Deborah Lippmann Swagga Like Us

This is my first Deborah Lippmann nail polish! I was so excited. Here are some swatches.

See the green around the golden color? There's a duochrome effect! Really cool.

As you can see, it's a very bright. Excuse my nails, this is after many days of wear and tear. This is with flash.

This is without flash, it definitely shows the green with the angle. It's not actually green but it shifts into a green duochrome at certain angles. 

Essie Manicure

I only own 2 Essie nail polishes so here they are.

 This is Coat Azure by itself. It's an opaque powder blue with shimmer. It's a 1-2 coater.

I decided to layer "As Gold as it Gets" over Coat Azure. I used 2 coats, it's really pretty. It's really sparkly and I like it both ways. 

The two bottles. I used the Beauty Secrets Base Coats and Seche Vite top coat to give my manicure that glossy finish.

Random Swatch Load

I haven't updated anything in such a long time. Man, school took such a huge toll on me. Anyway, here are the random pictures I took throughout the year and never got a chance to publish.

Color Club--

This is called Wild at Heart, it's a gorgeous purple linear holo. Just simply breathtaking.

Revvvolution; like Wild at Heart, it is a holo but it's a dark gray holo. Believe me, it looks better in person. My crappy android camera can't capture the glorious holo effect but believe me, it's there.

Nails, Inc.--

I hate magnetic nail polishes... I suck! haha. It's called House of Parliament. I love the color in all honesty.

ORLY--

This is ORLY Royal Navy. It's a beautiful jelly-like navy with light blue sparkles. It's soooo pretty. I love it a lot actually.

 Both of these are Halley's Comet, it was a really popular color but it's somewhat forgotten now. It is a blue-green; jam-packed with awesomeness. It has flecks that create the shine from my flash. Reminds me of a mermaid but darker.

 Luxe; exactly what its name implies. It is a metallic / foil-type gold that looks luxurious and expensive. It's not pure gold; it's actually not that warm. Very nice.

This is Rock Your World, it's a beautiful purple-y red (like a bruise, but prettier) with gold shimmer. It has INTENSE shimmer that stands out and it really does rock my world!

Zoya--

This is Zoya Reece. It's an amazing pink that's more on the purple-y side with golden shimmer. It's like hot pink but cool toned as opposed to the warm which contrasts beautifully with the warm gold. I've been eyeing this for a while actually.

Nubar--

 This is Nubar 2010, it's the standard flakies like Shine of Times or Hidden Treasure, pretty common but still lovely.

Purple Rain-- it's a really pretty deep royal purple with lots of holo glitter, it's not linear holo, it's holo glitter. Amazing, really.

Sally Hansen--

 Pacific Blue is nice creme blue. It's not as purple as the picture, it's actually blue; like a cornflower blue.

Time to Shine, it really is shiny but that's only due to flash picking up all the shimmer. If you just look at it, it's not actually that shiny but there is lots of shimmer in the mist of a nice metallic brown. I wouldn't say it's copper or anything of that sort. It's just lovely.

Revlon--

Facets of Fuchsia, apparently it's a dupe for the Deborah Lippmann Bad Romance. I've seen pictures, they're pretty close if not exact dupes. It's a dark black jelly with violet / purple glitter pieces. Some of them are small flecks, others are actually hexagonal.

Sinful Colors--

 Aquamarine, the name suits it. It's a blue creme that looks like a hue from a mermaid's tail.

Daddy's Girl, it's an extremely gorgeous nail polish with like 6 coats. Seriously, look at the thickness of that polish. Honestly it's a huge hassle but I LOVE THIS COLOR SO MUCH. I don't know why. It's gorgeous once it's been applied a billion times and with a good shiny top coat like Seche Vite.

Phew. Finally done. I probably have more pictures somewhere else but for the moment, that's all I could dig up. I hope you enjoyed this. :)

Milani Holographics

My, aren't I updating my blog a lot today? I just needed to get something out there. Plus, I figured the only way I could actually attract readers would be to keep posting and have more things.

Now on with the Milani Holographics Collection. I saw this at CVS like months ago and it's not limited edition so it's probably still there.

Milani: HD -- This is what I decided to try first. Haha. Go for the generic silver one. This was my first holographic nail polish (I've required some Color Clubs now) and it was also kind of disappointing. Although at the time, I was in love with it and loved it. So if you don't have any holographics and don't mind the duller version, this is perfect.

 Milani: Hi-Res -- The purple intrigued me. Although many say that the green one (Hi-Tech) or the blue (Cyberspace) is their favorite. Mine is the purple. It's just lovely. I think I just have a thing for purple holos because I really love my Color Club Wild at Heart, too. I actually didn't do a comparison of them yet. I worn the Milani one like months ago and the Color Club was just recently.

Then, I decided I didn't want to try all of them one by one so I just used all of them. Thumb (Digital), Index Finger (3D), Middle (Hi-Tech), Ring (Cyberspace), Pinky (Hi-Res). The purple definitely stands out. I loved my manicure though. They're all kind of blah on their own but they work nicely together. The gold one is definitely not a linear holo. It's just gold with some scattered holo glitter. But even then, it worked well together.

ELF Coral

I've been eyeing this polish for the longest time but didn't want to pay shipping for just one polish so when ELF had a sale, I decided to chuck a few things in my cart and buy it. I don't regret it AT ALL.

It's a peachy pink / coral color (well duh, its name) with gold shimmer. The shimmer isn't extravagant or loaded but it's definitely there.

This was taken with my phone's obnoxiously bright flash and the shimmer just magically appeared. I love the color but this is NOT what it looks like. The first picture was more accurate in color. I just wanted to really reflect the gold shimmer, even the shimmer isn't this bright but it's there. This actually looks like Zoya Reece (from the swatches I've seen online), dying to pick that up too but I really don't want to order online because then I might get carried away.

Do any of you guys have this color? If so, what do you think? Or do you have a color that is like the second picture, if so, which one? I'm dying for a bright pink that's loaded with gold shimmer.

Review: Beauty Secrets Base Coat

I've seen a lot of people use this base coat on YouTube and it's huge so I bought it. I generally don't use base coats but this makes my nails so smooth and prevents major staining, (I've only had trouble with it once and that was very minimum)... so I love it. Nail polish never really stay on my nails as I have a tendency to peel at them or scratch them off so I can't really say much about its ability with chipping but it makes my nails smooth and feel great when I put on nail polish so I'll continue buying. Maybe I'll do another review in the future when I try out my Seche Vite ridge filling one and the OPI one (I have both from when I went to Ulta and they had the buy 2 get a top / base coat sale. Never used them but I'll give them a try in the future).

Verdict:
Price: 5/5 -- very cheap for such a huge bottle.
Packaging: 5/5 -- the brush is very long and it fans out really nicely.
Overall Usage: 4.5/5 -- I only use it to prevent staining and smoothing out my nails, it does the job, could be better but I like it well enough.

Stamping

So last month, I went to my homecoming dance and I decided to do my nails. I didn't want something too time-consuming and intricate but I didn't just want a color since I was wearing a black dress and black nails would be too boring. I came up with this:

I used China Glaze Passion with BM-225. I got so many compliments on it! It looks intricate but not over the top and time-consuming. I tend to go classy, not trashy to my homecomings but I might succumb to teenage influence and go with a short, tight dress and fit in next year. Depends on my mood.