done out in deco.

It's funny because the label indeed says 'Do you lilac it', but when I compared it at robinsons, the colour was wayy off. Like I mentioned, this colour way wayyyyy more grey-ish than I had expected it to be, and my hunch was right!!! What do you think happened?

While this is still a nice colour- a very elegant shade of light purple, I'm quite disappointed with my first experience buying from a spree.

Sure won't be ordering from this spree organiser again! humph!

Have you ever had a disappointing nail colour experience when it wasn't what you thought it would be when you finally got it? Do share, what what colour it was!

ORIGINAL POST: -------------------------------------------------------------------

Oh yes I lilac very much!!

I can only sing praises about it... after years of tolerating cheapy the face shop products! I got this OPI from a spree- but trust me I think we're better off just buying from ebay. (hint of advice!)

Of course, as expected from OPI, this applied like a dream! GREAT opacity with just the second coat, something I have long struggled with other brands, and nice, thick, thick brush!!! Its a light colour, but woooo, its SOLID!

The only initial disappointment was that I was surprised at how much greyish undertones this colour had. Its supposed to be from the brights collection, but I really think this colour is sort of muted and well, more grey-ish, if you get what I mean, lol. I suppose lucky lucky lavender would have been brighter but so far it looks rather pinkish to me which I didnt want yet... shall go down to the store to check tmrw!

Having said that, it IS a lovely colour, though and I'm used to it already. Its luuvvvv

Products used: Sally Hansen Miracle Nail Thickener (see previous post), I'm trying it out as a base coat this time, see how it fares. Application of OPI was smooth and not bad at all! of course I had to go and ruin things by using a TFS top coat, but its the only topcoat I have, and while, in all honesty the OPI didnt look like it needed a top coat, I just can't bear the thought of bare colour exposed to all the harsh conditions!!

I promise better photo taking skills soon >.<

Yay!

Here are some lousy pics but with better colour matches- it isn't really as bright as it looks in the above picts!

Sally Hansen: Miracle Nail Thickener

Update!

This was a bugger to remove!! (to be fair I had on like 4 coats of it at the end of four days) but it took ALOT of remover to get it off, it was really sticky and sticking to the nail!It starts to bubble BADLY by the third coat, though So currently my second round of treatment I relaxed with the regime.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is another nail review *stating the obvious*

Anyway, after observing how ugly my nails are compared to the rest of the world's, I decided that this was because I have thin nails that have very bad contouring. Thus I've been looking at Nail treatment products and this item caught my eye.

Its kinda pricey, at 17.50. but I got it for 20% off at the Robinsons sale. So yay to that. So far I'm having an unstable relationship with Sally Hansen. The online nail community says to stay off her at any cost, but with products like a Nail thickener, and a top coat promising a 'diamond' shine, how can one resist? Has anyone actually tried this product? DO tell, and if it worked! Cuz in the back of my mind SH seems to be a huge nail sham, churning out products which don't actually work but fooling consumers like me into buying it and trying it out. :(

okay so, on to application: I honestly can say that it doesnt smell that bad to me. In fact it's sorta has no smell, and definitely does not stink as much as the face shop colours do. So thats a plus point. The formula isn't thick, but its sticky, but I tell myself that it'll be good training for applying Seche in the future, except SH provides a HORRIBLE brush (much like their other nail treatment products, I've heard, sigh.)

Texture and finish: Not that this is the main point of the product, but it dries pretty quick however it doesnt dry rock hard, i dont know how to explain it, like u can dent/ scratch it with your fingernails, and it leaves a mark, but that goes away after awhile. Oh and the formula bubbles on second application. I have no idea why :(. The finish however (when it isn't bubbling) is quite nice, it looks like freshly applied base coat still wet, and it remains that way. I've heard people saying that the product washes off but I haven't experienced that myself, as I've been applying a new coat daily so far (this is my 3rd coat).

Does it work: I honestly dont know, yet. I'm gonna try using the whole bottle, first so see how it goes. I'll probably spend the New Year's weekend testing it as a basecoat, though I'm apprehensive about results cuz this fella does feel a little bit waxy to touch >.<> hopefully, I see thicker nails soon!