Polish Pauper

Nail Tek is awesome, or how my nails recovered from the winter.

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Wed, 22 May 2013 14:03:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! This winter was rough on my hands and nails, not sure why this year it was so different, but it was. Peeling nails, dry cuticles and hands, blargh! My normal routine was not cutting it and I was at my wits end when the lovely people over at Beauty Stop Online asked if I would want to review the Nail Tek Beautiful Hands Kit, of course I said yes! This wonderful little kit includes two nail treatments and a tube of hand cream. The nail treatments are the Nail Tek II line for soft, peeling nails which fit me to a tee. I have used this kit for two months and my nails look so much better and I still have more then half of the bottles left. I used the Intensive Therapy every night before bed and the added bonus is that it made my nails look super shiny and polished when I did not have time to really polish them. The hand cream was nice, thick absorbed quickly and smelled good. Overall I would recommend trying out the Nail Tek Beautiful Hands kit, it has been a blessing for my poor winter hands. Product was provided by the company for my honest review. All pictures are from companies website.

We're going to party like it's Pretty Serious 1st Birthday!

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Tue, 14 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! One of my favorite bloggers ever, Kaz from Pretty Random, went and started her own cosmetics company a year ago and it is awesome! The year has flown by and the collections have been incredible, I can not wait to see what is coming up in the second year. Pretty Serious is the name of the brand and they have the cutest mascot, Daphne. Well, Daphne has gotten all dolled up for the celebration and has given her name to a gorgeous glitter bomb, Daphne's Birthday Party. The only thing she asked for was for all of us to share our nails decked out in this glitteriffic polish on May 14th, as I am not wanting to disappoint here they are! Share your own over on Twitter with the #happybirthdaydaphne or #prettyserious.

Find me on Bloglovin

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Mon, 13 May 2013 15:17:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! With Google reader disappearing in a couple of months, I've switched on over to Bloglovin. Come on over and check it out by clicking on the link. Ta!
Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Colgate Optic White, pretty!

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Fri, 03 May 2013 20:39:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Another off post, but I hope you don't mind. My Sugar n' Spice Vox Box had the Colgate Optic White regimen in it and I was curious to try it out. I had been using a sonic type toothbrush, but I gave it up after using the tooth brush and tooth paste in the Colgate Optic White line! My teeth feel super clean and may be a little bit whiter, though honestly I would use the tooth paste and tooth brush even if it didn't include the whitening properties. Check out some of these other reviews to see if they agree with me.

Product sent complimentary by Influenster. Image from Colgate.

Monk Fruit what? NECTRESSE™

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Fri, 03 May 2013 20:28:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! A quick post today and a little different then the norm. This time in the Sugar n' Spice Vox box from Influenster I got a box of NECTRESSE™ sweetener. Now I am not a huge artificial sweetener user, but on occasion I do use it. This one intrigued me with its use of monk fruit and the cute packaging didn't hurt either. I tried it on my cereal, tea and coffee, I could not detect any aftertaste and it dissolved well. I would use it again. Here are some other reviews by Influensters to check out!

Product was sent to me complimentary. Image taken from Nectressè web site.

Sand, Liquid Sand and Pixies Galore

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 13:09:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I've got the Scoop on texture polishes over on Scoop Charlotte today. OPI Liquid Sand and Zoya Pixie Dust have new colors that are amazing! Here is the link and a bonus picture of Zoya Betrix. Ta!

Zoya Betrix

Zoya polishes provided by PR for review

Here comes Peter Cottontail!

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 01:38:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I have a post up on Scoop Charlotte showcasing some of the prettiest pastels that will put you in the Easter mood! Check it out here! Till next time, ta!

Sweet Tooth 2013

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 20:57:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I hope everyone is doing well, we had a little tease of spring which was wonderful! This past weekend, Rachel of If the Shoe Fits and my partner in crime for travel and shopping, put on the second annual Sweet Tooth Festival. We had such a fantastic time, sampling all the cupcake, cookie and candy samples that out area has to offer! The next day I had such a sugar hangover, but OMG it was so worth it! A couple of my favorites, were pistachio macaroons, The Mad Hatter(vegan chocolate peanut butter cupcake) and a cherry confit with mascarpone ganache bon bon. Of course I had to do a mani that played on the festivals colors! the textured nail is here and Zoya has got one of the best formulas for this. Dahlia was the perfect choice for this mani! Sparkly, but matte and super fun! I added an accent nail of Cult Nails Fetish (love this one as well) with dots to go with the lollipop swirls. Till next time, ta!

Zoya products provided for review.

St. Patrick's Day Manis

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 03:06:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Looking for some St. Patrick's Day mani ideas? Head on over to Scoop Charlotte and check out what I came up with! Click here! Ta!

At long last!

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 22:44:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I am so excited to show you these swatches, they are stunning! I recently was contacted by the lovely people over at Beauty Stop Online about reviewing a couple of the China Glaze polishes that they offer. I went on and looked at the polishes they have to offer and knew immediately which ones I wanted to review! Here is a little back story on the polishes, in 2008 China Glaze released the stunning Rodeo Diva collection, this collection is beyond beautiful! I missed out on Rodeo Diva and kept an eye out for several of the colors that I had to have. Austin was super helpful and was generous enough to let me choose Gussied Up Green and Side Saddle and the shipping was fast. Wowzers, these colors are stunning, way to go China Glaze! Thank you, thank you to Beauty Stop Online for the opportunity to review these beauties! Please go and check out the China Glaze polishes that they have to offer, click here, they also have a ton of other beauty related items. Their customer service was fantastic and I know I will be purchasing from them in the future! Ta!

Gussied Up Green, just stunning!

Side Saddle, gorgeous!

Polishes were provided for my honest review

Disciplined Girly

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 22:33:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! It is no secret that I am a Cultie! I love Cult Nails polishes, they have never let me down. Knowing Maria and Juan is just a bonus to the great polishes! This awesome combo is Cult Nails Disciplined and Revlon Girly, I wanted to have something soft, but with an edge. Disciplined is somewhat sheer, but buildable, not having a lot of time I layered it over Zoya Kristen. Revlon Girly is Revlon's answer to Deborah Lippmann's Candy Shoppe. Revlon has gotten pretty good at duping Deborah Lippmann, which I don't have a problem with since not everyone can afford $16 a bottle and everyone deserves the awesome glitter bombs! Once again I chose to layer this polish and Orly Amped was perfect for it! I hope you enjoy this mani! Ta!

Valentine Mani Ideas

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 23:42:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Please go and check out my guest post over at Scoop Charlotte on Valentine Day mani ideas!
Click here!

- Ta, lovelies!

Guest post on Superbowl Mani's

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Sun, 27 Jan 2013 00:08:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Check out my post over at Scoop Charlotte about Superbowl Mani's! So excited to be contributing over there once a month! Let me know what you think!

Super Bowl Mani's

- Ta, lovelies

Jeweled Nails

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 20:36:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I hope you have not forgotten about me, because I have tons of good stuff coming up!
Zoya Ornate has got to be my favorite collection by far, the richness and beauty of the collection is superb. Today, I have Zoya Logan, a glimmering gorgeous green that I love! Pairing it with Ziv, a warm gold that surprisingly looks decent on me, made for a sparkling combination that I couldn't stop staring at! Two coats of each made for excellent coverage! Take a peek and ta!

Holiday Vox Box 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 20:03:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I hope you had a wonderful holiday! I have got my review of the Influenster Holiday Vox Box 2012 for you today. I was super excited to be chosen to receive this, as I had seen other bloggers posting about them. The lovely Pink Sith, was kind enough to extend an invitation to me and I was off! Let me start off by saying, that when I opened my box, I was not disappointed in what I had received. Here is a list of the items, along with my reviews:
Goody QuikStyle Paddle Brush

This is by far my favorite thing in the box! I had looked at these brushes in Target several times because I was curious about them, but was not going to buy one. Holy cow, they are amazing! They detangle like nobodies business and my hair takes much less time to dry. Love it for my daughters super fine, super straight hair, especially on bath nights!

Quaker Real Medleys Oatmeal +

My son, loves oatmeal snatched this out of the box and said that he was going to try it for me! Now in the words of a seven year old this was yummy, a little sour, but good sour and he wants to buy some.

NYC New York Color Liquid Lipshine in Nude York City

Who doesn't love a nude lip gloss? This was my first time trying this brand and I was genuinely hoping to like it. My first impression was that the color looked lovely, then the scent hit me, ugh, awful. It is like an overly fake vanilla got mixed with a fake toffee, so strong and unpleasant it overrode the great texture of the gloss, non sticky and creamy. I think I am also in the minority on disliking the scent, which if it wasn't so strong, I would like the gloss.

EBOOST Natural Energy in Pink Lemonade Energy + Immunity

I had tried these once before through Birchbox and really enjoyed it, so this was a no brainer for me!

Kiss Nail Dress in Shrug

Once again, I was excited to try these and the design was really cute. Loved the idea that you could use these on your tips or toes and that I did not have to use polish remover to take them off, my poor nails are suffering this winter! Opting to try them on my toes, I sat down and opened the package, wow, overwhelming plastic smell! I persevered and started applying them, they went on super easy, very similar to the Sally Hansen strips. Honestly, I had to take them off, the smell bothered me so. Apparently, I have a very sensitive sniffer!

The last thing in my box was a gift from Sole Society for $25 off my first purchase of shoes and to share with my readers. I had looked at Sole Society before and was not able to find anything that I wanted to purchase, but this time I did. The bad part is they were out of my size, boo. Sole Society has a mix of fake and real materials and styles. Feel free to use this code to get $25 off of your first purchase, it does expire on 1/31/13. INFLUENSTER25 (note this is not a referral code, I do not receive anything from your use of it)

Whew, sorry for the novel! Let me know what items intrigued you and what you have tried. Till next time, ta!

Disclosure: I received these products complimentary from Influenster for testing purposes.

Blaze a New Trail

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Thu, 06 Dec 2012 23:14:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I can not believe that it is December, where did this year go? I am late sharing this color, but it is gorgeous! Zoya really knocked it out of the park with the Ornate collection, formula, colors and finishes. Blaze is a red holographic that is to die for! My sister in law, who very rarely wears polish, noticed it right away and wants it. With out further ado, Zoya Blaze!

- Ta, lovelies!
Products provided by PR.

Shoes

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 21:34:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! If there is one thing that I love as much as nail polish it's shoes!
I recently had a chance via LuckyFABB to try a pair by DMSX. These to be exact. Image take from company website. Aren't they pretty?

DMSX is a brand by Donald J Pliner, which are amazing shoes. They are running a Pintrest contest for anyone to enter, click this link to my Pintrest account for all of the details on how to enter.
I am not involved in this contest in anyway, I just wanted to share it with all of you. Go pin and good luck!

- Ta, lovelies!

Aurora (borealis) maybe?

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 20:14:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Today I wanted to bring you another amazing Zoya Ornate polish! Seriously, Zoya hit is out of the park with this collection, make sure you scoop all of these up! First I need to share something, a group of bloggers have joined together today to share our purple manis and the following is the reason:

Bullying is not funny. It is not cool. It is not right. And more importantly, it is not okay.

Most of us are, thankfully, residents of countries that support tolerance and many of our families have settled in these places simply for that reason. Generations later, it is our responsibility to perpetuate that message of tolerance across our new social platforms, including the internet.

As members of the nail polish blogging community, we all share a love of beauty, color, and lacquer. Other than that, we are remarkably different: from our race to our religion to our hair color...even to our polish application techniques. To marginalize anyone because of those differences is completely unacceptable and today I take a stand against that. I refuse to allow other people's view of "normal" dictate how I behave, believe, and blog.

In solidarity with a multitude of bloggers linked below, my purple manicure represents my proud commitment to the No H8 movement. Today, November 8, I dedicate my post to ending bullying of any kind and to encouraging diversity and imperfection among our colorful community.

Aurora is purple, holographic gorgeousness that applies like a dream! I used Butter London Nail Foundation as my base then 2 coats of Aurora topped off by one coat of Cult Nails Wicked Fast(my fav). There is a little bit of tip wear in the pictures, but that was because I had already worn it for two days, the sun was not cooperating.

- Ta, lovelies!

Happy Halloween?

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 20:19:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Long time no polish, huh? I apologize for my absence, but life goes on! The sun did not cooperate yesterday, so these had to wait a day since Zoya Storm deserves only the very best! Zoya Storm, from the Ornate collection is one bad ass polish! The formula is amaze and the polish is OMG in a bottle!

On a more serious note, I grew up on the Jersey Shore, the devastation that Sandy caused is unbelievable. I have many friends that were seriously affected by this storm, houses destroyed, some having to be rescued from flooding. Please keep the Jersey Shore in your thoughts, we will rebuild! Jersey Strong!

- Ta, lovelies!
Some products provided by pr for review.

Snap, Snap and Bubble

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 22:27:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! It is finally beginning to feel like fall here, yay! In order to get into the mood, I pulled out Jessica Gingersnap and Champagne Bubbles from the Spicy Dreams collection. I love love this collection so so much! Gingersnap is a gorgeous complex color that is as close to a dupe of OPI Warm and Fozzie you are going to get. If you missed out on the OPI last year grab this one with both hands! I found the formula on Gingersnap to be a bit nicer then Warm and Fozzie. Champagne Bubbles is a warm silver with some gold in it, not a huge fan of this one on me, but it is a really pretty color. This is two coats and I got good wear out of it. Once again I am so impressed with Jessica and am amazed that it doesn't get more love!

- Ta, lovelies!

Matchy Matchy

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 17:40:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Hope that you all had a fantastic weekend. Today's post will be a bit different for me, as it pertains to sunglasses, yes sunglasses. A couple of weeks ago I was contacted by a company called Firmoo, to review their products. I did some research and decided to give it a whirl. I have included more information about Firmoo, as well as links at the end of this post. This is not a referral program or link.

Firmoo is an online glasses and sunglasses company that has a ton of choices and very fast turn around. Now seeing that I didn't need new glasses at the moment I chose a really cute pair of sunglasses, these ones here in purple. They have you choose your glasses by measuring the distance between your pupils which worked really well. The sunglasses arrived with a pink plastic case with a soft insert, a soft case and one of the biggest glass cleaning chamois I have ever seen! The fit was great and the lenses offered a very crisp and clear view. Plus I loved the little bows on the sides, they call them butterflies, but bows are much more accurate. Now, I know you might be thinking, purple really Kisten?, but yes this is the coolest, dusty purple! Overall I am really pleased with the quality of the sunglasses and the prices are very reasonable. I will be looking at Firmoo when I need to get a new pair of glasses!

Of course I had to coordinate my nails to them and Zoya Monica was perfect! Is from the fall Designer collection and is a dusty purple that went on with Zoya's great formula.

Firmoo(www.firmoo.com) is the world's most popular online eyeglasses store. Vision and Fashion the Frugal Way is the ultimate goal of Firmoo, so it has always committed itself to providing customers with high-quality and fashionable eyewear at the most affordable prices. Firmoo launched a program offering free eyewear to first-time buyers in order to make more people try Firmoo’s quality products & excellent service. Plus, it’s easy to get your free eyewear, and the delivery is pretty fast! Want to have a try? Just go to http://www.firmoo.com/free-glasses.html to get your FREE pair!

- Ta, lovelies!
I was sent the products in this post for review.

Lucky FABB Day 1

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 17:08:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! This time last week I was in NYC with Rachel of If The Shoe Fits and Michelle of Pin Queen City to attend my 3rd Lucky FABB conference. If you follow me on twitter you were probably bombarded with some of the happenings, so I apologize in advance for any repeat. My nails got many compliments, but of course I didn't get a picture until I got back. Cult Nails is my go to when I need my polish to last and once again they pulled thru like a champ! I did this on Sunday and took this picture the following Friday, woo hoo! I used Get It On, Awakening, I Got Distracted and then Wicked Fast.

Here we are in line to get in to The Times Center, it was early! The location changed this year due to they inviting many more bloggers and the location was gorgeous! The speakers were very informative and also very pro blogging and social media, which provided many inspirational quotes from the speakers. We also got a great lesson on analyticals from the super dapper Raman Kia, Conde Nast Executive Director, Digital Strategy. I'll admit I was so excited to see and meet Erica of ps I made this, Aliza, DKNY PR girl, Simon Doonan and Anna Sui. Rachel Zoe was very surprising, I really enjoyed listening to her. I was also very envious of her shoes and jewelry! Lauren Conrad was super cute and Leandra, ManRepellar was awesome, per usual. My favorite part of the day had to be Simon Doonan interviewing Anna Sui, what a blast. Thank you once again, Lucky Magazine for an incredible opportunity, well done!

- Ta, lovelies!

So hard to be a Trustifarian

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 20:57:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend! I am in NYC for the Lucky FABB conference, but enjoy the holo goodness of this polish!
Butter London's Trustifarian is a beautiful celery green holo along the lines of my all time favorite, All Hail McQueen. I knew I need to have this one as soon as I saw it, since it was so similar to All Hail McQueen, but in this gorgeous pale green. I used two coats I think, could have used three but oh well. Enjoy!

- Ta, lovelies!

Summer Fun!

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Thu, 23 Aug 2012 02:01:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Tomorrow is the open house for our school and I cannot wait! My youngest is starting kindergarten this year and I am looking forward to finding out who her teacher is. Here is a quick and fun Zoya color for you, Myrta. I took this a couple of days after application hence the slight tip wear. What a gorgeous juicy shimmery color!

- Ta, lovelies!

Summer Lovin'

noreply@blogger.com (Kisten Hunter) — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 19:58:00 +0000

Hey lovelies! Today I have a bit of a mish mash for you. I wanted to try a gradient nail using the awesome tutorial given by Sam at the Nailasaurus, look it up here to see how awesome it is! Looking at my backlog of polishes I settled on the Jessica summer collects called Gelato Mio. This collection is made up of 6 creamy, cool colors that totally remind me of Gelato! They are Strawberry Shake It Up, Barely Blueberry, Lime Cooler, Banana Peel, Tangerine Dreamz and Surfer Boyz 'n Berry. Now for my first attempt at a gradient it isn't too bad, not great, but passable. The color combinations are not the best, but oh well! The polishes themselves applied very nicely with two coats and were so creamy looking. The finished nail reminds of the airbrushed shirts you can get at the boardwalk in the summer.

Next up I wanted to mention that I am a Tweezerman Ambassador and I received this awesome manicure/pedicure kit below to review. Everything in this kit is really nice and useable by the home user with out any problems. The pumice stone to the right is called Pedro and it has been a lifesaver this summer! The nail clippers work really well with out any noticeable tearing and my cat loves the purple emory boards to the left! I think there were 6 to begin with and now I only have one left, thanks to the little furry thief! My only complaint is the Pushy, I am not able to use it since it seems that no matter how I use it, it scratches my nail bed. Overall I have been pleased with the nail care products from Tweezerman!

- Ta, lovelies!
Products were sent to me for my review.