Color Club Bewitching Halloween Mini Set 2010

Sorry about the lack of posting and online involvement, guys. Still not quite feeling like myself. Luckily my annual vacation is in a couple weeks so hopefully I'll feel better after that!

Anyway, wanted to be sure I posted this while it was still relevant. Only a couple more days til Halloween! Not enough time to order online and get it in time, but they sell these sets at Meijer now, so you can finally get Color Club sets in store in certain areas.

This is a set of four minis plus a roll of adorable Halloween nail decals (I seem to have misplaced my photo of them somehow) plus a little wheel of nail art gems/beads/decorations in black and orange that are sold separately. They're on the display next to each other.

And one more note before the pictures- these all seem like they might be re-promoted colors. I didn't side-by-side compare any of them but they're all really familiar.



Bewitching. Standard black creme.



Charmed, I'm Sure. Really inaccurate pics. This is purple, not blue. It's a lot like OPI Ink, and this might be Color Club Electronica, but my Electronica is a lot more sparkly. See the duochrome reflection in the bottom of the bottle in the sunlight pic? Much closer to the 'real' color of this polish.


Hocus Pocus. Man, blurry pics of holo polishes and glitter always look so good! Kinda gives you an idea of how sparkly it is in real life. Anyway, this is an absolutely gorgeous pale silver plus pink/lavender subtle tint hologram glitter. Could be Magic Attraction but this one seems warmer.


Spellbound. Traffic cone orange neon creme. Excellent color. Probably matches up to one of Color Club's existing neon oranges. Love this shade of orange though, it's absurdly bright.


These are minis but they're actually a pretty good size- .25 fluid ounces- that's half a normal polish bottle. No .13 fl oz mini-minis here. Great formula. I did three coats of all, none of them needed the third except Hocus Pocus but I was curious to see how they looked with three anyway.

I always dream about going to a Halloween party where they give out mini Halloween nail polish sets - like this or OPI Go Goth - in the gift bags... How cool of a party would that be?! Maybe I should host one.

(These were sent to me for review.)

New Kiss Halloween Nail Decals and some of my decal collection

Since Halloween is coming up quickly I've been scouring the stores for some new Halloween-themed nail stuff (and makeup and housewares and so on...) and came across these in Walgreens:

(Click to enlarge)

Aren't those CUTE?! They are two separate sets- the left purple/black background is set one and the right orange/yellow background is set two. The left ones seem like a variation on my favorite Fing'rs EDGE decals with the skulls and bats (of which I may or may not have about 20 packages stockpiled...) and the ones on the right don't remind me of any existing set of decals.

I adore these. There's only one thing I don't like about them. See how on the set on the right there are words? "Witch" "pumpkin" "skull" and whatnot? That's really lame. Boo is cute, Happy Halloween and Trick or Treat are cute, but honestly, how dumb is it to have the word 'skull' written on your nails? It's not a picture of a skull... It just says 'skull.' Uh.... Did they need page filler or something? Why not throw on a few more pictures of bats or actual skulls?

And just for fun, I took a picture of some of my Halloween decal stash (I am obsessed with decals)

The new Kiss ones are on the top left so you can see how they're packaged. Last year's Kiss ones (in the middle) were really cute. I don't know if you can see it but there's a pumpkin with a witch hat that's just adorable. There's also some bones in one set that look like dog bones that I've used with the Fing'rs paw print decals.

Are there any Halloween decals I'm missing? I need to collect them all!

OPI Go Goth Mini Set for Halloween 2010

This year's Halloween mini set from OPI is pretty sweet. Except for one thing... it comes with a stretchy lace bracelet instead of cute pumpkin and ghost decals! I love decals. Oh well. It's not like I don't have a stockpile of Halloween-themed nail decals at home. Oh yeah, no Glow In The Dark this year either! But the colors are really nice at least. The set is called "Go Goth" so of course I like it.

Nevermore. Inky, sparkly, gorgeous blue/purple duochrome. Impossible to photograph. You may be thinking this looks familiar... that's because it's OPI Ink. (I will post comparison pictures below.) So, if you have OPI Ink, you know what this picture is supposed to look like! OPI Ink is in my top five favorite polishes of all time, I have backup bottles I love it so much, and I wear it every chance I get. Unfortunately, I've never been able to get a good picture of it, and I must have taken over 100 pictures of it.


Obscure. Soft matte black creme. This isn't a super dark black like, say, KO Knockout Flatte Black? This is a softer, more faded looking black. Almost more of a dark grey than a black. The rest of the polishes in this set correlate to existing OPI or Nicole shades, but I can't recall a plain matte black OPI... Perhaps the closest color to this is Sephora by OPI What's A Tire Jack? Matte?


Sanguine. A deep, rich, shimmery, vampy burgundy red. Incredibly hot. Very sexy. My pictures don't do it justice. It's extremely rich looking and it has a lot of depth. I'm pretty sure this is OPI Royal Rajah Ruby, so if you missed out on the original India collection release, you might want to pick this up! It is not a color to be missed! Which reminds me... the India collection was great. I don't think I've ever posted it. I will add that to my project list!


Unripened. This is definitely the most fascinating one to look at in the bottle. It's a black base with large teal/aqua/blue shimmer particles that have a strong pink duochrome. On the nail the duochrome is rarely visible- seems most apparent in low light and at sunset, but the effect is much more subtle on the nail than in the bottle. Regardless, the black with blue shimmer is still pretty.


These all looked so familiar to me when I was swatching them so I decided to pull out some old bottles to compare:

Left to right (ring to index):
Nicole Party At 3 AM
OPI Nevermore
OPI Ink

I think it's pretty safe to say that this might be OPI Ink. The formula's been updated but the color looks the same to me!

Left to right (pinkie to index):
Nicole By OPI Black Cat-Cha Later
OPI Midnight in Moscow
OPI Sanguine
OPI Royal Rajah Ruby.

What do you think... looks similar? I couldn't really tell the difference in real life. Someone suggested to me that it also looks like OPI Romeo and Joliet, but I couldn't find mine to compare.

Left to right (pinkie to index):
Nicole by OPI Party at 3 AM
Nicole by OPI Blues in the Night
OPI Unripened
Jessica Casablanca

I threw the Jessica in with the OPIs because it was the first thing that came to mind when I saw Unripened. I'm thinking Unripened is Nicole Blues in the Night re-promoted for Halloween. Which is cool, because it's discontinued and really pretty!

The formula on these was excellent. The shades seem to have received a pretty nice formula upgrade since their original releases. These are all very opaque- two coats for complete coverage and that is what is pictured here. Very smooth, even, not runny, not thin, nice and on the thick side of medium. The only problem with these is that the mini brushes don't hold much product so you really have to try to get a big bead on the brush to ensure smooth application. Drying time is very fast.

Overall, awesome collection. I think most of OPI's Halloween kits have been minis of re-promoted colors plus one unique color like Ghostess with the Mostess or Glow-Ink In the Dark, so I'm not surprised to see some familiar faces here. All of the colors are drop dead gorgeous, Ink and Royal Rajah Ruby were always favorites of mine. In fact, if you haven't picked up the originals of these colors and they are interesting to you, you really might like to give these a try. I'm really pleased at the improved formula and application- the originals are on the thin and slightly sheer side (even though they are 3-free), but these re-promotes are really opaque and perfect in the formula department. Makes me kinda wish I had regular sized bottles of the new formula.

I think this set would also make a really cute gift. I know that personally I'd be thrilled to bits to get a gift like this from someone... Maybe in Halloween party gift bags or something? I don't know, I'm not Martha Stewart-y enough to come up with cute interesting ways to give gifts and stuff. But yeah, would totally make an awesome gift for someone!

(These were sent to me for review.)

China Glaze Awakening Collection for Halloween 2010

Halloween is one of my favorite things ever so I'm always super excited when Halloween-themed things come out... I have Halloween socks, Halloween nail art decals, Halloween lipstick, Halloween t-shirts, Halloween washcloths, sheets and shower curtains, Halloween dishes, Halloween candles.... you get the idea, right? Of course Halloween nail polish gets me giddy.

These brand new China Glaze Halloween polishes that just arrived on my doorstep totally brightened my day... take a look at the Halloween awesomeness:


Ick-A-Bod-Y. Not sure I quite get the name. I get Ichabod, like Ichabod Crane, but Ick-A-Bod-Y? Like... gross, ick, body? Zombie/corpse reference? Just being cute? Doesn't matter, this polish could be named Poop-On-A-Stick and I'd still love it. It's bright shiny orange glitter suspended in a dark smoky yellowy-green jelly base. The glitter is very dense so you don't need to layer this. The green base is a really nice surprise, too. It's not noticeable from a distance, but up close you can see the deep murky green peeking out from in between glitter particles. Very awesome. A+, China Glaze! As soon as I'm done with this post, this is becoming my new mani.


Mummy May I? Cute name!! Maybe OPI should take a hint from China Glaze... Mummy May I is a much cuter and less groan-inducing name than "Tattoo You Want Candy?" ... so... anyway... the polish... It's a bright pink/purple/fuchsia glitter in a dark purple jelly base. When you apply the first coat you can definitely see that the base is a deep, dark purple but on the second coat it just looks black. Maybe black with a hint of purple tint. Softer looking than straight black. And... a little Bad Romance-y, no?


Zombie Zest. YES!!! A zombie-themed polish!! I think this is my first... my first zombie themed polish. I have a bit of an obsession with zombies... so... pretty awesome. This is a murky, swampy, decayed-looking green jelly with lots of iridescent glittery reflective flecks of shimmer/glitter. It's yellow-based but has flickers of blue, moss, olive, gold and a little bit of orange at the right angle. Perfect Halloween color if you ask me... Is it a "rotten kind of cute"?


I was wearing SpaRitual Optical Illusion when these arrived and it immediately struck me that Zombie Zest and Optical Illusion seemed really, really similar, so I did a side-by-side to compare:


Now... honestly... can you tell which is which? Cause I can't. Take a guess! Give up? It's:

Index and ring finger are China Glaze Zombie Zest.
Middle and pinkie finger are SpaRitual Optical Illusion.

Three coats of each. I'm going to go ahead and declare these 'dupes'. Identical. They don't look the same in the bottle to me but they sure look the same on the nail. Which should be good news for a lot of people since China Glaze is a lot less expensive, much easier to find and has a way better formula.

The formula on these was decent. A little bit runny, but not unmanageable. I did three coats of each but only Zombie Zest needed a third coat. The glitter in Mummy May I and Ick-A-Bod-Y are a little bumpy so you will want a nice thick topcoat. I have not tested the dry time, but I'm about to do a manicure with Ick-A-Bod-Y so I'll edit this when I find out what it's like.

Super awesome set of polishes. I'm a happy Scrangie right now.

China Glaze also sent along their Breast Cancer Awareness October collection of pinks which I have swatched, I'll post them later this week if anyone is interested!

(These were sent to me for review.)

Happy Birthday, Illamasqua!

Two of my favorite British things turned a little older this week.... Yesterday it was Gavin, today it's Illamasqua!

Illamasqua turns one year old today. How cool is that?

I've been kind of in love with Illamasqua ever since I laid eyes on this:

Illamasqua Rampage

Happy birthday, Illamasqua! I hope there's many more years of dark, edgy and awesome nail polish and makeup to come!

Milani Halloween Collection 2009

I want to say this collection is called "Black Magic", but I honestly can't remember what the display said. Maybe it was Dark Magic? I should have taken a picture!

Anyway, these are all a black creme base with different colors of glitter, and they are awesome. Unfortunately, my pictures of these are not so good and don't capture the true essence of these polishes. They can give you a general idea of what to expect, though!

Charmed. Black with silver glitter. This is possibly my favorite black/silver combo. This is the one that changed my mind about how much I like silver on black glitters- this silver is SO SHINY. It makes the black look even blacker. It's like a sky full of stars. Perfection.

Enchantment. Black with blue-purple glitter. Blue purple... also known as "blurple"... This looks a little less blue and more purple in real life.


Fairytale. Black with blue glitter. Holy cannoli. This one is freakin' amazing. The blue glitter is so bright, it looks so fantastic against the deep black base.

Magical. Black with orange glitter. A black orange combo! I love it! If you don't like the hexagonal glitter in China Glaze Fortune Teller, this is a great alternative. I adore this.


Spellbinding. Black with red glitter. Similar to another Milani (I can't recall the name) and along the same lines as Piggy Polish Midnight Fireflies / China Glaze Lubu Heels / Rescue Beauty Lounge Black Russian. The red glitter in this one is brighter and more obvious, though.


Whimsical. Black with purple glitter. I think this is my favorite, I can't decide. The purple color of the glitter is so rich, it almost looks like purple polish combined with the black. Like a deep purple shimmer. This is the one I've used the most so far... I just can't stop staring at my nails when I wear this!


The formula on these is decent. It's a little on the thin/watery side and I did need three coats of each, but it went on well and dried quickly all the same. These glitters are very smooth, not rough at all. They do look best with topcoat, it helps bring out the sparkle a little more. Also worth noting, these were very easy to remove compared to other glitter polishes- about the same as regular polish!

I just can't get over how much I love these. I know you're probably thinking, why not just put a glitter topcoat over black? Cause that's what I thought until I wore them. There's so much more depth and interest when the glitter is mixed in. Sometimes the glitter sits just below the surface and you can see it shining through, like it's under water... The glitter is a lot more even when it's mixed in as well. And these glitters are perfect in this black base. They're super shiny and sparkly and they show through beautifully, unlike some others which don't break through the base polish and look lumpy.

My only complaint is that they were kinda pricey... When did drugstore polish start to cost as much as salon?! That's a bummer. I got mine at Meijer, but I've also seen these at CVS.

So much glitter... so much kickass polish!

Color Club Master of Disguise for Halloween 2009

Of course, by now you all know how crazy I am about seasonal-themed things, especially Halloween nail polish... Here's another cute set I love from Color Club!


Here's the little set. Isn't it cute? These are minis. Ghost of Chance, Abracadabra, Taboo!, Master of Disguise.


Ghost of Chance. Pure white creme. This is pretty much your standard white creme. Good formula, fast drying.

Abracadabra. Orange glitter in an orange jelly base. This is awesome! Orange glitter! This is really unique as well, I've never seen another polish quite like this one. Also looks great layered.


Taboo! Deep shimmery blue based purple. This picture lies about the color. It's really purple. You know, cameras and purple, that thing. This is a reminiscent of OPI Ink or Color Club Electronica, to give you an idea. Super, super pretty.

Master of Disguise. Black creme. A basic black creme. This could be a re-named Where's The Soiree? but I find the formula of this one to be better. This wasn't watery or sheer, in fact, it was dense, smooth and opaque. *Almost* a one-coater.


Here's Abracadabra layered:
Abracadabra over Ghost Of Chance.

Abracadabra over Master Of Disguise.

Abracadabra over Taboo! This one looks really cool in person but the photo doesn't really capture it.


Cute cute cute!! I love Color Club.