March 2013 Beauty Box 5

I have been awful about beauty box postings this month and now with Glymm GONE, and no word back from my credit company for a refund, there is one less beauty box for me to spend my money on! I won’t even get into the full story with Glymm as I’m sure many of your know what happened with them and the patronizing “goodbye email” they sent before vanishing into thin air. I have paid for the full year with BB5 so I hope they don’t disappear like Glymm did! What happened with Glymm has definitely made me think twice about paying for full year subscriptions…

Anyway, enough about sad things and onto more positive beauty things! 

Day 17-Having Fun with Nail Foils

Today’s manicure is all about trying a new technique which I feel is pretty much the theme of this entire challenge! I just picked up the Limited Edition Ciate Colourfoil Manicure Set and decided to give nail foils a go! I started with three coats Ciate-Pepperminty (provided with the set) and once my nails were completely dry, used the provided foil glue and rubbed random pieces of coloured foil onto sections of my nails. The fun part was ripping off the foil almost like when waxing! Seeing the foil get transferred was oddly satisfying and I do enjoy the end results. The only thing that didn’t work out so well was that once I applied top coat, the colour from the foil started to bleed…but other than that I actually love the results!   

Sample Sundays-Round 8!

It has been more than a month since my last round of Sample Sundays so I knew it was time to shop the sample stash again! This time around, I want to go through more of my skincare products as I have noticed that my sample box for skincare is literally overflowing.

Here’s what’s on the menu for the next few weeks!

Treats from Beijing!

I have a few treats to share with you all from a friend’s visit to Beijing! When it comes to Asian goodies, I always look forward to the excessive yet wonderfully attractive packaging of everything from food to beauty products! Shall we check out the goods? 

You all know my love affair with face masks especially sheet masks so on the left is an MG sheet mask box set consisting of: one Honey Oats Nourishing & Brightening Mask, two Emerald Grape Moisturizing Masks, two Oxygen Spring Water Purifying & Hydrating Masks, one Ocean Ice Spring Hydrating Mask and two Dynamic Hydrating Eye Masks. On the right are four Chamomile Anti-Allergy Repairing Masks which are meant for redness. I just can’t use these, the packaging is just too perfect with its metallic sheen and sheet mask plushness that I can feel through the packaging…the experience is all so magical. 

Day 16-Colour Opposites with Blue and Orange Dots

Today’s manicure involves colour opposites so I looked at the complimentary colour wheel and chose blue and orange as I felt like being bold and bright! I started off with two coats of Julep-Ally from the new brights collection followed by dots of OPI-Roll in the Hague. Is it just me, or do the dots make you think of growing bacteria on agar?? That’s all I keep seeing right now!

Be sure to check out the other wonderful ladies also participating in this challenge!

Naomi @ Bellezza

Traci @ drinkcitra

Masha @ Lost in Lacquer

The Anti Glymm Box Box Courtesy of Nail Polish Canada

If any of you are currently in a position, like myself, of trying to get your money back from your credit company ever since Glymm (Metro news article from today) up and left after weeks of dodging questions and horrible customer service, I have some news that will make your day!

Nail Polish Canada has graciously put together a $25 special edition box for those that got burned by Glymm! What a wonderful way to give back to the beauty community!

(images from nailpolishcanada.com)

Anybody who was a Glymm box member at any point during the last 4 months qualifies.

1. Email with proof of membership (receipt, confirmation email, credit card statement etc.) to boxmeup@nailpolishcanada.com
2. Within 24 hours we'll email you a coupon code to get this $25 value box for free!

Make sure to tell us if you want the Shocking Pink, Nova, or Towel Boy Toy version. (and give a backup choice too)

This awesome Anti-Glymm Box includes

• 1 x Choice of: China Glaze Shocking Pink, Nova (silver glitter), or Towel Boy Toy (blue)
• 1 x China Glaze For Audrey (best selling China Glaze ever!)
• 1 x Color Club In Theory
• 1 x White Nail File
• 1 x mini Seche Vite Top Coat
• 1 x mini Tend Skin

Note: The box is free, you don't need to order anything else. However standard shipping rules apply (basically order $25 of other items and everything ships free or it's only $3 shipping for just the box). Limited quantity available. 

Wow! I am beyond impressed as NPC is certainly going out of their way by doing this. They really are the “friendly neighbourhood polish people” and I am so proud to say that they are from my neck of the woods!

March 2013 “Metropolitan Chic” Glossybox

The theme for March was to celebrate the arrival of spring and and being armed with the right tools to prepare our beautiful selves for the warmer months to come. Out of the five products I received, I would say that maybe only two of them are what I would consider products I would use for warmer weather. Let’s have a closer look!

April 2013 Julep Maven “Brights” Box

For the first time ever, I had to have ALL THE COLOURS! Every colour looked absolutely delicious and I knew I would use the dry shampoo and cuticle serum as well so I splurged! I’ve always thought it was absolutely crazy to upgrade to the full Maven collection for the month, but my God this collection did some devil magic to me!

Amazingly, I do not own a lot of these colours so this was the perfect purchase! The bonus rock candy was very appropriate for the collection and I am beyond excited to experiment with these colours!

Day 15-Watercolour

Once again this nail challenge is pushing me to try a new technique and this time it’s watercolour nails! I was a little bit scared at first (as always!), but after seeing a couple of picture and watching a few videos, I was ready!

I started off with three coats of my new favourite white polish, OPI-My Boyfriend Scales Walls (how could I not have owned this before??). I then dabbed on two small drops of China Glaze-Too Yacht to Handle and diluted it with acetone. I did the same thing with China Glaze-Beauty Within and F21 Love & Beauty – Blue until the watercolour effect was complete. I found three colours to be the perfect balance. A helpful tip is to apply topcoat right after your base colour as you do not want the acetone to start dissolving your base colour! The extra layer of topcoat gives you a bit of cushion in case you go crazy with the acetone!

This is my favourite new technique so far and is perfect for spring! Be sure to check out the other wonderful ladies also participating in this challenge!

Naomi @ Bellezza

Traci @ drinkcitra

Masha @ Lost in Lacquer

Spring 2013 Loose Button Luxe Box

 At long last, the Spring Luxe Box is here! Again, I have seen quite the variety in products given which always used to irritate me in the original monthly format of the Luxe Boxes as I feel that since everyone pays the same price that there shouldn’t be huge price discrepancies between boxes. This season’s was a celebrity-sponsored box by CBC television personalities Steve and Chris. I hadn’t watched their show before so I had no idea what to expect!

Day 14–I Suck the Big One at Stamping

I don’t stamp often as I am awful at it, but I will once again share with you all my failure on Day 14 of this challenge. I started off with three coats of the ever gorgeous Layla-Ocean Rush. Application was not easy and I always forget how patchy some holographic polishes apply, but thankfully on the third coat everything evened out. Since my stamping photos are so awful, I will show you many of this one!

April 2013 “Regular” Topbox

We are back to the regular Topbox for this month as the ever-popular Elizabeth Arden box didn’t really do too much for me as I already owned samples of the Prevage serum, mascara and the makeup remover which I ended up receiving anyway! I still enjoyed my Topbox though as it truly was a surprise!

Day 13–Cheer Yourself Up Mani with Pink Glitter Gradients

Blergh, I’m late again with posting sorry! I really love taking pictures in sunlight if I can so nail photos tend to revolve around my work schedule. As with Masha and Naomi, gradients also cheer me up so what else could brighten up any bad mood other than a pink glitter gradient! I started off with two coats of Julep-Lily and then incrementally painted China Glaze-Hello Gorgeous! slowly up my nails. Simple, but definitely brightens up my day!

Review-Demeter Fragrance Library Pick-Me-Up Cologne Spray

A couple of weeks ago I made a relatively large order from the Demeter Fragrance Library and was itching to order again despite the brokerage charges I was stuck with. Luckily I was informed that Demeter was readily available at Superstore in BC! Awesome! There were a couple of other scents that were very intriguing and Demeter was lovely enough to send me a few to review and spray myself silly with.

Day 12-Pink and Black Tape Manicure

Sorry for the lateness of this mani, I think this is the first one I just couldn’t bring myself to do on time because I’ve been feeling somewhat under the weather. I cheated a little by keeping my pink splatter nails from a few days ago and used striping tape (for the first time ever!) to create my lines. I painted Essence-Black is Back on top and pulled off the tape with tweezers. I just love pink and black and the splatter effect made this manicure ever so slightly more interesting. This challenge is definitely forcing me to try A LOT of new things!

Be sure to check out the other wonderful ladies also participating in this challenge!

Naomi @ Bellezza

Traci @ drinkcitra

Masha @ Lost in Lacquer

March 2013 SeasonsBox–“Spring Into St.Patty’s”

After a fantastic February Seasonsbox, I was on the edge of my seat for the March box especially when I saw that there was an umbrella inside! In rainy Vancouver, I can always use a good umbrella! The theme for March was all about St. Patrick’s Day so of course everything was green! Even Yoshi wanted in on the action!

Day 11-Pink Splatter

Oi, was this messy! For today’s manicure, I started off with a base colour of Sally Hansen XTremeWear-Fuchsia Power and then used a straw dipped in Sally Hansen XTremeWear-Bubblegum Pink to blow out the polish. I tried not to inhale too much, but I felt quite sick after blowing polish on the first couple of nails. I felt like there was nail polish in my throat! I should have done this manicure ala Naomi and Traci because their mouths were nowhere near nail polish!

March Empties

This empties post has taken me almost a week to put together! For whatever reason, this is taking me a really long time! Last month was more about samples sizes for me which at this point is just as awesome seeing as how I have so many! I’m still quite pleased with my “performance” and I had great fun trying out all of these different products!

Day 10-Inspired by Geometry Wars

Today’s manicure is supposed to be “geometric” in nature and short of drawing shapes or Grade 12 geometry on my nails I wasn’t too sure of what to do. Then it dawned on me that the game “Geometry Wars” could be the inspiration for this nail design with all those crazy neon shapes eventually leading to today’s nail art! I know, exciting story right?

I started off with two coats of Essence-Black is Back and painted the shapes with acrylic paint. In an attempt to get the shapes to glow like in the actual game, I outlined the shapes with China Glaze-Fairy Dust, but it’s still quite hard to see.

Day 9-Saran Wrapped Pistachio

This is my first time trying out the saran wrap method and I have to say that it isn’t exactly my favourite manicure. Maybe it’s the lack of control I have over what my nail looks like in the end. This manicure was one that I actually had to do twice because my first combination of dark and light brown ended up looking like bathroom-doings…so I changed the dark brown to a bright spring-like green also known as Lime Crime-Pastelchio layered over top Essie-Brooch the Subject. I then finished off with a matte top coat which toned down this textured mess of polish just a little.

March Luvs

Not much makeup this month, but I have picked up a couple of things in the last week that will DEFINITELY be making it into April’s Luvs post! To tell you the truth, I feel like I’ve been surviving each day by the skin of my teeth with the fiscal year wrapping up. There are always so many little things to do that I am breathing a sigh of relief as I type this as I can finally have this week be a fresh start. Here are the things that have contributed to my sanity this past month!

Day 8-Flakie Gorgeousness!

For today’s challenge, we could choose from either duochrome, flakie or holo as our nail polish choice and I was thisclose to doing a holo skittles manicure, but I’ve been neglecting my flakies lately and I wanted to give them a little lovin’. I started off with two coats of mark-Violet Daze which I received in my March 2012 Topbox.

For the flakie magic, I used two coats of one of the prettiest polishes I’ve seen, Cult Nails-Seduction filled with red and purple flakies sitting in a sheer purple base. Gah, it’s just so pretty!

Be sure to check out the other wonderful ladies also participating in this challenge!

Naomi @ Bellezza

Traci @ drinkcitra

Masha @ Lost in Lacquer