I won a contest!

I'm a member of a polish swap group on facebook and got randomly selected to win a China Glaze polish. The girl giving it away decided to throw in all these other things as a surprise. China Glaze "Don't Be A Flake", Sally Hansen Triple Shine "Sparks Fly" and the yellow one is L.A. Colors Color Craze. There is no name for it. Then a concealer brush for nail cleanup, cuticle pen, and little nail doo-dads. Fun. =D Lucky me! 

Rainbow Honey for July

This month, I ended up buying a bunch of stuff from Rainbow Honey. I ordered the large mystery bag, a polish, a top coat, a perfume, and a scented oil. Because my total went over a certain amount, I qualified to get the mini mystery bag for free as well as a free full size version of Neon Blossom. 

I have learned that there is no difference between the mini and the large mystery bags aside from the size of the polishes and one or two of the other products they throw in. So save yourself some cash and order just one or the other.  Come along and see what I got. Well, this is only PART of my order. The other items are still on back order. Waaaaaiting!

The contents of the mini bag.

The mini gel

The mini perfume

Cuticle balm in the melon Midori scent

From L-R: Neon Blossom, Deep Heart Sea, Viridis, and Chemical Plant

Same order as above. Better look at the colors?

The large roller of Midori scent and an aloe-based cooling gel for sunburns also in Midori

I enjoy Rainbow Honey, but I feel they are very glitter-centered and while it IS cute it is also a massive pain in the ass to remove. I think I will be taking a break from nail polish for a while now.

Cult Cosmetics Blackbox

Recently I caught wind that Cult Cosmetics had a promotion to pick up one of their Blackboxes for a penny (not including the five bucks for shipping...), so I decided to jump on it for the cute holo-glitter "Hollywood Forever". Spring Fling is the name of the box, in case you were interested and I am pretty sure the code penny522 still works at this time.

They do have other boxes that offer other polishes and products so be certain to browse and see if it might be something you're interested in picking up. I've recently found myself on a sort of polish bender (that's a thing, right?) because my nails are growing great for the first time in years. It's a fun little project I kind of stick under the topic of art. It's color. It's paint. Nail are a medium, too, ya know?

Anyhow, here is what came in the box. For $5.01, it wasn't a bad deal. I decided not to stick with the monthly box because frankly 20 bucks a month of polish is best redirected at 20 bucks a month on horror. I have priorities, people.

Feel free to use the code for free ship if you don't use the penny promo

It smells like stinky vinyl.

Pretty nice quality for free brushes.

Hollywood Forever on the left and Belmont Shore on the right.

A shadow crayon. Pretty, too.

Normally wouldn't swatch so large but I accidentally broke the tip off when I opened it. D'oh!

A decal.

It was a nice box for five bucks. I will purchase from them again in the future. I'm actually sort of really interested in Coachella, but it shall wait for another day.

Julep Maven: Boho Glam for May!

So Julep has been after me for a bit by tempting me with a free first box, so I decided "What the hell". I only had to pay shipping on it, which was 2.99

I ordered it a couple days ago and it is already in my mailbox! Now that's quick shipping! I already knew what I was getting, of course. That is probably a mixed upside/downside sort of thing, I guess. I love being surprised but by picking which box I want, I have more control so I don't end up with something I hate or having to go through the bs that comes with returns or exchanges.

I chose the Boho Glam box this month, which also happens to be my Maven quiz result so I am trying out my own jam, so to speak.

This month I received the Mighty nail and cuticle pen. I can't figure out how to get the pen juice to the little brushy thing at the tip, but I will mess with it later. It seems pretty neat though. I can definitely get a lot of use out of this product. My hands and nails need some TLC after this long, rough winter.

The polish I got was Lena (they name all their polishes after powerful, inspiration women... they claim), which is a bright teal color with a lovely golden shimmer throughout it. I am in love with it immediately. The other is Elisa, which is what they call a wisteria shimmer. I am not sure how I feel about that one yet. I will have to actually apply it and play around before I make a solid decision. I would actually like to try and do a chevron pattern on my fingers with the two of them. That could be fun, but two entire hands of chevron might either be overwhelming to do or to look at. I will find out for sure as I play. I will take pics if I ever get around to that project. I digress. They also included two tiny little sponge things I can only assume are used to clean around your nails after a polish application. I am a beauty n00b, so please correct me if I'm wrong.

If you'd like to give Julep's Maven box a try, just follow this link. They will give you a promo code for a free box and you can basically try them out for 2.99 You really can't beat it for the price.

Enough of my chatter! Now on to the pictures of the un-boxing! Enjoy and live vicariously through my fun!

Rainbow Honey!

So I did some looking around and discovered that Rainbow Honey, an indie nail polish company, now offers subscriptions bags. You have your choice between a ten dollar mini sampler pack or their twenty-five dollar pack. These are also available as a stand-alone one time purchase if you don't feel you can commit to a monthly thing. 

I decided to test the waters and ordered their April and May mini packs since I had a lovely 25% off coupon code from Ipsy. I've never been much of a nail person but I've been really bored and feeling a LOT more girlish than I normally do and decided to turn over a new leaf and start playing around with make-ups and polishes and things of that nature. Why not?

I got my order late last week and took photos to share and everything! I even have some opinions on most of the things they sent. How exciting, right? Let's get to the fun part! The photos:

The adorable wrappings!