Sweet!

How happy was I when these beauties showed up on my doorstep? I have been dying to try them since I saw the very first promo ads! Especially Lollipop. They are such lovely feminine pastels. Makes me think of Easter eggs and baby chicks! Each come with a free little lip gloss too! My other favorite beauty item - lip gloss, yum!

Lemonade has the honor of being the very first yellow in my collection. I never thought I would try a yellow polish, but I really like this! I couldn't get over the perfect formula. Not too thick or thin and very opaque for such a light color. This is the perfect pastel yellow crème and it really makes me wish summer was here!


Lollipop is soooo much prettier in person! My camera had a hard time capturing this perfect pale lavender cream. It's a light purple but darker than China Glaze's Light as Air. The formula was perfect as well.

These pictures make it look a little pinker than it is.
Pixy Six! I love the name! I never thought I would like a bright pink-coral like this on my hands, but I really do! It's very cheery and makes me want to vacation some place tropical! The formula is a little thinner than Lemonade and Lollipop but just as nice to work with.
I can't wait to try this on my toes!

One thing I have always liked about Orly is how substantial the bottles feel. I also love the rubber grippy cap! The brushes on these were nice and fluffy not as long and skinny as the brushes on my Country Club Khaki and Cashmere Cardigan. These samples were sent to me, and I haven't seen them in Sally's yet (my Sally's seems to be slow getting any new stuff in!). They are due to be released in April, but hopefully come places will have them for sale a little sooner! The formula on these is so fantastic I really want to try Gumdrop and Snowcone as well.

Light as Air vs. Lollipop

Index and Ring: Orly "Lollipop"

Middle and Pinky: China Glaze "Light as Air"

Both are nice, thick, smooth formulas. Light as Air seems to be more of a subdued pastel grey-lilac, while Lollipop is more of a bright, cheery pastel lilac.

Ciaté is new here...

A-MAZE-ING! Awesome brush, cute bottles, great formula, durable wear...fantastic! A little pricey with the exchange rate, but even with shipping, still less than Chanel. I had a fantastic customer service experience with them. They were very helpful and responsive to some issues I had. I also have Superficial, so I can't wait to try that out!

Some China Glaze Up and Aways

Light as Air. Very, very pale lavender. Almost grey-lavender in the bottle. This is the one I wanted the most from the Up and Away collection. I couldn't wait for Transdesign to get it, so I ended up buying it off ebay. When it got here, I was not impressed so it took me awhile to get around to swatching it.

It looks about 100% better in these pictures than I thought it looked on my actual hands. Maybe I am just not used to pastels?

Light as Air was smooth to apply. This is two coats.

Something sweet was another one I was disappointed with on arrival.

It was also terrible to apply. Thick, streaky, just yuck.

I thought this pale pink would be pretty on my pale hands but I just didn't care for it.

Peachy Keen I thought I would try because I don't think own a single color even close to this.
I really wanted to try stepping outside the box and try something new and different for me.

Unfortunately, I hated this one the most. It felt way too orange on me. The application was terrible. My sweet husband, who never wants to say he doesn't like something on me, took one look at it and made a very pained expression. "It's not my favorite" his way of saying "that is fug".

I had planned to try Lemon Fizz and Refreshment from this collection as well, but I think I am going to skip them now. Maybe just pick up Grape Pop and look to the Essie and Orly pastels to get my spring-time fix. Ho-hum.

Orly Iron Butterfly...and a little Konad gone wrong!

I picked Iron Butterfly up on clearance at Sally's a few weeks ago, and finally got to try it.

I haven't really been a fan of the matte trend, but pictures of Iron Butterfly looked amazing so I had to try it. It's awesome! This is one coat and it dried super fast! My husband thought it was the coolest looking polish ever, which is always nice.

Close up, you can see shimmer particles. Very much like asphalt.

I had planned to use this with a Konad in China Glaze Millenium. Unfortunately, it came out like this. Not sure where I went wrong, some of the lines just broke off. I thought Konad and I had reached a new point in our relationship where we understood each other, but apparently not.

Oh well, I still think it looks kinda cool, and I am not planing on leaving my office today. :)
Happy Birthday Abe!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Spotlight on: DURI

Edited to add: cosmeticslk.com has been kind enough to offer 10% off if you use code: KATE10FF

Definitely a good way to check out Duri!!

I was so impressed with my one and only Duri polish, Midnight Blues, that I had to buy more! Duri seems to have a really impressive line of colors. From classic reds to pale blues and yellows. I chose these three as I though it was a good variety of finishes and colors.

I purchased these from CosmeticLK.com. Their prices were great, shipping reasonable and I had them in my mailbox two days after placing my order. Very impressed! I believe there is usually a clickable google ad link for CosmeticLK somewhere on this bog if you are interested.

This is rendez-vou, which is quite possibly my favorite taupe-nude cream ever.

You'll have to forgive me, I took like a millllllion pictures of it!

It was very shiny and wore very nicely.

This is three coats, notice I was a little thin on my ring finger...oops!


Next up: Backstage Pass
Really pretty pinky-lavendar color with just a hint of shimmer.

Again, tons of pictures because I really loved it!

Excuse the cuticles, winter is doing a number on my hands.

I didn't get to photograph Iced Plum yet, but it is also quite pretty.

Go Saints!!

I enjoy rooting for the underdog. And I can only really tolerate football about once or twice a year. Since the Giants aren't in it, GO SAINTS!!
Petites "Midnight Frost" can be found at Rite Aid and Wal-Mart. I wasn't a fan of the formula. It's very thin and watery. Completely miserable o apply. The silver glitter doesn't show up very well, so I added two coats of Orly Prisma Gloss.

Hard Candy - Mr. Wrong