My Pretty Priti - #209 Alister Stella Gray Rose

Today's NOTD is exceptional in that, after five minutes I didn't want to take it off.

Priti - #209 Alister Stella Gray Rose

Alister Stella Gray Rose is a nail polish created by Priti NYC An absolutely gorgeous shade, it's one of the first four Priti polishes I ever purchased.  It was also the one I was drooling over the most, partly because it was especially designed for Stella McCarthy's F/W 2011 Paris Fashion Week showing.   It is a soft, work-friendly coral pink that leans more pink on my skintone -- wow, am I that yellow? (J/k)

Anyways, Priti also collaborated with McCarthy to create a shade for Spring/Summer 2012 Paris Fashion Week:

#137  Sweet Pea

And here's her Spring/Summer 2012 Paris Fashion Week show:

I'm not a huge fan of sheers so I'm not sure how sold I am on it yet but I'm definitely a fan of Priti after trying Alister Stella Gray Rose.  Formula was not too thick to be difficult to work with and I reached an acceptable opacity after 3 coats.

The only downside to this polish is that it is on the pricier side, $12.50 USD per bottle but it makes up in a decent formula and gorgeous color payoff.  But for me, this is a polish I would definitely want a backup bottle of.  Not to mention the color online actually matched what I received.  Shipping was fast -- I placed my order on Tuesday and had them on Friday -- and they do have a "clearance" section where bottles are half off.  The color line itself is pretty work-appropriate and I don't regret choosing to buy Priti over Rescue Beauty Lounge this time around.

In addition to this shade, I also ordered #511 - Dusty Miller, #559 - Coffee Bush, and # #593 - Lamb's Ear, with the latter two being part of their new 2012 Pre-Spring collection.  I'll have photos up on the other three as soon as I can bring myself to take off Alister Stella...hopefully sooner, but probably later.

XOXO

Walgreens Haul

I don't normally buy a lot of things at Walgreens because I found them to be historically more expensive than other stores.  However, I was in search of Sally Hansen Glass Slipper and they happened to be on sale there so I thought, why not?

I'm glad I went.  I'm also glad I went to a Walgreens I don't normally go to because as it turns out, the girl in the beauty department was a nail enthusiast like me and was more than happy to help.

As you can see, I didn't get SH Glass Slipper but I did end up with a lot more...for a the price of two bottles of polish and a protein bar.

I managed to get my hands on the LAST bottle of clearanced out Seche Vite at that location (I now plan on scouring every other local Walgreens that has it in stock) for $4.79(!) and I got a bottle of Loreal nail polish because the girl swore by it.  I figured it has something to do with the Essie relationship and picked up a pretty bottle of gold that was not only $1 off, but another WG employee ahead of me in line gave me her Loreal coupon for another $1 off.

Here's the polish I bought:

 L'Oreal - Because You're Worth It

For some reason, the middle finger was really streaky and applied poorly.  I had to remove it and re-apply it to get it to look like the other nails.

This was a weird gold.  I've been wanting to try one and purchase Wallis earlier in the week on Ebay but this is a shade that I hated when I first applied it and have slowly grown to really love it.  Its a strong metallic shade that has a really cool tone to it, which really surprised me.  It almost feels like having a light gold foil on my fingers.

Application was streaky but 3 coats sufficiently cleared up the streakiness and opacity.  I have light tan skin with yellow-to-olive undertones so gold normally looks really nice on me but I honestly believe this might be better suited for cooler toned gals.   Either way, I loved the overall shininess of it all and I didn't regret buying it like a few of the other polishes I've bought in the past.

Retail price on the first display I found it on said $6.49 but it was on another display listing it for $5.99 with another $1 off from the Walgreens coupon.  Another Walgreens employee hooked me up with her personal L'Oreal coupon so ended up paying $3.99 for it.

All in all the nail polish WAS worth it -- meaning I'd probably buy another bottle once I ran out -- and of course you can't go wrong with 14 bottles of nail polish remover and Seche Vite for less than $5.

Orly Galaxy Girl or How I Learned to Love the Multichrome

As of late, I have not really had much love for nail polish that sparkles.  I should probably explain that when I was a child (an only one I should mention) the only shades of nail polish I was allowed to wear had to be in the very barest pinks, beiges, and any other color that qualifies as an "80s nude" shade.  This is why seeing my Aunt's best friend paint her nails in one of Chanel's deep chocolate brown nail polishes when I was around 12 or 13 played such an important role about how I viewed polish in my adulthood.  

Its very much like my obsession with shoes and handbags; keep the outfit simple and classic, go crazy with the accessories.  (And nail polish is definitely an accessory.  I should also note that I took piano lessons from my early childhood into my teens so my nails were always a stubby, not-so-attractive length so I didn't feel as compelled to paint them.)

Anyways, whenever my nails get to a point where I think they're "long enough" I decide it's time to get to painting.  I recently placed my first Zoya order and picked up a few beautiful shades -- Kristen, Codie, Kiki, Reece, Adina, Yasmeen, etc. -- a nice mix of "flat" colors and colors with glitter and duochromes.  Of the colors I bought Kristen and Codie were the ones I fell in love with.  They were perfect and neutral enough to wear in most situations and I was happy. The others just didn't feel right quite yet.

So they've been sitting in my polish box -- relegated to a fate unknown -- but hope for sparkle wasn't lost on me it seems.  Today, while perusing the Facebook nail polish group I belong to, I was inspired by a couple gals that had taken a trip to their local Ulta and discovered a cache of nail polish bottles.

I decided I would drag my husband to the one and only Ulta store in San Diego hoping to find some diamonds in the rough and I wandered in feeling like I wouldn't find anything.  The store is huge compared to the beauty stores I normally go to and it features a salon but the selection feels -- incomplete.  Despite serving a client base of young college aged women who attend UCSD nearby, and the generally upper middle class, I was disappointed with the selection as soon as I walked in.  I wandered aimlessly around the store searching for any sign of nail polishes besides the ones in the Sally Hansen aisle and finally, after the kids had gotten tired of being warned not to touch anything and consequently taken out by my husband, I found what I was looking for.  Tucked in the back near an alternate entrance and the "salon" was a oblong shaped island that featured the more popular OPI/Essie/Orly shades.  I must've circled it five times.  I decided to stop in front of the Orly polishes, searching for some life in the sea of common colors.  I picked up a bottle on the top shelf of the polish rack.  It was Galaxy Girl.  I was only really familiar with Space Cadet -- mostly as a cheaper alternative to the more elusive Clarins 230 -- but I thought, "why the hell not?" and picked it up along with Out of This World after some humming and hawing.  They were labeled with prices, but I thought as long as they didn't go over $8 I'd be happy.  

These were the (3) shades I decided on (L-R Out of This World, Yara, Galaxy Girl).  The Orlys ended up being a little more than I expected but I also signed up for the Ulta Perks Card and the girl took off an extra $3.50 from my purchase so it was like getting the Zoya polish for free!  (That's Kiki in the background in case you were wondering.)

After wandering around some more, I found a disheveled aisle of clearance items.  Sifting through separated bottles of OPI, Essie, Zoya and Orly was a little sad but I managed to score a bottle of Zoya's Yara for half price.  Not wanting to jinx my already good fortune of finding a Zoya color I was sort of wanting and two Orly colors that looked hard-to-find, I decided it was time to checkout.  In the Orly's were a little more than I expected but I figured they'd be worth it.  I'll let you be the judge.  

Here is Galaxy Girl paired over Wet N Wild's Morbid:

It was really difficult to capture the color shift fully...especially with a plain ole' point-and-shoot but you can kind of see the chameleon glitter shining here.

At certain angles, It just looked like a dark nail polish with a very fine green glitter.

In any case, it is an absolutely beautiful duo-chrome and I'm really excited about it.  I have yet to try Out of This World (mostly because I ran out of cotton balls and nail polish remover) but I'd imagine it won't disappoint me either.  

I think the thing I loved about Galaxy Girl the most was that I could do (1) layer of it over Morbid and it still looked amazing.  I think I'm definitely going to be experimenting with this one.