First OPI and China Glaze

I have a terribly addictive personality.

I just placed my first TransDesign order, since I have been lemming (for a whole THREE DAYS, lol) for OPI's Tickle My France-y and China Glaze's For Audrey. I just moved here to New Jersey last year from Canada, so I'm still really unfamiliar with the area and since my polish addiction is pretty new, I'm still getting my bearings. I ordered some other goodies to make the shipping "worth it" (oh the non-sensical justification has already begun...), but I'll save the rest for a future post!

By the way, I changed the name of the blog to Spaz & Squee. I'm terrible at naming things, but it seemed more appropriate since those are the two reactions I seem to be having when confronted with polishes I need.

Yesterday I stopped by the mall for three reasons:

1. Banana Republic: I had a 40% off one regular priced item coupon. I bought a dress shirt in turquose stripes

2. Disney Store: Needed to pick up 2 Pook-a-Loozs that I have been wanting:

I bought Eeyore a few weeks ago, but I wanted a Tigger.


And since they are 2 for $20 (otherwise $12.50 each), I picked up a lil Chessie-cat... The notebook is from last time. It's super cute too.


3. Hallmark: Needed to get a Father's Day card. I found the perfect one (in about 1 minute! The woman beside me looked like she was at her wit's end and I think she may have been there for quite a long time...)

I completed all these tasks, and was ready to book it home. I had to walk back to the other end of the mall to where I had parked, so I decided to go via the second floor for a change of scenery (and also fewer people! I don't know why it's always so crowded at the mall in NJ... just... always). As I was about to descend down the escalators at the end of the second floor, I noticed the in-mall hair salon had a poster on its storefront with "OPI $6.99" in huge letters.

Obviously, I made a bee-line into the salon, even though I had no intention of getting anything. That's how it always is, though, isn't it.

After deciding not to get anything, I was ready to leave, but spotted the Alice in Wonderland and Shrek collections at the cash. My friend Tish from back home had sent me my two first OPI's (they are in the pics below): Funkey Dunkey from the Shrek collection, and Pearl of Wisdom from the HK Collection, I believe.

I know everyone is gaga for Absolutely Alice and Mad As a Hatter, but honestly, I am not a huge fan of glitters, let alone ones with multiple colours in them. I feel like I'm already pushing the boundaries of acceptable nail colour at work as it is (thank goodness it's Spring/Summer, though! Essie Resorts don't look so strange right now!), so glitter is just too much for me. Plus, removing it is annoying and harsh on my nails (pure acetone :()

After my first taste of the Shrek collection with Funkey Dunkey, What's With The Cattitude and Rumple's Wiggin' had me salivating. I suppose Rumple's Wiggin' is quite a common pale lavender colour, but since my collection is essentially brand new, I needed myself a shade like this! I'm wearing Cattitude right now (I love Puss in the movies, and cats in general) and I love it. I did notice that it looked rather bright under office lighting while I was at work today. Oh well, it's not like clients actually come to our po-dunk office anyways.

Finally, I went back to the huge display for a quick look over, and saw You Don't Know Jacques. Tish actually sent me a bottle of this in my birthday package, but it broke! I was sad, so, naturally, had to replace it. I think I'll probably swatch it next time I do my nails, but not wear it until end of summer comes around.

On to the pics...


Pearl of Wisdom, YDKJ, Funkey Dunkey, Rumple's Wiggin', What's With the Cattitude


My girl Tish also sent me my first China Glaze in After Glow. I googled it and heard that it was amazing over black, so I picked up a WnW polish (which I also read raves about). After Glow has a blue iridescence to it, so I'm excited to layer that over some other darker colours as well.


I hate changing my lenses, so we're stuck with a picture like this. I don't think I will swatch for this blog (I don't think my nails can handle it), but I'll do NOTD's, I suppose! :)

Then I decided it might be fun to take some super up close shots of the bottles. Since I'm sure everyone has already seen the full bottle shots of these again and again...


What's With The Cattitude


Rumple's Wiggin' (is this like, Rumplestilson (sp?) is wigging out?)


Funkey Dunkey: I really like this! I'm a sucker for cremes though. Not so fond of obvious shimmers.


You Don't KNOW JACQUES: I felt like capitalizing the last two words... like someone is getting really worked up and yelling this out ^^; I over exposed this picture (obivously, but aiming my flash unit right into the bottle lol) so it's a bit light, even after adjustments.


Pearl of Wisdom: looks good with the straight on flash.


After Glow: I'm not sure if you can tell there's iridescence here...


WnW Black Creme: Why am I even posting this? lol.


until next time...

May 2010: Nail Polish Stash

Okay ya'll, all my recent nail polishes purchased online are now in my possession! I mailed Zoya ten of my nasty, old polish and received 10 brand new ones at $3.50 a piece (shipped).


I was so excited to unbox :D


Why Thank you, Vitali.


All 10 lined up in a row. Me, spazzing out.


Loooovesss














As of May 15, 2010, my polish collection…


My blues and greens

Obviously I love teals!



My reds/pinks

I didn't have many reds before (Dakota is a replacement for my Sally Hansen Red Brick), but all of these are lovely. The Essie one is really unique to me, I'm looking forward to using that. Sally Hansen Red Carpet + Zoya Ivanka are going to make for one sick Christmas mani/pedi this year!! :D



My purples/darker colours

So there's my Particuliere dupe by Rimmel. I still find it too dark and mauvish in some lights, and Playa del Platinum (in the next pic) is too grey/light and cool still. I want to find something in between...

Zoya Sloane is to replace my Sally Hansen Flirt. I think sloane is a little better, actually. I can't compare, since that's one of the old polishes I swapped. The Sinful Colors in Rich in Heart looks quite close to Sloane, but I swatched them side by side, and the Sinful Colors is quite a bit darker and browner. Yay no dupes yet!

Zoya Pinta is almost indigo or black in some lights. When I get my grubby little hands on Sally Hansen's Hidden Treasure I'm totes layering it on top of this.


My... other colours?

Zoya Richelle and SH Gilty Pleasure are quite close as well, but thankfully Zoya's is quite a bit warmer and bronzier, which is what I was going for. The Sally Hansen one is sort of antiquey looking.

There's Essie Playa del Platinum which I'm not quite sure I love yet. Here's me wearing it earlier this week... I don't think it matches my skintone very well, but I do like the colour a lot :(



Since I took these pics, however, about 5 more polishes came my way via my old friend Tish back in Canada. She sent me a few as a birthday present :D I'll save those for a future post though!

May 2010: Current Makeup Stash

To be honest, I still do my blogging over at Livejournal (since 2003!), albeit mostly friends-locked posts. However, over the last few months I've started learning how to apply makeup, and I tend to obsess over new hobbies. I figured since I'm following quite a few Beauty blogs now, I might as well throw up a few posts here on this ol' Blogger account (which I first used for my grade 7 and 8 group projects!) so I'd seem less a phantom when leaving comments on various posts.

So, here's my meager makeup stash as of May 2010. Hopefully things don't get out of control anymore!For the record, I still haven't found a foundation or concealer that I like (that is, can stand wearing on my face).

My nail polish stash is going to need its own post.

So I have everything (other than nail polish, which you can see in the background stored in pint containers from my fig binge last summer... I think I might have eaten more than 10 pints...) in this 99c container. it is further split up by yogurt containers. I know, it is so ghetto :( Hopefully I can figure out a more elegant solution after we move and I get to go to Ikeaaaa.

All my eyeshadows. There is >$40 worth of shadows in here, which is obscene when you really think about it. Oh well.

On the left hand upper and lower corners are the pans from my first eyeshadow quad: Maybelline Stylish Smokes quad in Natural Smokes. I like the matte shades (corner shadows) but the shimmery ones are poorly pigmented and glittery.

On the three surrounding the left side of the white circle pan and the purple "diamond" shadow are from my Urban Decay Summer of Love palette, which I faithfully destroyed in order to depot these. My favourite is Smog (right next to the weird clear/white thumb grip) because it's shimmery but not glittery. I also like the other shades in this quad, but they have a lot of glitter fall out. Still deciding how to play that!

The white shimmery circle pan is from the Sephora birthday gift. I think it is called Aspen Summit? It's a bit too shimmery to use as a browbone highlight (imo), but might work for inner tear duct area...

Then the final four round trios are from my Stila Bold Beauty Palette (the broken one). They look raggedy-ass, but here's the replacement I was sent:

It now acts as a backup and remains in near pristine condition (I nicked the pink one with my pinky nail... but I never use that pink anyways. It's kind of chalky).

Next up, lipsticks! Here we have Maybelline Moisture Renew in Rum Raisin (smells terrific, a little on the brown side for me now that I have other shades), Revlon Colorburt in Soft Rose (a dupe for NARS Dolce Vita $24 gloss... I really love this shade, it's soooo perfect on me), Revlon Colorburst in Peach (I like this shade, but I find it rather sheer), Revlon Colorburst in Soft Nude (cancels out my lip pigment, for the most part. i find it a little weird to wear alone, but looks good under a gloss), Revlon Super Lustrous in Blushing Nude (this was the second lippy I got, and I used it a lot more than the Maybelline one... but this too has fallen to the wayside once Soft Rose came into the picture), and my MAC Viva Glam in Cyndi (which I decapitated by accident; perhaps I'll share that story another time).

My two blushers: Milani in Luminous (famous dupe for NARS Orgasm, which as it turns out, is way too glittery for my tastes), and NARS Amour:

I love this NARS blush because it's totally matte. Plus the packaging is so much sleeker than that cheap POS the Milani comes in. So $6.49 vs $26 (got it for 15% off, though)...

This bronzer I never use. It was only $3.

It looks brown; it's matte, so there's that!

My Ole Henriksen moisturizer that I'm using at night. So far, I haven't noticed any huge improvement in my skin. It has been about a month, I think, since I started using it. I'll continue to hack it out. Also, the dupe for Make Up For Ever's HD microfinishing powder which is actually just 100% finely milled silica. I got this jar for $4 and put some in a smaller sifter jar. I bought it to use to set liquid foundation and concealer, but since I have neither of those things... yeah. Not used yet.

All my eyeliner pencils! Most of them are mini sizes though. I've got 2 Milani LiquifEYE pencils (Black and Brown) which I like. A gold Rimmel Exaggerate in Precious Gold (I really like this! I use it on my lower waterline). A basic white and black Rimmel liner (I don't use either much anymore). A Sephora mini from the free birthday gift. The rest are all Urban Decay 24/7 liners (Zero, 1999, Flipside, Bourbon, Mildew).

I've tried both the Milani and UD Zero to tightline, but after a few hours it still manages to migrate to my under eye area on the outer corner. I think it is just my eyes/lids that causes this to happen, so I might not be able to tightline period :( I still need to test them out a bit.

Mascaras, gel/liquid eyeliners, and eyeshadow primers.

I like the Lash Blast mascara, but it is pretty difficult to remove. The wand is kind of huge, which makes it hard to get the lower lashes. But, not much clumping, which is good! I also have acquired 3 mascara samples somehow. I don't like any of them that much... the wand on the Urban Decay one (plus the packaging) is quite nice, but the formula is not very black.

Of course, the cult hit Urban Decay Primer Potion in an obscene XL size that will probably go bad before I use it up. The little baby one is in Sin (a shimmery champagne colour).

Then there's the obscene Urban Decay glitter eyeliner in Distortion that I have NO IDEA what to do with.

My Maybelline Eyestudio Lasting Drama gel eyeliner (in Blackest black) that I'm quite fond of.

Stuff in tubes. I used a makeshift diffuser for this shot and had to turn my camera sideways, so it looks like fake sunlight, doesn't it?

The Monistat gel is to be used like a primer, the Korres clay mask (this was expensive. I wish I didn't buy it :( ), and the Covergirl tinted moisturizer (I don't like this. I should have returned it!)

Lipglosses/lip treatments. The left 2 (Stila lipglaze in Kitten and Estee Lauder in Blush) were free and the four CO Bigelow were from when I bought them in late 2008.