Maybelline Color Show Acid Wash Effect in Ripped-Tide

I apologise for the long title! The name of this little gorgeous polish is just this long..

I also usually strive to upload my post in chronological order, and never compromising on quality with ‘just getting a post out’, but I just wanted to show this little beauty to you 🙂

I bought this bottle at bol.com for €3.99, because I had some coupons to spend (also bought nail strengthener, nail polish remover, a top coat, a brightening concealer, and a mattifying compact powder; might do some reviews on those things!) and its name is Ripped-Tide (247). It’s a cute bright blue jelly-like polish, with white ‘glitters’ in all sizes! I can distinguish 5 or 6 different sizes, with the largest glitters being about 2 millimeters in size!

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The blue formula is very sheer though; I needed three coats to get some kind of opacity (and it wasn’t even fully opaque), but that was fine actually. It dried quick, and isn’t as bumpy as I’d expected it to be. Even the larger glitters lie relatively flat, and are easily evened out with a top coat. The sheer formula of the polish makes for a great layered-glitters-effect, I’m really loving it! I do suggest wearing it over a white or blue though, so the colours pop some more 🙂

I can’t really comment on the wear time, I can’t even wear it for a full day but my nails are really terrible. I used a coat of the new strengthener, and the new top coat, but still I had massive chips and could peel off large chunks of the polish. But even with a base coat, some of the glitters stuck stubbornly to my nails!

To conclude, I’m quite happy with my purchase! It has a very unique look to it, and if this bright blue isn’t really your thing, they’ve got some other shades too, including a white glitter topper!

NOTD: Holidays!

Just a little NOTD I made on the 17th of July. I wrote this in advance because I’m going on holiday for a while, so I won’t be posting/commenting/reading anything!

This’ll probably have worn off when this comes online, and some of you might’ve seen it on twitter/instagram already, but I still wanted to share it with you 🙂

The polishes I used are (from dark to light) Rimmel Out of the Blue, Fizz (some cheap polish from the Action) and NYC’s Blue Sky. The decoration is from the gift box I won at MissPinkyNails 🙂 It’s from Essence but I don’t know the exact name.

So, are you going on a holiday, or have you been away already? Please share!

Catrice Haul pt. 2: The Swatches

As promised before, here’s the second part of my recent blog sale haul!

Warning, lots of photos 😀

There’s the whole family again 🙂

All swatches below are two coats (I believe), and all polishes contain this little metal ball that helps shake the polish well! Always gives me that luxurious feel 🙂

First: the greys/whites

I kind of messed up the order of the polishes, but from left to right these are:

Sing: Hey, Dirty Lilah!; the name suggest there’s a hint of lilac in this polish (I think), but it’s more of a light grey to almost white to me. Has a really soft white glitter in it, and is very easy to apply due to its thin consistency.
London’s Weather Forecast: Best name ever. Dark grey polish, as grey as rainy clouds 😉 Also contains a really fine multicolour glitter. Same formula as before, I love it!
ASHley: Seems to be the only non-shimmery polish in this set. Looks similar to the previous polish, but is a bit lighter.
Limited edition White and Seek: a sheer pearly white. I’ve worn this over Hey, Dirty Lilah! for a good coverage (since I don’t own a good white, haha). This polish has the wide brush I really like 🙂

Essence Snow Jam Life is a Freeride: This one fit in with the other colours in this range well so I added it too 😉 It’s a bright blue with a fine multicolour shimmer. Also has the large brush!
No Snow Petrol: Quite similar to the Essence one, but has a slightly greener tone with almost a duochrome blue shimmer. One of my favourites! Again, large brush ^^
Sold Out For Ever: A pastel-ish green- I think this is the most unique colour in the set! Has bright green/blue microglitters which make it even more gorgeous
ACid/DC: The absolute brightest colour in this set, it’s amazing ❤ A punky lime-green colour (almost yellow) with green-ish microglitter.

And to finish it off: the darkest colours of this set:

Limited Edition Be Indiglow!: At first I thought it was nearly black, but in the right light a gorgeous deep, shimmery blue is seen! Very special, and matches well with the other LE (the pearly white; I got a post coming up with a mani with these two!). This polish also sports the wide brush.
Squeeze Me: A muted dark green/blue with golden/olive microglitter. Very hard to describe but gorgeous! With large brush.
Genius In The Bottle: I can barely describe this. A copper/blue/green multichrome, which looks mostly brown on my nails but like an oil spill in the bottle. Haven’t tested it in daylight yet, but I’ll try this soon! Has a slightly larger brush than others, but not super wide.
Petrolpolitan: another of my faves. I guess this would be ‘petrol’-coloured, a blue/green with slightly larger (but still tiny) glitters in blue and green. I also used this in my matte top coat DIY! Also with large brush.

So, that’s it for now! I did take pictures of the swatches in my little book, but haven’t processed the photo’s yet.. I’ll add them as soon as I finish them!

DIY: Matte top coat

I’ve been expanding my nail polish collection for a while now (I just bought a massive amount of Catrice polishes from mylittlepaperplane), but one thing that was seriously lacking, is a good matte top coat, or any matte polishes at all. I’ve been drooling over pictures of matte (mostly denim) polishes, and they just make a look so much classier!

Now, being the budget lover (and DIY lover) I am, I found this video on YouTube how to make your own matte top coat! I tried it, and it worked quite well! So, of course, I’ll share this with you too 🙂

What you need:

Clear nail polish
Corn starch
(paper) funnel
Spoon

And that’s really all! I didn’t even use a funnel because.. Well I forgot it xD I made a bit of a mess but nothing really bad.

How it works:

Make sure your bottle is not completely full, otherwise there’s no room for the corn starch. I had a little bit of polish left in a bottle I spilled (over my pants..) and used it to test this DIY 🙂
Place the funnel over the polish bottle and put a bit of the corn starch in. There’s no exact amount of corn starch you need to add, just add, shake and test until you got something you like! I added quite a lot to a small amount of polish, so don’t be scared to put in a lot.
Again, that’s it. Easy, isn’t it? Just remember to shake well. If your polish gets too thick, you can add some thinner or nail polish remover.

And this is my result! On the left is with the DIY top coat, on the left is the plain polish (no top coat). I used Catrice’s Petrolpolitan (no. 35) from the aforementioned haul 😀

So, what do you think about this DIY and/or matte polishes itself? I just *love* them 🙂

Catrice Haul pt. 1

Since I thought my nail polish stash was seriously lacking in size and variety, and my budget is still very limited, I decided to find some nice blog sales to expand my collection! After a while I found a blog by Dana, called mylittlepaperplane, and she had (still has!) a huge blog sale with tons of Catrice polishes! If you’re in the Netherlands, check it out! For just an euro each, I couldn’t really hold back and got 10 of them. Dana threw in 4 other polishes (which I all love) and some samples 🙂 She even included a cute handwritten note! With shipping, I spent €16,75, and I gave some beautiful polishes a second home 😉

Packed in bubble wrap (whoooop!) and with some extras 🙂

All unwrapped ❤ (sorry for the blurry pic..)

All Catrices lined up..

So, here’s the list of polishes I got:

34 Squeeze Me
35 Petrolpolitan
240 Sold Out For Ever
280 London’s Weather Forecast (hilarious. It’s a grey polish :P)
610 ASHley
630 Sing: Hey, Dirty-Lilah
810 ACid/DC
840 Genius In The Bottle
880 No Snow Petrol
C01 White and Seek
C04 Be Indiglow!

And from other brands:

Essence Snow Jam: Life is a Freeride (03)
Maybelline Color glitter top coat (855)
Kleancolor Grand Finale (169)

I’ll add swatches (on nails as well as in my little book!) and a bit of a review in part two! Stay tuned 😉

This is what happens when I go shopping lately..

This is what happens when I went to the drug store today.. I just start swatching every pretty polish I see! Most are Essence, Catrice and Etos.. I ended up not buying any of these because they were either too pink instead of red, similar to a polish I already have, or too sheer. I might go back to buying the glitter/feathery polish on my ring finger. It also had large diamond-shaped glitters, but mine fell off. Definitely needs a top coat! I also kind of liked the yellow/green on my middle finger, but it’s quite sheer on its own.

What do you think? Should I buy any of these polishes, or got any recommendations in general?

BPS Haul

Since I discovered BornPrettyStore (it’s like a DealeXtreme for beauty-stuff, haha!) I’ve ordered several things. Some of them were featured in my last blog post, and I recently bought some other items:

Cuticle cutter and file ($0.99)
Nail polish (sold out 😦 ) ($2.85)
2 sets of ‘surprise’ gift bags ($0.99 each)

It’s just a small order, I just really wanted the nail polish and bought the other things since they were really inexpensive! I paid for most of it using their points, every point is worth 1ct and you can get them by ordering stuff, writing reviews and uploading photos/videos. I can really recommend this if you’re low on cash and want to buy some great budget items!

Cuticle cutter and file
There’s not a lot to say about this; it’s a file and cuticle cutter in one. The cutter is really sharp, and is great for removing dead skin and hangnails (which I get really often..). Luckily, it’s protected by a cap so you don’t cut yourself on accident. The file is quite fine and allows for a smooth finish on your nails. The pointy end is useful for getting the dirt out from under your nails.

Nail polish
I’m really glad I bought this polish before it sold out! It’s a beautiful metallic shade of light blue, which looks silver or blue depending on the light you’re in! It’s opaque in two to three coats (depending on the thickness) and the formula is very smooth and glides on easily. It’s absolutely packed with glitters and doesn’t need a top coat. I needed to shake the bottle vigorously, because the formula wasn’t really consistent, but that’s a really minor thing. It does have a strange, but not entirely unpleasant smell to it. There is a darker blue version of the same/a similar polish (same brand and bottle), which you can find here. I’m planning on buying it because it looks lovely and I want to check if they’re similar.

The light blue polish in different lights

Surprise gift bags
I bought two of these by accident, but since they’re so cheap and much fun to open (I love surprises), I was actually glad I got two!

The first pack contained a pair of false lashes, a small red lipstick, and a little mascara brush. I don’t have lash glue or a reason to wear the falsies yet, but they feel great and look awesome already. I’ve got a wedding coming up so I guess that’s a nice moment to try them on. The red lipstick is really tiny, but extremely bright and pigmented. I tested it on my hand and when I wiped it off, my hand was still red-ish. The mascara brush.. well it’s a brush 😛

Set 1

The second set contains a black, loose eyeshadow (it can be bought in a set of 12 colours, which is on my wishlist!), a soft sponge and a pony mirror. I’m not used to working with powder eyeshadows (I only have pressed ones) but it’s very pigmented and I’m going to have to try it out soon! The sponge is very fluffy, but I haven’t found an use for it yet. The mirror is.. well.. let’s just say I’m not a big fan of ponies. Anyone want a cute little mirror..?