Tag Archives: OPI

The Best of 2011: Nail Polish, Nail Art, Makeup, Skincare & Fragrance

Swatch And Learn The Best of 2011 It’s been quite a year, hasn’t it?

I’ve tried all sorts of new beauty products including nail polishes. And I’ve had tons of fun coming up with nail-art designs!

Now that it’s the last day in 2011, it’s time to reflect upon the year.

I’d like to share with you my Best of 2011 list! I still have a ton of favourites from last year, so these picks are strictly new ones that I’ve blogged about in 2011.

You’ll see it broken down into the following categories: nail polish (duh), nail art (double duh), fragrance, makeup, and skincare. All lists are in no particular order. (It was difficult enough to whittle down my picks for the nail polishes!)

Feel free to click on the links – they’ll take you to the blog post with the swatches, reviews, and tutorial (where appropriate).

Now I’m so curious about what you think!

Is there a lacquer that you feel I sorely missed including? Have you found your Holy Grail facial cleanser? What nail-art design have you worn in 2011 that you would consider wearing again in 2012?

Please weigh in with your picks! We’re all different, but our love for beauty products brings us together. 🙂 Continue reading →

Nail Art Tutorial: Snow Bunny Nails

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Flash Snow Bunny Rabbit Nails Nail Art Tutorial & Pictures Since I had so much fun wearing my Penguin Nails, I decided to try more animal nail art in the snow – Snow Bunny Nails!

Although this design doesn’t use many colours, it took much longer to complete than the penguins. So if you give this one a go, make sure you have a good chunk of time on your hands.

Like what we learned in Aesop’s Fables, slow and steady wins the race. Looks like in this manicure, the hare taught us that, though, not the tortoise.

This was my Christmas manicure. I wore it on the 23rd straight through to today even though I really wanted to wear China Glaze Party Hearty. (After spending over an hour on these ‘wascally wabbits’, as Elmer Fudd would say, I just couldn’t bring myself to remove them for a long time.)

With some minor tweaking (i.e. making the ears shorter), you can easily convert these rabbit nails into cat nails!

Also, I was extremely busy over the past few days, so I was only able to capture this manicure mainly with my flash. Although, a few are in the sunlight and some are in terrible dim artificial light. But from the mediocre photos I was able to take, you get the basic idea. Continue reading →

Nail Art Tutorial: Reindeer Nails (Rudolph Nails)

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Sunlight Reindeer Nails Nail Art Tutorial & Swatches It seems like everyone’s doing Reindeer Nails (Rudolph Nails) lately, and since it’s a design I’ve never tried before, I thought there’s no time like the present!

Although I liked the way it turned out, I strongly suggest that if you replicate it, that you opt for a light-coloured background instead of a bronze shimmer like I did. (It’s better to have more contrast between the background and the antlers.)

Also, I used red heart sequins for the noses because I wanted to do something different than just dots. This proved to be both a good and bad choice. I’ll explain later on in my step-by-step tutorial featuring written instructions and photos. Continue reading →

Nail Art Tutorial: Penguin Nails

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Sunlight Penguin Nails Nail Art Tutorial & Swatches My hands are usually cold during this time of year, so I thought it would be a great idea to do Penguin Nails! (Also, one of my followers on beautylish requested that I do penguins sometime. I was happy to oblige!)

This look is extremely easy to do, but the finished design appears more complicated.

Like I always say, it’s about patience more than it is about skill. Don’t be intimidated by nail art!

(Check out my tutorial where I walk you through it with step-by-step written instructions and photographs.)

I really hope that you’ll try this design. 🙂 And if you do, let me know how it goes! Continue reading →

OPI DS Glamour Swatches & Review

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Flash OPI DS Glamour Swatches & Review Think about a blue that first comes to mind when someone says ‘denim’. Now, imagine that it’s holographic. You’ve got OPI DS Glamour – it’s an oldie, but a goodie!

I really miss these kind of holographic colours that used to be in the OPI DS (Designer Series) collection. They were really outstanding in every way.

Like all OPI DS polishes, they cost more than your typical bottle of OPI. Thankfully, when I first got into nail polish, this was really easy to find for even less than the retail price of a regular OPI bottle, so it didn’t hurt my wallet.

There are still new colours added to the Designer Series collection, but I think they pale in comparison to the beauties from just a few years ago. I wonder if it’s because of a pigment shortage or a price increase for it.

If you’re lucky enough to get your hands on it without paying a small fortune, I urge you to buy it. This is a very special polish! Continue reading →

OPI Grape…Set…Match Swatches & Review

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Sunlight OPI Grape Set Match Swatches & Review Some exciting news! A couple of days ago, I purchased a DSLR camera (my first one ever). All this time, I’ve been using a really ancient Sony Cyber-shot DSC W200 point-and-shoot camera, so it’s a huge upgrade. 🙂 The Sony was good, but it’s been dying on me a lot lately.

I’ll be playing around with the new toy for a couple of weeks or so before I introduce photos I take with it on here.

Hopefully you’ll all notice a big quality increase when I make the switch. I’m mostly curious about how well it works in dim light, since my current camera can’t handle it. (When I use the DSLR on the first post, I’ll announce it.)

Today I have for you OPI Grape…Set…Match, which is part of the OPI Grand Slam England Duo Set. Continue reading →

OPI My Private Jet Swatches & Review

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Sunlight OPI My Private Jet Swatches & Review Holographic nail polish makes me happy because it lets you take a rainbow wherever you go!

When I was picking what colour to wear a while ago, I came across OPI My Private Jet from the 2007 Night Brights Collection. The last time (and first time) I wore it was on Hallowe’en in 2009. That’s far too long ago, so I had to bust it out again.

It’s exactly what I remembered – a sheer charcoal with holographic particles that are somewhat linear, but are really soft, so it’s somehow also a little scattered at the same time.

Now, there are at least 2 different versions of OPI My Private Jet. This is one of the older ones, which is why it’s charcoal. The newer version is brown and still pretty. (I don’t own the brown version.) Continue reading →