Category Archives: Product Reviews

Pretty Serious Museum of Naileontology Collection (3 New Shades)

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Pretty Serious Museum of Naileontology Collection 2016 Swatches Twitter

I hope that you all are having a wonderful Christmas Eve! 🙂

A dynamic trio has been added to the Pretty Serious Museum of Naileontology Collection for 2016, and they are available on the Pretty Serious website:

  • Mad Skull of Cloverton – Pink-green pearly duochrome
  • Chariots of the Red Sea – Red glitter jelly
  • Disc of the Heavens – Green glitter jelly

Mad Skull of Cloverton has a delicate sensibility with an air of elegance, like a modest string of pearls worn with a Little Black Dress. The soft pink dominates the nail polish, and it’s accented with a flash of angelic green.

The formula of Mad Skull of Cloverton was on the sheer side, but it builds up opacity quickly with a second coat. I opted to use three coats to further bring out the intensity of the pretty duochrome.

Chariots of the Red Sea offers depth because the glitter is suspended in a jelly base, which allows the sparkle to peek through, rather than get covered up and look flat. Two coats is all you’ll need for this beauty to fully cover the nail.

Disc of the Heavens has subtle glitter in a jelly base that, when worn with two coats (as I did here), looks more like a crelly (creme-jelly hybrid). It has a milky look to it.

All Pretty Serious nail polish are formulated without Toluene, DBP, Formaldehyde, and Formaldehyde Resin. Also, you’ll be happy to hear that they are vegan and cruelty-free.

My favourite of the trio? While I have a soft spot for green nail polish, the one that caught my attention the most was Mad Skull of Cloverton because of the duochrome shift!

P.S. Have you entered my worldwide giveaway? Enter by December 31, 2016 for your chance to win the Zoya Enchanted Collection! (3 winners! Be sure to read all the details in the giveaway’s blog post.)

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Pretty Serious Ghosts of Christmas Past Collection Swatches & Review

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Pretty Serious Ghosts of Christmas Past Collection Swatches Review

With Christmas just an ole Saint Nick wink away, I thought that I’d share with you swatches of the festive Pretty Serious Ghosts of Christmas Past Collection that recently arrived in my mailbox! (You can find the collection available to purchase on the Pretty Serious website.)

While it’s a holiday collection, these colours can be worn any time of year, so don’t keep them in the dark corners of your Helmer. They want to be taken out for a night on the town. Who wouldn’t?

My favourite, while difficult to choose among so many beauties, is Enchanted Evergreen (the dark green) because my affinity for green nail polish knows no bounds. Gimme, gimme, gimme! 😉 If you’re a green lover, I’m sure you’ll love it, too, because it’s richly pigmented, and it has darkness and depth without looking like a black polish.

Hmm…but Peace on Earth is tied for first place. It’s an ethereal seafoam green that has delicate flashes of pink. These flashes remind me a lot of the inside of some pearlescent seashells. Magical and fairy-esque don’t even begin to describe its appearance.

You can never go wrong with a classic holiday red like Velvet Bow (a rock-and-roll metallic) or Verry Merry Berry (a super shiny creme).

Make nails sing a Christmas melody with silver (Fairy Lights) and gold (Tarnished Tinsel).

Then, there are the two top coats that can completely transform your existing manicure, taking it from strolling down the sidewalk to modelling on Mars (in a good way)! Hehe, oh the places that my mind sometimes goes. 😉

Jack Frost doesn’t nip at my nose. Instead, this iridescent glitter top coat makes my heart race like Usain Bolt! I tried it over Enchanting Evergreen, and it created a blue galactic wonder on my nails! (If you like my swatch of it, you will love it even more in person.)

Mojito is the other top coat. It has fine green shimmer, so adding it to any manicure will bring out its inner ribbit. 🙂

If some of you aren’t already familiar with Pretty Serious nail polishes, they’re cruelty-free and vegan. They also don’t contain Toluene, Formaldehyde, Formaldehyde Resin, or DBP.

P.S. There’s still time to enter my Zoya Enchanted Collection worldwide giveaway, but hurry – it ends December 31! (Remember, there will be three winners!)

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Zoya Naturel 3 Collection Swatches & Review

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Zoya Naturel 3 Collection Swatches Review

A few days ago, the Zoya Naturel 3 Collection launched on Zoya’s official website, and it includes six colours that are work-appropriate and that will flatter different skin tones. (As a refresher, check out the official press release that I published on here earlier.)

While I am the first one to pounce on a bold, vibrant nail colour, I can appreciate muted tones that offer understated elegance.

For formal occasions or in conservative settings, it’s not always appropriate to wear a manicure that screams louder than a neon-plaid jumpsuit. Those times call for wear-anytime colours. The Zoya Naturel 3 Collection fits the bill!

As you know, Zoya nail polishes are often given women’s names. I’m thrilled to see that Zoya has finally released a nail polish called Mary! 😉 It’s described as a ‘raisin,’ which is accurate because it’s a soft brown with a tinge of purple mixed in. I love how it’s slightly different than your run-of-the-mill gingerbread brown.

Zoya’s creme nail polishes are always on point with smooth, pigmented formulas that are consistent and reliable. The ones in the Zoya Naturel 3 Collection live up to my expectations because they were a dream to apply, and I only needed to use two coats to achieve full opacity.

The formula is also very forgiving, in that it doesn’t dry too fast, so you have some time to paint over your nail several times to get the look and coverage you want. No hiccups here! Plus because they’re cremes, they were easy peasy to remove.

They also are shiny, even without a top coat. (All of my swatches in this post are shown without a base or top coat, and you can see how glassy the nail polishes are!)

My favourites? Aside from being biased and having a soft spot for the one named Mary (hehe), Debbie and Jill are my next choices.

Which ones are you gravitating toward?

P.S. If you haven’t already, remember to enter my Zoya Enchanted Collection worldwide giveaway by December 31st! (There will be three winners. Check that blog post for all the details. Good luck in the draw!)

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How to Get a Personalized The Body Shop Body Butter

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The Body Shop Fiji Green Tea Body Butter

A little while ago, I came home to a fun surprise in the mail: a personalized The Body Shop Fuji Green Tea Body Butter! This cute Christmas gift from PR put a smile on my face. 🙂

Have someone on your holiday list who might also love this? 

According to The Body Shop Global Gifting survey, which studied the gifting behaviours of 1,950 men and women across 10 countries from five continents, “48% of people want to give a bespoke gift during the holidays.”

If you’re a fellow Canadian and you are close to these participating stores, you can create your own personalized Body Butter:

  • CF Toronto Eaton Centre (220 Yonge Street, Toronto, Ontario)
  • The Body Shop Toronto Pop-Up Store (93 Bloor Street West, Toronto, Ontario)
  • CF Richmond Centre (6551 No. 3 Road, Richmond, British Columbia)

There are different designs that you can choose from, not just the flamingo. All were designed in collaboration with Yago Partal and his world-renowned portraits of animals.

The Body Shop’s personalized Body Butters can feature one of four exotic creatures to help bring your gift to life and add a fun, creative, and wild touch.

To add a name to The Body Shop Body Butter, all you have to do is purchase a 200ml ($21 CAD) or 400ml ($34 CAD) Body Butter at the above stores. Then, one of the store’s consultants at the till point will help you to create your personalized Body Butter!

What are some of your favourite things from The Body Shop? Are you interested in me reviewing this Fiji Green Tea Body Butter or other The Body Shop products? Let me know!

P.S. In case you missed yesterday’s post, I’m having a Zoya Enchanted Collection Giveaway that’s open worldwide. Hurry to get your entry in, as it ends December 31, 2016! (3 winners!)

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CND Creative Play Celebration Collection Swatches & Review

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CND Creative Play Celebration Collection Swatches

Nails just wanna have fun with the eight festive polishes in the CND Creative Play Celebration Collection!

With an assortment of dazzling glitters, smooth-as-silk cremes, and more, this is the collection you’ll want to break out for a night on the town, sitting by the fireside on Christmas Eve, and ringing in the New Year in style.

The cremes (Naughty or Vice and Happy Holly Day) apply like a sugarplum-fairy dream and are pigmented. No painting hiccups. I used two coats for each.

The playful glitters (Extravaglint, Stellarbration, and Turquoise Tidings) are excellent for layering one coat over another colour. They’re great for sprucing up an old manicure and giving it some seasonal sizzle.

Turquoise Tidings is the only one from the glitter bunch that you could also wear solo. With three coats, it covered well and had a mystical mermaid glimmer that photos can’t do justice. (See it in person for the Wow Factor!)

The other two glitters are sparse, so they’re best used as toppers. (Also, in Stellarbration, there’s some star confetti. It can be a bit tricky to fish them out and place them with a brush, so you may want to use a thin, precise tool like a toothpick.)

The yellow, Foiled Again, is much more golden and flashy than it appears in my swatch. It’s certainly a blingy polish that catches the light. The pigmentation on this was great, as I only needed two coats to fully cover my nails.

Revelry Red is a traditional Santa red that’s ideal for the holidays, but instead of being flat, it gets extra festive with small glitter and microshimmer. Instead of being blingy, this one subtly twinkles.

RSVPlum has an icy appearance, and I recommend carefully painting this on straight because the brushstrokes, while subtle, are still noticeable up close.

Check out the rest of this post to see a closer look at my swatches of all eight colours and to see the press release for the colour story!

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CND New Wave Collection Swatches & Review

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CND New Wave Collection Swatches Review

Bob your head, and tap your nails to the colourful tune of the CND New Wave Collection for Spring 2017, which officially launches in January!

Shake off the cold weather with a look at six bold hues that will have you feeling nostalgic over Cyndi Lauper, teased hair, denim jackets, and friendship bracelets! It’s no wonder because the CND New Wave Collection drew inspiration from the electric 1980s.

This collection puts a huge smile on my face! Being a big fan of saturated shades, I was inspired to put together the above collage to showcase the spectrum. (Who else was a kid growing up in the 1980s? Ah, yes, it was a decade of great memories, music, and funny fashion!) 🙂

In today’s blog post, I share with you swatches of all six shades in the CND Vinylux formula: Video Violet, Pink Leggings, Blue Eyeshadow, Jelly Bracelet, Banana Clips, and Ecstacy. (They’re also available in the CND Shellac formula.)

The CND Vinylux New Wave Collection colours applied easily and smoothly. The cremes (Pink Leggings, Blue Eyeshadow, Banana Clips, and Video Violet) were especially pigmented, and I only needed two coats to achieve full opacity. (Even though yellow nail polishes are notorious for being streaky and hard to work with, Banana Clips was an exception. It was very pigmented, and I didn’t see any streaks. Great yellow!)

The two shimmers in the collection (Ecstacy and Jelly Bracelet) covered well with two coats, but I found that three coats brought out the best in them.

My swatches of the CND Vinylux shades are shown without a top coat. You can see how shiny they are on their own.

All the CND Vinylux nail polishes are intended to be used in conjunction with the CND Vinylux Weekly Top Coat, however, in my experience, I’ve found that using your favourite shiny top coat can work well, too.

On November 22nd, I had the pleasure of attending a PR event where I was treated to a professional CND Shellac manicure at the TIPS Nail Bar in Greektown. I chose the colour Blue Eyeshadow, and if you follow me on social media like Instagram, you already saw a few photos of it!

Later in this post, you’ll also see some photos that I took in the nail salon, and The Good Press juices that matched three of the CND New Wave Collection nail polishes. Additionally, I’ve included the official press release, promotional images, and nail-art ideas, if you want some colourful and creative inspiration!

CND Shellac Blue Eyeshadow (from the New Wave Collection)

CND Shellac Blue Eyeshadow

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Kitlife Planner 2017 & CND New Wave Collection for Spring 2017

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Kitlife Planner 2017 CND New Wave Collection

I’m planning great things for next year with my cute Kitlife Planner (Festival Edition) and favourite Staedtler Fineliners!

I used to use the Erin Condren Life Planners, but decided to switch it up because the Kitlife Planner has a full page for each weekday, which allows me to write more and still have space to decorate, if I want to. (Also, Kitlife shipped the planner super fast to Canada. We’re talking just a few days!)

Until December 4, on the Kitlife Planner website, you can enjoy 15% off everything with the coupon code “CYBERSAVINGS15”.

Also, I’m loving the CND New Wave Collection for Spring 2017, which includes colours that are inspired by the electric 80s. It launches in January 2017.

Not long ago, I attended a PR event and was cordially treated to a professional CND Shellac manicure in Blue Eyeshadow from this collection at the TIPS Nail Bar in Greektown.

I wore it for about 10 days straight, and it was still going strong. However, I finally removed it, so that I could swatch the collection of 6 Vinylux shades.

Swatches are coming soon, so stay tuned! 🙂 Edit (December 5): Swatches of the CND New Wave Collection are now up!

Are you also a planner? What are your favourite planner supplies? Have you ever tried bullet journaling? (That’s something I want to get into.)

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