Julep January 2016 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! I’m back with new material today: a subscription box post! Instead of going through the backlog of subscription boxes that I didn’t get around to last year, I decided to skip ahead to this month’s Julep box to keep it current (well, sort of current, since it’s not January anymore). So today I have my January 2016 Julep box (New Year, Fresh Look) to show off on the blog, replete with swatches and nail art!

This month’s collection was full of gorgeous cool-colored shimmery shades that immediately caught my attention, so I was very taken with the polishes this month since those are right up my alley. For this month’s box, I just stuck to my favorite three shades from the collection, but there were so many other lovely polishes. I used the three colors plus Julep Mahima to create some eye-catching peacock feather nail art, which came out so very nicely. Read on to see all the polish!

Swatches – Carpe Noctem Clear Skies and Interstellar Towel

Hi everyone! I’m still here – yes, I am! So…ummm…I’ve been away for a while… A combination of various factors ended up keeping me away from my blog for a month and a half, the biggest one being that I’ve been putting in a lot more time at work. Usually when I come home on weekdays, I’m too tired to paint my nails at all, let alone do nail art. Also, I shifted my spare time towards another creative hobby of mine – sewing – so that I could complete a gorgeous new Renaissance costume for this year’s faire (which is AWESOME). But, yeah, I’ve been away from my blog for a while, which isn’t something I wanted to happen. Hopefully I can get back into blogging more frequently now that I’m not doing as much sewing, and I can eventually move through the backlog of things I’ve wanted to write about (especially the subscription boxes!).

Before I get around to the subscription box posts, though, I thought I’d post some swatches of a few polishes I wore recently by an indie brand named Carpe Noctem Cosmetics. I don’t exactly remember how Carpe Noctem first came to my attention, but I somehow found their Etsy shop and I liked a number of polishes they had and placed an order. They have some gorgeous holographics and shimmers, and the best part is that they offer multiple sizes of the same colors so you can buy smaller (and less expensive) bottles if you want! Since I have photos of some of the polishes I’ve worn, I thought I’d share them: here are Carpe Noctem Clear Skies and Interstellar Towel!

SquareHue July 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! Today I have the SquareHue July 2015 box (the 1960s) to show off on the blog! Finally, I’ve gotten around to the subscription box posts! About time, too – it’s almost the end of the month…oops…  Anyways, this is the box that I was most looking forward to for the entire year because I figured that there would be some pretty “out there” polish inside. I was totally psyched for the crazy stuff! Indeed, SquareHue did not disappoint: this is the grooviest bunch of colors I’ve gotten so far from them; it’s highly appropriate for the ’60s and the summer. Since the psychedelic influence of the colors and names was very obvious, I combined all three polishes into an electric daisy design for some flower power on my nails.

Also, as I mentioned in my last post, I’m trying to explore my new neighborhood more now that I’ve moved into a new apartment. Given how much I was digging the ’60s inspiration behind this SquareHue box, I took the opportunity to conduct some firsthand “research” on the decade by traveling to one of the hotspots of the hippie movement on my way home from work one day. I’ve got a bit about that trip, with a few pictures, at the end of the post!

Julep April 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! Today I have my Julep April 2015 box (Paradise Collection) to show off on the blog (even though I missed the end of the month…again…)! This month’s box was full of brights, and, given how much I love bright colors, I had a lot of fun with this collection. I ended up picking four polishes and, as usual, I swatched them, did a few comparisons, and made some nail art. Since two of the polishes I chose were shimmery blues, I went aquatic with my nail art and did a little seascape with brightly colored fish.

Swatches – Different Dimension Tulips Are Better Than One and Julep Marla

Hi everyone! I sincerely apologize for the lack of blog posts recently. The truth is: I’ve been sick with a really bad cold since my last blog post over a week and a half ago. Between having a fever for a few days, frequent coughing fits, losing my voice for 5 days, and difficulty sleeping, my “energy” for painting my nails (much less nail art) was completely sapped. On the bright side, I’m FINALLY starting to get better after what feels like forever, and I’m back to posting! I know I missed at least one blog post that’s usually a monthly feature on my blog (you probably know what it is), but I hope to get back on track soon and finish up all the things I got behind on when I was sick. Anyways, to any of my readers who have stuck around, thank you so very much for continuing to read my blog ❤

Today I have two swatches of some random polishes I wore while I was sick. The first is Different Dimension Tulips Are Better Than One – a really fabulous bright “blurple” (blue-purple) duochrome shimmer – and the second is the polish I picked to wear on the first night of Passover: Julep Marla. Unlike the majority of the posts where I show swatches of polish, these two don’t really have any relationship to each other. But, still, I thought I’d combine them into one blog post since my swatch posts are pretty short.

Julep February 2015 Swatches, Comparisons, and Nail Art

Hi everyone! I know it’s kind of late in the month (the March reveal is, like, today) but I of course need to do my monthly Julep Maven box post! Today I have a post about my picks from the Julep Maven February 2015 collection (Afterglow), which is the first box I’ve customized. That’s right – I reluctantly switched to My Maven so that I can get what I want out of each collection, and avoid things I don’t. It makes sense at this point, since I usually never want the beauty products and Julep has been putting more and more of them into the Style Profile boxes. Now it’s just polish for me! Yay!

This month, I chose my three favorite polishes from the February collection, plus I got another one (Hartleigh) as a freebie, for a total of four polishes. I used them all to create a nail art design that somewhat echoes the dark, rich florals that were part of the collection artwork.

Purple Duochrome Swirls with Zoya

Hi everyone! Today I have some two-color nail art today that features two purple polishes from Zoya! While I’m still busy with all my crazy work this month, I still found some time to do this in between all of my responsibilities; of course, it does help that one of my biggest tasks got postponed to November/December…

Anyways, this design was prompted by my recent discovery of Zoya Adina (a purple-based duochrome with a green shift). I found myself entranced by this magical photo of Adina that Zoya posted a month ago on its social media sites, and couldn’t resist getting it once Zoya put out some great promotional deals. I mean, seriously amazing promotions. So good that I basically bought my entire polish wishlist in one order. That’s one of the best things about Zoya: when they have a sale, they have a SALE. One of the other polishes I bought in that order was Margo, which is one of the new polishes from the Entice Fall 2014 collection. It’s a highly saturated medium grape purple creme, and I love it! This shade is so flattering on my skin tone, and I’m very fond of how vivid and intense it is. It made total sense in my mind to pair Margo with Adina, since they are both great purple shades and they look good together. I chose to do these soft swirls to give Adina a chance to shine without being overwhelming.

Whimsical Blue Feathers with Essie – Summer Promo!

Hi everyone! I have some exciting news: Essie is having a summer stock up! This news is like two weeks old, but the promotion is valid until September 1st, so it’s still relevant. The promotion is: if you purchase any three Essie polishes at an authorized retailer, you can send a picture of the receipt to Essie and they will ship you a free bottle of topcoat in three to four weeks. The offer is valid for US residents only, and lasts until September 1st. Since Essie hardly ever has promotions, I took advantage of this offer and bought three Essie polishes at my local drugstore; combining other drugstore coupons with the promo made me feel like I actually got a good deal. It’s only been one and a half weeks since I sent in my receipt, so no topcoat for me yet.

The link to the promo is here:

http://www.essie.com/summer-promotion

The three Essie polishes I bought were Who is the Boss (light blue green), Strut Your Stuff (BRIGHT turquoise blue – new for summer 2014), and For the Twill of It (purple-green duochrome). Because the colors looked so good together, I combined them into this feather design, which I think is quite whimsical and breezy. I like it 🙂

Julep Swatches – Phia and Phoebe

Hi everyone! I’m back after a week and a half of not posting with some random Julep swatches. I wasn’t very inspired to make fancy nail art, so I just wore single colors for a little bit. I find that wearing single colors is a refreshing change from crazy complicated designs. And with these two colors, wearing them by themselves was far from boring.

Julep Phia is a new color for this month (June 2014) that is an orchid-to-grey duochrome fleck metallic. The polish overall shifts from an orchid purple in the center to a tan/grey at the edges, and the individual flecks themselves reflect a variety of colors including green, pink, and gold (this can be seen in certain lightings). Visually, it is very intriguing. Moreover, the polish was very easy to apply and covered in three coats. The best thing about Phia, though, is how well it disguises tip wear. These photos are from Day 5 of this manicure, and you can barely tell that there is tip wear. Overall I highly recommend it.