Butter London "Marrow"

Ordered this online along with the beige Alexander McQueen one. Very satisfied with experience, even if it's full retail. (ouch) Ships from Richmond for all you Canadian girls, and was less than 10 for two bottles. It came in a box for 3 so I would imagine that's the cost for 3 as well. Although at 17 bucks a pop can we be friends if you buy that many?


On to my absolutely horrifc scarring awful swatches of "Marrow" . I was first inspired to lust after seeing images of this on AllLaqueredup.com and now that I have it I can't remember why. I think I thought it was more taupe then purple. The polish in bottle contains a pearlescent sheen that doesn't really translate onto the nail. I'm in the process of moving so almost all of my comparison purples are packed. But it's a dark greyed cool purple with pink and purple shimmer. Shimmer not so visible to naked eye.  As with all of my BL polishes the application is very smooth and is opaque in two coats.



Is it a "must have" like I felt it was when I saw on ALU? Not so sure.  What do you think?

Essie "Demure Vixen" & Nivea Natual Volume

Today my copy of Lou Lou Magazine (aka Canada's "shopping" magazine) arrived and inside was a free sample of Nivea natural volume lip gloss/shine.  Yay, free stuff! It says "enhances natural volume and gives beautiful shine". My lips don't need volume. I have always had enormous lips. So volume boosting products aren't really a sell for me. What does sell is shine, texture and hydration. I do own several lip fusions, I feel they do plump lips and they are pretty much the only thing that conditions my lips in the winter time. I get horribly chapped lips, perhaps because they're so HUGE. The lip fusions make it so I can actually wear lipstick, otherwise it's just a flaky hot mess. Photos and stuffs after jump

Barry M "British Racing Green"

Loving my Barry M polishes so far-although this one wanted to make me cry. The formula was just so not dumb dumb friendly-I actually had to use Seche Vite to make this smooth. And I hardly ever use a topcoat (GASP!) since I don't keep polish on more than a day. I do most of my clean up for polish in the shower. I'm too much of a spaz to be truly neat during my application

Trolling for Beauty (or why I dislike haul posts)

Everyone struggles with self esteem at some point in their lives. Be it weight, puberty, job/work, relationship. Some people more so than others. It's taken me a long time to figure out healthy ways to indulge myself in the beauty/cosmetic/fashion industry. Online and in real life. I have spent thousands and thousands of dollars on cosmetics over the years, enough to know more about most brands and products then the women selling them to me.  Enough to recognize marketing gimmicks and false claims. And to find them amusing. Enough to realize that when I am feeling fat and frumpy a new lipstick/polish/foundation/moisturizer isn't , in fact, going to make me look any less fat and frumpy, it's only going to eat a hole in my pay cheque and make me feel like a hoarder when I try to find somewhere to stash it. I see endless blogs, forums, Eotd, Notd, haul videos where ladies promote and review beauty products, some bought some promo'd about product. How much of this is fueled by low self esteem? Shopping is a pick me up for many many women. I see countless threads and posts where women are eagerly awaiting the release of collections of powders and such that they don't need.  Specktra has an entire section dedicated to photographing your make up collection-and these women aren't even make up artists! Oh, I'm sure many of them want to be but let's face it most aren't. Being able to expertly apply shadow on your own eye shape and such is one thing, figuring it out on many different types of eye shapes is another. Do these women really need 5 different mineralize skin finishes from MAC?  Stacks upon stacks of pigments they'll never use up?  Granted, if cosmetics is your hobby (as it is mine) these things don't really expire. But a lot of it does, mascara, lipsticks, foundations creams etc. Do you really need another? This is why beauty is a multi billion dollar a year industry. The rational part of my brain shudders. The part that likes shiny things orders another nail polish (ALSO DOESN'T EXPIRE....sigh)

I also wonder how many of these young girls and women can afford to spend like this? (I hope not on credit. Please Jeebus) Picking up a shadow, skin finish and lipgloss at a MAC store costs about 100 retail. It worries me. I feel a lot of beauty bloggers feed into this when they post promotional materials emailed to them, as well as do raving reviews on free promo items. It's specifically why I dislike haul videos and posts.

At the end of the day it comes down to this-if you're unhappy with the way you look buying make up doesn't make your nose smaller, or make you less fat. It just makes you fat (and with a big nose) with a new lipgloss, or eye shadow, or nail polish. And less money for important things, like car repair, bills, retirement savings. So take stock of the things you have already and try to "hit pan" so to speak before spending your hard earned cash. I feel many women online keep searching for the one product that will make their skin less oily/dry, make their hair less curly/straight and somehow make them look like poreless wonders who never break out. It's not going to happen honey.  Eating less makes you lose weight, not a "holy grail" foundation. Airbrushing in magazines makes you matte and poreless, not a new skin primer. Genetics give you smooth straight hair, or on the other hand wavy long manes. So learn to love yourself, or change the things you hate or you'll never stop hauling.

NOTD Butter London "Come to Bed Red" and Tiffany bracelet from my seester

I own about 5 or 6 Butter London polishes, with two more coming in the mail. At 17 dollars they are super extravagant and expensive but the colours are so far unique and the formula is generally awesome.  (Except for somehow today I already managed to chip a thumbnail? This never happens to me) And so I present BL CTBR a beautiful blue cool red that is one of my fav reds. (Disclaimer-I own very few reds)

Please excuse my Craplication.  Also, I saw a display at Zellers that had dupes for at least two BL polishes-Big Smoke and the green glitter one. LA Colors. I was going to purchase two for swatch comparisons but I felt a little obsessive considering I just got my Barry M ebay haul today. Tomorrow, perhaps. And my sister gave me a lovely bracelet! She won't tell me where she got it online since she's found something to give me that I love. I won't push it either, it's nice to get nice things.

Winners Hair Product Extravaganza

My  new found Love/Lust for EO lemon verbena shampoo has taken me to a new level of hoarding folks-whilst in my Winners I picked up ANOTHER 32 oz bottle of the Shampoo (in case it all sells out and there is a nuclear war and I am unable to order things on the internet, and no all my hair did NOT fall out with radiation sickness) AND a 32oz bottle of the conditioner. It. Smells. Fabulous. I made the cashier and my visiting family members all smell it and they agree. So now I have a GIANT bottle of Phillip B conditioner, my Farouk silk therapy "fruit cocktail" and pounds of the EO stuff.

But wait! There's MORE! I had picked up a bottle of Barex UV shine spray and loved it so much (something about Monoi oil/scent just gets me) that I picked up a leave in and a rinse out conditioner. 8.99 CAD regular 30. Deal! I love the Sun Essentials hair oil spray is very softening although if your hair is fine I'd skip this you'll look like a greaser from the 50's. Barex HERE . I need to stop buying things, seriously.


I'll do a review on the leave in cream. On a side note, if you're wondering why my comforter looks linty it's because I have 3 cats and nothing is untouched. Nothing.

Sniffle. Filed nails down-NOTD

Title pretty much says it all. They were getting so long, and the eff you finger of my right hand was chipped so filed down they all went. Then last night I lost sleep over it. I know, crazy right? Well I'm a nail biter who currently doesn't want to fall off the wagon so I have cause to worry that my nail shape isn't right therefore I will chew it. I have hundreds of bottles of nail polish, I'd feel like an ass if I had no nails to paint!

Now that they're shorter I've done them up in a hot pink Color Club "warhol".  The awesome Barry M blues and turquoises I've been enjoying just didn't feel right on shorter nails. As you can see hot pink is not so easy to take a picture of. If you look closely you can see VNL and a few cat hairs but whatever.  Two coats over Nubar Nu Nails no topcoat. Think I'll do a third coat.

A lemming fufilled? Essie Sag Harbor

I first saw this swatch on various other nail polish blogs last year when I first started to seriously hoard accumulate nail polish last year and decided it must be mine but was unsure about ebay prices. Well, now that transdesign has Essie for 8USD it's actually cheaper on ebay***. So I bought it, along with a few select others.

Photo after Jump

Polish or Perish Giveaway!

I'll help you ladies out, even though absolutely NO ONE reads this blog! Polish or Perish is a blog I check out several times a week, mainly for the swatchy goodness and proper spelling. Grammar is such a wonderful thing don't you think ?

That and all of the posting ladies have nice, non creepy nails.( Some of the nail polish bloggers out there have nightmare fingernails. Not because of length, but SHAPE! Like franken shovels, or franken nubbins)

So I believe they are having a one year giveaway and you can enter for it here

And now for some random trolling

Oompa, Loompa, Doopity-Do - I've got a little self tan post for you

Ever since I stopped fake and baking last year I've tried to keep up my "glow" with self tanners. Some I do OK with, others I eff up horribly and I look like an Oompa Loompa. Take the pictures below, for example.

Hugely embarrassing photos after jump

Unabashed relative promoting

I'm going up to see my baby nephew tomorrow, his Mom (my sister) is visiting and I just LOVE him! He has an older brother that I may put photos up of when Baby H is older, and less adorable. But for now I present you with ... HENNERS

My take on Fyrinnae

I finally hauled with Fyrinnae cosmetics!  I ordered the Pixy  Epoxy, Translucent face powder for oily skin and a boat load of eye shadows.

Swatch photos after the Jump!

EO Shampoo Lemon Verbana-At a Winner's near you!

Finally! A Shampoo that doesn't smell like chemicals! O joy, o wonder!


Ever since my on again, off again BF made the comment that my hair "stinks" (like garter snake urine, even. How specific is THAT) I've been on a quest to find a Shampoo that doesn't stink. Make that shampoo, conditioner and leave in serum/spray and perhaps even a flat iron spray. I had been using "DermaOrganics" line, with Moroccan oil-shampoo, conditioner and leave in serum. Which left my hair lovely clean and soft. The shampoo is really nice in that it lathers well and rinses clean. He seems to think that everyone should be using "Sunsilk" because it smells "awesome" but I've tried to explain that my hair is essentially bleached from my ears all the way down and the conditioner doesn't condition enough.

However,  this post is about EO shampoo. Was creeping in Winners (is it TJ Max or Ross for you US folks?) and discovered this gem. Big honking bottle for about 13 bucks CAD and it smells DIVINE. A co worker had picked this up several months ago in a Vancouver Winners in Orange and I was thrilled to see it in our local one.

The smell of this is exactly as described-Lemon Verbena. Wonderful. No need to repeat unless you have a heavy treatment in your hair. If you're looking for a new shampoo I highly recommend this line. 

It's yet to pass the "stink" test but at this point I'm all like "Eff you, I've gone through 100 bucks worth of product this one stays"

And now a lovely stock photo I've stolen off the Internet for your enjoyment.  You can order directly off of EO products  if your local Winners hasn't got this in.