I'm Baaaack ;)

I know it didn't seem like I was on vacation the past couple of weeks with my scheduled posts...but I'm back from my New England States trip with Dale

I have a lot of vacation pictures to share with you, haul posts and some reviews also. 

But I thought I would start off with a post showing you a few outfits I wore during the past two weeks. 

This is what I wore to meet Dale at the Pearson Airport two weeks ago. 

Headband: Elle (I did a review on the headband in this post)

Necklace: Charlotte Russe (one of my favourite necklaces - I love lots of chains, links & rhinestones)

Rings: Forever21 (the one on my middle finger), Betsey Johnson (index finger)

Dress: Forever21

Bag: Michael Kors

High Heels: Guess "Chief" heels

Nails: Broadway Fashion Diva Go Glam nails

Here's a closeup of my nails. I love these! Unfortunately, these are one of the few Broadway branded nails that Dale & I got at Duane Reade in New York City....which we're not able to find elsewhere. 

A mirror finish zebra printed manicure :) What more could a girl want for a manicure?! 

Like all other Broadway branded nails, these are great quality and I highly recommend them. 

Here are a few outfits I wore to the baseball games that Dale took me to at Fenway Park in Boston. 

Headband: Claire's

Shirt: Forever21

Skirt: Garage (it's actually scooters. I love the denim skirts and scooters at Garage)

Handbag: Michael Kors

Heels: Red Patent Peep Toe Slingbacks from Charlotte Russe

Bracelets: leopard print bangles on left arm from Forever21

Watch: Michael Kors

Baseball Cap & Jersey: Boston Red Sox MLB gear

Bracelet: Charlotte Russe

Jeans: Almost Famous

Heels: Red Peep Toe Side Zipper Booties from Charlotte Russe

This was a professional picture taken along Yawkey Way outside of Fenway Park in Boston (it's a proof picture, hence the watermark)

Baseball Cap: Boston Red Sox MLB gear (I'm loving this baseball cap)

Necklace: Arden B (I LOVE this necklace!)

Tank top: Pink for Victoria's Secret (they have a line of MLB baseball gear)

I'll be posting some pictures from my vacation shortly.


Let me know how you've been doing! :)

Nail Polish Reviews: Charlotte Russe, Sinful Colours & Claire's

There are two nail polish brands that I've recently tried and I love them both!

First up is Charlotte Russe's Nail Polishes

Dale picked these up for me during our New York City trip ;)
The bright colours drew us in and I'm happy to say that I absolutely love the quality of these two nail polishes.

There are no names for their nail polishes.

And even though Charlotte Russe's online website ships purchases to Canada, their website does not have any of their nail polishes listed. So you have to visit a Charlotte Russe store location to buy their nail polishes
And if your geography is gawd awful like mine is, their store locator is a freaking map that you have to click on to locate stores. Couldn't they just have a drop down menu of listed US States/Cities like any other online shopping website?! 

This is my manicure with two coats of the Charlotte Russe's hot pink nail polish.
I love how the finish is matte and how opaque the colour is. The formula is great and it dries quickly (even faster than those nail polishes I have which claim to be "fast drying")


So I jazzed my manicure up a little bit using some glitter - oooo I cannot resist glitter! ;)

This is Sinful Colors Nail Polish in Frenzy #922.
Dale & I picked up this nail polish at Target during our travels across the border - I don't believe that Sinful Colour nail polishes are sold in Canada, or are they? I haven't seen them around :S

As much as I love this glitter nail polish, I can't really tell the quality of Sinful Colors nail polishes based on this one. That's because I find the formula of any branded glitter nail polish to be almost the same - glitter polishes dry really fast and after three coats of glitter it becomes a pain to remove unless you use the foil method - what?! I just googled "foil method" and the algrebraic acronym came up for it. Haha! I remember that from high school. 





My Mom loved this manicure on me :)
It's with two coats of the Charlotte Russe hot pink nail polish, three coats of Sinful Colors nail polish in "Frenzy" #922 topped off with Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri (which is an amazing top coat!!! Thanks for letting me know Carol)


As much as I love a bright or glittery manicure, I also love baby pink nail polishes. The problem is that all of the baby pink nail polishes I have require a good 3-4 coats and it's still a tad bit sheer even at that.
BUT, I found my HG baby pink nail polish *shrieks* =)

My new HG baby pink nail polish is Claire's "Rose Petal"

Here's two coats of Claire's "Rose Petal" Nail Polish. I love it!!!
It's opaque with just two coats and it's exactly the shade of colour I have been looking for *sigh*
The formula is very good too and it also dries very quickly.
Thank you for picking this up for me too Dale :)


Have you tried any nail polishes from Charlotte Russe or Claire's? 


Do you have an HG nail polish? 

Review: Kiss Catwalk Nails from New York Fashion Shows

Okay so there is one thing from my New York trip that I am missing

Dale picked these up for me when we both went into a Duane Reade pharmacy in NYC - it seemed like there was a Duane Reade on nearly every block in Manhattan!

I wore these Kiss Catwalk nails after I removed those ugly horrible Revlon Fake nails (review here).
I'm really in love with these and I wore them during our Pittsburgh trip after NYC :)

The quality is just as great as any other Kiss branded fake nails and these look fabulous!

The only problem is that I think these are only sold in NYC :(
Dale & I tried looking for these at a few pharmacies in Pittsburgh to stock up but we could not find them. And from looking at the picture I took, I think these are limited edition nails from the New York Fashion week.
So if you live in NYC and are looking around for nice fake nails, check out Duane Reade for these.
I highly recommend them

Review: Revlon Fake Nails

Remember my manicure a few posts down? 

These fake nails are by Revlon and they are horrible. 

They are by far the worst fake nails I've ever had. 

By the end of the 1st day, one of them got a huge chip in it....and it progressively got worse.

This is what it looked like on the second day - second day!!!

I wasn't doing any unusual activity....no crazy typing on my laptop nor extensive cleaning.

I also glued on these Revlon nails using my favourite nail glue: Nailene glue (I reviewed it here)

and out of all the various fake nails I've worn over the years, I don't ever recall having a fake nail chip on me. 

You should have seen how bad this manicure looked on the fourth day when I had to remove them - they looked embarrassingly horrendous with so many chips and colour having come off.

So I will absolutely not be repurchasing Revlon branded fake nails

The fake nail brands I love which are great quality, offer more variety, do not chip on me and are more affordable than Revlon are Broadway (which I have done a tutorial on here) and Kiss. 

What's your take on fake nails?

FOTD, Nails, Casual Outfit: A bit of red with a deal at Winners

I don't post a whole lot of "deals" that I manage to score at stores because Dale very much looks after me and spoils me with things. But I'll try to share with you any deals I can score!

In Canada we have a store called Winners and if you have time (and patience) to sift through racks and shelves, you can often find a great deal. 

Winners is sort of like Marshalls - which, I am happy to say, has arrived in Canada. 

Oh yeahhh! 

So look what I found at Winners the other week which I am happy about. 

I bought these using one of the gift certificates Dale got for me from Winners :) Such a sweetheart!

I loved the marked creasings and fades on these!

I love the black sequins on the back pockets of the jeans and there's even a bit of sequins on the front pockets too. They blend in really well since the jeans are a dark wash.

Yay! $16 for jeans?! I couldn't believe it LOL 

And I like how they look. Plus they are comfortable and the denim is soft. 

The brand of jeans is Almost Famous. I have not heard of this brand but these look better (and feel better) than a couple of my $180+ CDN pair of jeans. 

Have you heard of the brand Almost Famous Clothing?

So here's yesterday's FOTD, OOTD (with the new jeans) & Mani....a bit of red. 

Wore this casual outfit to meet clients

Red Checkered Shirt is from Forever21

Jeans are by Almost Famous

Heels are from Guess 

French manicured nails are by Revlon 

(the "medium length" nails are more conservative with Revlon - read, shorter) 

Soooo, I'm going to meet Dale today at the airport!! :) 

Gosh we are so last minute LOL We're still flying to New York tomorrow, however he might change our flight to stay one extra day in New York city...and during this weekend, we might make an overnight trip to Atlantic City New Jersey. I kind of like last minute changes - makes it more exciting!

 I'll take lots of pictures and share with you later :)

Have you scored any shopping deals recently??

NOTD: A Hit with the Guys + New York

Heyyy! I'm back home in Toronto from my trip out West....and this was my welcome home bouquet of two dozen roses from Dale ;) He knows I love the coral coloured roses and extra baby's breath. He's a sweetheart

And this was my manicure during my trip out earlier in the week

For fun, I had asked Dale what colour he would like my nails to be. He said hot pink :) So I immediately thought of the China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy nail polish that he picked up for me last month. A couple of coats of China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy:

Funny I didn't realize I had a small birth mark on my pinkie until I saw this picture! Huh, the things I discovered via blogging....

This colour is really bold especially on fake nails like this. I liked it but spruced it up a bit with some chunky glitter polish at the tips. I like to do this to jazz up any base coat colour

Left to right: No brand chunky blue glitter polish I bought in Thailand, China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy

Sooo, this is the first manicure where I got numerous compliments - and all the compliments were from random gentlemen (the security guy at the airport, the gentleman sitting beside me on the plane, the male air flight attendant..etc..). I didn't get any compliments from the ladies...ah well. Hence the title of this post!


Now I gotta focus on my studies and catch up on some work stuff. But I can't complain because in two weeks Dale is taking me to New York!!! Ahhhh! I'm really excited :)

If you have any suggestions on must-see places in New York, please let me know


How is your weekend coming along? :)

Nail Polish Swatches & Reviews: Claire's Icing, China Glaze, SH & Orly

There are so many things I want to post, but I have been kept busy

Thank you for being patient though - I will try to update blogger more regularly again ;) 

As promised two posts ago, here are swatches for some of the nail polishes Dale picked up for me last month. 

The first swatches are from a limited edition set of Icing Nail polishes from Claire's

There is no name for the set nor for the individual nail polishes.
Note that the bottles in the set (12 mL each) are a tad bit smaller than the standard 18 mL nail polish bottles

So from left to right here are the swatches (all the swatches are two coats, no top coat)

This magenta colour has a really nice iridescent sheen to it

I like this blue-green colour more than I thought I would :)

This blue nail polish dries matte

I really like how bright this orange shade is....it reminds me of palm trees and tropical weather ;)

This colour is really why I wanted the set - the bright purple looked so pretty in the bottle. The formula came out thinner than expected though

Although the Claire's Icing Limited Edition nail polishes do not have any names, the regular sized individual nail polishes do have names.

Here is Claire's Icing nail polish in "Laura's Fave"

I was on the hunt for a nice turquoise-blue nail polish colour....and the colour of "Laura's Fave" caught my eye when I was walking past the store!
It's a nice colour but I wish it was more opaque...so it might be "Laura's Fave" but it's not Karen's Fave LOL


The next nail polish was along the St. Patricks' Day themed shelf

This is Claire's Icing nail polish in "Green with Envy"

This is two coats...but I find that three coats gives a nicer finish

This was my St. Patrick's Day manicure of the week with three coats
I really like it! It took me half a day to get use to it since I tend to be more demure with my choice of colour with longer nails...but it grew on me quickly and I'll be wearing this even during the year

Overall it was my first time using nail polish from Claire's. And they're quite good. There wasn't any streaking that could not be covered after two coats of nail polish, and the only one requiring a third coat was the green glitter one (for intensity preferences). The colour has lasted me 3-4 days without major chipping, and that's pretty decent wear for me


*********

Here are several other nail polish swatches from a few other brands

This one is China Glaze "Innocence"

I really do not understand the great reviews on this nail polish colour
I personally think China Glaze is slightly overrated (sort of like MAC eyeshadows)
Basically, this is any other light ballerina-ish pink colour - I can find at least two others like this at my local pharmacy drug store for half the price. I thought the formula would be slightly more opaque....but what really bothered me was how long it took for this nail polish to dry. It seriously took much longer than other nail polishes to dry.


Next up is China Glaze "Flip Flop Fantasy"

Unlike China Glaze "Innocence", I do recommend China Glaze "Flip Flop Fantasy" if you're looking for a hot pink colour. There just isn't a hot pink colour nearly as bright as this one (that I could find), which is nicely opaque with two coats and applies well. Dale picked out this colour - good one Dale ;)


The following two are nail polishes are from Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri line

If you know me, you'll know that it's difficult for me to resist anything of nude or taupe colour - that's high heels, dresses, tops, lipgloss, lipstick and even nail polish....

This one is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in "Quick Sand"

I should have read some reviews prior. I must say that the negative reviews regarding the brushes for this line of nail polish is quite accurate as you can see

Honestly, if you're going to design a nice wide brush (like OPI) please ensure the opening of the bottle is substantially wider than the brush width!!!

For some reason the formula for "Quick Sand" sadly comes out looking like sand on my nails each time I've used it. I keep getting a ton of air bubbles for this nail polish colour. I'm not sure if it has something to do with this particular nail polish formula since the following nail polish is also from the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri line and it applied very nicely

This is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in "Sonic Bloom" 

With the exception of the strange combination of a wide brush and small nail polish bottle opening, I quite like "Sonic Bloom". The formula applied very smoothly.

I find that the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri nail polishes dry just as fast as the Claire's Icing Nail polishes. In fact, the China Glaze "Flip Flop Fantasy" dried a tad bit faster than the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri polishes....so I do not agree with many reviewers that said the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri polishes dry much faster than other brands


The last one for this post is Orly in "Passion Fruit" from their Hot Neons collection

This was my first Orly nail polish and wow! I'm really impressed with the formula and I absolutely love the rubberized handle on the brush:

If the rest of Orly nail polishes are anything like this one in terms of formula, application and even the rubberized handle, then this might very well become my favourite brand of nail polish. I know China Glaze gets a lot of love, but sometimes the formulas are not to my liking. And yes, the OPI nail polish brush is quite nice, but I found the Orly one great to work with too. We shall see!

Do you have a favourite nail polish brand? 


What have you been up to lately?? :)