Essie To Buy or Not To Buy

Hey everyone!! There's so many of you now.. Makes me a little nervous! And excited!!

Here's a quick post of a pretty polish that I'm not sure I love.

Essie To Buy or Not to Buy is relatively new, I believe, and it's a pretty boring, typical pastel lilac creme. In the bottle there's this gorgeous pink and blue shimmer that drew me in like a polish lover to a black label OPI, but it does not translate to the nail. At all. In any way. I waved my hands around like a fool in lamp light, artificial light, sunlight, black light, Coors light... okay, I'm kidding. 

See? Pretty, but so boring. Formula was alright, a little dragging even though I waited a few minutes in between coats. This is three, and the effort was not really worth it.

Can you kinda see it?  GORGEOUS. But on my nails.. nada.

Sooo Essie got stamped in the face with Kleancolor Metallic Black and a cute leopard/cheetah/whatever stamp, then a coat of SV. Better!! 

What do you think of To Buy or Not to Buy? I think the name is ironic. 

VERDICT: I should've have bought.

Stay tuned for my 100 Followers giveaway!! 

See you soon :)

-Rachael

Colorful Camo + Stamping

Hey lovely followers! How's everyone tonight? It's a little after seven pm for me. I have an eight am class tomorrow so I tried to get this mani done earlier than usual. I'm a night owl, so I always end up being up too late despite my best efforts. Oh well.

ontoooo the goooods! For today's mani I thought I'd do more sponging. I started with one coat of my only decent base coat, called Seal the Deal from Bath and Body Works. I've had it forever and a day, and just haven't gone to buy a better one yet. I'd love to hear about your favorite base coats in the comments! :) 

Then I used one coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Lacey Lilac. I love this color. It's a soft pastel purple with a fantastic one coat formula that dries very quickly. For about $2.5o a bottle, it's perfect all around! You can see it underneath the sponging here. Sorry, forgot a pic of it alone =/ Then I sponged on Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear- Blue Me Away!, Zoya - Ali (the pretty hot pink), OPI - Mermaid's Tears, which is the barely visible pale green, and Sinful Colors  - Snow Me White. I used torn off bits of cosmetic sponges. They're so squishy!

the hot mess I ended up with after sponging. I just used the back of one of my stamping plates and put a drop of each polish as I went along. 

Then I topped with a coat of SV, and when that was dry, I stamped SHANY plate m76, pictured below, with Kleancolor Metallic Black.  Then another coat of SV, and voila!

indoor light 

up close!

L-R: SH- Blue Me Away!, SH- Lacey Lilac, OPI- Mermaid's Tears, Zoya- Ali, and SC- Snow Me White

Konad Stamper in the fleshhh. Er, plastic. I love this thing. $2.99 on amazon.com.

Not really sure what that design is.. Sorta looks like someone dragged through it with a needle. Oh well, it's fun!

Hope you liked today's mani! I'd love to hear what you think. For my second time sponging, I don't think it's too bad! And my cuticles are much better than they used to be, thanks to Burts Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Cream, and SH cuticle oil, and lots of patience. 

Thanks for reading, and have a wonderful day :)

Rachael