Orly Fowl Play

I'm still in denial that the long weekend is over, LOL. I hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving (or non-holiday weekend).

I had Thanksgiving dinner with a friend from college, and one of her other guests had a baby girl (14 months). While I was playing with the baby, my heart fluttered when she grabbed my nails and looked at them!!! I was wearing Lynnderella Very Pretty Vampire over Zoya Valerie that day, so baby-girl has good taste! Haha, I feel like such a dork :3

Today I'm wearing Orly Fowl Play, which my friend had sweetly RAOKd to me before I went on vacation in September. I had spent two or three weekends trying to find it before I gave up and had to start packing, LOL. I took the swatch pictures as soon as I got it, but just this weekend decided to wear it as a full mani (I consider it a full mani if I wear it out of the house, LOL).

I really like it! The formula was not troublesome to me, and it built up in 3 coats without any streakiness. IRL, it looks a bit darker and more subdued, but I love it all the same. I think it looks great when I catch a glimpse of it in the mirror ^^

Orly Fowl Play - 3 coats by itself. I really like the blue flecks; they aren't as apparent in real life, but you do see glints of blue-violet in bright lighting.







Of course, this is the anticipated OPI Merry Midnight dupe. As far as I know, it is super close to the OPI, but the base colour is a tiny bit different. There are many comparisons to OPI MM out there, but since I don't own the OPI, I can't join in the fun :) I do own Nfu Oh 51, and since it's a flakey in purple base, it seemed to make sense to throw in this comparison:

Comparison: Orly Fowl Play and Nfu Oh 51 over Zoya Pinta - I think I prefer the Orly! I was unable to build up the Nfu Oh by itself, so I quit trying ^^;

And now some off-topic blabbery you are free to skip:

We picked up our Christmas tree from Home Depot on the long weekend, but haven't had time to fully decorate yet! We chose a 7-8ft Frasier Fir. Here is "Piney" (II) with lights and a couple ornaments so far:



I loooove the holiday season. DBF and I had our first Xmas tree together last year, and it was so wonderful how it transformed our dull apartment into a home. We were sad to see Piney (I) go last year... we threw him on the curb after the New Year, and then he was prompty buried in two feet of snow. imo, NJ doesn't handle snowstorms very well, so the tree collection was put off for a couple weeks. Everyday I drove passed the pile of trees my heart sunk a little, LOL. Poor Piney!

Anyway, have you guys started celebrating the holiday season yet?

Lynnderella All Hallow's Eve

Here's a few swatches of Lynnderella All Hallow's Eve. I don't think I found a combination I adored, though. :( What do you guys think?

Lynnderella All Hallow's Eve over Illamasqua Rampage - This is two coats of Illamasqua and 2 coats of Lynnderella.







Lynnderella All Hallow's Eve over a variety of polishes: Based on a bunch of your suggestions, I tried out these combinations. I think I like it over Essie Power Clutch the best.




Happy Thanksgiving to my American peeps and happy Thursday... to everyone else ;)

Revlon Royal Cloak

I recently got this in a swap!

Revlon Royal Cloak - 2 medium coats. The flecks show up pretty well IRL, but not as clearly as these photos (since I use flash). Nice, easy to use formula, though.



Comparison: Revlon Royal Cloak and Zoya Neeka - I know some people were curious about these two, so here's the comp. I love Zoya Neeka! You can see it has gold flecks compared to the Revlon, and again, they show up better in my pics than IRL. Both are pretty.


Comparison: Revlon Royal Cloak and OPI Funky Dunkey - And to give you an idea of the base colour, Revlon is quite a bit brighter than the Zoya when you look at it next to OPI FD.


Personally, I prefer the Zoya because it's dustier, but the Revlon is also quite nice :)

Hope that helps someone!

Lynnderella Snow Angel and Blog Sale Updated

Edit: I have been getting a lot of questions on how to get this polish, so I'm editing this original post.

Lynnderellas are currently only sold at two websites:

LLarowe (It may be out of stock, though)

and

Directly from Lynn herself (But she is not accepting new orders until the new year)

I hope that helps someone!

--

Hi guys! I updated my blog sale with some new items (including some makeup from Korea). Please have a look if you're interested :) I will be shipping out the first batch of packages on Monday.

So here is one of Lynn's most famous polishes, Snow Angel. I wore it over Orly Pure Porcelain at first, but really didn't like how it looked, so tried it over the jellier Essie Marshmallow. I like how this looks, but it was still a bit bumpy on me and didn't really dry. It looks so ethereal, though, right?


Lynnderella Snow Angel over Essie Marshmallow - 1-2ish coats of Lynnderella over 3 coats of the Essie. I used SV between my Essie and Lynn layers though. Also topped with Barielle ME and another layer of SV to smooth out the glitter.

Orly Pure Porcelain and Orly Nite Owl

Hey guys, here are a couple Orlys I tried recently.

Orly Pure Porcelain - I had heard about how awesome this polish was and needed to try it for myself. The formula is quite good for a colour like this; 2 coats, not streaky, but not self leveling either. Unforunately, I think it's a little bit too stark for my skintone.


Comparison: Orly Pure Porcelain and OPI Let Them Eat Rice Cake - I think LTERC is a bit better on me, no?


Comparison: Orly Pure Porcelain and OPI Steady as She Rose - Here it is compared to SaSR... I'm not really digging that one anymore either, since it seems to dry darker than bottle shade.


Orly Nite Owl - I wanted to try this because it looked like it might be a dupe for SH Fedora, one of my favourite nudes ever. Turns out this is actually closer to Essie Mochachino, though (I don't have it yet!). Two coats.



Comparison: Orly Nite Owl and Sally Hansen Fedora - Not a dupe. I'm stuck with that SH-paddle brush, dang it!

China Glaze DV8

Guys, just a heads up, I will be updating my blog sale this Friday morning! I'll post again on Friday when it's up! :)

I got into polish pretty late, so I never really allowed myself to lust for the OMG collection. However, I was able to secure this polish in a swap with a wonderful lady :) It's just as lovely as swatch pictures, if not lovlier! I'm very happy to have this polish in my collection now! and with minimal angst!

China Glaze DV8 - 2 coats, excellent formula!

To be perfectly honest, though, I find the names in this collection to be horrible. My teenage years were rife with shorthands such as "u", "r", and "gr8". I never understood why kids used those shortcuts; it really was not that much harder to type the rest of the word out, even on an old-school cell phone. I'm glad that trend passed, but I'm a little annoyed it has been immortalized in a beautiful nail polish collection, LOL.

Essie Bonded

A few months ago, I heard about this gorgeous polish being the red-version of Starry Starry Nights, and luckily found it on Ebay for around $5 shipped. I'm not sure if it's still available at a decent price, but it's definitely worth a look :)

This polish is a bright red jelly-ish base with silver microglitter. It's so gorgeous!

Essie Bonded - 3 coats, lovely formula!

Essie Power Clutch

This is the only polish from the Fall collection that interested me. And it's awesome.

Essie Power Clutch - gorgeous formula. 2 coats.

I didn't have anything even remotely close in my stash. Any suggestions for comparisons?

Essie Raise Awareness

You may have noticed in my stash-carpet picture I don't own many baby pinks. That's because, frankly, I hate them on myself. LOL. DBF is in love with baby pink on me, for some insane reason, so he flipped when I bought this polish "for him". I also got him Essie French Affair, though I hate it on myself.

Anyway, I had read that the formula on Raise Awareness was good and it looked a little warmer in swatches, so I decided to give it a try.

Essie Raise Awareness - the formula is much better. It's almost jelly-ish, and not chalky at all. I think I used 2 coats here.

Comparison: Essie Raise Awareness and Essie French Affair - It's a tiny bit warmer than Essie French Affair. I like it better!

So what did DBF say when I showed him the two swatched side by side?

"I can't tell the difference... But you have to keep them both."

!!! MEN! Hahaha :)

I will probably purge French Affair later this year. He didn't notice when I purged OPI Panda-monium Pink or Mod About You, and he looooved those ones too :p

Essie Mint Candy Apple

I actually picked this up in my last Aveyou.com haul. I had picked it up and put it down a million times before. I guess I heard the formula was bad so kept my distance, but actually I didn't find it bad at all. Not to say it was fabulous, but it wasn't hard to deal with :p

Essie Mint Candy Apple - the name is really cute too. I think I used 3 coats.

And since I have a few mints even after purging... comparisons! Honestly, you only need one mint polish, but once you get them in your hands, it is so hard to let them go!!!

Comparison: Essie Mint Candy Apple and American Apparel Office

Comparison: Essie Mint Candy Apple and Illamasqua Milf

Comparison: Essie Mint Candy Apple and Orly Gumdrop

... they're different enough to own all four, right?

Essie Mesmerize

Here's another polish I got a while ago and forgot to post! I'm not sure I want to keep it, though. I'm not a huge fan of brights like this! I like my polishes to be a bit dusty, or complex... know what I mean?

Essie Mesmerize - surprisingly opaque, almost a 1 coater, but the formula is not thick like most 1 coaters.

Comparison: Essie Mesmerize and OPI Dating a Royal - sort of close, but Dating a Royal is hard to photograph (for me) since it's a jelly.

Essie Chinchilly

I purchased this polish a while ago, but realized I never posted the swatches! Oops! Actually, this may be the "theme" of my posts over the next couple of months... haha. Hope you guys don't mind!

I had picked up and put down this polish countless times at the store, and finally decided to just buy it. I'm so glad I did, because I flipping love this neutral polish!! If you have a similar skin tone to me, you definitely owe it to yourself to try this polish out. Mmmmk?

Essie Chinchilly - It's somewhere between a 2 and 3 coater.

Here are a couple comparisons to help you get an idea of the colour:

Comparison: Essie Chinchilly and Milani Bare to Wear

Comparison: Essie Chinchilly and Revlon Stormy

I played with my stash this weekend. Since I love seeing "nail polish collection on the carpet"-pictures, I thought I'd show you mine:

And sorted by brand...

Actually, after sorting by brand I realized I was missing two bottles of Zoya (found 'em under my coffee table) and that I had some polishes for swapping in my main drawer by accident. DBF also asked me, "What is the purpose of this activity?" to which I promptly ignored. :)

Hope you guys are doing well!

Lynnderella Very Pretty Vampire

I ordered 8 Lynnderellas during her last sale and have been trying to wait until I have worn them all to show you a huge spam-festival-post, BUT I could not wait to share this combination I tried!!

Lynnderella Very Pretty Vampire over Zoya Valerie - I think this is 2 or 3 coats of Lynnderella over 2 coats of Valerie. My eyes nearly popped when I put this on!!

Lynnderella Very Pretty Vampire over Essie Size Matters - Here's the first combo I did with this polish, in case you were wondering how it looks over a red creme:

I'm so glad I ordered this one! It was a last minute addition ^_^

I'm still having trouble finding perfect layering combinations for All Hallow's Eve; any suggestions?