My Picks from Essie Spring 2020!

*All products in this post purchased by me*

Hi everyone! Hope you are all surviving whatever level of Jumanji we're on these days 😂. Today I have my picks from the Essie Spring 2020 collection. I haven't been buying a lot of Essie polishes for a long time now, but the last few of their collections have been really beautiful so that had to change! I also picked up a few from the Summer 2020 collection and have plans to grab some from the newest collections- Sunset Soiree and Sunny Business. First up today is Essie Spring in Your Step, a gorgeous pinky-purple with a reddish pink shimmer. The shimmer is the real key to this polish, it's so smooth and really stands out in the light. Essie Playdate has been a favorite of mine for years, and this is it's shimmering cousin. This kind of purple has well balanced undertones and will look great on a wide variety of skin tones.

OK so remember I said I haven't purchased any new Essies in a long time? Well I completely forgot that they got a new wide brush awhile ago! I was SOOOOOO pleasantly surprised when I uncapped the bottle and saw the perfectly shaped wider brush. I used to hate the skinny little brushes! The new wider brush made application an absolute breeze. This was two easy coats, no need for clean-up. This will definitely be one of my go-to polishes for fast, no fuss application.

Essie Feeling Wellies is the polish that really inspired me to buy these polishes! As soon as I saw pictures of this unique pale mango creme, I knew I needed it! I love yellow and orange polishes, and this is a great pastel mix of both. It reminds me of summery things, like creamsicles and fruity frozen drinks. It will look amazing with a tan (not that I ever get one 😆). I can't think of anything resembling this in my sizable collection of pastel oranges and yellows!

Best part about this? It's opaque in 2-3 coats and has no streaks like some pale colors! I did 3 thin coats, but I tend to apply everything in very thin layers and need 3 coats almost all the time. It was pretty opaque in 2, even for me. Again, no clean-up needed, thanks to the perfectly shaped brush!

Essie Can Dew Attitude is a soft sage green creme. I am always interested in greens of all varieties, so I had to grab this one. I have other pale sage greens, but I think this one is more white based and less dusty than the others I can think of. It almost has that "mod" feel like some light pastels. A great pop of fresh green!

This was two easy coats. It was very opaque and had the same effortless application as the other two, and, as you can see, no streaks in sight. I'm really feeling this new brush, I may have to buy a lot more Essies in the future!

Are any new Essies catching your eye? I'll have my picks from Summer 2020 up for you soon too. 

I ordered these three beauties from 8ty8beauty.com. If you've never ordered from 8ty8Beauty, they are great. I have ordered from them for years. Fast shipping and everything is well packaged so they arrive safely. These are sold out a lot of other places, so if you're looking for them, I see they are still in stock!

TGIL- Volume I of Lynnderella Fridays!

*Sent for review*

I've decided to make Fridays my weekly Lynnderella post, because, quite frankly, what better way to get ready for the weekend than some sparkly Lynnderella goodies? So when you see TGIL- Thank Goodness It's Lynnderella- you know the weekend is almost here! We start off this edition of TGIL with the beautiful Lynnderella Fig State. Fig State is a super sparkly plum microglitter. The glitter is a pink burgundy with holographic flashes. This polish really makes me want to eat plums!

Fig State is super full coverage. This is two thin coats, but I really could have done just one! It was easy to apply, maybe a little thicker than some Lynns, but still good to work with. It was nice and smooth with one layer of Essie Good to Go.

Lynnderella Outlandish is a hot pink sheer jelly with iridescent and gold shards and pink shimmer. This one is so multi-dimensional! The gold shards and the iridescent ones play nicely off of each other and are all sorts of sizes, so they look nicely random. The neon pink is really bright and pretty too.

This is three coats of Outlandish. It has a nice squishy look to it and all of the shards are smooth and flat (yay!). It was nice to apply, no problems.

Be still my navy loving heart! Lynnderella Craving Navy has everything I want in a navy polish- deep dark navy blue base, navy microglitter and twinkly holographic glitter accents sparkling like stars in the night sky. Droooooool.

This is two coats of Craving Navy, but again I almost could have done one coat. It was super pigmented and opaque. It was so easy to apply, I didn't do any clean up here. It was also totally smooth with one layer of Essie Good to Go. My new favorite navy for sure!

Lynnderella Purple Piffle is a super cute pinky purple and holographic microglitter polish. It has a translucent pinky purple base and small holographic purple accent glitters. This is a really beautiful shade of purple, kind of like orchid and deep lavender mixed together.

This is two easy coats of Purple Piffle. It was great to apply and nicely opaque.

Lynnderella Fruitcake Melt is one of those polishes that makes me want to eat it. My mouth actually waters when I look at this and I think of delicious Creamsicles or maybe orange-mango sorbet. Fruitcake Melt is a yellow orange with complex pink, gold and even blue shimmer. The shimmer makes this look different in different lights, sometimes it looks more like a soft peach than it does here. 

This is three coats of Fruitcake Melt. It starts off being translucent, as Lynnderella describes it, but it builds up to full opacity in three coats. It was easy to apply and is a very nice consistency. I don't have much experience with Lynnderella's non-glitters polishes and I was very impressed with this one. It's lovely!

*Sent for review*

These are all limited edition Lynnderellas, so just keep your eye on the Lynnderella eBay store or Lynnderella StorEnvy for these. For more information about Lynnderella, please check out lynnderella-lynnderella.blogspot.com. Also, like Love Lynnderella on Facebook for more pretty swatches!

China Glaze Electric Nights Summer 2015 Swatches, Part 1!

 *Purchased by me*

It's the most wonderful time of the year- China Glaze neon collection time!!! China Glaze neons are always my favorite neon polishes and I basically live in neon polish during the summer months. They're just so bright and happy in the summer! This year, China Glaze was inspired by the electronic music festival scene and apparently the nine neons in this collection all glow under black light. There are also three glitter top coats in the collection, but I skipped those for now. China Glaze Home Sweet House Music is a neon mango creme. It's an orange with a healthy does of yellow. I love orange polish in the summer and this is just perfect! It's a little different from other neon oranges, as it leans more towards the peachy/yellow spectrum, rather than the red end of orange. 

This is three thin coats of Home Sweet House Music. I love that a lot of China Glaze's neons do not require a white base to be vivid, cause ain't nobody got time for that in the summer! The formula of this was good. I let each coat dry completely before applying the next one to avoid streaks. It was pretty opaque in two coats, but I did a third to really smooth it out. Like all neons, these dry to a semi-matte finish, so I finished it off with a coat of Essie Good to Go.

China Glaze Plur-ple is a bright playful blue-purple neon creme. I think it looks a little brighter in my pictures than it did in person and it also looks brighter outside than it does inside. This is a really great purple for summer and I think it's good for people who want to wear a bright without it being radioactive-looking (although I myself love a good radioactive-looking neon, haha).

This is two coats of Plur-ple. I did a have a little trouble with applying this one. I wiped the brush off as I usually do, but on my first two nails, the polish came pooling off the brush very quickly and flooded my nails. You can actually see the difference between my first two nails and the second two in the picture below (I couldn't see it until I put the pictures on the computer though). So the first two have two very thick coats and the second two I managed to control it better. Just be aware that you may have to wipe the brush off a lot more than usual.

*Purchased by me*

I have some more of the Electric Nights neons coming up for you soon! I love these two and can't wait to wear them to the beach! 

I purchased my Electric Nights polishes from nailsupplies.us, but they are also available now at Ulta and Sally Beauty.

OPI Hawaii Spring/Summer 2015 Swatches- Hawaiian Sunset!

*Sent for review*

The OPI Hawaii collection for Spring/Summer 2015 is exactly what I need in my life right now. It really makes me think of a trip to the beautiful islands of Hawaii, a trip I'd like to take immediately. For this collection, I'm going to do a little something different. I'm going to post them a couple at a time and include a fun look with each post. Today I picked three of the colors that remind me of a Hawaiian sunset. OPI Go With the Lava Flow is a juicy blood orange with golden shimmer. This fiery red orange beauty gets a nice kick from the gold in the shimmering base. You can see the gold mostly in brighter lights, although you can see the shimmer even in dim lighting.

This is two coats of Go With the Lava Flow. It was very easy to apply and nicely opaque. The consistency is pretty perfect. I especially can't wait to wear this on my toes on an 85 degree day!

OPI Aloha From OPI is a bright red coral creme. This is a standard summer color, but I can never get enough of them! This particular version leans on the redder side of coral, but still has hints of orange and pink.

This is two coats of Aloha from OPI. It was pretty easy to apply. The consistency was good, maybe a tad thicker than some cremes, but not in a bad way.

OPI Is Mai Tai Crooked? is a yellow-toned peach creme. It's a brighter peach, not so much pastel, but it's definitely a peach that leans yellow, not pink. My camera seemed to be a little confused by this one. I think my last picture is the most accurate. The first one is a little too bright, the one below is a little too pastel and dusty.

This is three coats of Is Mai Tai Crooked?. It had good pigmentation and was fairly even in two coats. I did a third coat to just smooth out an area or two, but you may find that two coats is perfect.

When I put Aloha from OPI and Is Mai Tai Crooked? next to each other, I instantly thought of a sunset, so I had to do a gradient. This looked much better blended in person, the sponge marks are so much less obvious. I feel like that's the case a lot of times with sponged gradients, they end up looking splotchy in pictures. I really love this in person, I've gotten loads of compliments on it!

Ahhhh, this makes you think of beaches and warmth, doesn't it?

*Sent for review*

The OPI Hawaii collection is available now at Ulta, Ulta.com, and fine salons.

China Glaze Metro Pollen-Tin

 *purchased by me*

Another China Glaze City Flourish polish for you today and another one that was hard to capture on camera! I did notice that several other bloggers reported having a lot of trouble taking accurate pictures of some of the City Flourish polishes, so I don't feel like such a failure, but it still makes me mad when this happens. Anyway, China Glaze Metro Pollen-tin is an apricot tinged yellow creme. It's not just straight up yellow, it has a bit of orange to it that really did remind me of an apricot. It's bright, but not neon. I have an extensive yellow and orange polish collection and could not come up with anything like this. Everything else was either too yellow or too orange. This is a yellow, but towards the peach/orange side of the spectrum.

Metro Pollen-tin needed three coats to make it perfectly even, but I think the formula was less troublesome than At Vase Value and Grass Is Lime Greener. It's still three coats, but it's a slightly easier three coats.

*purchased by me*

Ultimately, I am really happy with the three China Glaze City Flourish colors I have. The colors are bright, fun and unique. I can deal with applying three coats a bit carefully on occasion if the color is worth it. If you have no patience and don't want to deal with anything less than buttery perfection, you should stay away from these. I also ordered Thistle Do Nicely from the same collection, but I didn't receive it in my package. I'm trying to fix that situation now, so I may have swatches of that too. Did you get any City Flourish colors or do you plan to? I'm eyeing the Off Shore collectio now myself!

Zoya Bubbly Summer 2014 Swatches!

 *Sent for review*

Today I have swatches of the sparkly Zoya Bubbly collection for Summer 2014. Before we begin, I have just a quick note about the pictures in this post. I take all of my pictures outdoors in natural light, but these Bubbly polishes have tons of iridescent glitter in them, which basically disappears in sunlight. I took this pictures mostly indoors or in the shade, so if you notice they are a bit darker and less sharp than usual, that's why! Now, on to the fun part! Zoya describes the Bubbly polishes as "six dazzling hues loaded with holographic glitter particles" and says they have a "buildable formula- great for layering". I would describe these as having a buildable jelly base packed with iridescent shimmer and tons of iridescent small hex glitters (bubbles!). Zoya Jesy is a juicy orange juice color with iridescent shimmer and glitter.

What's really cool about these polishes is that they look like you had to use two polishes to get this effect (a jelly base color and a glitter topper), but it's all rolled into one convenient polish. I will take a little more about the formula at the end of the post, as they were all very similar. I used three coats for all of these, followed by a layer of top coat.

Next up we have my favorite, for obvious reasons, Zoya Binx!! From the minute I saw the press release for these, I started freaking out because my precious kitty has a polish with his name!!!! And it happens to be my absolute favorite color of all time!!! Thank you Zoya for making a purple-y pink sparkly polish named Binx. I will now buy 8 back-up bottles. Zoya describes Binx as a purple orchid, and that's pretty accurate. I know people said this was pinker than they expected, but "orchid" purple is very pink-leaning. I love this one (even aside from the name), it's a gorgeous, very flattering color. The iridescent shimmer and glitter really pop in this color too. The macro shot below gives you a better idea of the shimmer and glitter in these Bubbly polishes.

Ugh, I'm sorry, I just want to marry this polish!! Look at this picture! YUM!!

Zoya Staasi (is this pronounced like Stacy or Stah-si?) is a yellow-y darkened celery green with iridescent shimmer and glitter. I am dying to try this layered over black or maybe a really dark green like Zoya Envy. I am planning to do a whole post of layering these Bubbly polishes over different colored bases, so please let me know if there are any combinations you'd like to see!

I think Staasi was the sheerest of the bunch of these. This is three coats and there was still some VNL in places. Although I think it's more visible here than it was in person. In person, your eye gets so blinded by all of the iridescent shininess!

Zoya Alma is described as a "golden peach". It's a yellow orange packed with iridescent magic. It's cool how the base color of each of these polishes affects what colors you see in the iridescent glitters. As you can see in the macro below, in Alma, you see a lot of yellow and peach in the iridescent bubbles, whereas in Staasi, you can see a lot of greens and blues. Zoya used the same iridescent glitters in all of these polishes, they are just reflecting their surrounding colors.

 
I always like orange polishes of all shades, so I quite enjoy this one!

I think Zoya Harper might be my second favorite of this collection. Harper is a barbie pink and the whole combination of barbie pink with the iridescent shimmer and glitter is really excellent. This formula seems to shine with pinks and purples. Zoya describes Harper as a "Mexican pink", I am not sure what Mexican pink is, but it sounds pretty!

Harper was very pigmented too. It's always nice when your favorites of the collection also have the best pigmentation! This is three coats here, but I think two would work for most people.

Finally we have the gorgeous Zoya Muse. Zoya describes this as "mermaid blue". PERFECT description. How can you look at this polish and not think of mermaids? The glitter is like the iridescent scales on their tails! Looking at Muse makes me feel relaxed, just like gazing out at the ocean does. I know I said the Bubbly formula is fantastic in pinks and purples, but it really is stunning in this blue as well!

The Zoya Bubbly formula was very nice to work with for all of these. I used three coats for all of the swatches, but you may find that Harper, Muse and Binx only need two, depending on the thickness of your coats. They were easy to apply and control. The glitter came out quite readily and was evenly spread about on the nail, not concentrated in one glob. When the press release for these first came out and I saw "buildable- great for layering", I was concerned that you wouldn't really be able to wear these alone, but as you can see, they are great alone! I will be posting lots of layering combos in the near future though, because I do think they'll be fun to layer!

 *Sent for review*

My top picks for the Zoya Bubbly collection are Binx, Harper and Muse! So... half of the collection LOL. I really like the other three as well, I don't think there's a bad shade in the bunch. Which Bubbly shades will you be picking up? The Zoya Bubbly collection is available now at Zoya.com.