Press Sample
Because it's still Christmas, thus not too late for a swatch and review of a holiday nail polish collection. What's on today's roster? A swatch and review of China Glaze Cheers! Holiday 2015.


Kicking things off is Mix and Mingle & Break the Ice
Mix and Mingle is fully opaque in 2-3 coats, but this cool-toned purple drags if you aren't careful. The formula is somewhere between a crème and a jelly; so yeah, that make it a crelly.
Break the Ice is a glitter topper that consists of silver holographic shards. The coverage you see above and below is actually one coat with a minimal amount of maneuvering the glitter once on the nail bed. An added bonus? I didn't have to fish to get the glitter out of the bottle.

Don't Get Elfed Up & I Soiree I Didn't Do It
Don't Get Elfed Up is (described by China Glaze) as a deep emerald shimmer. It reaches full opacity in two coats.
I Soiree I Didn't Do It becomes fully opaque in three coats, after applying the first coat I assumed it should only have been a glitter topper. I soiree I didn't know it would be full coverage. (See what I did there?)

Son of a Nut Cracker & Ugly Christmas Sweater
Son of a Nut Cracker is a "fiery red-orange pearl" that reaches full opacity in two coats. It's nice color, but I feel like I have a dupe in my stash. And I'm pretty sure that dupe is another China Glaze lacquer.
Ugly Christmas Sweater well, I'm just a not a fan of this one. I'd probably wear it to an ugly nail polish party--you know, if that was a thing. Anyway, I used two coats.

Better Not Pout & Brand Sparklin' New Year
Better Not Pout nothing too unique about this berry pearl shade but the formula is pretty decent in 1-2 coats.
Brand Sparklin' New Year sadly, yet another shade I just couldn't love. Shown here is three coats. Perhaps it'd look better as one coat over an opaque purple crème?

Wine Down For What? & Bring On the Bubbly
Wine Down For What? generally, I'm not a wine fan, be it color or beverage, but dare I say I'm loving this two coat crème.
Bring On the Bubbly a slightly holo gold glitter? Needless to say it's one of my favorites. Shown above and below is only one coat with no fishing, or glitter manipulation required.

Peppermint to Be & Coal Hands, Warm Heart
Peppermint to Be a simple red shimmer shown in two coats. There's nothing too original about this color, but it's still a nice red shimmer to have in any stash.
Coal Hands, Warm Heart is three coats and reminds me of a tame version of Essie Bulgaria. Some of you may already know how I feel about Essie Bulgaria. If you don't, allow me to summarize it for you really quick. Ew.


Overall, there is literally something for everyone in this collection. Some shades are pretty standard crowd pleasers (i.e. Break the Ice, Mix and Mingle, and Bring on the Bubbly) while others are pretty polarizing (i.e. Coal Hands, Warm Heart, Ugly Sweater Party, and Brand Sparklin' New Year). So depending on your taste you're bound to like at least one lacquer in this twelve piece holiday set.


Since we're on the subject of China Glaze holiday collections, so far, there hasn't been one that tops the Cirque Du Soleil collection from 2012. At least, that's just my opinion.


Press Sample
Spot any fast favorites? Think this collex is better than the Cirque Du Soleil collex from holiday nail polish past? Sound off in the comments.
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Nothing To Disclose

Ah, just in time for your hump day needs.

If you've picked up on the starter pack/Rick Ross reference, congrats! You know this nail art look is about what else? Pineapples. ;)


For some reason I'm being drawn to items with pineapples on them. Not really sure why, but I've got a t-shirt and the phone case to prove it. And now I've got the nails.


You all know I love neon, so a base color of Color Club East Austin was a no-brainer. And because I love gold I had to emphasize the gold glitter on my iPhone with Ruby Wing Sunflower.

A little side note: Ruby Wing polishes change color depending on whether you're indoors or outdoors; but because I've had this polish for years, Sunflower no longer changes color & stays the bright, yellow gold you see in the mani.


I hate mini nail polishes, but it was buy one full size Color Club, get a mini Color Club free at Beauty Plus Salon. I never turn down free nail polish, so that's exactly how I ended up with a mini East Austin.


Every now and then I share my mani sketches on my Instagram *cough* @DropOutNails *cough* and have been thinking about posting them here.

Let me know in the comments if you want to see more posted here on Nail A College Drop Out.

Pineapples... #NailACollegeDropOut #TuneInDropOutLovePolish #NailArtinUpInThisBitch #iwasntready #ididntfinish

A photo posted by Nail A College Drop Out (@dropoutnails) on Jun 30, 2015 at 7:05am PDT

And for the sake of (somewhat) uniformity with every other blog post, here are some mani pics with my standard black backdrop.



This isn't the first time I've tackled pineapple nails. Dare I say, "I wasn't ready." Anyway, click HERE for the first pineapple mani I did a few years back.

Give yourself a pat on the back if you actually read this entire post and laughed at the Kevin Hart, Rick Ross, and starter pack meme references. You the real MVP. *insert MVP award emoji here*

Wanna see more of what's in my sketchbook on the blog? Wanna trade corny jokes about bae coming over? Or just chit chat about your hatred of mini sized nail polish? Let's talk it out in the comments.
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Nothing To Disclose

NEW YORK, NY (SPRING 2015) —
Barielle’s Bling It On Collection features some truly fashion forward, dazzling color  combinations of glitter. These vibrant glitters are perfect worn alone, or they can add an exciting dimension to a manicure when worn as a top coat, french tip or reverse french!





Sea Urchin - A Sea Foam Green Glitter
Angel Dust - A Sheer Iridescent Glitter
Shooting Star - A Metallic Blue/Purple Glitter
Golden Halo - A Gold With Pink Glitter
Amethyst - A Purple Glitter



Contains no formaldehyde, toluene, dibutyphthalate, camphor or formaldehyde-resin.

Nothing To Disclose You know how you plan out a mani in full detail and then when the time comes for execution it flops? Like really flops? Welp, that happened to me. Back in October I bought some decals and sketched out an idea for a mani. Monday night rolls around and the sketch on paper just failed in real life. *sad face*


There's just too much going on here.


Nothing To Disclose

Press Sample Believe it or not I swatched this entire collection during two different swatch sessions--which you'll notice from the drastic difference in nail length/shape--prior to Halloween and I completely forgot to edit the photos and post them until now. I know, shame on me.

Before we get started, all shades are swatched with top coat. Now let's get to it!

Getting To Gnaw You
Getting To Gnaw You is a black jelly base with copper glitter suspended throughout. Shown above is two coats.

I Love Your Guts
I Love Your Guts dries to a matte textured finished. I liked the idea of this shade, but unfortunately, the application of this polish was challenging. It didn't self-level, even after two coats of color and one layer of top coat.

But Of Corpse

But Of Corpse is the green alternative to I Love Your Guts. Same matte, semi-textured finish, but minus the issues with self-leveling. Shown above is two coats.

Don't Let the Dead Bite
Don't Let the Dead Bite is a nude jelly base with red metallic glitter dispersed throughout. I was really intrigued by this particular lacquer because I don't have anything like it in my 1,500+ nail polish collection. Shown above in two coats.

Rest in Pieces
Rest in Pieces is my absolute, hands down favorite piece from this collection. Is it the black hex glitter? Is it all the holographic gold glitter? Could it be the great formula that made copious amounts of fishing for glitter completely unnecessary? Yes to all of the above! Shown above in two-ish coats.

There's also the annual re-promote of China Glaze's glow-in-the-dark polish, Ghoulish Glow. You can read the full press release here.


Press Sample I personally would wear Rest in Pieces all year round. What say you?
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Nothing To Disclose Yesterday was the end of September and the Proud Beauty Bloggers of Color prompt of the month was black & white. I should've had this post up yesterday but, let's just face it, I suck at time management and I completely forgot yesterday was the 30th.


Just gonna address the elephant in the room for a moment here. Yes my nails a re nubbins again. After a series of breaks to my left index finger and my right thumb, I got tired of constantly having to repatch them so I just decided to cut them off completely.

Okay, now back to the mani.

I started with a gradient of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls and Wet n Wild Wild Shine Black Créme--I can't stop telling you that this has been my go-to black nail polish for years! Then, because I had to break a monochromatic theme and throw in a lil bit of neon somewhere, I splattered on Dare To Wear Violetta. And to bring it home I added a layer of  Nanacoco White Witch.


Nothing To Disclose

Friday night I was at the mall and spotted a new Zoya Collection in Beauty Plus Salon. No, not Entice & Ignite, but something even newer. The Ultra PixieDust Dust Collection!


What makes these so ultra? At this point I have no idea, but I'll be sure to post the official press release when it becomes available.


If you're in NY, NJ, or CT, you can find available for purchase now at Beauty Plus Salon.


Have you seen these in person? Have you bought them? Let's speculate what makes them so ultra in the comments.
Tune in. Drop out. Love polish.

Nothing To Disclose So I've been wanting a few shades from last year's summer CG collection, and for whatever reason I'm just now getting them. Three cheers for procrastination. Hip hip hooray? *crickets*



As I mentioned earlier, I've been wanting most of the Sunsational collection since it came out last summer, but I was waiting to find it on clearance at Lengths so I never bought it anywhere else. That is until I placed my first Transdesign order! That's Shore Bright and Too Yacht To Handle were standout shades for me so I knew I had to use them asap.

After laying down a the gradient of the two new-to-me China Glaze shades, I opened up my handy dandy indie polish drawer and out came Ooh La Lacquer Hypnotize.


I couldn't quite get That's Shore Bright to photograph accurately in the gradient as it is more cool-toned in real life, so please refer to the product porn photo for a better idea of this gradient really looks like.

Before I go any further I'd like to say that Too Yacht To Handle is everything Aquadelic and For Audrey should have been.


I wore this mani yesterday and I got more compliments on this from my co-workers than any mani (nail art or otherwise) in the last 3-4 months. I guess simple is better to some people.



Nothing To Disclose How are you handling these summer months? With plenty of neon nail polish I hope!
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Press Sample Summer is finally in full swing in Upstate NY--let it be known that the summer weather doesn't last very long--and I've got three easy ways to wear the Zoya Bubbly Collection.


The formula on all the of  the shades in this collection are same; easy to work with jellies. Most were two coaters, others were three.

I started with the combination of my three favs from this collection. From thumb to pinky the colors are Binx, Jesy, and Alma.




Binx is my favorite because, well, it's purple. Need I say more? Well, yeah. I should mention that it took three coats to reach this opacity. Three coats of purple flaky goodness.

Jesy, described by Zoya as a "fiery coral orange," reached the above opacity in two coats.

Alma, Alma, Alma, why couldn't there be a créme version of this in the Tickled Collection? Alma is a more yellow leaning orange jelly packed with flakies that reached the above opacity in two coats.


Generally I am not a pink fan, but I really do appreciate the way Harper looks on her own. Just look at her little cotton candy pink self. All stunning in two coats.


The combo of Muse and Stasi makes me think of a base for bomb subaquatic nail art.
Muse iswas two coats while Stasi is the only other three coater in the collection.


Press SampleEach lacquer in the Bubbly collection retails for $9 at Zoya.com.

Dear Zoya,
Can you make a créme alternative to Alma. And maybe, just maybe, pretty please name it Briana?
K thanx.

Spot any must haves here?
Tune in. Drop out. Love polish.

Purchased by Me | Press Sample July 4th is Friday and if you're like me, you still have no idea what you nails are gonna look like. To help me (and you lovely folks) decide what polish to use I dug through my stash and picked out some very holiday-esque lacquers. And yes, this post is incredibly picture heavy.

Let's start this post off right with my favorite nail polish finish. CRÉMES!

Press Sample

Press Sample