Review and Swatches: Essie's Cute as a Button

I picked this colour up on a whim, as I really really don't need more nail polish (thank you Julep Maven) but when these went on sale for $7.99 at Shoppers Drug Mart I couldn't resist. Normally these retail for around $12 depending on where you buy it from and this is the cheapest I've see it (other than buy one get one deals around boxing day).

This is a really cute summery pink/coral colour. Perfect for summer days by the beach or pool. This is definitely going into my regular rotation of nail polish colours. I think I'll turn to this when I want a less intense pink than OPI's Strawberry Margarita.

The one thing that bugs me about buying these at Shoppers is that the packaging is slightly different than if I get this a beauty supply store. There's a sticker on the top with the name (most times it comes on the bottom) and a white Essie sticker on the side that I always peel off because it looks tacky.

Rating:

Packing: 4/5 There is nothing wrong with the packaging per se, it's just nothing to write home about.
Pigmentation: 5/5 I got the bottle colour with two coats
Texture: 5/5 This is a nice creamy polish
Longevity: n/a*
Application: 4/5 I prefer OPI's larger brush, but nothing particularly bad about the smaller brush.

Overall I would recommend this colour, it's a perfect summer polish. This would look great on toes as well. Overall Rating: 4.5/5

* I can't wear nail polish to work so I only wear polish on the weekends. Sorry I can't test this for wear time. 

Mini Haul

Went to Marshalls today and was pleased to see this wish kit from Smashbox for $19.99, originally retailed for $56. The soft-lights bronzer itself is worth $36 and I get to try out the photo finish primer, their Photo-Op under eye brightener, the O-Gloss in gold, and the Jet Set waterproof gel liner. I'll write reviews for these after I've had a good while to test them out.

They also had the Sally Hansen Salon Effects in this cute heart pattern for $4.99 so I snatched it up to give it a try. I was really impressed with the selection at my Marshalls, they had tons of Bliss products for the face, some nice bamboo makeup brushes (I have my eye on some sephora ones at the moment), some Pacifica body butters and most of the China Glaze Hunger Games polishes. I'm definitely going to keep visiting to see what other goodies I can scoop up at a steal to test out and review.

Last but not least I got a new case for my Kindle. This Verso Marrakesh cover was waaaay out of my price range at $70, but Chapters.Indigo had it on for 50% I could justify it. My old hot pink case was getting a little worn and this is simply gorgeous, even if it does seem a touch pretentious.

Italy Packing: Nail Polish

I took a small selection of nail polish to Florence. I ended up leaving the glitter top coat at home as it's a pain to remove. I brought my sally hansen top coat, OPI's Strawberry Margaretta (the perfect Barbie pink), Essie's California Coral and their Sugar Daddy (my go to pale pink colour). I kept the colour selection simple to make it easy to match to my outfits while away. I ended up buy a really pretty purple and teal colour from an Italian cosmetics line called Kiko, which I'll be posting a haul of what I got soon!

Review: Sally Hansen Insta-Dry Nail Polish

Sally Hansen Insta-Dry nail polish seemed like a great buy. It was on sale for $4.99 and it claimed to do a full polish with just one coat. I picked it up in Presto Pink and Lively Lilac and couldn't wait to test it out! I found that the colour pay off was true to the bottle, however Lively Lilac was streaky while Presto Pink went on smooth. The polish dries very quickly, though not in the 60 seconds it claims to, more like 2-4 minutes which is still amazing. The Perfectionist Brush that Sally Hansen says is so great was the real downfall for me here. I found the brush large and unwieldly, making it hard to be precise with the application. I like bigger brushes on my polishes (when OPI switched to the new brushes I was in heaven!) but this one is clunky and keeps too much product on it. The polish also transfers. I was doing some course work after painting my nails and noticed that if I ran my finger on the page it left a streak of colour. The polish comes off easy enough, though I did notice it tinted my nails underneath slightly. I'm going to give this another shot, mostly because it does dry so amazingly fast and that's great for a chronic smudger like me! I think I will reapply maybe with a base coat to protect my nails and I will do a follow up review with some pictures.