ABC Challenge 'J' - Revlon Jaded Night

Hey all!

I had a really hard time picking what to do for this challenge day. Originally, I wanted to do a really cool jelly sandwich but I figured I've already shown all my jelly polishes and I just wasn't feeling inspired when I sat down to do it. Then, I remembered I still haven't worn a very special (to me) polish starting with J but I knew I wouldn't get good pictures of it so I settled on this combo you're about to see. It's nothing too special but at the same time absolutely gorgeous.

I started with two coats of Revlon Jaded Night, this was part of a LE fall collection in 2011 (!). I remember this polish being one of the first that I semi-hunted for and as such will always be a bit special. Then I added another polish that was such a huge lemming for me, Essie Shine of the Times. Even though SOTT wasn't the lemming per se, it was Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure but OMG I remember to this day looking at the pics of those magical flakies and being so excited when a dupe surfaced.

Looking like nothing super special...

You start to see a bit of the magic...

Suddenly, BABLAM macro and it's magical and fiery and beautiful

Mmm pictures like that make me think I'm not so over flakies as I thought :D.

Thank you for reading and have a great day!

ABC Challenge 'F' - Revlon Facets of Fucshia

Hi all, happy candy day!

Today I'm finally back with day F of the ABC Challenge and I've chosen a semi-untried, Revlon's Facets of Fuchsia! This polished caused a big hooha when it came out due to it being fantastic and glittery in a time when indies were practically non-existent. Thankfully, Revlon heard our cries and it is now a permanent core shade and was renamed 'Scandalous (but since my bottle is Facets of Fuchsia it totally counts for the challenge). 

I'm showing one coat over black undies.

This was a semi untried because I wore it once last Halloween, to a dark nightclub where it got zero love and it hadn't been posted on here yet. Application was super easy and I love the simpleness of the glitters! It harkens back to a time before the 18,000 indie brands and glitter bombs.

Now, if you're at all interested in the crapmess my adviser got me into and why I've been gone for a week, click the Read More button below. Otherwise have a great day doing whatever you're going to do, whether it be celebrating valentine's day with a loved one, friends or not celebrating it at all!

31 Day Challenge Day 31 - Recreate!

Hey all!

I may be late but its well before midnight so I'm still on time! I have to be honest, I'm a little tired of the challenge, as you can see by how late I've been posting lately. However, while I may be a little burnt out, I have enjoyed SO much posting with all these awesome girls. I am definitely down for another challenge or group posts every now and then so if any of you feel the same way, leave a comment either here or on Kimber's blog! Just please, not a LONG challenge :D

I had a hard time deciding on which mani to recreate today since there were so many awesome posts from all the girls. In the end though, I chose something that wouldn't be too time consuming since I knew I was going to be busy today. I know it's kind of cheating but I have every intention on recreating a couple of really awesome manis I've seen from all the girls later.

Today I recreated Kate's yellow nails from Day 3 of the challenge! I didn't have the extra awesome neon polish she used so I substituted with China Glaze Sun-Kissed over Revlon Graceful. Kate runs The Painted Pony blog and she has some really amazing nail art, you definitely need to check out her blog if you haven't seen it yet.

I had a couple of smudgey tape disasters but, overall, it's not a bad look! I've had these craft scissors for a while now but couldn't get them to work. The strips were too thick or it would mangle the design. A good tip if you want to try this is to get blue painter's tape instead of clear scotch tape and actually stick the tape onto the blade and cut down. I don't know if that made any sense...

Anyway, if you have any questions let me know in the comments! Now go see the other ladies and their recreations to conclude this epic challenge!

-Kimber at Kimber's Lacquer Korner
-Kat at Hooked On Polish
-Diana at Nails By Diana
-Aly at Wonderland Beauty
-Meredith at Perfectly Polished
-Nicole at The Color Republic
-Kate at The Painted Pony Nails
-Cee at Absolutely Cee
-Sam at Polished Art
-Nail Narcotics
-Nicole at Nicole Gets Nailed
-Shelby at Shelby's Swatches
-Stephanie Louise at All Things Beautiful
-Mixed Mama
-Joanna @ Sweet Polish of Mine
-Patty Greenberg
-Liz and Lisa @ Lozlosa 
-Mari at Nailista
-Miss L at Beauty by Miss L 
-Gini at Sassy Paints
-Chameleon Stampede 
-Pam at Nail-E-Glance
-Me, Myself, and Polish 
- Robin Sparkles

Comparison Mini-Spam!

Hello there!

Today I have some simple comparisons for you. This is mostly newer polishes I've acquired that bear a big resemblance to others in my stash. Maybe this could help you save some moolah. Yeah, I just said moolah.

First up, some comparisons to the new Essie Winter Collection. On my pointer I have Where's My Chauffeur, middle Turquoise and Caicos. Ring finger is Butler, Please and pinky is Nails Inc. Baker St.

Where's My Chauffeur definitely stands alone in my stash since it's bluer than its other mintier turquoise counterparts. Although, if you have China Glaze Aquadelic you might not need this one. Butler, Please is very close to Baker St. but, maybe this was just my experience, BP had a hoorrible formula! Streaky, pulling up polish and it dries to this weird lumpy semi matte finish. Baker St. is still just a touch brighter and the formula is absolutely wonderful so, while I don't regret having Butler, Please, Baker St. is the clear winner for me.

Next up, a reader request! It's some blue jellies. You know I love me some blue jellies. Pointer finger is Sation It's All Navy Baby, middle is China Glaze Ride the Waves, ring is Nina Ultra Pro Cobalt and pinky is Revlon Royal.

As you can see, no real dupes here. Sation is definitely the darkest and every polish was 2 coats except Ride the Waves, which needed 3. I'm wearing the Nina polish as I type and it's absolutely beautiful, a welcome addition to this blue jelly hoarder's stash.

And finally, some Illamasqua comps! Pointer finger is Revlon Jaded Night from a LE collection a while back, middle is Illamasqua Kink, ring finger is Sation Little Miss Emo and pinky is Illamasqua Prosperity, from the newer Rubber Brights.

Kink and Jaded Night are extremely close, I could barely tell these apart IRL. In macro mode, the rubber finish sets them apart and it looks a little lighter. Little Miss Emo is not quite as blue as it photographs, so its really just a touch darker than Prosperity. These would make for a very subtle gradient.

All in all, I'm happy with the polishes I have. The little differences are enough justification to keep them all. I may have a problem.

Hope this helps and please be smart tomorrow when voting. I know people here get involved in the fanaticism and euphoria and vote 'for the color' (the political parties here are very associated and identified by their colors), not the leader so I can sincerely hope it's not the same in the US.

Have a good day!

Navigate her....whimsically? Whimsical Navigation of Her? She? Nevermind.

Crap. It's Monday.

Alrighty, now that we got that out of the way, I can tell you the story of a sad little girl who neglected her nails for about 4 or 5 days while on vacation and saw a very stressful movie (Dark Knight Rises is awesome) and bit on her nails during the movie. This sad little girl is me. Unfortunately, my nails have been suffering from the peelys lately and I had to trim them down to start anew. I'm also starting the Nailtiques Formula 2 treatment so I'm currently sporting naked nails *sob sob sob*.

Here's the last mani I did before I decided I should just baby them some more and actually do a treatment like it says: sans polish. I layered two coats of Revlon Whimsical over Essie Navigate Her.

I've usually seen Whimsical layered over a light blue so I wanted to try a different underwear color. I liked this in person much more than I do in the pictures, but that's mostly due to the shorter nails. At least I still have free edge, I guess.

I still have some pics to be posted and, if I should run out or decide not to post them I'll probably do some simple manis, take pics and remove them for the 2 weeks I have to use the treatment so as to not interrupt your regularly scheduled programming. And to satisfy my need of polishing my nails. It's only been two days of nakedness and I'm already tweaking.

May you have that kind of day that makes you forget it's a Monday! (Good, just in case).

A Girly Sorbet Cloud

Hey guys! This is the first of a couple scheduled posts I have for you since I'm going to be on vacation until the 23rd. At the moment I don't know if I'll be taking my laptop with me so, to be on the safe side, let's say I'll respond to any comments when I get back.

Now, this is sorta kinda a Monday fail for me. It's not that the design came out terrible per se, but I think it looks a little cluttered and not as crisp as I would like. Let's just say it's half-a-fail.

I did some clouds a la Nailside! I've had this on my to-do forever and even did some on some false nails but it never made it's way to my own nails. For some reason, I decided to dot on the rest of the nails with the same cloud colors which were Sally Hansen Smooth and Perfect in Sorbet, Revlon Gold Coin and Essie Marshmallow.

I have to say, Sorbet is kind of awesome! The only other peach I have is Essie's A Crewed Interest and it looks so pink next to this one. I have no idea if this goes with my skin tone or not but I loves it. I also chose Marshmallow so you could peek a little at the gold underneath and give it a softer look overall.

Btw, those aren't the same 2 pictures up there. I only now realized how similar they look....my bad. What do you guys think? I'm sort of regretting the dots. I also had to redo my middle nail because, the first time, it looked like a seriously bloated french tip or a messed up gradient. It wasn't good, is what I mean.

Have a good Monday while I'm vacationing it up ;) (Technically I leave 8am of tomorrow though so I'll still suffer the Monday blues with you).

It's Sandwichin' Time!

Hey all, me again! Told ya there was gonna be something exciting soon ;)

Today I'm participating in a really fun group post thing coordinated by lovely Hannah at Polly Polish. Aside from being a total sweetheart and planning this whole thing, she also says things like 'knob' 'I'm chuffed' and the likes so how can you not, at the very least, enjoy reading her stuff?! It's always fun for me to chat with her on twitter.

Onto nails! We're all doing jelly sandwiches! I really wanted to come up with something cool for this challenge but I had the hardest time picking combinations for the sandwiches. Finally after much planning, I stumbled onto something I liked.

I started with one coat of Revlon Royal, added a coat of Milani Gems and picked some big hexes from a random Forever 21 glitter polish. Then, instead of another coat of Royal, I added Milani Rad Purple which is supposed to be a purple neon, but is actually a berry colored jelly and finished with Seche Vite to actually get it to dry.

And because, you know, matte glitter.

Mmm...I much prefer how this looked glossy, it looked juicier. I was aiming to get a blurple sandwich with this layering but the polishes didn't really blend how I thought. It just looked blue at the edges and purple where the glitter was but I am happy with the final outcome! It also looked purplier when matte.

Alright, that's it from me, I'm all talked out for today. Remember to see what the other ladies did for their polish day below!

Hannah (Polly Polish)

Jen (The Nail Polish Project)

Susy (Susy In Color)

Jenny (Beauty by Jenny)

Mara (Mara in Polishland)

Nail Tart

Salla (OMG Polish Em)

Jasmine

Deborah (Love Varnish)

Kat (Hooked on Polish)

Melissa (The Crimson Petal)

Cassie (Sparkles Make Me Happy)

Pris (Pris Nails)

Julie (Time On My Nails)

Keisha (Refined & Polished)

Alexis (xoxo Alexis)

Cuti-CLUE-les

Mihaela

Stephanie (Sincerely Stephanie)

Heidi (Pretty Painted Nails)

Sabine (My Polish Stash)

A Lacquered Affair 
Nail of This Week
  Wendy’s Delights
  Charlotte’s Nails
Unhas a Trois
  Polished Off 
  Colores de Carol
  Nailutopia
  Manicurity
Ishah x Beauty
Fab Fingertips
  Pish Posh & Polish

It's a Blue Jelly Smackdown! (Comparisons)

Hey everyone! I survived the night of San Juan so I'm back with another posty post for you!

Today I have the blue jelly battle royale. I'm comparing the whopping 3 blue jellies that I own in an effort to remind myself they are indeed different and I do need them. Ok, technically I'm comparing only two that might have sort of been dupes and two that were similar for different reasons, but let me flow with it, I was excited to sound like a wrestling announcer.

I'll be comparing Nubar Blueberry (BB) vs. China Glaze Ride the Waves (RtW) vs. Revlon Royal (r) vs. Nails Inc. Baker St. (B St.). I know Royal isn't even close color-wise, but it did earn it's place here for (possibly) being my all-time favorite polish. Baker St is also different since it's a creme and not a jelly, but the vibrancy of the color also merited inclusion into this comparison.

Onto the show:

As you can see, Royal is definitely darker but I also wanted to compare formulas so that's why it's there. Baker St. is fully opaque in two coats and I feel it has a hint of more purple to it? Like it's SO BLUE it's right next to the purplier shades. The two worth noting are Nubar Blueberry and China Glaze Ride the Waves. Although they're definitely not dupes, one might be enough if you can't find the other (and aren't a blue jelly collecting fiend). Blueberry is a tad more opaque than Ride the Waves and RtW is also a straight up jelly, while Blueberry is tad more "creme-y". Not quite enough to be called a true hybrid but a difference that makes Nubar's formula superior to China Glaze's

In this close up you can see the slight differences better, especially in the VNL. I used three coats of Blueberry and Ride the Waves while I only needed two for Royal and Baker St. Overall, do I have a favorite? Hellz to the nah. Royal is a little higher up on the list maybe but I couldn't in good conscience say I prefer one above the other. I guess the difference comes down to availability, pricing and personal preference of course.

I hope you all had a great weekend and enjoyed this post! I'll see you tomorrow for a nice pool party!

A Royal Sandwich

Hear ye, hear ye! All in attendance shall take a bow at this mighty polish.

Just kidding, I'm sure you're sitting anyway. The weirdest thing happened the other day: I sat down to do my nails and I didn't want to do anything. I was just so scattered with different ideas bouncing around but in no mood to experiment so I went for a safe choice that wouldn't disappoint me: Revlon Royal. I know I've featured this polish on here before but a) those pics were horrible and b) my nails were so short! This time around though, I knew I wanted to try sandwiching it.

Revlon Royal, in case you're not familiar, is a deep blue jelly and absolutely breathtaking if you're a blue lover (which I totally am). Beware if you're going to buy a new bottle though, apparently there was a bad batch where the pigments would settle on the bottom and not mix so they would mess up the polish.

I used one coat of Royal, one coat of Revlon Stunning then Royal again. Please excuse the awkward hands, they don't know how to pose outside their normal setting. I snapped these outside in the sunshine to better show squishyness.

And since I was outside, you get a palm tree.

 And an artsy shot on a bush

 And before the final coat of Royal

I used a thicker coat of an already-thick Seche Vite to see if that would protect my nails since I was gonna supervise my boyfriend washing cars. Spoiler alert: I didn't really do much so my nails stayed intact! Yaay.

Have a good day!

PS: This would have been up sooner but Blogger was being a pain in my butt last night so I couldn't schedule it.

Revlon Mint Gelato - Review and Swatches

Good morning!

Today I have a quick post reviewing Revlon's Mint Gelato, which is part of their new Limited Edition Scented Treats collection that's out now at drugstores. When I first spotted this pretty at Walgreens, le boyfriend convinced me I didn't need it (for shame!), so I left it behind. Finally, yesterday I went to buy something else (on my own) and realized why I was so drawn to it...it's a jelly!! I'm totally on a jelly trip right now. So much so that I'm going to buy more glitters so I can do sandwiches. Mmm jelly sandwiches.

Mint Gelato is, to my eyes, a greener turquoise, similar to For Audrey and the likes but dustier and less blue. I don't know, I'm really no good at describing polish colors, just look at the pictures!

Ignore the little scratch, my fault :(

Formula was pretty good! You're seeing three coats without top coat so it was very shiny and pretty much opaque unless you hold your fingers to the sun, but really, who does that? Then I did some stamping with the zebra pattern from my Bundle Monster plates. I kind of can't believe it's my first time using this image when it's one of the more popular ones. I stamped with Sally Hansen Whirlwind White and I also added a coat of Essie As Gold as It Gets as an accent on my ring finger.

Another note about the formula, it dried quicker than I expected. Usually jellies with 3 coats take forever but I had good results with this. I was still uber careful for a while just in case it wasn't thoroughly dry but I had not dents or the like. The only thing I don't love about the polish is that it's scented. The scent itself is not displeasing (big word huh? :P), but it is distracting while polishing. I also used the phone a lot today so I was sick of the smell after a while, but it does fade away so just make sure to do the scratch and sniff at the store in case you hate it.

So that's pretty much it... Happy hump day! ;)

Revlon Graceful + Leopard for Mom!

Happy Mother's Day!


My mom is almost everything in my life. She's one of those supermoms who does anything and everything for her kids, including pulling double duty as mom & dad. She's incredibly strong and determined and pushy, in a incredibly good way. She's also funny.

So in honor of my mom I finally used the leopard print on my BM plates because she absolutely loves anything animal print. Now, don't get me wrong, I love my mom, which is why it's kind of sad how this mani turned out. On to a visual representation of words:

I started with two coats of Revlon Graceful. A taupe-y creamy neutral color. I really like this actually. It's not quite mannequin hands for me but clean. Then I stamped with BM-221 in Essie Little Brown Dress and dotted with....something gold. And that's when everything went wrong.

I'm so sorry. I had to redo my pinky and ring finger, and on the second try my pinky came out all weird then I forgot to clean the stamper before I did my ring finger so that's what happened with that. I really need to do shorter sentences. Maybe I shouldn't have had coffee...three weeks ago... Just kidding (Points if you know where that's from).


Hope you enjoyed this disaster if only to learn from my mistakes :)

Revlon Coastal Surf Gradient (Or how I'm unoriginal)

Happy friday everyone! I'm so excited for this weekend, does anyone have any plans? Today we're making sushi at my house and tomorrow is the Cotto vs. Mayweather fight which I'm so pumped about! Of course, I want my guy (Cotto) to win, but above all I want a good fight. I don't want them to pussy out halfway through.

Back to the nails, today I have a quick review of Revlon ColorStay Coastal Surf and a gradient I did on top. I've really been enjoying all the gradient mania lately and so many new tutorials have popped up that I decided to give one a try. For this I started with one coat of Coastal Surf and sponged a Bettina on top (I can't remember 100% if it was Premium Wash or Over-Dyed, I know it was from the Jeans collection so one of the two).

To be worn as a mani, Coastal Surf could have benefited from the second coat to even everything out but it has a really good formula. It's thick so it goes where you want it to, I barely had to do any clean up on this. I had been eyeing this pretty for a while but convinced myself I didn't need another blue but after I saw some swatches on other blogs I was done, I needed it!

For the gradient I just brushed both polishes onto the sponge and, you know, sponged. It's still not as smooth as I would like it but in real life (not macro mode) the effect is very subtle and pretty.

I definitely need to experiment with different color combinations and stamping on top. Now that I think about it, my nails will get beat up in the sushi process so I'll probably stamp something :D.

Now for some exciting news, if you noticed something different in my water mark it might be because I bought the domain for my blog! I'm now officially on hookedonpolish.com! I hadn't considered buying it because it's not like this blog is huge, but I thought about it and didn't want anyone else taking it from me either, so here we are.

I hope you guys have enjoyed this look. I'm also debating on whether or not I want to commit to posting every day of the week or keep my 'every other day' schedule so we'll see what happens.

Happy weekend!

Sinful Colors Cinderella vs. Revlon Blue Lagoon

Today I have a comparison for you guys. It's my first one so be gentle! Lately all the drugstore buzz has been about Sinful Colors Cinderella. It's a beautiful light blue with a strong pink shimmer but when I first saw the swatches it reminded me of Revlon's Blue Lagoon (minus the pink) so I decided to pass on it. Then came along the Walgreen's sale and I saw Cinderella there for just 99 cents and I couldn't resist!

Similar, no? See more pics and the verdict after the jump!

L'Oreal Now You Sea Me (Pic Heavy)

I've never been one to get mad or disappointed when one of the blogs I was following didn't post every day,  but I did think "Well, blogging doesn't seem so hard". Ooh boy was I wrong! So I want to apologize to those bloggers, I get it now. I had planned to have this post up much sooner and another that I still have to edit but this weekend I learned just how hard an overnight shift and having a cold can kick your ass.

Now this post is gonna be pretty massive. I took a buttload of pictures trying to get the color as accurate as possible and I'm pretty sure I still didn't get it, but I tried. Let's see some nails!

Revlon Royal

Just a quick post today, haven't had the heart to actually remove this polish so I've been wearing it for 5 days. Please excuse the imperfections you may see, I took this when I was about to remove it because my right hand was already chipping :(

Mmm...my favorite in my whole stash. Two easy coats stamped with BM-224 and Sally Hansen Silver Sweep. This mani started as a way to please le boyfriend who complains I always ask him for ideas and then never do them. But then it was a fail so I just did what I wanted. Maybe next time.

Blurry macro so you can see the detail.

I've always loved blue but lately all I want to wear is blue. I promise you'll see some variety soon. Sidenote, you're going to see the watermark change a bit while I decide the best way to mark the pics.

Happy polishing!