Illamasqua Viridian

I chose this polish from a need for a Christmassy manicure that wouldn't take any work. No nail art, no glitter removal, just something that felt appropriately holiday. And so it was that Illamasqua Viridian went onto my fingers.

In direct light, you can see how green and shimmery it is.

In indirect light, it's a little more teal and blackened on the edges, but it's still not a flat, boring polish by any stretch of the imagination.

This was just two coats of smooth, easy application. Unfortunately, I topped it with my current go-to quick dry polish, Essie Good to Go, and it does NOT play with with Illamasqua apparently! I had shrinkage like crazy, and it was the same when I used it over Glitterati a few weeks ago. Note to self: don't do that again.

And an out of focus shot so you can see how sparkly and gorgeous it is. :)


This is now one of my go-to Christmas polishes for when I want something really easy. What's your favorite easy Christmas manicure?

Hard Out Here

This is inspired by Lily Allen's manicure in her newest video, "Hard Out Here." Watch it here!

In the VIB sale I bought the Twenty-Two so I could try out the new Formula X polishes, so I figured I'd use a couple of them to recreate it!
Unfortunately, as soon as I finished this mani I hated it so much I had to take it off. Let's see why!

I started with Radioactive. It's a great color; it's neon, though it doesn't indicate that anywhere. It took three coats to get rid of VNL and it did not dry well. Since it's neon, it dried sort of matte; not completely matte, but sort of waxy. Next time I use it, I'll try to layer it over a white and hope that helps with some of its issues. I will also double up on my base coat, because even taking it off after just a few minutes it was starting to stain.

Over Radioactive I used Need For Speed. This is where it all went from questionable to horrible. As you can see from the bottle I'm holding, it's SILVER... but on the nail, over a green, it's ...bad. Not silver. Sort of gold-y but not really. Really brush stroke-y. Mostly just horribly ugly. Bad. Ew.

I'll try Need For Speed again sometime on its own, but right now I must say that I am not impressed.

China Glaze Cirque du Soleil

I've been DYING for this collection! On our first family vacation, my parents and I saw La Nouba, and it completely opened my eyes to what performance can be. It was seriously life changing. We've seen two or three shows that have travelled through our state since then. There was even a point in high school that I almost auditioned for a part in a show that was going to travel through Asia. Cirque is pretty much one of my favorite things ever. So the day that this collection showed up on Transdesign, I didn't even wait for any swatches to show up. Add to cart, check out, wait impatiently for them to be delivered!

I only ordered the "interesting" half of the collection, and they're all beautiful.


To start, here's Bend Over Backwards. This is just one coat, no top coat. It's a really pretty, shimmery red that feels very holiday appropriate.

Here it is with an accent nail of Whirled Away. Whirled Away is obviously related to Connect the Dots (what would Lynnderella have to say about this, I wonder?! haha), but as I've never seen it in person... I can only speculate, but the white hexes seem larger to me, and the bar glitter is only black.
Speaking of bar glitter, I actually don't hate it here! I think it's because it's just black, instead of shiny and obnoxious.

And here it is over all of my nails! This is over Zoya Carly, which I just recently showed you, because I slapped it on as soon as I got the box open!

Applying Whirled Away was not my favorite experience in the world, and here's why. Check out that brush: NOTHING ON IT. I had to fish around to get anything out of the bottle. Then dabbing seemed to be the best application for me. Your milage may vary, of course.

This is Get Carried Away. Silver micro glitter, the same black bars & hexes as Whirled Away, silver hexes, and hexes that I feel are supposed to be red but instead come out a little pink? Index is one coat over black; middle is one coat over gray (Orly Mirror Mirror), ring is 2 coats and pinky is 1.

 I think this is best as a layering polish, but I don't think I'll ever layer it over black. You lose the black glitter and it makes it much less interesting.

Running in Circles is a densely-packed green shimmer, and when I say dense I mean it: this is one coat! It falls somewhere between Zoya's Ivanka and Apple in terms of color. From some angles, there is some VNL, so I might layer this over a green, or do two or three thinner coats.

Water You Waiting For is small blue glitter and slightly larger purple glitter in a clear base. It dries really gritty. I put a thick coat of NYC top coat on these and took photos before it had dried, and by the time I was done taking pictures it had already started to eat it up.

I see myself wearing this as a really pretty gradient. I also see myself using peel off base!

Index is over black; middle finger is over gray (Orly Mirror Mirror), ring finger is two coats; and pinky is just one coat.

It's a Trap-eze! makes my little nerdy heart go all aflutter! Even if I didn't care about Cirque, this polish would have been mine JUST for the name! Ah, China Glaze, thank you for this.

This polish is sort of like making a jelly sandwich with a DL Happy Birthday dupe. I'm not a connoisseur of all those glitters, but I've been seeing some talk from The Polishaholic saying that this has white glitters that the others don't.

One coat:

 And two coats.

Overall, I can't say that I can see this collection as "inspired" by Cirque du Soleil, but I'm really glad I got these! I'll wait until I see swatches of the "boring" half of the collection before I decide to get any of those.
I hope this helps you decide which ones you will be getting!

Hard Candy Beetle

We all love a good duo chrome. These aren't the most amazing pictures, but I did what I could.
Hard Candy Beetle. I've heard it's a dupe for Orly Space Cadet? The pictures I've seen of Space Cadet do seem pretty similar, but I can't make any promises as I don't have it to compare! But Beetle is still easily available at Walmart. This is... 2? maybe 3? coats, no top coat.

 Brownish-pink that sometimes looks purple and has an incredible green duo chrome. Yes please.

Easter Roses!

I wanted to do an Easter mani, but I didn't want to go all out with bunnies & eggs & the lot. So I went with something still season-appropriate but less holiday-themed: roses!

The base is China Glaze Refresh-mint. I hadn't used in in a long time, and I think I'd forgotten just how pretty it is! It's not the easiest in terms of application, but worth it. The roses are a generic white (Confetti brand, I think?) and Essie Your Hut or Mine. I just put two little dots right next to each other and swirled them together using a bobby pin (as I don't have a dotting tool). Then the leaves are acrylic paint, done with a tiny striper brush.

One of my uncles-in-law actually pointed them out and said they looked lovely! Then he said, "My daughter had to have the Hunger Games polishes... I ended up buying her two of them!" I laughed and said, "Yeah, my mom bought me all 12..." Now his daughter hates me forever, I think, but I don't care because someone noticed my nails! That's all I ever want from life, really. :)

China Glaze: Hunger Games - Agro

I have so many other manis to show you (I'm a couple weeks behind on here vs real life), but I got my China Glaze polishes yesterday, put on Agro, and FELL IN LOVE. So here are some pictures, because I don't want to make you want to see them!

Agro is a mossy green with a great shimmer. It's almost a metallic, vaguely frosty shimmer, but not at all in a brushstrokey way.

First, here are a few pictures in the shade.

These are all just 1 coat. There is a little balding going on at the base of a couple fingers -- see the ring finger -- but that is all entirely my fault. My brush was a little wonky; it was a little fluffier than the China Glaze brush I'm used to, and it had one piece that went out a bit to the side, but it wasn't bad enough to be a hindrance. One coat that looks this good this easily is an A++ in my book.

Super gorgeous, right?! It makes me think of a mossy, shady forest in the sumer. I love it.
But wait. It gets better.

Super shimmery in the sun! And look at it out of focus:

Some of that shimmer looks a little holographic to me! It's all sorts of pretty colors.

All of these pictures are clickable to make huge, but this is the one you absolutely HAVE to see large! The index finger is in focus, so you can see how pretty the polish itself is, but the closer fingers show you some of this seriously amazing shimmer! I haven't seen anyone else mention this, so I was not expecting it, and it is INCREDIBLE.

To sum up: I love Agro! Now to choose which HG polish to use next...