A little Anti-Valentine Cold Hearted Wench with Smokey Mountain Lacquers

I have a special treat for you tonight! It is my first collaboration polish!!! I was thrilled when Kim from Smokey Mountain Lacquers informed me I was her February blogger of the month, and I would get to do a collaboration polish with her!

Since everyone was doing pinks and reds, and all in favor of Valentine's Day, I asked Kim about going another direction, kind of an anti-Valentine polish. I had picked out a few names, the one we chose was "Cold Hearted Wench". The idea was that the base color was kind of an icy grayish mint color and would include pink and purple teeeeeeeeny glitters. Kim executed it PERFECTLY!

The swatches are two coats of the polish. One coat is a little sheer for my taste, but with the second coat, I had awesome coverage. It applied evenly and very smooth. The swatches include HK Girl topcoat. Here are the photos:

Close-Up:

 

No Flash:

 

 

With Flash:

 

 

Let me just say that this polish would make an adorable Easter and Spring color too! It almost looks like speckled eggs. Kim was very sweet to include an extra bottle of Cold Hearted Wench for me to giveaway! I am also contributing by purchasing the winner one bottle of Smokey Mountain Lacquers from the store. (Item must be in stock at time of giveaway end)

 

You can purchase "Cold Hearted Wench" from Smokey Mountain Lacquers here:

http://www.smokeymountainlacquers.com/

 

Stop by Smokey Mountain Lacquers' Facebook page and thank Kim for donating a bottle for our giveaway! Be sure to like her page while there:

https://www.facebook.com/SmokeyMtnLacquers

 

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

A Little Bit of Philly Lovin'!

Hello lovely readers and followers! I slacked again, and I always feel so guilty, but wrestling has literally taken over my life. My son however is kicking some serious backside! This weekend is Jr. High State, followed by Youth Regionals. Two big events, one weekend. So much stress for mom! He never breaks a sweat or worries. So strong willed!

Enough rambling about my boy, and on to some love and pretties!

Today I want to share some love! This weekend, I would love to share a blog that has influenced my buying a TON this month. She is super nice, she is very personable and interacts within the various Facebook polish groups, and her pictures are GORGEOUS!

My Blog of the week is:
Amanda Loves Polish - Her Blog: http://www.amandalovespolish.com
                                       Her Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/amandalovespolish/
                                       Her Instagram ID: amandalovespolish

Please check her blog out and some of her beautiful swatches!

My polish maker of the week is Philly Loves Lacquer. I chose this brand because I am finding more and more that I want ALL of her polishes, and Esther, the owner and creator, has some fantastic customer service. She goes above and beyond! All of Philly Loves Lacquer polishes are 4-free and cruelty free! I will have links to all of Philly Loves Lacquer pages after the polish! :)

My best friend in polish and life sent me an awesome preset of three of PhLL's mini polishes. They were all supposed to be a mystery, but my BFF decided to mark the bottles for me since she had the colors already and so I would know what they were. I fell in love with these beauties, just like any other PhLL I have! Today I have two of those gorgeous beauties for you.

First up is Christmas Village. This is a gorgeous squishy reddish pink holo. It went on in two coats with no issues, and had a fantastic dry time. N streaking or bubblies, and very smooth. These manis were topped with Poshe' topcoat to give it the awesome shine.

 

Close-Up:

 

No flash:

 

 

 With Flash:

 

Next up I have A gorgeous light baby blue holo named River Rink. As with Christmas Village, the formula was fantastic, application was super smooth, and this is two coats. Again, Poshe' was used as my topcoat for this mani.

 

 

Close-Up

 

 

 No Flash:

 

 With Flash:

 

You are probably wondering, "Why is she showing us Christmas polishes now? After Christmas?" Well, I have seen a couple of these on some of the ladies Store Envy pages for sale and on Pinterest boards for sale, I recommend you snatch them up because these colors are definitely not just for Christmas!

 

What do you think of these two colors? Do you own any PhLL? Leave me some comments below and let me know!

 

Links for Philly Loves Lacquer:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PhillyLovesLacquer

Store: http://phillyloveslacquer.com/

Instagram: phillyloveslacquer

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GIVEAWAY ALERT!!!!!!

 

Also, while you are here, I am asking you check out Anne Kathleen Polish! She has a giveaway on her page and I am sponsoring one of the prizes! Check it out! :)

 

Store and Giveaway link: http://annekathleen.com/blogs/explore-beauty-inspiration/11897117-in-celebration-of-the-fans

 

~Jenn

 

Share the Love Saturday and Darling Diva

Hello peeples! :) Hope everyone is having a great weekend! Today I have another Darling Diva to share with you. It is one of my NEW favorite Darling Diva polishes. It is so purrrrdy! I also wanted to join in with many of the other bloggers and makers with share the love weekend. In doing so, I am going to post some links to a couple of my favorite bloggers and makers. I have also decided to do a "Share the Love Saturday" post every Saturday on the CbC Facebook page. Feel free to post your links there, your Instagrams, etc. I am also on Instagram with the user name @covered_by_color. I post a few other photos besides nail photos, but they are usually proud momma photos and such. I also will follow back!

Anyhow, onto Share the Love then I will get to the stunning Darling Diva polish!

First blog I want to share is Kirby Hartline's blog. She is super sweet and has always been willing to help me out when I have needed it. Her blog is fantastic and she blogs about drug store brands as well as Indie polishes. You can find her blog, The Mercurial Magpie Here: http://www.themercurialmagpie.com/

The second blog I follow often is "The Crumpet". Her blog and swatches are fabulous and she always has insightful posts. (It doesn't hurt she is a fantastic stamper too!) You can find Debbie and her blog here: http://www.the-crumpet.com/

Now I figured since I am obsessed with so many indie polishes and makers, I would highlight one each Saturday. This Saturday since I am showing you swatches of Carrie's Darling Diva Polish, I would make that my first spotlight brand. It is a great time to spotlight Darling Diva too, they released two new collections this week, The Muscle Car collection and the White Witch Collection! I have always had great customer service with Darling Diva. Carrie and Mr. DDP go out of their way to make sure each customer is completely satisfied. I also want to state that their shipping is super duper speedy! I usually order and receive my shipping notice within 48 hours.

You can purchase Darling Diva at either of the two links below:

Bigcartel: http://www.darlingdivapolish.bigcartel.com/
Etsy: http://www.etsy.com/shop/DarlingDivaPolish
Darling Diva Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/DarlingDivaPolish

Now onto the beautiful polish I have to show you from Darling Diva!

Today's polish is Blue Diamonds. It is from a semi-new collection at Darling Diva called the Diamond Collection. It is so pretty! I recently started really getting into blue polishes more so than I already was. I have always loved blue, but never thought much of it on my nails. I started trying it out and decided I LOVED it on my hands!

Blue Diamond is described as a "stunning blue holo is both linear and a one coater." on the Darling Diva store page. It sells for $8.00 plus shipping. Also, the description warns of high amounts of pigments which can evaporate faster than other polishes, and can thicken over time. It is recommended that you add thinner if you have issues with thickening.

The photos are of one coat of Blue Diamond over OPI Nail Envy. These photos are one coat! One coat polishes are fantastic because you aren't wasting time and product going over the coats again and again. The polish applied smoothly (almost like butter!) and there were no issues with the formula. I have had this polish for a few weeks, and did not experience thickening or evaporation. There is beautiful flashes of purples and pinks within the holo.

Here are the photos:

No Flash:

 

 

With Flash:

 

 

Close up:

 

What do you think of this beauty? Do you own any Darling Diva polishes or any of this collection? Leave me some love in the comments! I always reply and try to comment back! Got a blog you want me to check out? Leave me the link in the comments as well!

 

These polishes were not provided to me for review. They are from my own stash and the opinions are my own. I was not influenced in any way to publish anything about these polishes.

 

 



Another dose of Mentality!

Hello lovely people! Since the holidays are finally over, and wrestling has slowed down a little, I can finally sit down and commit myself to the blog again! I have quite a few posts planned and all ready to go so look for more posts!

This Christmas, I exchanged gifts with a very dear friend. We met in the polish community last year, and we have been friends ever since. She knows my taste and likes so very well! This year for Christmas she got myself and the other admins of our group a custom Mentality polish. Then she went a step further and got me another Mentality custom. 

I debated on whether or not to share these, because the last custom I shared was so well liked, that it is now available to the public! However, these colors are gorgeous and I couldn't contain myself! So here they are.

First up is custom CS004. Since Mentality doesn't name their customs, they are given a series of letters and numbers. If I could name this polish, I would have to name it simply "Decadent". It looks like a delicious, rich, yummy, sinful, piece of chocolate. There are hints of a eggplant purple color in it though. So we couldn't name it "Chocolate". It all depends on what light you look at in. 

The formula was great, as it always is with Mentality. The photos are one coat topped with HK Girl by Glisten and Glow. 

Here is CS004 without flash:

Here is CS004 with flash:

And how about a nice closeup of this beauty? You can see the gorgeous shimmer in this polish and see why it is so "Decadent"!

Next up is CS005. This polish is so pretty!!! If I could name this one, I would name it "Sparkles". It is a gorgeous shade of pink with teal shimmer. I had so much trouble capturing the teal in this polish on camera. It is GORGEOUS! 

This is one coat topped with HK Girl by Glisten and Glow. The formula again was fantastic. It was a little thick, but nothing a drop of thinner couldn't fix!

Here is CS005 without flash:

Here is CS005 with flash:

 A close up of CS005. So pretty!

What do you think of these two customs? Do you have any Mentality polish? I have a huge collection of Mentality! They also make GREAT stamping polishes. 

You can find Mentality polish here for sale:

http://mentalitynailpolish.bigcartel.com/

Also, there is a giveaway going on at the Covered by Color Facebook page, so be sure to visit and check it out!

These polishes were purchased by me and the opinions in this review are all my own and were not influenced.