Review & Swatches: Colores de Carol Holiday 2013 Nail Polishes

Press Sample
In honor of Small Business Saturday, I thought it was the perfect time to show you some swatches of some polishes by indie retailer Colores de Carol. I've been a huge fan of Carolina's work for a long time now, lovingly admiring her creations both in her shop and via the swatches of various nail bloggers. But as I mentioned in my last indie polish review, I've been like a deer

Small Business Saturday Beauty Sale Round-Up

Today is Small Business Saturday! For those unaware, this is a day to show your support of the independent small businesses both in your area and online. Of course we all should be supporting independent small businesses EVERY day, but on Small Business Saturday, you're encouraged to shop ONLY the small businesses in your area and online.

In addition to supporting the local small businesses in

Fragrance Direct Friday (on Saturday) & Festive Nail Art

 Hi guys, today I have the last (for a little while anyway) instalment of Fragrance Direct Friday and my first festive mani this year.  This weekly feature will be going away for a little while, but instead, I will be posting about some fabulous budget polishes from elsewhere around the web on Saturdays.  I have some really great shades that are quite hard to find swatches for online, so I'm looking forward to sharing all those beauties with you in the weeks to come!


The first polish I have to show you today is this very Christmas appropriate green from the Revlon Top Speed line.  This is Emerald, and the formula on this beauty is divine!  The photos show 1 coat, no top coat and no clean up.  Yes, you did read that right, I didn't do clean-up.  The formula on this is so easy to control that I didn't really need to.  That has happened to me a total of 3 times now, so it's pretty big.  There were a couple of streaks when I applied it, but it self-levelled nicely.  Dry time was pretty short (not that I have much to compare, as I always use quick-dry top coat), and it dried nice and glossy.
This was 99p here, and they are still in stock, so if you need a dark green for Christmas I would absolutely recommend this.  Naturally, I was compelled to do my first Christmas mani over this base.  It would be rude not to!
The little trees were stamped from PUEEN42 with Barry M - Gold Foil, and the accent nail is 2 coats of Shimmer Polish - Candace.

The second polish I have to show you is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri - Lively Lilac which is available here for £1.49.  This is 2 coats with top coat, apart from the ring finger which needed 3 coats to help cover some bad staining I have on that nail.  It didn't quite do it, but never mind.  Incidentally, that staining is from Brisk Blue from the same line of polish.  It didn't stain when I wore it alone, but I used it as a base for a chunky glitter polish, and it left stains in spots under the larger pieces of glitter.  That was a couple of weeks ago, and it's still pretty bad.  Any tips on getting rid of them would be greatly appreciated : )
 In the bottle, this appears to have some silver shimmer, but I couldn't really see it on the nail which was a shame.  I picked this up because I know a lot of the Insta-Dri range are good for stamping, however I'm not so sure this one will.  I'll try it anyway, and let you guys know how I get on, but I'm not holding my breath.
 That aside, this is still a nice polish so I will still get some use from it, and I didn't spend a lot so I'm not too bummed about it.  What do you guys think of these polishes?

Rite Aid Winter Beauty Clearance Sale

LAST UPDATE: 3:00PM PST, 12/10.

The Rite Aid Winter Beauty Clearance Sale is officially underway! Thanks to several of you for the heads-up about this Rite Aid sale--I've got LOTS of pics to share with you today!

PLEASE READ BEFORE ASKING QUESTIONS IN THE COMMENTS (THANKS):

If you do not see yellow clearance stickers on the displays at your store, take some of these items to the register and

Spotted: Six NEW L'Oreal Infallible Eyeshadow Shades (permanent, not limited edition)

We've got six new PERMANENT (not limited edition) L'Oreal Infallible Eyeshadow shades, folks! Huge thanks to reader Lisa for this sighting--Lisa spotted the new Infallible shades at her local Bed Bath and Beyond this week and was nice enough to share lots of pics with us. Take a look!




 image credit: Lisa for Nouveau Cheap

NEW L'Oreal Infallible Eyeshadow shades




image credit: Lisa for

20% off NARS + free shipping, no minimum order required

I've added this (and many other new BF offers) to the Black Friday Round-Up, but I want to give an extra-special thanks to reader Lisa for sharing this deal today.

Now through 12/2 on the NARS website, receive 20% off your entire order with code NARSFRIENDS. And, they're also offering free US shipping (no minimum order required and NO CODE required) right now!


I tested this on a NARS blush (

#33DC - Day 30 - the same pattern in different colours

 Hi guys!  I'm back today for Day 30 of the #33DC and the prompt for today is: the same pattern in different colours.  I decided to go with a vertical pastel rainbow gradient, and some silver stamping.  I love how subtle this turned out, even though I used 6 different base colours!



Those 6 polishes were Rimmel Lycra Pro - Cocktail Passion (creamy coral), Revlon - Cupid (pink), La Femme - Lilac Cream, La Femme - Ice Blue Cream, Barry M - Blueberry Ice Cream (light blue), and Headline Colours - Poolside Party.  I also added a coat of Barry M - Pink Iridescent Glitter for a little bit of sparkle
The coral side on the thumb was a lot less orangey in real life than it looks here, but I couldn't fix it without messing up the rest of the colours so I just had to leave it  : (
This image is from Bundle Monster plate BM-022, from the revised edition of their first set of plates.  I was lucky enough to win this set from Bundle Monster's Fall Into giveaway recently, and this is the first image I have tried from it.  As you can see, it stamped brilliantly, I am looking forward to trying some more from this set, there are some very pretty images in there! : D  I actually had a really lucky streak a few weeks back, and won these plates, a Organic Surge face mask, a mini from Indy's Indies, and a set of 3 minis from Polish Yer Hooves (swatches coming at some point)  Thank you to everyone that hosted the giveaways, I am very grateful.  I did end up playing a couple of scratchcards that week too, but I guess that was just pushing it XD