Honest Babes

While trying to make my list for the in store and online Sephora Friends and Family sale, I've trawled through more products than I care to count. In case it might be helpful, I'm providing some links and a little commentary here in case you don't feel like going through and looking for all the nail polish items on Sephora. It's very "wall of text," so if you want the highlights right now, here they are: Givenchy has a polish out, some of the nail stickers from Sephora's brand are super cute, and Nails Inc now has flakies for us!Read more »

I ordered a bunch of new (to me) Nails Inc. colors as soon as I noticed that they were on Sephora's website.  I also ordered the Kensington Caviar top coat, which I'd heard good things about.  I have yet to try four of the other polishes that I bought, but here are some preliminary thoughts about what I have tried thus far.

There are two collection sets available right now.  Each has four 10 mL polishes for US$25, which is cheaper than buying each polish individually.  (That would be $38.)  If you like the colors in each set, they're a great deal.  According to Nails Inc., Sephora is the "world exclusive launch for the autumn winter collection."

The Neutral Collection consists of Elizabeth Street (510; light bubblegum pink with subtle shimmer), Jermyn Street (071; mauve crème), The Thames (also 510?; dark gray crème), and Porchester Square (161; light gray beige crème.)  Elizabeth Street and Porchester Square are one and done lacquers if you're in a hurry.  The latter is surprisingly pigmented at one coat, while the former is sheer but not streaky at one coat.  All four look great at two coats.  I ended up doing four coats of Elizabeth Street, but I couldn't get it evenly opaque.  (It looks more opaque on Tobywoo, so opacity may be possible in fewer coats than I used.)  Jermyn Street did look more brown in some lights, which makes sense as Sephora describes it as "pink brown."  The Thames and Porchester Square also available with a cute crystal-embellished cap for $19.50.  All four of these polishes are also available individually with normal caps.

Bottles in the same order as above:

My heart goes out to those of you in Norway and anyone affected by the shooting on Utoya and bombing in Oslo.  As an American, I am shocked and surprised that a country like Norway would be attacked.  The United States sticks our nose in the business of a lot of other countries, but I didn't get the feeling that Norway did the same.  If it does turn out to be a terror attack, what has them so upset?  Do the terrorists "win" if we're fearful?  When does careful turn into fearful?  Heavy thoughts going into the weekend.  I now give you a regularly irregular blog posting written over a week ago...

Rescue Beauty Lounge's Orbis Non Sufficit is a lovely darker medium green crème.  RBL describes it as "moody grayed-out combat green crème," but either I'm way moodier than it is, or it's not so moody.  It was created back in 2009 by The Polish Addict (head there to find out more!) but was discontinued.  It's such a great core green color and, if you're careful, it's a one coater.  I did two since I had a little bit of sheerness around the edges of my nails with only one coat.  It's super, super glossy if you slap topcoat on it and it's a good green to own if you're a green fan.  About the only thing I'm not loving about this polish is the brush since it was a little hard to control by my cuticles.  (To say the least, ugh!  But feel free to blame me, not the brush. )

ONS tied with Killa Red for third place in the last "Bring It Back" vote on RBL's blog, so if you want to order it, start looking next year per the comments on that post.  Orbis Non Sufficit will probably retail for the usual RBL price (US$18.)  Here's two coats plus topcoat inside my lightbox:

I was itching to try out Sephora by OPI's Blasted Gold (SE 301) polish, so I topped ONS with Blasted Gold.  Blasted Gold is described by Sephora as "blasted effect opaque gold with fine iridescent glitter."  It's a yellow-y gold, so it's not exactly perfect for my cool skintone.  But gold is the only color that OPI didn't release in their own Shatter line (perhaps saving it for the SOPI collection for the time being) so I had to have it.  It was a little goopy in the neck of the bottle, but not as bad as some of the Shatters I've used.  It has a satin finish when dried, which I liked with the super glossy ONS peeking out in the cracks.  But Blasted Gold really comes alive with topcoat, so I definitely suggest that if you like it blingy!

Here's my thumbnail sans topcoat, with topcoat on every other finger:

Blasted Gold is available at Sephora for $9.50.

I love midnight showings and I love good books, so of course I had to attend the last Harry Potter film as soon as it came out.  While the theater's disorganization and disregard for previous policies sucked, I'm still glad we went to see the movie.  Neville and Snape were particularly good in my opinion, and this was my favorite part by far!  We're going to have to see it again since we were so close to the screen the first time.   Did anyone else go see it?

Funky Fingers' Snakeskin (901) is mostly gray with a slight green tinge and gold shimmer.  You can see the green tinge if you're looking for it, but it definitely looks gray at first glance.  The formula is a bit metallic, so you may see slight brushstrokes.  I had no problems with two coats, but the topcoats I used gave me bubbles so my pictures below are with three coats.  I had no complaints about the brush, the formula was easy to work with, and the bottles are so darn cute!  Funky Fingers polishes retail for US$5 for three bottles at Five Below stores, but I'm not sure what the cost is if you only want one bottle.  Since Funky Fingers and Color Club are made by the same company, you can get Color Club Snakeskin if you don't have a Five Below near you.  Scrangie reported that Color Club's Snakeskin has microglitter, so it's possible that this is also microglitter (and not shimmer like I'm seeing) or the formula was tweaked just slightly.  It's a bit of an unusual color, and even though it's a bit too warm for me, I like it.

Bottle picture:

Snakes on a blogpost!

SOPI's new color, Make the First Mauve (SE 068), is like a purpled greige, or edging towards taupe mauve, or maybe it's just a warm-ish dark medium lavender gray with lighter pearl.  There's not so much pearl that the finish is frosty; you'll find no brushstrokes here.  The brush was easy to control and nice to use.

In various lighting situations from full sun to lots of clouds:

Click if you dare...

Nicole by OPI has released some Spring exclusives for Target.  But you already know that by reading other blogs, right?   I found them at my local store last week, so check your store if you're cruising for them!Some cell phone pictures...

Who Let the Dorks Out? (SE 293) is from Sephora by OPI's new Glee collection.  It's described as "opaque metallic peacock green," which doesn't strike me as the best description for this polish.  It's kind of a wishy-washy green with icy blue shimmer.  In certain lights, you can see the shimmer turn pink.  I personally don't like the base color and the color of the shimmer together, but maybe I'll warm up to it.  It certainly doesn't make me think of the character of Sue Sylvester on "Glee" or peacocks, and it doesn't resemble the little dot on Sephora's website, either.  In fact, the two crèmes and to a lesser degree Miss Bossy Pants kind of look like their sample dots, but the rest of the colors are off-base.  Hell to the No looks like a shimmery cooler-toned purple on sephora.com, but it's more red-based in color with heavier gold shimmer, for example.  But I digress!

Of course there's the new Glee collection at Sephora, and Hello Kitty is now in store too.  But there's some other polish news at Sephora, so if you're interested, read on!Dior, Hello Kitty, Tarina Tarantino, Sephora by OPI...

The Sephora by OPI Glee polishes are trickling into stores now!

The polishes themselves retail for US$9.50 (did they go up in price recently?), and the following set was $24 (though I had heard it'd only be $22.)

Slushied is a crème and Celibacy Club is holo, while the rest of the colors pictured are shimmers of varying sizes.  I'm missing Hell to the No, Diva-in-Training and Who Let the Dorks Out.  I hope to pick those up tomorrow.

Here's a quick picture of Sephora by OPI's Glee collection polish called Mash-Up (SE 290) compared to Katy Perry by OPI's Not Like the Movies (NL K09):

If you haven't entered my giveaway, go take a look at it and see if you're interested in entering!

The first thing I did when I got Riva, swatch-wise, was compare it to some polishes I already own.  I wasn't all that impressed with it at first.  But after doing an almost full hand manicure with it, I think I like it more than I initially did.  Is it worth US$27?  Well, that I'm not sure about just yet.

Riva is like a grayed dark light blue, if that makes sense.  It looks different to me in person versus the promotional pictures and dries darker and less dusty/dingy than the color you see in the bottle.  The electric blue shimmer is much more noticeable in the bottle than on the nail.  I originally wrote that Riva wasn't unique and wasn't worth $27 unless you like the color or collect Chanel polish, but I find myself backing off of those statements now.  Riva goes on jelly-like, which I appreciated more with each nail I painted.  I did have to use four thin coats to get my nails to look even, which I don't mind for the right color.  I did get bubbles both times I had Riva on, but I blame that on my China Glaze Fast Forward top coat and Sally Hansen drying oil.  I am really disliking Fast Forward so far- it bubbles and it doesn't dry very fast at all. How much do you like light blues?