Butter London West End Wonderland and Milani Gold Glitz

Tomorrow I'm leaving for Loreto, Mexico for a vacation with Chief and his family, and I'm going to try and see if my 24 Karats Incoco strips will live up to the 10-day wear test (which is how long we'll be there). But before I took off West End Wonderland, I wanted to compare it with Milani Gold Glitz since they seem very similar. Here they are:

Butter London West End Wonderland (index and ring) and Milani Gold Glitz (middle and pinky)

The Milani is definitely more orange/coppery while WEW is more traditional warm gold. Both look wonderful on my skin which has yellow base tones. They both take two easy coats, though I applied the Milani a little unevenly because I was impatient. Also, the Milani is shown with only one coat of Seche Vite on top, but I had put two coats (which sunk in a little over time) on WEW since it was a full manicure. Both are mostly smooth with two coats of SV.

Honestly, I don't know which I like better! They are most certainly not dupes, and they both have excellent formula (and of course, both are a pain to remove). I'll probably be wearing both this holiday season, along with all my other festive reds, greens, whites, and glitters!

Butter London - West End Wonderland Swatch

I'm pretty sure I've found my new favorite gold glitter. I don't know what it is, but warm gold looks wonderful with my skin. I saw Butter London West End Wonderland on Alexandra RC the other day and knew I had to go straight to Ulta to pick it up (and usually I think twice about most polishes more than $10 each). Check out how beautiful this is!

Butter London - West End Wonderland

Wow.  Such a stunner.  I'm pretty sure this will be one of the few polishes I don't want to take off.  I love this gold.  It's mostly warm light gold micro glitter with a few pieces of copper micro glitter mixed in.

I already can't wait for the holiday season, and this is just so festive it feels perfect for my mood!

My first thought was that this looks somewhat like Milani Gold Glitz (my picture of it is a little bit too saturated), but this is lighter and less orange/copper.  They have similar formula, going on in two easy coats.  I'll try to remember to do a comparison before I take this off.

Bloop H198 Franken

I've been drooling forever over Kaz's swatch of Bloop H198 over at Pretty Random, so I decided to try and franken a dupe for it.  I think it came out fairly well!  Bloop H198 is a teal jelly filled with multi-color micro glitter.

Bloop H198 Franken (3 coats)

So what do you think? It's a tad bit more vibrant and green in person that the photo shows, but I couldn't get my camera to capture it without making my skin look super yellow. Honestly in person it looks nearly identical to Kaz's photo except that I think Bloop's base is a little less greyed. I think I added a little too much black to the mix so the Bloop looks more vibrant teal at two coats than mine. However, when they're built up to three coats, they look like very near dupes to me. Also, I can't tell whether the Bloop just contains holo glitter or whether it has actual multi-colored glitter, so I used both and love the way it looks.

If you'd like to try this franken for yourself, here is the general recipe (thought I don't know proportions because I added things little bits at a time):

Multi-colored micro glitter - I used Kleancolor Midnight Seduction
Silver holo micro glitter - I used China Glaze Fairy Dust
Dark green jelly - I used Nfu-Oh 569
Dark royal blue jelly - I used NYX Ink Heart
Black jelly - I used China Glaze Liquid Leather
Clear - I used some glitter suspension base and some plain clear, but I don't know if this is necessary

I just had to play around with the proportions until I found what looked right, but I suggest not adding too much black to the mix to begin with like I did. I may add some more of the blue and green jellies in the future to try and counteract the grey in the mix, but for now, I love it!

Hawaiian Color Matte and Blitzen

Of course, because everyone loves China Glaze Fortune Teller mattified, I had to try it with Hawaiian Color as well, and here it is! I just hate how matte topcoats make the polish cloudy instead of just matte. This is China Glaze Matte Magic, but I think I'm going to go looking for Essie Matte About You because it looks like it may be a little better.

China Glaze Matte Magic over Island Girl Hawaiian Color and China Glaze Liquid Leather

NOTE:  Seche Vite's shrinkage drives me nuts... but it's the only one I've found that REALLY dries my polish in minutes.  As in, I took two rambunctious German shepherds to puppy school RIGHT after finishing my nails once and didn't get a single ding!

Oh speaking of, here's a bonus pic of my little white shepherd boy, Blitzen.  I adopted him from the White German Shepherd Rescue here in Phoenix last November and I consider us to be each others' Christmas present last year.

 Blitzen (White German Shepherd)

Isn't he smiley?  He's ALWAYS smiling, where my little girl dog always has sad puppy dog eyes.  It may not show in the picture, but this guy has a HUGE HONKER.  It's a diabolical nose that knocks over anything and everything.  Also, he's the shedding-est dog EVER, and I wouldn't give him up for anything in the world.

Happy Halloween - Island Girl Hawaiian Color Swatch

Happy Halloween!!

I know this looks like China Glaze Fortune Teller, but it's actually Island Girl Hawaiian Color. I wanted so bad to find Fortune Teller a while ago, and when I finally got this polish while in Vegas I was so happy! I don't have both to compare them obviously, but I understand that they are close anyway. Good enough for me! The base color in this is a little brown so I layered one coat over black (China Glaze Liquid Leather, 2 coats) to get a nice black and orange for Halloween.

Island Girl Hawaiian Color over China Glaze Liquid Leather

OPI The Show Must Go On and Orly Rock It Swatches

Today I have a couple of pink/red/orange duochromes for you. I like these for fall, but they seem like they'd be fitting for summer as well. I put Orly Rock It on today and it reminded me I had pics of OPI The Show Must Go On to post as well. Both of these seem to have lots of pink/red/orange duochrome foil flecks in them but with different base colors.

The first up is OPI The Show Must Go On.

OPI - The Show Must Go On

The duochrome in this one is quite strong and beautiful. While I'm not much a pink fan, I very much enjoy this one.


Next is Orly Rock It from their current fall collection:

Orly - Rock It

The duochrome in this is much less pronounced and (unfortunately) is a lot harder to catch. I love the orange end of the spectrum in this one, but it can only be seen at certain angles. Nevertheless, it is still gorgeous. A beautiful rich dark magenta that turns crimson and a kind of burnt orange.

I know sometimes (a lot of times?) I forget to comment on application. Honestly, it's probably because I don't much care how hard it is to put on. If I love a color enough, I'll go through hell and back to have it on my nails. I'll try to include the number of coats and a little comment on application if I remember from now on though. These were both two coats and had very easy, smooth application. Removal is a slight pain just because of all the sparkly particles.

Sally Hansen Nail Prisms Amber Ruby Swatch

Here is another of the Sally Hansen Nail Prisms line:  Amber Ruby.  This is one I love so much I had to get a backup bottle of it.  It has a strong duochrome/multichrome shift between red, copper, gold, and green (and apparently it goes all the way to blue, but it can only be seen in the underwater pictures).  I swatched it recently but was unsatisfied in my capture of all of the colors, so I re-swatched it over OPI Royal Rajah Ruby and it seems to bring out the colors just a tad more (two coats Royal Rajah Ruby, one coat Amber Ruby).

Sally Hansen Nail Prisms - Amber Ruby

What can I say? It's just STUNNING. See the beautiful mossy green on the edges? Yes, it does show up like that in person. In low lighting this polish is constantly shifting between all of its colors. It also has a very nice metallic finish without showing brushstrokes. Here's a picture taken at an angle where you can see the mossy green by itself:

And now for the underwater pictures (I love taking these - it's so fascinating!)

*gasp* I can't help it - it's so wonderful.

And here is OPI Royal Rajah Ruby on it's own, which is quite nice in itself!

Lyderella Swatches!

I just received my order from Lynnderella's latest sale yesterday and I just couldn't wait to try them! She sure does make some doozies! Just look at these beauties! If you love glitter, you NEED to keep watch for her next sale (she only opens shop for a small bit of time every few weeks - this last time she was only open for some 15 minutes before she was swamped with orders!).

Lynnderella - Cauldron Drippings over Essence - Get the Fever

This is Cauldron Drippings over Essence Get the Fever. So many pieces of pretty copper/orange glitter with some random bits and pieces thrown in (whatever is in the cauldron, she says). It's just a perfect Halloween polish. I did like it over orange, but I decided I'd try it over black and it's EVEN BETTER!  I will definitely be wearing this on Halloween, no question.

Lynnderella - Cauldron Drippings over China Glaze - Liquid Leather

Lynnderella - The Glittering Crowd over China Glaze - Liquid Leather

So most glitters have a couple colors and may contain a couple different shapes. But not this one. According to Lynnderella, this polish contains over ONE HUNDRED different types of glitter, and because of this, every finger comes out different. Also, all of the Deborah Lippmann Happy Birthday dupes (I don't have the original) look dull in color compared to this one. The colors are so vibrant and varied that it's the biggest rainbow in a bottle I've ever seen. This is THE BEST rainbow glitter EVER. I'm wearing this for my mom's birthday this Sunday!

Lynnderella - Very Pretty Vampire over Essie - Bordeaux

Very Pretty Vampire is not as "blingy" as the others, but it's just as gorgeous. It's a mix of all different shades and hues of red and burgundy (and even black I believe). I layered this over Essie Bordeaux, but it appears that the base itself is tinted. I may have to try it on its own sometime.

Lynnderella - Connect the Dots over China Glaze - High Hopes

Connect the Dots is one of those truly unique but kind of simple ideas. It's just black and white glitter, but in all different shapes and sizes, including string or bar glitter. It's totally awesome, but I had trouble getting the glitter to look any kind of "even" between all the fingers. Nevertheless, it turned out amazing anyway, and I love the shimmer in the base. Also, I like how a smaller black hex ended up right in the middle of a white one on my ring finger - so cool! I SHOULD have layered it over orange for more Halloween vibe, but I didn't think of it until just now.

Lynnderella - Snow Angel

Last is Snow Angel. I may have mentioned before that I was obsessed with finding a white glitter polish. Well, this one takes the cake. It's been mentioned that it is hard to work with, and after the first perfectly even coat I thought "no way!" However, the second coat was a little rougher, and you can see it doesn't come out quite even. Maybe letting each coat dry in between or even putting Seche Vite in between each coat would help, I dunno. I wish I would have gotten a picture at one coat because it was so dainty and delicate and I liked it better. I'd also like to try it over some greys and a white like Essie Marshmallow.

I'm so incredibly excited that I was able to get an order in this last sale, and I can't wait to see what she has to offer in her next sale!

OPI Let Them Eat Rice Cake Swatch

I'm reluctant to take Icing Blackout off, so for now, here's an older swatch of OPI Let Them Eat Rice Cake.  Nice palette cleanser in between the more crazy, bright or dark colors.

OPI - Let Them Eat Rice Cake

Essie Little Brown Dress Swatch

Here is Essie Little Brown Dress. Another nice fall color, but not much to say about it. Just a nice brown creme.

Essie - Little Brown Dress