Covergirl Peacock VoxBox Review

Note: I received the products in this post complimentary of Influenster for testing purposes!

We are going to take a little break from nail polish to talk about the fourth (possibly fifth?) VoxBox I have ever received: the Covergirl Peacock VoxBox. Once again, no nail polish. Do I need to start restricting myself to only reviewing nail-related things on that site? My first VoxBox got the whole nail-obsession thing down, but not a polish since then. Oh well, because this time around I got to review mascara, the only makeup item besides nail polish that I use on a regular basis!

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Butter London Cashmere Crèmes: Swatch & Review

So, I just discovered something REALLY STUPID. I bought this lovely set of Butter London Patent Shine 10X lacquers earlier this fall and, since it is a beautifully packaged gift set, I decided to sit on swatching it until closer to Christmas. As I was finishing up putting this post together, I went to Butter London’s site to link the set and… nothing! They don’t have it for sale anymore and neither does Nordstrom. What poop! You would think it would stick around a little bit longer, wouldn’t you? The set contains several neutral shades as well as some fun yet very wearable colors. The perfect nail polish gift? I would think so, but clearly Butter London and I are not on the same page. Obviously I am still deciding to post my review anyway, but just wanted you to know upfront that you may not be able to find this set anywhere. Which is a cryin’ shame because this set is Butter London at its best.

Fall Favorites: Essie Dressed to the Nineties

Essie Dressed to the Nineties, 2 coats plus NYC Shine in a Minute Grand Central Station

This will be my last fall post of the year *waterfall of tears*. Except… I’m not really THAT sad because Christmas is my favorite holiday. Now that US Thanksgiving is over I am in full Christmas mode! Christmas music playing 24/7? Check! Every surface of my living space covered in festive penguins? Checkity check. The most cheerful, happy, warm feeling I am going to ever have this winter? CHECK!!! I’m now going to take a moment to reflect and look back fondly upon fall 2017 (which we are still technically in… the winter solstice isn’t until the 21st of December). This year gave us some awesome new nail polish releases like Essie Dressed to the Nineties. Essie’s fall collection had some interesting shades; I picked up As If! and Girly Grunge too, but I opted to wear Nineties because it is so interesting. It is a deep purple (but NOT black) with a dusting of turquoise, greenish shimmer and I enjoyed having it on my digits.

First Impressions: Collection Long Lasting Nail Effects

Collection Peacock, 2 coats plus Seche Vite

Hello friends, and welcome to another episode of how in the heckin’ heck do you hold this dadgam bottle. Seriously, do not pay attention to the way I am holding the bottle picture-to-picture because the inconsistency is truly astounding. I am not going to blame Collection for that, though, because this polish is stunning. This is my first (and only) Collection polish and I really wish I had picked up more. Maybe none of the other colors are this amazing. Definitely not true, Cosmic Stars and Touch of Glamour look b-e-a-utiful! I think this is the second blue-green polish called Peacock that I picked up while in the UK and it’s definitely my favorite of the two (no offense to Seventeen, I thoroughly enjoyed wearing that one). Pictures cannot accurately convey the beauty of this polish, but we’re going to look at some anyway.

Deborah Lippmann x Grey Jason Wu

A couple, possibly a few, months ago Deborah Lippmann announced a little collaboration with Jason Wu as part of his new line, Grey. I’m not entirely sure what makes Grey different from his usual fashion line because the prices still make my jaw drop. There must be more people out there than I think who are willing to drop $400 on a sweater. That makes me want to go on all kinds of rants, but we’re here for the nail polish, not Ashley’s diatribes. I do not really know what made me buy Grey Day, the name of this little number, because it kind of looks like a grey that every brand has. Surprisingly, I actually own nothing like it! Money well spent. It walks the line between a few different types of greys and I love it lots. I mean, it’s grey, of course I wasn’t going to hate it…

Fall Favorites: OPI This Isn’t Greenland

OPI This Isn’t Greenland, 2 coats plus top coat

There is pretty much nothing I anticipate more in the nail polish world than the release of fall collections. Fall colors can be muted, bright, vampy, bold, shimmery, or dusty, but there is something about them… the colors always feel closer to nature, but perhaps I’m just thinking that because nature really goes all out during fall. OPI is one of the brands that killed it this year with their fall release and I was both terrified of and excited by this particular green. I was not sure if the muted, yellow-tinged sage, green khaki color of This Isn’t Greenland would suit me, but I enjoyed every second that I had it on my nails. It was somehow classy and fun, possibly the closest a green is going to get to being a neutral.

First Impressions: YSL La Laque Couture

YSL Rouge d’Or, 2 coats plus top coat

I have this thing about spending money on nail polish… I just cannot bring myself to buy a polish that is over $10 a bottle. It doesn’t matter what size the bottle is, but $10 is my limit for a single vessel of polish. For this reason, I have very few higher-end polishes in my collection. Luckily, discount beauty stores exist and scrounging around in them landed me this bottle of YSL polish. Rouge d’Or is a delightful orangey, coral-y red filled with a fine gold shimmer. If you’ve been following me a while, you might know that orange + gold is one of my major weaknesses!

Butter London Fall Duo 2017: Swatch & Review

It’s the most wonderful time of the year and, no, it’s not Christmas, it’s FALL!!! This summer has been way too gosh dang hot and smoky, due to all the forest fires raging about the state. I think I was over it in August. The weather has noticeably cooled and my hands have started drying out, and yet I am walking on cloud nine. The crisp mornings. The changing leaves. The fall nail colors, which is why y’all are here. Butter London has been fairly consistently releasing a duo-pack of Patent Shine lacquers since at least last fall when I reviewed a set. It’s (more) reasonably priced at $25 for the duo (considering that the Patent Shines are normally $18 individually) and if you wait until there’s coupon code, even more savings! This fall they have supplied us with a purple and a grey, much like last year, but in much darker shades. Mmmm, delicious!

First Impressions: Maybelline Super Stay 7 Days Gel Nail Color

Maybelline Surreal, 2 coats plus Sally Hansen Insta-Dri (more like Insta-Bubble)

The only Maybelline nail polish I had ever seen before stepping out of the country was the Color Show line (which I have strangely never tried). I randomly saw this polish at Superdrug and decided I should grab it, even though there was a chance I would be able to find it at home in the US. Good job I got a bottle because I have not seen these anywhere, and believe me, I have been on the look out (did I sound too much like Trump there with the “believe me”? yikes…). Maybelline’s very long-named Super Stay 7 Days Gel Nail Color is, surprise, not an actual gel polish. It is one of those “gel-like” polishes every brand these days feels compelled to make. They claim seven days of no chips, as long as you do top coat touch ups. Hmmm, okay. I don’t do wear tests, so what you’re going to see is an application review. Not even concrete could last seven days on my nails!

The Color Box: Blue

If you had not noticed yet, blue is one of my favorite polish colors. I probably own more blues than any other color, yet polish makers world wide keep managing to create lovely hues of blue that you couldn’t find a match for even in my vast collection. While perusing a few of my favorite blogs, I saw that The Color Box, a quarterly collaboration box that releases five different polishes from five different indie makers in the same color family, chose blue for their spring color. I have never tried any of these brands before, but you better believe I whipped my credit card out in 0.2 seconds after seeing the blue deliciousness that could be adorning my nails. Although you will probably not be able to get any of these specific polishes any more, I thought I would share my experience with The Color Box with you anyway! There’s never anything wrong with getting exposed to a few more indie polishes, right?