Lynnderella Connect The Dots

About a month ago I received my epic haul from Llarowe. Included in the package were my Lynnderellas! Most importantly, I finally got my hands on "Connect The Dots". That was the polish that made me fall in love with Lynnderella. Surely you have all seen swatches of "Connect The Dots" already, so this is nothing new and ground breaking, but I still love it.

The base is an Essie color, I can not remember the name nor can I locate the bottle at the moment. If anyone recognizes the color, tell me the name in the comments section! *EDIT*- It is called "School of Hard Rocks"
I am not quite sure how many coats of CTD was used. I had my nails done at the salon (I'm getting lazy with doing my own nails lately), and my nail lady did the standard polish application procedure which is to gently wipe the excess on the inside of the neck of the bottle and apply a thin coat. This doesn't work with Lynns due to the amount and different sizes of glitter. The result was that only the tiny dot glitter went in to the nail. It looked like salt and pepper! So when I got home I applied another coat of CTD, but this time I applied it without wiping off the excess, and pushing the glitter evenly around on the nail.

So as much as I love Lynnderella polishes, I think I am satisfied with what I have in my collection (Connect The Dots, The Glittering Crowd, Snow Angel, One Nutty Fruit Cake, All Hallow's Eve, Shape Shifter, and Bride of Franken). There are a few new ones I would like, and I am kicking myself for not ordering "Very Pretty Vampire" or the "Glitter Tamer" topcoat, but it seems to be a lot of trouble to order now. You have to email a special email account, get a form, fill out the form, and then go on a wait list! This is testament to how wonderful and popular Lynnderellas are, but I think I am good now. I would rather let someone else who doesn't own any of these beauties get the chance to have some!

On that note, if anyone has "Very Pretty Vampire" and would like to swap it with me for "Snow Angel", please email me! "Snow Angel" is GORGEOUS, but I am just not loving it on me!!

Claire's "Disco" glitter

Hello everyone! I have been having a great week. I am on vacation in Arizona. I absolutely love it! The landscape out here is beautiful and the weather is perfect!
I'm visiting friends and a few nights ago I kinda had a little too much wine, and then right before I was going to bed I thought "oh hey I should do my nails..." (I think we can all see where this is going, LOL)

I picked up some good polishes out here, one of them was Claire's "Disco". I LOVE holo glitter polishes. This is pure silver holo hexagons, all one size. Reminds me of American Apparel's "Light Year" which I wanted, but now I think "Disco" will satisfy me!

"Disco" is a little bit hard to apply, as are most medium/larger glitter polishes. I'm sure the wine didn't help my application skills!

I had a difficult time trying to get all the glitter evenly on my nail. You can see how it clumped in certain spots, particularly on my ring finger in the above photo.

It is a bit overkill, and it took some getting used to. It looks crazy rainbow shiny in direct sunlight of course, so much so that my camera couldn't capture it properly! I like that I can still see some of the flakies in between the glitter.

My dream polish would be a solid silver chrome that shines back a holo rainbow. Like the back of a CD. I think the closest I will get to that is a chunky holo glitter like this, or maybe one of those nail sticker things. I believe MinxLusion comes close, but I have not seen them IRL, so I can not be sure.

I'll probably leave this on until I get home. My gel mani is holding up pretty well, only the middle finger on my left and and my index on my right have chips. It has been almost 2 weeks.

Oh and I have 50 followers now!!! :) Yay!

DUPE ALERT!! Happy Birthday vs Gems

I have been on a serious glitter kick lately! I think the OPI Burlesque Collection got me started!

After I found the dollar store BSN glitter that reminded me of Deborah Lippmann's "Happy Birthday" I decided to go out and seek the real deal. I was considering spending $18 for the full bottle, but then I saw a cute little set of 3 mini DL polishes that came complete with a mini plastic carry case for $25. The colors were: "Happy Birthday", "Wicked Game", and "Dark Side of the Moon". While I am happy I finally got my hands on some DL polishes, I am SOOOO happy I didn't buy the full size of "Happy Birthday"!

I was at CVS yesterday and I saw a new display from Milani called Rockstar Heavy Glitter. The first one that caught my eye was "Gems". It was $4.99 and I knew I had to get it (along with the other glitters in the line)! These new Milani polishes are advertised as being a one coat glitter. Sounds good to me!

Here is a quick comparison between the two:

"Gems" is more dense with glitter than "Happy Birthday". The different sizes and colors of glitter are exactly the same except "Happy Birthday" has pink hexagonal glitter, while "Gems" does not. This is barely noticeable and only a true nail fanatic would notice such a difference.

Overall I think Milani did a great job with this color. I am surprised, but I think I like the Milani version better!

EDIT: If we are not basing it on price, I think I like Deborah Lippmann version better. Since it less dense than "Gems", "Happy Birthday" is better for layering over another polish. Although it isn't too apparent in my swatches, "Happy Birthday" has more of a rainbow confetti feel than "Gems". "Gems" has more of a Christmas feel, which I don't really care for. (Yes, I am a slight Grinch.)

BSN "Remix"

I found this gem at my local dollar store. The brand is BSN (Beauty Sense of NY) and the color name is "Remix". The first thing I thought of when I was applying it was that it reminds me of Deborah Lippmann "Happy Birthday". I don't own "Happy Birthday", but the most obvious difference I can see from checking out swatches online is that "Remix" doesn't have any green in it. Only pink, red, blue, and the tiny gold glitter.

This is 2 thick coats. the first coat dried quickly but the second coat took awhile. It had a funny chemical smell, but it has since disappeared.

The bottom label had something I have never seen before on a nail polish. An expiration date! Apparently this is good until January 2014!