Well, this makes me feel better...

After my experience with Mermaid's Tale, I was pretty down on the Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure line. But, because I never give up after one shot, I tried it again!

The top row in the collage is Wet N Wild Megalast in Valet Tag, which is a gorgeous neutral beige, with just a pinch of purple to it. It went on smooth, and easy. The color is really pigmented - that's only one coat in the pictures!

Wet N Wild promises that Megalast will deliver "5 days of chip resistant wear", and they are a brand that really sticks to their promises, because that's exactly what I got. In fact, if you're counting a little optimistically, it might have even made it to six!
Wet N Wild Megalast comes with a wide brush. In fact, one of the widest I've seen in any brand! I can clear each finger in about a stroke and a half, maybe two if I really want to be fussy about the coverage. Every formula I've tried has been nice to control, thickness wise, and was easy to clean off the skin if you accidentally paint your skin instead - which we've all been known to do a time or two. :D

The bottom row is "Commander in Chic", from the Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure line. My last try at the Salley Hansen CSM line was Mermaid's Tale (read about that frustrating experience; here), so I was pretty down on the line.

I'm much enthused to report that I had much greater luck this time! The color went on smooth, to a high gloss finish, and lasted a full six days with no chips! The color is a nice purple grey (what it looks like on my toes doesn't do it much justice, it's pretty true to the color in the bottle). It's a nice stand out color, without being as bold as say, black or blue. It's not particularly summery, but is enough of a stand out that you can get away with it whenever you want!

I was really pleased with both of these colors, and I'd for sure recommend them again! :)

Bye, beautiful!

Look at my WILD lashes!

Mascara is one of those products where it's pretty tough to reinvent the wheel, even though everybody claims that they have. Think about the advertising for mascara - everybody is always claiming that their's is the latest, greatest thing in lash building, lash curling, lash darkening technology. And they're usually good, but they usually never live up to their own hype.

Now, having said that? Let's talk about this.

Wet N Wild Megavolume mascara. With it's cheerful, bright yellow tube. I especially appreciated the packaging, given my black, overcrowded makeup bag. :D

This mascara promises a 5x increase in the natural looking length and volume for your lashes.

Y'all, I kid you not - it delivers. This is one of the first mascaras that I've ever seen that does exactly what it says it will. The brush is wide set, and the formula is thick, goes on without clumps, and both dries and builds well. Really impressive, especially for the price!

I will say though, that this doesn't even play at pretending that it's waterproof - I washed my face with this on, and washed around my eyes, and still had racoon eyes when I stood up. This takes another round with the makeup remover, for sure.

I do alot of the picture taking for this blog with my iPad, and I downloaded a collage app over the weekend, so rather than show you five different pictures, you can see most of what I'm trying to show, all in one shot. :)

The product! You can tell, a tube that bright would be easy to spot, for sure! :)

The collage, so you can see the mascara in action. The bottom right square is no mascara at all. You can tell in all the others, even the one with the heaviest liner, that there is a definite increase in definition, length and volume in my lashes.

I don't often buy the same mascara twice, but I would definitely give Wet N Wild mascaras a second look! Try them out, you might be surprised! :)

Later, beautiful!

Doesn't it figure...

...I get turned on to Revlon Colorstay nail polish, right as it's getting ready to be a thing of the past?

Revlon is getting ready to replace the Colorstay with the Colorstay Gel Envy, so heads up - if you haven't stocked up on your favorites from the Colorstay line, now's the time!

At any rate - this line promises 11 days worth of high gloss, chip free color. And I am nothing, if not willing to test that sort of thing, so I was hoping against hope for 11, but I made it 7. After a week, I started getting grow out, like you would with a set of acrylics. And, just like with a set of acrylics, the grow lines were snagging in my hair when I took a shower. So that was the end of the Colorstay colors. But I will say - at the end of the 7 days? Just as beautiful, and glossy and chip free as it was at Day 1!

I purchased two colors - "Trade Winds", a nice neutral tan, and "Rich Raspberry" which was, well, a rich raspberry color. I actually picked out these two in particular, because I thought they might look nice together. I've been reading up on nail art, and thought these might be a nice pair to try it out with.

I was quickly shown the error of my ways though. Both products come with the same brush - wide, thick, allows you to maintain a nice level of control of the polish. But where Rich Raspberry was thick, rich and pigmented (one coat could *just* about get the job done, you'll see that in the pictures later), Trade Winds doesn't boast the same thickness. In fact, if a good French Manicure is your thing, Trade Winds is probably a color you need to own. So, they do both look very nice, but they weren't a good match to try out my nail art skills on.

The beauty shot. Nice big portion of color for the price, good handle to hang on to. The colors have a nice wide, thick brush, which gives you a nice control of the color. And see what I mean, about thinking they'd look nice together? They do, don't they? And I think I mentioned this already, but if you're a Colorstay original formula fan, stock up, because they're getting swapped out for the Gel Envy line.

The Rich Raspberry, in action. With this one, there's enough of a color payoff that one coat will just about get the job done, I just like my raspberries a bit higher voltage, so I went in for two. So if you like the color, but without the high wattage, one coat might do it for you.

The nails. With the one coat, you can see that there's still some transparency, one coat would probably make a excellent base for a french manicure, if the pink isn't your thing. I went in for two, and it bubbled a little bit, unfortunately. I kept looking at it, dismayed, but my seven year old son (and you can trust boys to keep it real, haha...) told me that no one else noticed but me, so I'll have to take his word for it, that I was just being fussy.

The colors looked great, and held up impeccably, so I'd absolutely recommend them. Target has just about cleared out of their stock, Wal-Greens just started, and Rite-Aid still has their full supply, at full price. If you're a decent enough couponer, you can get a great deal on some polishes!

I will also point out - this raspberry color removed cleaner, and easier, than any color I've removed in a while. I was well and truly surprised that I didn't end up with raspberry colored toes! Clean and easy, right off!

More beauty tips from Pinterest!

This week, as much out of necessity as it was anything else, I tested another tip off Pinterest!

The last polish I had on my toes was the Rimmel "Red, Steady, Go!", and while that is in fact a gorgeous polish, taking it off was kind of a mess. Will I never learn to wear a base coat? It created such a mess, that it prompted my son to ask me if I'd been bleeding. :O

So the tip from Pinterest said to take whitening toothpaste, and a nail brush. Apply the toothpaste to the toe nails, and go to town. That sounds crazy to me, I'll sacrifice my toes to the cause!

Unfortunately, I didn't end up with a good enough before picture (I always take lots of pictures, so I've got choices, but none of them came out great...), but like I said. My seven year old asked me I were bleeding. So you can imagine.

The tools I used. Crest Complete toothpaste, available at any drug store the world over, and a nail brush, that might have cost me a dollar or two at the beauty supply.

In action! Apply the toothpaste to the toes, and scrub! And that's every bit as tough to hike your leg in to the sink and stand still enough to take a picture as you'd figure it'd be. But if I wasn't going to have bloody toes anymore, it was worth it!

After! No more bloody toes! Hooray! Another swipe at them with some nail polish remover, and I was ready to go for a new pedi!

We all know Pinterest is a little hit and miss, information wise. Sometimes, it's solid, sometimes, not as much. So I've been pleasantly surprised to find out I've gotten two good tips in a row so far! :)

I'll keep looking for interesting tips and tricks - these have been as surprising to try out as they have been successful, so far - and you keep looking beautiful!

See you next time!

It's "Test a tip off Pinterest!" Week!

This week on Pinterest, I read a tip from a makeup artist that said that people should be wearing PURPLE eyeliner, because purple will help the eye pop, better than black or brown liner. I went "What, really?!", and promptly went out to look for some purple liner to test this little tip out for myself.

To make sure that it was genuinely my eyeliner that was making my eyes pop, and not my eyeshadow, or something of that nature, I kept all my makeup exactly the same over the course of this little experiment.

My little helpers:

From top to bottom, we have;

Boots No. 7 eye color duo in "Royal". It's a gold, and what I think is purple. And I say "I think", because it's one of those shape shifter colors. In certain lights, it looks like a real deep purple, in certain lights navy, and on my pale skin, it looks black. It's really rad. I think they've changed up their products, but I hope that's one I can find again.

Rimmel Scandal-eyes mascara in black. While I do like it (and I do - goes on smooth, doesn't clump, regardless of how many layers I put on), it's not as exceptional as Rimmel would probably want you to believe. Everybody wants to talk about their mascaras like they're exceptional...they aren't.

Rimmel Scandal-eyes eye shadow stick in Paranoid Purple. And if you'll let me go off on this one for a second - this one had a CRAZY tight lid. I'm perfectly healthy, getting that liner off shouldn't have been that hard! And I got halfway through lining my first eye, and the point BROKE. And of course I can't find a sharpener to keep going, so I end up painting the shadow on with a q-tip. Irritating, for sure! I'd be a little bit pressed to buy another one of these, even as much as I liked it, just because of all the trouble I had with it!!

Rimmel Scandal-eyes waterproof Kohl-Kajal eyeliner in black. I got this in a GWP with the mascara, and this, I like. It's like the kid sister to the new L'Oreal eyeliner that's out right now. Nicely pigmented, long lasting. I feel like I'd buy this one again if I ran out of it.

Lastly, Wet N Wild Color Icon pencil in Purple. I let myself get a little intimidated by this one, and I really shouldn't have. The pencil makes this look like it was a REALLY vivid purple, and I kept looking at it, and getting eighth grade royal blue eyeliner flashbacks (we were all there once...), and talking myself out of wearing it. In reality, it's a nice royal purple, and wears nice. It was much better than I had imagined, which is always a pleasant surprise. :D I'd buy this one again, for sure.

So I tested this out three different ways;

Just purple. This is the Rimmel purple, because I hadn't yet convinced myself to go Wet N Wild. And I had quite the Murphy's Law experience with this one (I already spoke to some of it, in my description of the pencil, so I won't go over it again, haha...), but I'm not disappointed. My eyes are blue, and I felt like the purple actually made them look lighter, and greener, which was a surprising development.

This is the Rimmel black liner, with the same eyeshadow/mascara combo. There's nothing to hate here, but you don't get quite the same POP that you get from the purple.

This look was the purple and black put together. I used the Wet N Wild purple this time, rather than the Rimmel purple. I put together the entire look, with the black liner, and then drew the purple liner, up over the top of the black. This might have been my favorite look of the three. At first, when this was fresh, this felt like an absurdly large amount of makeup - then as it settled in to my skin a little bit, and was a lot happier with it.

I know sometimes Pinterest can be full of craziness, and impossible to duplicate tips, but I think in this case, there's no disputing - the purple does in fact pop the eye (well, my eye anyway), better than black does. Purple! Who knew, am I right?!

See ya later, gorgeous!

Yes, another pedi...

Does my current nail polish obsession know no bounds?!

And will I ever remember to trim my finger nails, so I can paint them too?!

Let's find out together!

This weeks find was 60 Second Nail Polish, by Rimmel, which promises to dry in only 60 seconds. I hardly got out a timer, but it did seem to dry pretty fast. So, on the question of "does it live up to the promises?" My answer is a solid, "Um...maybe?"

The color I selected is called "Red, Steady, Go!", and is a bright, neutral red. Not especially warm, or cool. Bright, and solid. The color has a nice brush, and goes on smoothly, evenly, and streak free. It's really a fun color, another one that was a little outside of my realm. My seven year old picked it out - he's got a real eye for color, he wanted me to try this one. I like it! I might let him pick more often!

The packaging is clearly written, and easy to read. The bottle, like most, is the color of the product inside. Which means for a bright, neutral red, this one would be easy to find, just about anywhere! The bottle is small though. Like, surprisingly small. But having said that, I'll tell you this. Actually, I'll tell you two things:

1)This polish is cheap. It retails for $1.50 (USD) at my local Wal-Mart. So they're charging the right prices, not to mention, for that price, you can change your polish a lot!

And 2)Rimmel puts out coupons a lot. Like, a lot. In fact, the whole reason I bought this color was because I had a good coupon. I had a coupon for $1 off any Rimmel product, so I got this tasty little viddle of nail polish for 50 cents! Can't beat that!

The beauty shots:

The bottle! Easy to read, easy to find in the dark (lol...)

The polish, on my toes. Goes on smooth and extra glossy. My husband and son, both of whom profess to not be nail polish guys, have really enjoyed my testing out all these colors, and I've only had on this color about 10 hours, and it's already drawn both of their attention.

Will update next week with the chippage alert!

Until next time!

Chip Update: 6 days, which actually puts it right up with some of the best that I've tried from the drug store. Although, there was some staining on my toes when I took it off, and that's no good. It prompted the joke that I'd been "stomping strawberries" at the Memorial Day Cookout my family had. So pretty, long lasting, gonna stain your toes. You take the good, you take the bad, you know?

Just another pedi Monday!

Today, I went to the well that is Wet N Wild, thanks to some good couponing and a pink I couldn't resist (serious - I usually go with blues or purples, this is way out of character for me...), and tried out Fergalicious, from their Fergie collection.

First, let's chat about the good:

This color is super fun, and super summery. If you can't wear bright pink on those June (err...middle of May), 90 degree days, when can you wear it?! Some colors aren't particularly seasonal, but pink says summer, all day long!

This polish also comes with a wide brush. In fact, I did my whole pinky toe in one stroke!

Since I mentioned being a bit of a packaging junkie in my last post, I'll also point out - this packaging looks fantastic, it's one that will fit in nice on your vanity. I was having a few technical difficulties that were making me think you wouldn't get to check it out, but I worked it out! So, see?

So fun and summery, and in nice, pretty packaging to boot!

Now let's get to the downside. That great big brush? Delivers really runny product. Like, I know I'm not dealing with super glue or anything, but I ended up with as much polish around my toes, as I did ON my toes, just for working with this runny polish and big brush. As much as I initially loved the big brush, I feel like if the formula is so runny, the brush needs to be smaller, otherwise you just end up with polish smeared from one end of your foot to the other. And that's no bueno. :/

There's the shot you've all been waiting for! It looks great on, but I've only had it on about 20 minutes, so I can't speak to chipping, yet. I'll update when I've got more information on that front!

Later, beautiful!

Chipping Update! Made it to day 5 before I started noticing chipping! So not great, but none too shabby either.