Treats from Across the Sea

Yesterday I caught up with my display posting; today I am catching up with my swap posting. I haven't been swapping much at all recently, just with a few special friends where we've got a good rapport established and the swapping is easy (well, the communication and shopping and such is easy; the parts we can't control like the postal service and customs isn't always). The proprietess of Under the Gravity's Nails is one of these friends; we did another big swap with each other last fall, and it's taken me this long to say a public thank you. Not because I didn't love what she sent but because I am so easily distracted.

As often happens, I don't appear to have taken any photos of the edible bits before I started eating them. I am only slightly embarrassed to admit that I sucked some of the honey right out of the packets rather than putting it in my tea, the better to appreciate it. There were other sweets, too, besides the honey, tasty little sugared jelly squares and the like. Maybe someday I'll have the self control to snap photos first, then eat, but perhaps not. There are reasons I'm not a food blogger.

On to the non-edibles now ... there was a charming little notebook and two exotic to me soaps:



Postcards of places maybe I will one day be fortunate to see some of with my own eyes:



And then the polish ... so much polish! There was a set of three liquid metals polishes:



Another set of ombre polishes in purple:



O Boticário make B. polishes in fancy boxes—Cacau, Verde, Azul Sixties, and Lilás Sixties:



A quartet from Flormar—413, 454, BT01 Cookie Monster, and BT03 Princess Castle:



Some cuties from Essence—Kiss Me Freddy, Sparkle Sand in Hello Rosy, It's Raining Men, and Electric Feathers That's My Pop Cake (there's another polish that should be here but I'd pulled it aside to admire and neglected to put it back; you'll see it on my nails in a bit):



A bounty from Catrice—Be My Violetine, Glitterazzi, Blue and a Half Men, London Calling, Mind the Red, English Rose, Brit Chick, and Hyde In the Park:



Plus two of the Catrice Luxury Lacquers Million Brilliance line, My Big Green Wedding and Plum Fiction:



A sextext of Kiko—Quick Dry 856 and 859, 387 and 373, Quick Dry 857 and 813:



Essence Hello Autumn Thermo Effect—Charlie Seen in Green, Meet My Pumpkin, and Keep Calm & Go for a Walk:



MO by Beaty Express in 22 and 02:



Inocos Cinzento Real and Bola de Pêlo:



My Label Perfect Cover 35 and Risqué Bali:



Catrice My Big Green Wedding was the first of these to get on my nails, as an accent in my pre-Christmas meetup mani, so that's where I started, with the two Luxury Lacquers. This is two coats of Plum Fiction (almost a one-coater) on all but my accent nail, which is two coats of My Big Green Wedding. All nails have topcoat to smooth things out. I love the depth of these; if Catrice were on offer here, I'd hunt down more of the collection.



MO by Beauty Express 22 reminded me a lot of my beloved Essie Bikini So Teeny, balanced between blue and purple with a subtle shimmer. I need to do a comparison someday, but this strikes me as leaning more purple and with a less shy shimmer than the Essie. It's gorgeous regardless. This swatch is two coats, no topcoat.



I topped it with the Essence missing from the group shot, Essence Effect Party Jewels in Party Never Ends. I did two coats, the second one more dabbed than stroked on, and added clear topcoat as well. There is quite a party going on in that glitter, with everything from tiny tiny needles of bar glitter to flashy silver holo diamond glitter. Quite fun!



I liked the first MO by Beauty Express so much I tried the other one immediately. 02 is a pinkish light tan creme, wonderfully behaved, especiall for such a light color; my swatch is two coats.



02 was elegant and sophisticated on its own, but it could mix it up with the party crowd, too; I topped it with two coats of Essence Electric Feathers That's My Pop Cake plus topcoat. This glitter has small reddish pink particles accented by slender silver holo bars.



I did another combination with the other Essence Electric Feathers, Gold Fingers, which has small gold glitter and slightly bigger silver holo bars than That's My Pop Cake. I did one coat of it over two coats of Flormar 454, an olive green creme. I didn't add topcoat over the glitter and was pleased to see it wasn't especially bumpy.



I wrapped up my play session by combining Kiko Quick Dry 813, a mossy brown shimmer, with an accent nail of Inocos Bola de Pêlo, a tan with subtle silver shimmer. I used two coats of each color. The Inocos was fine without topcoat; I think the Kiko would have benefitted from some extra shine.



I would have loved to try the rest of these but unfortunately I do have to go to work and do other things. Someday maybe I will manage to get the rest of these on my nails—or at the very least nail wheels. Even if that takes a long while, I'm very happy to have them all in my stash.

Recent NOTD: Flormar U09

Speaking of catching up (as I was, yesterday), I'm finally getting around to my nails of the day from the end of May and beginning of June. I posted a peek at this mani a couple weeks ago but of course I have many more pictures to share. As I mentioned, I got this polish, Flormar Supershine Miracle Colors in shade U09 in a swap. This one was with a lovely lady from Latvia I got to know through MakeupAlley. U09 is a flecked shimmer in a purple that gives my camera trouble—in most lights and with most camera settings, it looks cooler-toned than it is in real life. I've done my best to adjust things, so that accounts for my extra rosy skintone in some of these shots.







I applied two coats of the Flormar (plus my regular base and top coats) and it wore really well. When my regular polish change day rolled around, I just touched up the tipwear and added another polish from the same swap, Golden Rose Scale Effect in 09. Oh, glorious flakies! In the bottle I saw rosy coral and gold; on the nail I saw those plus orange and green depending on the light.









This is one of those manis I couldn't resist taking pictures of at random times. Here it is in my car in daylight:



Here is it in subdued lamplight:



I liked it with the flakies so much that instead of changing my polish when I did some swatching, I took a page out of Jenni's book and did a mismatched hands mani (I hope I'm remembering that right; I know someone I read regularly doesn't necessarily polish both hands the same). I left the Flormar plus flakies on my left hand and put something else on my right hand which had been stripped for swatching purposes. I had some lime green cremes sitting around (perhaps you saw the wheel yesterday), and I thought those went with the green flashes from the flakies. I didn't write down which one(s) I used (I was supposed to be getting ready to go out to dinner so was rushing), but I think it was probably Sally Hansen Grass Slipper or Orly Green Apple. I couldn't quite deal with one green hand and one purple hand, so I added China Glaze Fault Line on top of the lime to coordinate things better (I also topped my left index finger with the crack to help things pull together). My index finger is a good example of why you should make sure to thoroughly shake your bottles (or roll them depending on your preference and how much time you have to wait for them to settle). I didn't shake at all (rushing, remember) and ended up getting only the layer that had risen to the top on that first nail. Not the color I was going for, so I shook the bottle and then did the other three. (I did clean this up a bit after I took this photo but before I left the house.)



I rather liked the mismatched hands (accent hand?) look; I might have to do that more often.