Zoya Joy and Jo

To say that last month we were not inundated with Zoya would be an understatement.  It seems like everywhere I turned Zoya was on sale or at a reduced price which suited me fine. I know right off the bat I bought both the Pixie Dust which I have yet to share and are sitting in my computer waiting to get cropped and the Lovelys which I did post earlier this month. But even with ordering those I found some on eBay and amazon at a great price.  So, I did go wild on Zoya last month.  I hope I get a chance to show them all by the end of the month.  For some reason I have not received mail since Saturday.  So everything I have ordered might be here tomorrow and I have to say I am a little scared.  I have my polish room almost up to being photographed.  I've been working on that and inventory and getting polish  together for a blog sale.  It is a little harder than I thought, but I am not stressing and that is good.
This first polish is called Jo. It is a light blue definitely more on the red than the purple side.  When I wore it , I just kept thinking ok the possibilities with this polish.  I could dress it up with a silver tip.  Or draw flowers, laser tape with a blue gradient.  I love to recycle and this one is perfect for that if that is something you do.  The quality of the polish was perfect dried quickly and smoothly.   It did not drip down my nail causing flooding at my cuticle.  i hate when new polish does that.  I had no problems with this polish.

















 This is Joy and she is a really pretty one.  I thought of my daughter when I painted this color for the reason that, this is not really red but would look great with it .  My daughter would never wear a bright red even if she was wearing all red because even though she likes it she does not like the way it looks on her hands.  I will wear just about any color and make it work but not her.  I thought this is a good color for the younger girl who wants to wear red but Mom won't let her or anyone who doesn't wear red this is a perfect place to start.  I know growing up there was a stigma if you wore red nail polish so we tended to avoid it.  But today every thing goes and as far as the beauty arena.  I think we have seen the most changes with nails because let's just face it MAC came out with a black lipstick and it looks ugly.  Even blue lipstick. Unless it is Halloween or some costume party those colors don't look good but we can't say the same for nails.  Anything goes and we like it.  Yes, we are polish addicts and no one needs to know.  They just know our nails always look damn good.

Ciao,
Patty

What I Wore For Valentine’s Day

I realize I never showed my Valentine’s Day manicure.  You might be expecting more but this is what I really wore. 

I don’t always stamp.  Sometimes a polish is so pretty when I put it on I just can’t stamp it.   I wore this and the next day stamped black tips on it and it looked really good.  I love this color it is a perfect night time winter shade it is called Cabernet by Ciate`.  I love the smoothness and how quickly it dries.  It does remind me a lot of the Lancôme polish that I fell in love with.  I compare this also to Butter London same price almost the same formula but there are colors that Ciate has that Butter London does not.  So, this was my Valentine’s Day manicure simple and no bells and whistles.









Even though we only celebrate it Valentine’s Day.  I always say any day can be Valentine’s Day.  The more good loving days you have the better your life is going to be.  I will be posting the giveaways for the week tomorrow.  I am in the process of updating the page and enter the ones you want.  Don’t think you can’t win.  I won one this week.   Last month I think I won about the.  Yes, they take time but enter the ones that you like the prize and believe me sooner or later you will win.  I hope everyone had a great weekend and has a good week.
Ciao for now,
Patty

Products I Am Loving

 Over the holidays I ran out of my makeup.  I have been wearing MAC Studio Fix forever and a drig store brand that I use for whatever.  I got a sample of this Clinique Stay Matte Oil-free makeup and I loved it.  I tried the beauty balms but I need a little more coverage.  When I was 14  I was in a really bad car accident.  I lost my front teeth and was left with scars all over my face.  It was horrible especially because of my age.  I had two reconstructive surgeries over the next year achieve.  Remember we are talking 1979.  There is still some slight scarring if you look closely but I am always conscious of it.  That is why I need more coverage in my foundation than a balm can provide. This makeup is light as a feather goes on smoothly and provides medium to full coverage.  It does keep my skin matte where the MAC would get a little oily and I had to use blotting tissue.  Here is a tip,  bathroom liners work fantastic for blotting tissue.  I've used store bought and paper liners and I cannot tell the difference.  But this makeup stays on and doesn't make me look pastey.  I love it so far, we will have to see what happens during summer.  We have had some summer days and it held up but what would happen in 100 degrees.  I'll let you know in a couple of months.



The next thing is this mascara from Clinique.  It is called High Lengths Mascara.  I have short lashes and it does bring then out the only thing is that you need to use another mascara to volumize.



Here is a picture of the brush.

                             

The Close up


The next thing I am loving the Essence color and go nail polishes.  They have great colors.  A great formula and at 1.99 what more do you want.  I buy mine at Ulta always with a coupon.



This is a color called I Love Bad Boys.



Here is a swatch of I Like Bad Boys.   I will do a full review next week.  It is just a nice powdery blue.  These polishes are great to use as undies for your precious indies.  Plus, they are fine to wear alone as I showed you in a post Day 60 Chic Reloaded.


The next thing is that I joined Julep.  I have heard their polish is really good and I had to them.  So, far,  I am pretty happy with them.  You take this test and it tells you what your style is I am classic with a twist so on the 20th of the month I think they send you an email and show you what is going to be in your box.  If you don't like it you can change it to another box if you don't want the box you can send it to someone or just cancel till the next month.  Certain bloggers have a badge that say become a maven for a penny that is what I did and by first box cost $5.00 for shipping.  Each month you pay $19.99 for a box.

This is the starter box.  Two polishes and a cuticle oil.



 

This is the first box I got.  It had three polishes a gel top coat.  Two chocolate hearts and this really cool little eyelash curler.  These colors are really pretty.  I will also review them next week.

 

Well those are just a few things.  I have a couple other new things I am trying and liking so watch for that post to come.

 

Please take a minute to answer the poll on the left side of the column.  Thanks and have a good evening.

 

Ciao bellas,

Patty

Eggnogaholic Girly Bits

 Good Evening,
I hope everyone had a great week and are ready to enjoy a wonderful weekend.  I know I am ready.  The weather in Houston is absolutely gorgeous.  The sun is out with highs in the 70's.  it is amazing how weather can affect a person's mood.

Tonight, I have an extraordinary polish for you.  This is from Girly Bits.  It is called Eggnogaholic. Yeah, I know a couple of those. My son in particular.  He loves eggnog.  It's ok, I like but can't handle it since I am lactose intolerant.  That's another one completely forgot about.  I guess I have just lived with it for so long it doesn't phase me.  Sometimes I think people think I am making all this up just not to eat their goof or for sympathy but I am not.  The only thing I really miss is my dark chocolate and Parmesan.


So,  this polish was popular and still is but since people who really wanted finally got it of course it is more readily available.  It I a cream colored base with small gold glitters.  Just enough to sparkle in low light.  Don't let the name keep you away from this one.  It is definitely something you wear year around.  Everything I am ready is saying the color for spring will be whites and crimes.  What I did with this is used OPI's Titan Your Toga.  This is an old discontinued polish but it is a perfect creme.  You can use any creme colored polish you have.Just don't use white .  it loses some of it's color and then you have to use three coats.   I used two light coats of the Eggnogaholic.  It was not much of a jelly so it dried rather quickly.  I used a coat of my new favorite topcoat Nubar Diamond Seal and shine top coat.  If you don't have it some good alternatives is OPI's My Vampire is Buff which is from the new Euro-Central line.  Here is a tip, I can't believe OPI has raised their prices.  I got my OPI's from eBay for $7.50.  The Euro Central line, free shipping.  I also bought some from a new vendor I had never heard of but thought I'd give it a try called trendy hands.  The polish was 6.95 and shipping wasn't that high.  I did not check to see what other brands they had but if you are cruising the net check them out.





















Please take a couple of seconds to answer the poll on left column.  Have a good evening
Ciao
Patty

Trendy Hands

With the price of OPI going up to $9.00 what is a girl to do but start looking for bargains.  I bought 3 from the new line off ebay but I found another site called Trendy Hands.  I had not heard anyone talk about it and was a little leary of trying something new but they were actually a good place to buy OPI each bottle is $6.95 and the shipping is not that high.  If you want to check it out it might be an alternative to payin $9.00.  On ebay I bought four for $7.50 that is a savings of $1.50 shipping was free. 

Kimber’s Challenge A-Z Letter F

Today, I have Funky Fingers Factory Girl.  Six Weeks now.  I really thought I wasn’t going to get it this week but I found one that brand was started with an F and the name of the polish was F.  It was on the top self of the the far right side of  the polish self but there it was.  Light dusty pink the bottle and the polish but it was in great condition.  It has been about seven months since I wore it.  Then I stamped with my DRK-B with the image that had butterflies.  I really love butterflies when I was in college we were out retrieving soil and plant specimens and someone moved something and what seemed like hundreds of butterflies flew out.  It was beautiful.  I’ve been a little down these last two days but remembering about that changes.  Maybe making a list of  little memories like that would help anyone when they are down to give them a little lift.  Something to think about.
Here are my nails.

Ciao for now,

Patty

Valentine’s Day Manicure Marbling

Today, I have another Valentine’s Day manicure.  This time I did some water marbling.  I used Zoya Areej, American Apparel, T-Shirt, and China Glaze Platinum.  There is just one thing I want to say about water marbling, when I was doing this I thought if I could only make a heart then I would be a real pro.  I got a  heart on my second try but it was too big.  Now a lot of people are scared of water marbling.  You don’t need to be scared.  It is really easy.  The reason I see people mess up is because they use too many colors.  Three is best.  They really think they need a white base.  You do not need a white base use the lightest color of the marble you are using as your base.  You need to use drinking water and make sure your water is clean after each marble.  I use a urine specimen cup I got from my doctor.  It is easy to use after you finish just wipe it down with acetone and it is good to go for the next use.  I’ve used Styrofoam cups and they don’t work well for me.  I like the plastic.  Sometimes another problems people have is that the water is so cold that the polish won’t spread or you don’t wait long enough for it to spread.  I make sure I use a couple of drops on my first round to make sure it covers the whole top of the cup.  If you really want to see a pro water marble on YouTube there is a girl called Simple Pleasures and she can get a heart on her water marble.  I learned from her and then you just practice. I taught my niece when she was 11.  This is not rocket science.   If you’ve never done it just get in there and do it you’ll have fun and then come out with some pretty cool nails. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, pull out your polish and try a water marble you might surprise yourself.

Ciao bellas,

Patty

Owls and Lacquer Mooney

This is the creation of Mara from Owls and Lacquer.  It is a clear base with black and silver glitters.  I paired it with Zoya Avril which is what I call a baby pink.  I like that color combination.  It creates a bery sft yet a little sexy look.  My husband really liked it.  To me that is always the sign of sexy.  Why I really like about Mara's clear base glitters is that they dry pretty fast some take a little while and when I am working I want fast dry so I can take pictures outside.  I have the light box but I just really prefer taking pictures outside.  I just think I get better pictures that way.  So, check these polishes out.  I have three and I really like them.  You can go to her website http://www.marainpolishland.com/2012/12/introducing-white-owl-lacquers-first.html for information on how to
buy.

Mac Snob

 Today, I have Mac's Snob.  It is such a pretty pink with lavender undertones.  It is also my favorite lipstick color that is why I went ahead and indulged in this product.  As far as formula goes it is not very pigmented and it did take three coats to achieve this color.  Mac polishes are ok but I really don't see any colors that wow me.  I wish they would re- release Bad Fairy because I would stand in line for that one.  I have heard that Model's Own Pinky Brown is a dupe but I don't know.  My sister has Bad Fairy and I have Pinky Brown maybe she will lend it to me to compare.  For me because of my love for the lipstick I justified this purchase.  I never say never but if MAC does come out with something great then I will buy but right now nothing special has jumped out at me.

Ciao,
Patty