Anchor & Heart You Are My Home

Hi everyone!
Back to the indies we go! This one is a new to me brand and I just bought the collection of polishes a few weeks ago so this is really really current! Today, I am going to show you guys Anchor & Heart You Are My Home. It's from the Through The Stones Collection. I think it's based on The Outlander series. All the polishes are really beautiful multichrome polishes.

The above pictures were taken above during a cloudy afternoon. This polish has a green base and shifts from turquoise to blue to purple. The purple was not seen as much unless I viewed my nails at an extreme angle. The polish also had holographic microglitter that gave it a bit of a bumpy appearance but with topcoat, it was very smooth to the touch. The pictures below were taken with strong indoor lighting.

I really enjoyed wearing this. I'll be keeping my eye out for more collections from Anchor & Heart in the future.

Color Club Date With Destiny

Hello hello! I'm back with another polish for you and this time it's a mainstream! I'm sure it's still available in various places online. This is Color Club Date With Destiny. It's a holographic polish but the holographic-ness of it is not as strong as a lot of the indie holos I've seen lately. It's still a delicately pretty polish with a light lavender base. I thought it would be a perfect canvas for a little stamping, which I had the time for and hadn't done in a long time. The image is from the Bundle Monster plate BM 310. The polish used to stamp was China Glaze Harmony, which is from the Romantique collection. All of them make good stamping polishes.

The picture below is in the shade and the one below that was back in sunlight. 

Thanks for looking! See you next time. 

Colors by Llarowe Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star

The thing I love about the indie polish world is how much more you can get to know the maker of each brand, how interactions with them through emails, Facebook groups and other social media can elevate it from a cold business transaction to something a little more special. Of course, that means you sometimes find something out about a maker that rubs you the wrong way, goes against your beliefs or outright offends you but that comes part and parcel with human interaction, right?  I'm happy to say that Leah Anne from Colors by Llarowe has shown herself to be a wonderful, genuinely nice and generous person. I had started buying her polish long before I really knew what she was like but I'm so happy to know that I have at least half a Helmer drawer full of beautiful polishes that are made by a beautiful person. The polish I'll be showing you today is one of them, called Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.

That is an incredibly appropriate name for this polish because it seriously twinkles like the night sky. I think this polish is considered a close dupe to the original Essie Starry Starry Night. I don't have that polish so I can't compare but I know there are comparison posts on other blogs and they do look practically identical.

The base of the polish is a dark blue jelly with silver glitter suspended in it. It's very simple, no holo, no color shifting, but still magical. In keeping with the starry night theme, I stamped an accent with silber polish and a star image from the Bundle Monster plate BM-310. I absolutely loved this look!

That's it for today. Thanks for visiting and see you next time!!

Emily de Molly Crestfallen

Purple is one of my two favorite colors. That and teal. A vibrant purple or a mysterious teal really make me happy. When I first started collecting nail polish, I really had a disproportionate amount of purple until I started making a conscious effort to branch out. I like other colors and I didn't want to get in a rut. That being said, I think my collection is still disproportionately variations of purple and teal.

Today's polish is a beautiful purple holo by Emily de Molly called Crestfallen. This is an opaque polish that is a very vibrant shade of purple and a prominent holographic finish. It also has small red microglitter/shimmer that give it a very warm flash, which I loved.

Again, with the weather being the way it is, I was unable to take good pictures of this outside in the sun so I have some indoor desk lamp pictures and one from my family room with has some bright ceiling lights. 

There it is, my best photos of a polish that looked even better in real life. Until next time!

Femme Fatale Pyramids On Mars

Hi everyone! Another post this month? I am on fire!! I love love the polish I am going to show you today. This is from Femme Fatale called Pyramids on Mars. It is a deep purple jelly polish with iridescent flakies and small red microglitter. It is complex and a chameleon. It looks so different in different lights. The best light to show it off in was cloudy outdoor light (which we have plenty of in the Pacific Northwest). Look at those amazing flakies!! This was an old color which Sophie brought back for a limited time either last year or two years ago. I was lucky enough to get it the first time around and got a back up when she brought it back. 

I have mentioned once or twice how I really love my indie brands (hah!) and Femme Fatale is really there at the top with a few others (ahem, Tonic). Sophie and team have so so soooo many polishes out there and although I have a decently large collection, I have only a fraction of what's available. I gave up my desire to have a full Femme Fatale collection long ago since I have not really even scratched the surface of my own collection. I was really happy with this polish, if you couldn't tell, and I'm looking forward to trying many many more!

Until next time!!

Glam Polish Case Full of Magical Creatures

Hi folks! I've recently realized that I've been so into my indie nail polishes that I have not worn a mainstream polish in a long long time. Those poor bottles have been sitting sad and lonely in their storage without any love being sent their way. I should make an effort...someday.

Anyway, today's polish is yet another indie polish, Glam Polish Case Full of Magical Creatures. This is from the Magical Creatures collection. They were inspired by the creatures from the "Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them" movie. I have not seen that movie myself but it's definitely on my list. 

It is a plum colored polish with holo and iridescent glitter and color shifting metallic flakes in it. It took me about three coats to get opaque but because of the jelly quality of the base, there was some shrinkage from the tip of the nail.  It was not a big deal at all in real life. Since my move, I haven't been able to set up my small light tent yet so I'm showing you pictures I took in various lighting. Indoor, in the car and in late afternoon sunlight below.

I really enjoyed wearing this one and I'm excited to try the others I have from this collection. Glam Polish always has amazing polish, I think, as evidenced by how many of them I have. They are based in Australia and they have fast and reasonable shipping. Right now, the owner is on a bit of a hiatus but it looks like they still have stock and the website is open for business.

MDJ Creations Da Vinci

Hi guys! Today's post is going to be a short one. I didn't get the best pictures of this one so I only have one picture to show you. This is MDJ Creations Da Vinci. I bought this several months ago along with a few others but this is the one that drove me to make the purchase at all. Also, I can't believe I'm saying this, but, this is currently available!! I feel like I'm always posting about nail polish that is super old or limited edition but this is in the Etsy shop now, people. So, if you want it, you can get it!

It's described as a teal base with flakies and holo glitter. I'm not sure if you can see the holo glitter well but the flakies were mesmerizing. They are chrome flakies with a multitude of colors in their shift. I think I have two coats here, which may be why it looks a little lighter than the website swatch photo. It has a partner polish called Michelangelo which is flakies in a creamy lighter colored base. I did get that one as well and I'm looking forward to wearing it. I'm happy I ventured to buy from this maker. If I had the budget, I would be buying more. She looks like she has some very interesting polishes in her Etsy store. 

Short post today. See you next time!!

Illyrian Dream Hopper with Indigo Bananas Bonanza

Hello all! How is everyone? I see that I'm getting a couple of views here and there so there must still be people reading my posts...fancy that! So, for the five of you out there who will read this one, here is a polish from another new to the blog indie maker, Illyrian Polish.

I have been in love with Illyrian polishes for a while now and even though I have a sizeable collection at this point, this is the first time I'm wearing and blogging about them. Today's polish is a base for the manicure you see above and below and it's called Dream Hopper. It's a multichrome polish that shifts green to purple with a murky dark base that gives it a near black look. In real life, it looks like a dark purple brown color with a mysterious shift in the colors at different angles. I wore it alone for a day before the urge to layer it with something came. The base is versatile and I could have layered it with many things but I chose another untried polish, Indigo Bananas Bonanza. The green to blue to purple shifting flakes were set off wonderfully over Dream Hopper. 

Here it is, all by itself. You can see how it has that purple brown base with the multichrome pigment that goes from green to purple. I thought this would be the polish I liked the least out of my collection and I liked it quite a lot anyway so hopefully I really love the other polishes in my collection. 

And, that's it for today. Hope everyone is having a good beginning of 2018 so far!!

Polished For Days Anemone

Hello everyone!

I’m back with another indie polish that I’m loving. I have not posted about their brand before. I first noticed them when I started buying the For The Love Of Polish box from their website. Then I started browsing the other polishes offered and really loved a bunch of them. The brand is Polished For Days and the polish is Anemone.

This is from the June 2017 FTLOP box. According to the description on the original swatch post by DeLicious Nails, this polish is made up of a purple holographic base with bronze and rose gold flakes, sterling silver flakes, holo flakes, and green/gold/blue chrome flakes. Now that I know all of that is in there, I can pick them out. Otherwise, it looks like a lovely sparkly holographic chrome flake polish in a pale lavender color. As with all these polishes, it comes alive in directed light, especially sunlight. In the shade, it’s still lovely but sedate.

I’ll post a few more pictures in different lighting. What I also discovered with this polish is that the formula for this was amazing. I applied two coats with no difficulty at all. It dries smooth and even. Soon after I applied the polish but before the topcoat, I had to suddenly take care of removing and washing my son’s sheets due to a vomiting incident and I was convinced I would have to redo my nails. I only ended up having to fix the tips of a couple of them. It dried so fast and held on really well.

I really hope indie polish never goes away. I don't think it will. I can't believe the breadth of creativity of all these makers with their polish creations. Now with these curated and themed boxes, special Facebook group offerings, special limited editions like the Polish Pickup monthly polishses, I keep finding new brands and finishes and it's nuts! I wish I could own them all!