Author Archives: Sarah Cosper

Floss Gloss, Nails

Floss Gloss Fall 2013 Princess of the Night Collection Swatches & Review

floss gloss princess of the night set

L-R, Dinge, Black Holy, Moon Baby, Faded, $8 each

Growing up, the top names to call me at school went like this:

  1. Witch
  2. Lesbian
  3. Daria
  4. Eddie Munster

I was a spooky kid, I guess. That’s cool. I get it. I wore a lot of black and I listened to Nine Inch Nails and The Cure. I have a widow’s peak. I was not an active volleyball participant in gym. I don’t know why they were calling me a lesbian though, that one is still a mystery.

tumblr_m4ruxajOR41qhgcq1o1_500

Does that tell you all you need to know about how I’d feel about a polish collection called, “Princess of the Night?”

I’m all over it like Glenn Danzig on a bench press. I’m excited like it’s 1995, it’s my friend’s slumber party, somehow I got to pick the movie, and that movie is “The Crow.”

Let’s conjure up some bad bruja nails, boos.

*****

I was really impressed with the coverage from these colors; the creamy, glossy formula applied beautifully. The polish flowed onto my nails from the brush, with both Black Holy and Faded being almost completely opaque with only one coat. I love it. Watery black polishes, get the fuck out of here.

All colors were swatched using two coats of polish and my Seche Vite top coat.

MOON BABY

Moon Baby is a cool, icy baby blue with gray undertones. I had no idea how much I would love this color, but it’s so eye catching on the nail, it’s my favorite color of the whole collection. My polish rack is full of blues, but I don’t have anything like Moon Baby.

floss gloss moon baby 1

floss gloss moon baby 2

floss gloss moon baby 3

DINGE

Dinge is a cool, dirty, fleshy pink. Floss Gloss has described it as the color of beat up Capezios, and that’s totally accurate. It’s an incredibly sexy sort of nude, and it’s running a close second to Moon Baby for the title of #1 STUNNER in this collection.

floss gloss dinge 1

floss gloss dinge 3

floss gloss dinge 2

FADED

Faded was such a tricky color to photograph! My camera was refusing to pick up the accurate stony color of this polish. They say Faded is the color of faded tattoo ink, and that’s totally right! But, what is that?! Is it navy blue? Kind of? Not really! It’s hard to describe, but it looks rad as fuck. It photographed really dark, but I don’t think it looks this dark in person.

floss gloss faded 1

floss gloss faded 2

floss gloss faded 3

BLACK HOLY

Black is the classic nail color for girls of the witchy persuasion, and I consider myself a connoisseur. Glossy, deep, perfect, creamy black. It’s my good, old, classic fave getting the treatment it deserves.

floss gloss black holy 1

floss gloss black holy 2

floss gloss black holy 3

I really loved this colors in this collection. It’s nice to see something other than the usual dark jewel tones and burgundies for fall; and although half the colors in the collection are very light, they don’t read pastel or sugary sweet. Floss Gloss has nailed the “light-colors-that-look-dark” concept, and it evokes a chilliness that’s perfect for fall and winter.

I’m already rocking Moon Baby full time, and I’m really looking forward to wearing Dinge next. I’m all hyped for fall now! BYE, SUMMER. TAKE YOUR SWEATY BANGS AND GO.

Buy the Princess of the Night collection HERE.

Standard
Maintenance, Personal

Hello, Sarice

I got totally good at not chewing or picking at my cuticles and the skin around my nails. I thought I broke a 20something years long habit. I was all proud of myself and feeling like I could accomplish anything. Like, I beat finger skin picking, it gets better and now I’m going to EGOT.

PSYCH ON ME!

Two of my fingers are bleeding right now, and the rest are mangled. That usually means I’m worried about something, but maybe I’m just hungry for my own delicious flavor. What the fuck? Sarah, you gross cannibal. I’m not even a fancy Hannibal Lecter type cannibal, I’m more the stick my own finger into a Ramen seasoning packet and then nibble on that type cannibal. ACK! So much sodium!

For the record, I have never eaten my own Chicken seasoned finger. I’m just saying, I wouldn’t ever braise myself or anything.

I promised myself a new full set of beautiful nails if I kicked the habit again, and I just got shipment notice on the FLOSS GLOSS Fall collection. Time to put the smelly hand lotion on the skin, and slap my own fingers away from myself again!

Standard
Hair, Links

OOOH BLAH BLAH

I want my hair to look like this, so I’ve been sitting here in front of my makeup mirror for, like, an hour, watching YouTube videos, trying to learn how to french braid. Because nobody ever taught me how to do it, MOM.

My arms feel like they’re going to fall off. How many WW Activity Points will all this exercise get me?

Standard
Aging, Personal, Skincare

Sarah now Clara

mom and sarah chis

CHI LYFESTYLE

A recent British survey says that most women “turn into” their mothers at 31. I saw this, and didn’t really think anything of it until, one morning recently, when I found myself sitting outside at an ungodly hour, drinking coffee, with a chihuahua stuffed inside my robe.

I texted her and demanded she answer for her brujeria. But, it was too late. I’ve already started saying movies are, “cute.” She just laughed at me anyways and told me she knew it would take one day.

And now I am Clara.

I wake everyone up by cheerfully singing, “Wake up, get out of bed, drag a comb across your head,” but I don’t sing any of the other lyrics, I always feel like watching “Moonstruck,” I SLEEP NEXT TO A GUY WEARING A SLEEP APNEA MASK.

Not that “Moonstruck” isn’t great. Everyone in it is amazing.

moonstruck

Such a cute movie! 

Besides the snoring husband and the ability to coax tiny dogs into my clothes, I’m also getting my mom’s skin tags and hyperpigmentation spots. These delightful hereditary traits have also been triggered by the arrival of my 30s.

The skin tags are nothing new, I’ve always been prone to  a small smattering of tiny ones (gross), but now I feel like they’re trying to take over. My mom had to have hers lasered off! I don’t want that for myself, but I really don’t know how to stop it. I know all the tricks for removal, but I don’t know any tricks to keep them from happening.

The dark spots on my skin though, that I can do something about. I think. I usually feel really confident when I buy beauty products, but this branch of the skincare tree is all new to me. I’m feeling a little lost about how to go about finding the most effective anti-aging treatments. Where should I start? I get a bunch of beauty magazines, but I’ve seen “The Devil Wears Prada” on DVD on TV many a Saturday afternoon, I know how the advertising works. I really feel like I can never be sure if a magazine is telling me about a great product because it’s truly great, or if the magazine is telling me about a great product because Meryl says there needs to be more advertiser product. Same goes for beauty sites.

I don’t want to just buy the Clinique one because I think the egg is cute!

clinique egg

I’m not saying I won’t buy the Clinique one, it does have excellent reviews. I just want to be more informed about what exactly I need to be doing. It probably comes from my time as an esthetician, this need to draft a treatment plan. But where the fuck do I start? I think this problem requires more than just a Sephora sample. That’s good for cleansers, and masks, but these kinds of things need long term time to work.

Does anybody else know what I’m dealing with here? If you’re on an anti-aging regimen, how did you choose it? Have you turned into your mother? Does she like you more now? I bet mine does! It bears mentioning that my sisters became our mom at about the ages of 10 and birth, respectively. So with me, she’s probably like, “Finally! This asshole has become someone I can relate to!” And then we clink chihuahuas.

 

Standard
Beauty Tools, General, Nails

Pretty Ladies All In a Row

Big home improvement projects happening here over the weekend:

polish rack

These are load bearing polishes.

I’ve always dreamt of having an acrylic wall mounted nail polish rack. I love to see my preciouses there all lined up and pretty. Like, really, you’re supposed to keep your polish in a cool, dark place. But that was not working for me.

polish bin

UGH. UNACCEPTABLE.

They were all living in this bin, under our bed, slowly poisoning us while we slept. Probably. Opening that bin was a real kick to the sinuses, like WHOA. You can’t see a thing in there either. When I arranged all the polish in there in the first place, I thought it’d be clever to group them all by color. That lasted about 5 seconds. It feels dumb to tell people they have to put the polish back into the color family from which it came, so I just stood by and let anyone who looked through them put them back wherever. And, come on, what the fuck, like I’m going to dig through there and try and find the small section of silver polish when I need to put something back? No way.

This rack is so much better! It appeals to my warped sense of order that only works on makeup and my underwear drawer. You can’t open a closet in our house without risking a junk avalanche, but my chonies are neatly rolled and tucked away in straight, sexy, rows in their drawer, and my nail polish is arranged by brand. I *think* about rearranging the towel closet a lot, if that counts for anything.

My Farm Boy put up the rack for me, and then I got to work clearing out my polish bin.

I went with arranging them by brand instead of color, and I can not even explain to you how satisfying it was to click them all into place on the shelves. Hearing the literal click of the bottles on the acrylic and against each other while everything matched up and fit just right. Mmm. Heaven! I love it!

I’m going to need to do some reordering soon since I always have new polish in my future. I’m starting to see multiple acrylic racks in my future too….next up, stacked clear acrylic drawers for all my makeup. My train case in my closet is too out of sight, out of mind.

I ordered my rack off Amazon, and we picked up the wall mounts at a hardware store. It all came together pretty quickly!

The only downside is now Jason can see exactly how much polish I have. Too bad I always need more, FOR RESEARCH.

Buy this acrylic display rack HERE.

Standard
Floss Gloss, Hex Nail Jewelry, Nails

Hex Nail Jewelry Cobra

hex nail jewelry cobra

Polish: PARTYBRUISE by FLOSS GLOSS

When I think of cobras, I think of the line in The Cramps song, “Sheena’s In a Goth Gang,” that says Sheena’s in “the Cult of the Cobra.” So, I call this nail look, “Sarah’s In a Goth Gang.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBguttUsPyw

If you don’t click play on that, I feel sorry for you.

Sarah’s in a goth gang! Sarah’s in a goth gang! Sarah’s in a goth gang nowwwww! I love it when I can easily make a song about myself, I hate having to force it.

Now to the important stuff!

I don’t remember how I discovered Hex Nail Jewelry, and their gold plated brass nail charms, but the first night I was on their site, I had a cart FULL of product. They’re SO boss, and at $1.75 each, it’s easy to pick out a bunch of them. When I finally placed my order, I had some big decisions to make, I was like, “Cobra or scorpion? Cobra or scorpion? BOTH.” I didn’t get the spider though, I have some self-restraint.

My delivery came really fast, so, +1 right away, right? I decided on the cobra first, because I had the opportunity to finally try PARTYBRUISE, and I was already thinking “Sarah’s In a Goth Gang” to myself. I’m always thinking that to myself.

After my two coats of polish and top coat were completely dry, it was time for the main event….

Hang on.

My nails don’t look that great because, FULL DISCLOSURE, I did them with pizza fingers while I was drinking beers, watching Project Runway and talking with my soul sister. It was a nail pizza party! So, basically, two of the best kinds of parties you can have with a friend! Slumber party would be another, key party would be another, NEW YEAR’S PARTY IS ONE! New Year’s Party is like a slumber party and a key party all rolled into one! A chaste key party, but still! I kiss a lot of friends on the lips at midnight, I’ll tell you that much. A lot.

So, the nail charms. Honestly, I fucked mine up a little bit. They make them so hard to fuck up, they’re curved to fit the bend of your nail and everything, but I figured out a way. Here’s what happened, to put them on your nail, you place a tiny bead of nail glue where you want the charm, then, you put the charm on top of the nail glue. Easy. Really easy. Well, I dropped the charm onto the nail glue, then I went, “Mmm….no,” and tried to slide it over a little with my finger. I instantly got my fingertip stuck to the charm and my nail by the still wet glue, yanked my finger up, ripped up the charm by accident, screamed, then had to press it back down, and hope like hell there was enough glue left to keep it stuck to my nail. There was. But, now I had nail glue stuck all over my fingers and the charm. Next time, I’m going to use an orange stick to make adjustments. Hex says you don’t need to put a top coat over the charm once it’s stuck to the nail glue, but I had kind of scuffed mine up with glue, so I threw a top coat over it to shine it up a little. I fucked that up too. I put the top coat on under my ceiling fan, so it went on all thick and stringy.

I think it really speaks to the radness of this nail charm that despite my best efforts, it still looks great. I’ve been wearing this cobra on my nails since Saturday, and it hasn’t snagged on anything, popped off, or lifted. It’s worked out great because my polish is starting to look like it wants to be changed.

To remove the charms, you just pick them off, and wipe the glue residue from your nail with polish remover. Then, you can throw the charm in your jewelry box to reuse!

I love my little baggie of charms, I already have my next manicure planned out!

Buy Hex Nail Jewelry HERE.

P.S. When I think of cobras, I think of this too:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pcv1EhH7Xh0

P.P.S. If this entry seems super long and meandering, please know I’m on drugs. I need a backeotomy, but I’m on drugs and a heating pad. I *need* to be trying to work up my photo space because my poor backdrop went into the trash. Instead, I’m going to put a bunch of pillows under my knees and wait for someone to come pull the plug because I’m obviously falling apart. See?! Meandering! Shut up, Sarah!

Standard
Education, Eyeshadow, How-To, Links

The Blends

One of my biggest beauty pet peeves is seeing unblended eyeshadow out in the wild. Like, I get it, these things take practice. But, DAMN GURL, YOU GOT A MIRROR OR WUT? How do people not see these things?

It can just look really bad. That’s all I’m saying.

Check out this tutorial: 3 Easy Ways To Blend Your Eyeshadow Like A Pro

The first two blends are especially relevant to the looks most people want to do. That last one, the cut crease, that’s some more advanced shit; use only if you’re ok with people looking at you.

 

Standard
All Skate!, TGIF

My Post of Many Topics

I don’t have much today. It’s been kind of a slow week around here, actually.

Jason has been in Austin since Monday, and I thought that would mean I’d get so much work done, but it really means I just wander around bored and watch “Mermaids.” I have been dealing with trying to figure out which smoke detector is chirping since Sunday night, so that’s been keeping me pretty busy. It’s never the first one you rip off the wall…..

I’ve started to revert to my feral single life again! I keep eating Cheerios for meals that aren’t breakfast, I’m talking to myself and the dog like we’re 3 different people, I have a burglar beater next to the bed, and I’m scared of slipping in the shower. Plus, my husband has become really funny and charming again, so you know I’ve been without DAT D for a while now.

YEEZUS FUCK WHICH ONE OF THESE THINGS IS CHIRPING?!?!

Serenity now. Jason will be home later today to reach all of them, and I can move on with my life.

I wanted to do a Friday I’m in Love today, but my photo backdrop keeps falling off the wall, so I said, “FUCK THIS,” and just left it down. On top of that hazardous condition, I’m trying to get myself on a new eyebrow threading schedule, so I’m a mess. I kept going to get my brow and lip threading done when I was on my period, and that’s, like, the WORST time to do that kind of thing. It hurts way more. So, for the sake of my face, I sacrificed my face. I’m really pretty brave, if  you think about it.

Since I don’t have anything of substance today, can I just show you a bunch of random semi-beauty related stuff? Yes? Good!

babewolf

I bought this rad “Babewolf” sticker for myself from Sara M. Lyons, and slapped it on my laptop. I fucking love this sticker. Her armpits really speak to me. I need her to make some kind of bunny girl to balance out the other side!

I just found this art she did too, and I feel dizzy, like if I don’t own something, ANYTHING with this on it, my life will always be a little worse.

in lux we trust

MY GUY

I’ll name a baby Lux. I swear I’ll do it.

crayon lipstick

Here’s THIS weird and cool looking tutorial on xovain about making your own lipstick out of crayons. I’ve never even considered that before, but it’s interesting. I’d like one of you craftier readers to do this, and tell me how it goes. I don’t want to do it, I’m not that ambitious, and I only have one stainless steel bowl.

What else we got?

Oh. My oldest niece is suddenly totally grown up. She’s sending me emails, with old photos of myself attached, that say “I LOVE YOUR HAIR.”

blond sarah

This is what happens when you work in a salon. Some days are slow, and you end up with blonde hair. It’s bizarre, right? I always wanted to try my hair like that though, so I went for it. Whoops! My dark eyebrows under there look TERRIBLE. I was like, “Madonna can pull off black eyebrows with platinum hair, why not me?” Why not you? Umm. I can think of lots of reasons, Past Sarah. How about, reason number one, you’re not Madonna. I can’t even believe I’m putting this picture on here. I’m clearly in a hotel, I’m not wearing makeup, and I look like a freak. The saddest part is, this is the best picture of me with my hair like this that I’ve ever seen. I don’t know where she got it! It’s weird to see old photos of yourself you’ve seen before, right? This blonde left my hair such a gross mess. I was always itchy because little pieces of hair were always breaking off, and when I’d wash it, it’d get wet and just streeeeeeetch and sort of semi-melt. My hair was thrashed. I do wish I’d taken the opportunity to dye it a bright blue though before I went back to a natural color. Missed that chance, Past Sarah! From getting in the car with strangers in Vegas, to not dyeing your hair a great color when you had a blank slate, to doing crystal, you always make the wrong decision! You’re a reeeeal fuck up, Past Sarah. Lucky for you, Present Sarah is very generous with her forgiveness, and willing to put the past behind her.

stila teaser

Oh! My new Birchbox came this week, and it’s the best box yet. I got a full size eyeliner, a deluxe Stila lipstick sample, a hair product I’ve been dying to try, and a bunch of other cool stuff. I’ll try to have the full review for you guys on Monday. Until then, that’s a not great photo of the Stila color I got. I LOVE IT.

pool party rowdy

CHILLIN

I took Rowdy to a friend’s house to go swimming the other day, and we had a great time! Turns out, she likes being in the pool! I held her, and all her little arms and legs were just floating in the water, while she had her eyes closed and her face turned towards the sun. When I tried to put her back on the concrete, she didn’t even try to help. She wanted to stay in the pool! She’s so crazy.

For real though, the very best thing that happened this week was an actual super awesome thing; FLOSS GLOSS retweeted one of my polish reviews. That’s the first time a beauty brand has done that, and it was VERY RAD!!!

What’s up with you guys this week? Did you have any past beauty experiments that you just had to get out of your system at least once? Is your past self a giant idiot too? Do you know which one of my smoke detectors is going off? HEY. WHAT’S GOING ON?

Standard
General

Anybody want to buy some pinkeye?!

makeup dump

I was just looking around craigslist for a wall mounted acrylic nail polish rack when I happened upon this mess. Someone is trying to sell their old ass pile of drugstore makeup for $50. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! GURL PLZ. Nobody wants to buy those teddy bear bottles of nail polish from you. Just throw it away.

Hey. I get it! We’ve all been there! I have to do a makeup purge at least once a year or things get really out of hand. We’ve all dreamed of getting our money back for these piles of barely or never used cosmetics, but that shit ain’t happening. Give the unopened stuff to friends, dump the rest.

Thems the blue eyeshadow breaks, honey!

Standard