Rainbow Honey Kawako

I apologize for not posting in a while.  I have had some health issues (nothing very serious), and we also just refinanced our home mortgage (woohoo!), and that took chunks of free time.  Also, my husband has been monopolizing the home computer, the one that I use to edit blog photos for blog posts.  The few times I was alone at home, I either had things to do and couldn't take advantage of the opportunity to use the computer, or I was just too tired and sat back and read a book instead.  I read dozens of books, actually, including urban fantasy novels and time-travel fantasy novels set in the Scottish middle ages.  Then last week I started working on our taxes.  I have to go through our receipts and have everything organized before the end of January.  It's good and it's bad, blog-wise.  It takes time away from blogging, but my "reward" to myself for finishing each category of receipts is to work on a blog post.  Working on the computer is also more challenging this week because my glasses are getting new lenses because my prescription changed so much.  I really need glasses to work on the computer, so I will limit my time on the computer to avoid too much eye strain until I get my glasses back.

This blog post is the last of my reviews of the Rainbow Honey Yokai Collection.  I had a preview post here on the Rainbow Honey Yokai Collection with pictures of the package I received and of the three polishes swatched on nail wheels by themselves and in combination with other colors and matted.  The Yokai Collection polishes were limited edition for Autumn 2012 and were released on October 13, 2012.  The polishes were available on Rainbow Honey's website for $10 each but they were not sold anymore after October.  Did any of you manage to buy any of the Yokai Collection polishes before they sold out?

The first of the Yokai Collection that I wore was Kitsune.  I reviewed Kitsune here.  Then I tried my first dotticure over Kitsune!  After Kitsune, I tried Oni and wore it as a manicure for a full week in mid-October. I reviewed Oni here.

This last polish from the Yokai Collection is Kawako.  It's worth going back to my preview post here because I had swatches of the polish as it came in the bottle and also after adding a matte top coat.  Also, I mentioned a post on Sheila's Pointless Cafe blog where she compared Kawako to Essie's Starry Starry Night.

I normally create a draft post soon after applying a manicure, but I don't have a draft post for Kawako, so I have to rely on my memory.  It's a gorgeous dark shade of blue with sparkly bits.  Other bloggers found the formula too thick, but I didn't.  The one thing I wasn't sure I liked or didn't like was the addition of flakies.  Some of the flakies were large, but they remained under the surface of the blue polish, so they marred the surface of the polish, keeping it from being smooth, but they didn't add the special multichromatic effect of flakies.  When a flakie was at the surface, however, especially when it was one of the flakies that flashed fuschia, the effect was amazing.  You'll see in the pictures below that there was some tip wear, but otherwise the polish held up very well.

Sunlight

Indirect Sunlight

Indirect Sunlight
The dimpling is from flakies below the surface of the polish.

Sunlight
It was difficult to capture how the polish glistened.

Sunlight
You can see a bit of the shimmer in the polish.

Sunlight
Blurred--shows the sparkles.

Sunlight
Seldom-seen right hand
You can see some of the shimmer in the polish
Dimpling and uneven texture is from flakies underneath the surface of the polish; top coat didn't smooth it out enough.

Indoors
Such a pretty dark blue!

Thank you for reading my blog!

Rainbow Honey Kitsune from the Yokai Collection

I had a preview post here on the Rainbow Honey Yokai Collection with pictures of the package I received and of the three polishes swatched on nail wheels by themselves and in combination with other colors and matted.  I am really excited to be reviewing these polishes, and I'm honored that even with my blog being new, Rainbow Honey still sent me these polishes for review.

Rainbow Honey is an indie brand, relatively new but you would guess the opposite looking at their polishes and professional packaging.  These are my first Rainbow Honey polishes, although I have eyed many of them in the past.  After receiving the Yokai Collection, I went to the Rainbow Honey site and ordered minis of Hoof Wrassle, 20% Cooler and A Little Kindness.

The Yokai Collection polishes are limited edition for Autumn 2012 and were released only days ago on October 13, 2012.  The polishes are available on Rainbow Honey's website for $10 each.  These are good sized bottles at a half ounce each, and $10 is a very reasonable price for these indies that are so professionally produced and look like little mini works of art.

The first of the Yokai Collection that I wore was Kitsune.  I wore Kitsune all of last week as my manicure.

Kitsune is referred to as the Magical White Fox on Rainbow Honey's website.  The base is a gorgeous cream color, like the color of French vanilla ice cream or like eggnog.  With its golden microflakes and its small sparkling holo and red-orange glitter, this creation looks like a beautiful stone.  It is amazing to me that the polish has so much depth and that the microflakes and small glitters don't just sink into the polish but show right at the top of the manicure.  It's like someone cut a slab of perfect natural stone.

You can wear multiple coats of this polish, but I preferred the look of just one coat, so I wore "underwear" underneath it.

I have read other reviews where other bloggers describe the formula as thick and perhaps in need of a small amount of thinner.  I don't have really great manicure skills, though, and my hands shake a little, so I really *loved* this formula and didn't find that I wanted to add thinner to it.  I liked that it didn't pool or flood my cuticles, and I liked that where I put it, that's where it went and stayed.  I basically didn't need to do much cleanup, and I had no balding or dragging, even though I didn't wait between applying the underwear coat of polish and the coat of Kitsune.  The brush is great, round but a nice size and not too thin.  It was a very fast and easy mani, and I got so much payoff in terms of the beauty and complexity of the polish.  With a look that rich, you would think that I had put together layer after layer of this and that to make up the final look, but you get an amazing look in just one coat of Kitsune.

I found the formula top-coat hungry.  I like my manicures glassy smooth, and this mani didn't get that way until about Thursday.  I do my manicures on Sunday nights, so by Thursday I had the initial Seche Vite top coat plus another four coats (one per day) of Sally Hansen Quick Dry Top Coat.

The manicure wore extremely well for an entire week.

The polish reminds me of eggnog, and with the holo glitters and red-orange glitters and the very reflective gold mini flakes, it is very festive.  So, while it looks like shades of fall, I think it would also be a nice holiday polish.

You can count on Rainbow Honey polishes to be unique and unlike any other polishes out there.  I definitely don't have anything like Kitsune in my collection of polish.

In the pictures below, I have on a base coat, one coat of Sally Hansen Persistent Peony as "underwear," one coat of Kitsune, and one 1 coat of Seche Vite.

Sunlight

Indirect Sunlight

Sunlight
You can see the small and very reflective gold flakes in the polish.

See the holo glitters?

Indoors, not 100% color-accurate, but the color does look a little different in different lighting.

In this blurred picture you can see the golden shimmer effect.

Thank you for reading my blog!

Halloween Giveaway

I have a quick giveaway for Halloween for you because I couldn't pass up the opportunity to buy some polishes and nail polish strips at really great prices.  These prizes were purchased by me specifically for this giveaway.  You don't have to be a GFC Follower or Like my Facebook page to enter this giveaway.  Follow the instructions in the Rafflecopter widget below to enter, and please give the Rafflecopter widget a few moments to load on your screen.

This giveaway is open internationally as long as it is legal for me to send you nail polish in your country.  For the full terms and conditions, please click on the terms and conditions link in the Rafflecopter widget below.

There will be two winners.  The prizes are explained in more detail in the Rafflecopter widget below, but here are some pictures of the prizes, starting with WTFuschia:

And also Party Action, with lots of really pretty glitter in there.

And also Deceit, a favorite of mine with its gorgeous flakies.  I have a post on the blog comparing Deceit to Finger Paints Twisted and I have another post with pictures of my own bottles of Blackheart Beauty and swatches of those polishes on nail wheels.

This picture is from Hot Topic's website.

And also the Sally Hansen nail polish strips in the skull & crossbones pattern.

I have my own bottle of Deceit.  I don't own the other two Blackheart Beauty polishes, and I don't own the skull & crossbones nail strips; I bought them just for this giveaway.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thank you for reading my blog!

Rainbow Honey Yokai Collection Preview

I am very excited to write this preview blog post on Rainbow Honey's Yokai Collection.  It's a preview because the polishes themselves go on sale on October 13th, and it's a preview because it's not my usual manicure blog post.  I am also excited because I was very lucky to be given all the polishes in the Yokai Collection to review!  I got my package from Rainbow Honey in the mail yesterday, and I expected the package to have one polish to review, maybe a mini polish, but I received all three of the Yokai Collection polishes, and all the bottles are full size!  That package really made my day yesterday.  My husband is away on a trip (he's flying back home right now), and I was a little mopey yesterday at home.  Please forgive me military spouses because I know that you have to endure much longer separations from your significant others, but I am just a wuss and really miss my husband when he's gone.  Rainbow Honey's package changed my mood and got me to "do something."  I immediately swatched the polishes on nail wheels.

Rainbow Honey is an indie brand, relatively new but you would guess the opposite looking at their polishes and professional packaging.  These are my first Rainbow Honey polishes, although I have eyed many of them in the past like Hoof Wrassle, 20% Cooler, Koi Pond, A Little Kindness, Pinkie Promise, Celestia, Mare of the Moon, Lunairetic, Siren Song, Snake Eyes, and Frozen Flame.  I think I will be ordering some minis of those tonight before I go to sleep!  I'm really itching for them now even more than before! Rainbow Honey polishes have a distinctive look to me which is hard for me to describe, but it's a kind of look that reminds you of texture and natural grains in stones, even though it's not really grainy polish.

The Yokai Collection polishes are limited edition for Autumn 2012.  There are three polishes in the Yokai Collection.  In alphabetical order, they are Kawako, Kitsune, and Oni.  Kawako is dark blue and makes me think of the night sky; it has tiny silver flakies that sparkle, and it has blue flakies, some of them large.  Kitsune is a camel/nude base with gorgeous tiny gold shimmer and/or flakies and brown microglitter and my favorite part, small orange glitter hexes.  Kitsune looks like "fall" to me.  Oni is a blackened brown base with irregular gold and purple flakies; the combination looks olive or flashes olive and is spectacularly pretty!  All the polishes have cream bases as far as I can tell.  In my opinion Kawako and Oni look best with two coats, but I like using just one coat of Kitsune.  I will be using Kitsune for my manicure tonight, and I will put up a blog post about it hopefully on Tuesday.

There are already a lot of review posts of the Yokai Collection up on blogs.  Two posts really stood out to me.  Sheila has a comparison post on her blog, Pointless Cafe, where she compares Kawako to Essie's Starry Starry Night.  In a post on the No Holos! blog there are pictures of Rainbow Honey Oni with gold nail art swirls.  So gorgeous!  Click through and take a look!

Even though I only just swatched these on nail wheels, I was a little obsessed and tried the polishes mattified and tried Kitsune over lots of different polishes, so there are a lot of pictures coming up.  In the nail wheels below:
#8 is one coat of Kawako,
#9 is one coat of Oni,
#10 is one coat of Kitsune,
#11 is one coat of Kitsune over one coat of China Glaze Papaya Punch,
#12 is one coat of Kitsune over one coat of a burnt orange polish,
#13 is one coat of Kitsune over one coat of a different burnt orange polish,
#14 is one coat of Kitsune over Wet N Wild Black Creme,
#15 is one coat of Oni over Wet N Wild Black Creme,
#16 is one coat of Kawako over Wet N Wild Black Creme,
#17 is one coat of Kawako with a coat of mattifying polish on top,
#18 is one coat of Oni with a coat of mattifying polish on top,
#1 is one coat of Kitsune over one coat of Essie Blanc,
#2 is one coat of Kitsune over one coat of Finger Paints Gossamer White (a light pinkish nude cream),
#3 is one coat of Kitsune over one coat of Sally Hansen Persistent Peony (iridescent nude very similar to Kitsune's base), and
#4 is one coat of Kitsune with a coat of mattifying polish on top.

This beautiful card came with the polishes.

Rainbow Honey does a great job with packaging.
The paper is more eco-friendly than extra bubble wrap or styrofoam.
Under the paper the three polishes were in a bubble wrap bag.
Inside the bag, the three polishes were each in their individual boxes which kept them safe and meant not using more bubble wrap instead.

I like Kitsune at one coat (#10 above).

Kitsune over Papaya Punch was pretty (#11 above).
I think some nail art with Papaya Punch on part of the nail and Kitsune on another part would look nice.

 

Look at how beautiful the polishes are mattified (#17 & #18 above)!

I love the golden shimmer from the mini flakies in Kitsune.

#3 is how I'll be doing my manicure tonight:
one coat of Kitsune over a coat of Sally Hansen Persistent Peony.

The Yokai Collection will be available starting October 13th on Rainbow Honey's website for $10 each.  These are good sized bottles at a half ounce each, and $10 is a very reasonable price for these indies that are so professionally produced and look like little mini works of art.  I see adorable squat little mini bottles on the site for other collections, and those are $5 each, but I don't know if the Yokai Collection will include any mini bottles.  Again, this is a limited edition collection, so when they run out, they're gone!

Thank you for reading my blog!

Comparison of Blackheart Beauty (Hot Topic exclusive) Deceit and FingerPaints Twisted Flakie Polishes

As I write this post, Tropical Storm Isaac is over South Florida, and tropical storm conditions will intensify here for the next 12 hours and continue for probably another 12 hours after that.  So far we have not lost power in our home, so I'm taking advantage of that to put up a blog post, maybe even two posts if I can.

On Saturdays, after a week of wear on my manicures, I usually try an accent nail of glitter or some other special effect top coat because I don't have to worry about being work-appropriate, and I take off my polish and give myself a new manicure on Sundays just in time for work on Monday.

In the pictures in this post, the base color is L'Oreal's L'Orange, which I reviewed here.  In the pictures it looks red, but it's orange in real life.  My camera photographs oranges as reds and purples as blues, and I have not figured out a way around that yet.  I had worn the L'Orange for a week, so there is tip wear and shrinkage in the photos below.

I decided that Saturday to try Blackheart Beauty's Deceit--a flakie polish--as an accent nail on my left hand.  Blackheart Beauty is an edgy brand of cosmetics created especially for Hot Topic.  From what I understand, the products are vegan-friendly and not tested on animals.  The products are very low in price, and the prices are even lower now.  They are available in Hot Topic stores in malls and also online at Hot Topic's website.  Everything is buy-one-get-one-half-off now on the site.

I started out with an accent nail on my left hand with Deceit, but I liked it so much that I put the Deceit flakie polish on all my nails on my left hand.

Here are some pictures of Blackheart Beauty's Deceit, taken indoors, in my bathroom, so not the best pictures (but you can click on them to enlarge them to see more detail), and it's not easy to photograph flakie polishes, either, but here are the photos I was able to take:

I started with just an accent nail.
I don't know why I held my pinkie out, but I assure you that I do have five fingers on my left hand.

See?  Five fingers on my left hand.

I liked the polish so much that I put it on all my nails on my left hand.

I thought that the polish was similar to FingerPaint's Twisted flakie polish, so I tried Twisted on all my nails on my right hand.

Here are some pictures of FingerPaint's Twisted on my right hand:

Indoors, bathroom lighting again.

Weird pose or picture or both, isn't it?

You can see that Twisted's flakies lie flat on the nail with just the slightest amount of dimpling after top coat.

Sunlight.

Sunlight.

Indirect sunlight.  The flakies are clearer on my pointer finger in this photo.

The polishes are similar enough that I could get away with putting a different one on each hand.  There are quite a few differences between the polishes, though.  The flakes in Deceit are more shard-like rather than the traditional fish flakes in Twisted.  The flakes in Deceit stick out a bit, like most shard flakies, but the flakies in Twisted lie flat.  Twisted is shinier but not as eye-catching.  Also, Deceit has added glitter to the polish which contributes to it being more eye-catching.  Deceit is in a pink base, so it tinted my manicure and changed the color of the L'Orange manicure, making it more red-orange rather than orange.  Twisted comes in a clear base, so it doesn't change the color of your base polish.  Twisted's flakes also seem to have more gold and green whereas Deceit looks more pink and purple.  So, they are different enough to justify owning both . . . in my opinion, wink, wink.

Thank you for reading my blog!