Julep: Trick or Treat Mystery Box, Take Two

Last week, I wrote about my Julep Trick or Treat Mystery Box that was apparently sent back to them because of a mistaken address, and how I called them, and raved about their awesome customer service, and they said they'd send me a second box, with no questions asked. Then the next day, my box did show up, very beat up, but it got here regardless. So this week, I ended up with a second Trick or Treat Mystery Box and I was eager to compare them... So off to box two.

The inside of my box, at a glance.

My mystery bag add-on and mystery color add on: Payton, Leah, Roc Solid, and Millie, the exact same colors as I had gotten, last time, as an add on. No randomness there, so onto the box.

This was the inside of my box, already it was different, at a glance.

Mint Condition Pedi Creme, worth $16.00 [and more candy corn, yay]

I've gotten that in a box before. I still haven't used the last tube I had of it. It does feel refreshing, it's a product that I just forget I have... But it's also almost winter, so it's not really going to be flip flop season anytime soon, even in Texas, it's more like Ugg season, so this product isn't something that I'll be using very often.

Verdict: Meh

Mighty Nail and Cuticle Serum, worth $22.40

This doesn't really interest me. I'm not really into nail care. I mean, I like how polish looks on my nails, but I'm a special education teacher, and my day is far too active and hands-on for me to obsess over my nails.

Verdict: Meh

Julep Vanish Cuticle Softener & Remover, worth $14.40.

I just got this in either my September or October Maven Box, I don't remember. I don't need another when I haven't even opened the first.

Verdict: Meh

from l to r: Beatrix, Lacey, Chloe, and Veronica, each worth $11.20, for a total of $44.80

I got Beatrix in my last Mystery Box. Still a cool color, but I don't need two of them.

Lacey is a pretty shimmery indigo blue, I needed a color like this in my life.

Chloe is a cross between red, brown, bronze, and gold. It's not a color that I would have picked for myself, but it's not awful.

Veronica I have already, it's a coral pink color that came in one of my monthly boxes.

Verdict: Okay, I really like Lacey, and Chloe isn't awful, but I preferred the colors I had gotten in my last Mystery Box.

Total Value: $97.60

About a dollar cheaper than my last box, but still more than what I had paid for it.

I also liked my last box, a lot better.

The moral of this story is:

1. Yes, Mystery Boxes do have some randomness.

2. I need to stop spending my money on Mystery Boxes because they just haven't wowed me lately. Unless there's an exclusive color I need, I just need to say no.

Monthly reveal closes today, BTW, I added on every single eyeliner pencil... I think I have a problem.... But you can never have too many eyeliner pencils!

Julep: October 2014, Black Magic Collection

Wow, my October Julep box came really early this month! I wasn't expecting it for another week or two. Maybe... they gave me a shipping upgrade because I upgraded to the entire polish collection? Who knows.

I don't really feel like I need to go into detail about what Julep is anymore since I'm pretty sure I only have two readers on this blog, and they both already get their own Maven box. So here's a quick 411, you pay money every month, you get nailpolish and/or beauty products every month. The more money you pay, the more stuff you get. Subscriptions start at about $20.00 and go up to $40.00 depending on what box you choose to receive. The  boxes are completely customizable, so you can swap in and swap out whatever you want, then when you're done doing that, you see all the extras you can get, and you spend more money on those.  That's Julep for you in a nutshell.

This month's theme was "Black Magic", and believe me, when I say, I am such a sucker for anything Halloween themed. I love Halloween. Therefore, I felt it necessary to upgrade to every single nailpolish color.

And of course I added extras... That buy three extras get a free product deal gets me every single time...

My first extra, black cat stickers for my nails... Only because I am a crazy cat person.  Hell, I'm thinking of dressing as the Cheshire Cat for a Halloween costume party that I am going to.

My second extra, the TADA Quick Dry Drops because they work wonders, and totally pwn over sticking my nails on the freezer to get my polish to dry, and I was almost out of them. I don't really have a use for the cuticle softener stuff, but it was sort of a buy one, get the other sort of deal, so oh well.

Lastly, Casper, a glow in the dark nailpolish, that's white and glittery. I don't know if it will glow in the dark, but we shall see. I'm a sucker for white and glittery shit anyways because it reminds me of New Jersey aka home, and how the snow looks after it first falls down over winter.

My freebies were two polishes: Catrina and Karmen.

I know I already own Karmen, but I don't mind, I think it's the perfect fall color. It's an apple red color with a bronze glitter that reminiscent of leaves changing color and fall.

Catrina, I don't own, but it's yellow, and I FUCKING HATE YELLOW, oh well, it was free.

I've also already devoured the candy corn extra that came with the box this month. Yum.

Moving onto this month's colors:

From l to r: Ledi, Nancy, and Dana.

Ledi is a black color. Just plain black. Nothing more to describe. I actually don't think I own a good black nailpolish color, so it'll be a nice add on to my already humungous nailpolish collection.

Nancy is a silver glitter with a hint of green in it that you can't really see in the picture. I am a sucker for silver nailpolish.

Dana is apparently black light reactive, not that I own a black light to test out that theory. Otherwise, it's a white color, with a blue ultraviolet like glow and glitter, and I assume it would turn that color under a black light. 

from l to r: Shailene, DeAnn, and Logan.

Shailene is a brown and gold glitter. I don't think its true color is that apparent in my picture. It's a cool color that sort of brings me visions of a witches broomstick or something.

DeAnn is a dark pink creme color. It's more red than pink, it looks pink in my picture, but to me, it's more of a cranberry pink color. I like it, it sort of reminds me of blood, which makes me think of vampires, which makes me think of Halloween.

Logan is a cool color. It's purple black, and I've never seen anything like it. It reminds me of the night sky during twilight. [not the stupid movie with the glitter vampires, like the real sky.] It's a very much a Halloween/Fall color. I love it a lot.

from l to r: Marla, Briana, and Margarita.

Marla is a crimson color with a purple glitter that's not that apparent in this picture. It sort of reminds me of red wine, and Cayuga wine that I used to bring back from Ithaca back in the days when I used to go wine tasting.

Briana isn't as bright as my picture makes it out to be, it's more navy than cerulean. I love a good blue polish.

Margarita makes that Jimmy Buffet song start playing in my head... wasting away in Margaritaville... It's a bit darker than my picture implies, it's more of a dark purple than a bright purple. I also love a good purple polish. 

Here's every single color I got this month, including the add-ons.

I liked this box a lot, I thought the colors fit the Halloween theme nicely, and they're colors that will definitely get some wear from me.. except that fucking yellow color.

So overall, great October box,

So anyways if you're so inclined, check our Julep, your nailpolish collection will never be the same after you do.

Julep: Halloween Secret Store

First, of all, let me preface this by saying, I LOVE HALLOWEEN, AND I LOVE FALL!!! Unfortunately, living in Texas, there's NO SUCH THING as fall.

But anyhow, if I'm going to blow my money on makeup at any time during the year it's from Halloween to Christmas because those holidays are my favorite time of year. I love the colors, I love the sparkles!!! I especially love Halloween, I have a million pairs of Halloween earrings, and I literally wear them up to Halloween, which my pre-k students love.

So needless to say, the October secret store, got me excited!

I forget the name of the packages I spent all my money on, but here's the nail polish colors I indulged on:

from left to right: Glenda [a silver cackle], Tracy, Karen, Amity, and Cleopatra.

Glenda, is your typical silver cackle, I admit, I haven't tried it yet. I've never actually done cackle nail polish before, I used to have a bottle of black cackle, but en route from NJ to Texas, the bottle had an unfortunate accident in my car, but I definitely like silver better than black.

Tracy reminds me of Van Gogh's Starry Night. The picture doesn't do it justice. It's a deep blue color with glitter. It goes on nice and thick, and reminds me of stars in the sky, not that you really see many stars in Texas.

I LOVE KAREN, I painted my nails with it this week, and one of my pre-k students told me that it looked like pumpkin pie. It's a nice smooth, pumpkin colored nailpolish. It's also thick enough that I needed only one coat. My pre-k kids love it, therefore it gets two thumbs up, a pat on the back, and a stamp of approval.

I wrote Amity about two weeks ago. It's a pale silver white color. The color is so light that it took me several coatings to even see the color on my nails. I love silver, but there are better silver polishes to use that I don't need to use one hundred coats of it to show.

I have not tried Cleopatra, but the black latex intrigues me. Perhaps I should try that with Glenda. I do love black nailpolish, and considering it's called black latex, I'm sure it's a very thick black nailpolish. I shall let you know when I try it.

With one of my nailpolish packages, I got this:

A silk skull scarf. I've tried it on, it will be a nice accessory for a Halloween outfit I can wear to school next year.

and this:

Halloween nail decals. Mind you, I am way to lazy to actually figure out how to put these my nails. I spent all day chasing four year olds, when it comes to being home, I want to do nothing that involves using my brain such as figuring out how to use nail decals. But they are very cute.

This was one of my add-ons:

A pomegranate sugar scrub. I love sugar scrubs. This one smells very nice. But it doesn't meet my sugar scrub expectations. The sugar itself, isn't thick enough, and it doesn't blend well on wet skin in the shower, and it doesn't leave my skin silky like the Victoria's Secret or Philosophy ones do, but it was only three bucks, and I do like the smell.

On the Halloween nailpolish note, I picked these up for 99 cents with my Walgreens card:

First of all, I LOVE SINFUL COLORS, they're only two bucks, and I find their nail polish is better quality than some of the more expensive stuff like Sephora brand. I have almost every color of theirs, and I always buy colors I don't have.

From l to r: Call You Later, Faceted, Black Magic, Glow in the Dark, and Citrine.

I've tried Black Magic on my toes. I didn't really like it. It's supposed to be black with orange sparkles, but I found the orange sparkles got lost in translation from the bottle to my toes, and it was mostly black and not very glittery, which is a sad face :( It's also very hard to get off your toes!

I used Glow in the Dark on the dollar  skeleton gloves I bought from Kroger to make the bones glow in the dark, and it worked beautifully, and my pre-k students thought that was the coolest thing ever.

I currently have Citrine on my toes and I love it. It's bright and screams fall to me and reminds me of foliage in NJ and pumpkins. It also goes on smoothly, and I found I only needed one coat of it.

I'll let you know about the others when I try them.