ModelCo Eye Shadow Trio in Smokey Eye Review and Swatches

Another eyeshadow palette! This one was a gift from Larie, and fills the black-smoky-eye hole in my collection.

L'Oreal Infallible Gilded Envy and Infinite Sky Review and Swatches

I picked these up a while back when Rite Aid had 40% off L'Oreal and I felt like injecting some new sparkle to my eye collection. I love Bronzed Taupe, though I don't find the Infallible formula to be ironclad like others do, but I always wear eyeshadow primer anyways, so whatever. Gilded Envy and Infinite Sky are both very different from anything else in my stash, at least!

Gilded Envy is a crazy pewter-olive-grey-sage-whatthefuck glittery reflective pile of amazing.

macros r us

Manicure Monday

Still truckin' along with my NY resolution! Here's some of what's been on my tips the past couple weeks.

a england St. George

Amazed I haven't reviewed this already! It's a gorgeous dark teal with subtle holo, opaque in one coat. I remember disliking the a england brush, but it was fine this time (except for my ring fingers, which both ended up with polish on the cuticle, how annoying!). I wasn't going to photograph it because my nails are super short, due to one breaking, but then I discovered I haven't featured this polish yet, so I figured it's better to have stubby photos than none at all. Now I want to try Dragon again to see if maybe it will behave better than I remember...

Too Faced Boudoir Eyes Soft and Sexy Eye Shadow Collection Review and Swatches

Look! I'm reviewing something that's not a lippie! *pats self on back* I picked this up during Sephora's F&F because I wanted a cool-toned palette of "neutrals", since I gravitate towards those shades during winter and felt a lack in my collection.

Some Random Polish Swatches

I'm not wearing polish on my nails for the time being while I use Nailtiques on them to try and make them not suck, but I have some swatches from before my self-imposed polish absence that I don't care enough about to write individual posts for, but that I would nonetheless like to be able to get off my computer, so I figured I would just throw them at you! And use a really long sentence to do so!

Essence Where Is The Party?

How it looks in the bottle most
of the time

The name of this polish makes me laugh, because you would never hear it said like that (except by ESL speakers, which I would guess the namers of this polish are, since Essence is a German company). It sounds so formal! So funny how little things like not contracting sounds so weird (even though I wrote that sentence, I was still momentarily confused by the status of "sounds". I've clearly spent too much time linguisting...).

And how it looks in the bottle at an angle!

How it looks in head-on light

Crazy color shift!

Anyways. Linguistic entertainment aside, this is a pretty cool polish. It was the first duochrome I got, though I've actually yet to wear it as a full mani. It's a purple-green duochrome, and shifts from being a rich purple head-on to being a softer grey-purple that shifts to green in different light. It's got a slightly frosty finish, so you do have to be a bit careful about applying, but it's not really high-maintenance. It's a little thick, too, so you have to let it dry between coats if you ever want it to fully dry, but for a buck, I can't complain! I think this was 3 coats, but it's been awhile, so I'm not sure. You can get Essence at Ulta and Fred Meyer, as far as I know, though there may be other retailers, and from drugstores in Germany (and possibly elsewhere in Europe?).

Mavala Nail Polish Reviews and Swatches

Mavala is a Swiss brand that makes mini bottles of polish (0.17 oz, rather than the usual 0.4-0.5 oz) in a stunning array of colors. As far as I know, they're not available in the US, but you can order them from Beauty Bay (which has free shipping options sometimes [editor: like right now!], as was the case when I bought mine, and even when not free the shipping is quite reasonable, ~$6 to the US), which is what I did. They run ~$4, and the greatest challenge is in deciding what shades to get! These polishes are another post-breakup purchase, and by post-breakup, I mean the day after. It took almost a month for them to get to me, though I imagine the time would be less if you're on the East Coast, and for free, I'm not complaining!

Left to right: Electric Green, Charm, Berlin, Dakar

I ordered 5 colors, but evidently one was sold out before they shipped my order (and sadface, it was the awesome duochrome one! Alas), so I have 4 to show you today.

Revlon Carbonite LE Nail Polish Review and Swatches

Chanel came out with a trio of polishes this summer, including a sparkling gunmetal-gold called Graphite (and a truly lovely green duochrome, Peridot), that was very popular.  Of course, at $25/bottle, it's way out of my price range.  Revlon came out with a "dupe" a couple months later, Carbonite (clever, guys), which I happened to recently see on clearance at Rite Aid, so I picked it up so I could see what the hype was all about (you can see Cafe Makeup's comparison of the two here and here).  For me: major letdown.

Revlon Carbonite

Sonia Kashuk Nail Colour in Blank Slate Review and Swatches

A few weeks ago, Target had a mobile coupon for $2 off any Sonia Kashuk cosmetics purchase, so I decided to pick up one of her nail polishes, Blank Slate, a dark blue-grey creme, normally $4.99.

Blank Slate