Pre-Orders September / October 2013!

I have received some queries asking about the next restock so I thought I should do something about it.

As you know, I am currently waiting for a couple of shipment for my supplies so I will not be restocking my Etsy shop anytime soon.

Instead, I've decided to accept pre-orders starting from tomorrow, 4 September 2013!

Details are as follows:

• Pre-orders are available from 4 Sept, 9 am SGT until 15 Sept
• Orders will be filled in late Sept or early Oct (depending on when I get my supplies) on a first-come-first-served basis
• International shipping available
• 2 sizes available - 5 & 12 ml (yes, new bottle!) @ US$4 and US$10 respectively
• Link to pre-order form will be posted here in this very post (I will update it)
• Shipping and other details will be on the form
• As a thank you for your support, orders above US$100 will also receive a little extra *winks*

Link to pre-order form: http://bit.ly/14oHr8G

In other news, I hope to work on some new releases but everything is still on the drawing board for now. So stay tuned!

Update + Franken Fail

I am suchhhh a terrible blogger for not posting as regularly as I wished. The past two weeks have been crazy for me. My cousin fell quite ill and was warded for a few days. Then, my sister went for an operation because she tore her ACL and meniscus in her knee. Thankfully, they are both discharged from the hospital now and are recovering at home.

Just when I thought I could do some swatching over the weekend, it had to rain so I had to ditch my plan :(

Instead, I spent some time rushing out the orders that have been placed so far. I've shipped out more than half of the orders (check your email for shipping notification!) and plan to ship the rest of the orders out this week. Please accept my sincerest apologies for the terrible delay. ><

As I was filling up the orders, I had a sudden urge to try duping Butter London's Two Fingered Salute and this is what I've got:

Clearly I am a long way off. The color is not exactly right and the flecks are definitely not as copper as I would like. Oh wells. I wish I could get my hands on some TFS naoooooooooo!! *sad panda*

What about you? Are you the lucky owner of BL's Two Fingered Salute?

News Flash: I'm Still Alive!

Ooof! Another week has passed and I've yet to update my blog. Shame on you, mich!

Buuuuuut.. in my defense, I've been really busy making polishes to fill up the pre-orders that some of you have placed at the end of last year!
After a long two months, I've finally managed to get more suspension bases to mix up a storm. Unfortunately I had trouble securing some other supplies for Wrath, Lust and Envy. I've already been contacting some of you to confirm your orders and there are a few who did not reply so I had no choice but to offer the polishes to the next person on the list.
So... If you have placed a pre-order with me, please check your inbox (the paypal email address that you've used) and the spam folder for updates! 

Apart from filling pre-orders, I have also been working on some new colors. Here are some quick and dirty swatches that I've posted on Instagram:

Spring Kisses. 2/3 coats on its own.
Delicate pink flowers blossoming amidst a snowy white base - this is partly inspired by a picture posted on IG by A Lacquered Affair a while ago. I added some fine lavender and holo sprinkles to complete the look.

Water Snake. 3/4 coats on its own.
As this year is the year of the water snake for the Chinese, I mixed up this reptilian franken. It is a dark green (near black) with green flecks and sprinkles of gold.

Blue Bell Bottoms. 2 coats on its own under indirect light.
My first attempt at making holos! I had wanted to try duping DS Glamour but it proved to be impossible. So I gave up and focused on making a blue holo that resembles denim. This picture turned out slightly color inaccurate methinks - it is not as bright and slightly darker IRL. The holo effect is not mindblowingly strong but I'm quite happy with how it looks on this blue. I will definitely try sourcing for some spectraflair to play with next time.
Meanwhile, I will continue to pray that I will find a bottle of DS Glamour some day. I want it soooo much. *writhes about in agony*

So what do you think of these new colors?
Just in case you are wondering, I haven't set a release date yet because I am still sorting out the pre-orders and working on other new colors. Do let me know if you have some ideas you'd like me to try! ^_^

Till next time! <3

xoxo,
mich

Annnndd I'm back!!

Yes! I made it back from the most grueling revision + exam period ever (as of now)! Cramming 8 subjects in under 4 weeks is definitely no joke and I really regret not being more hardworking before that. I really wouldn't have made it without my friends so here's a huge THANK YOU to my friends if you are reading my blog! I love all of you!

A huge THANK YOU also goes to all of you for staying here with me! I will be working on getting swatches up as soon as I settle the post-exam matters!

That aside, I've also went through the rafflecopter entries for my last giveaway and here are the lucky winners!

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Congratulations ladies!!
I will be sending an email out to you so please do check your inboxes (or even spam folders)! You will have 48 hours to reply after which I will have to pick a new winner if there is no response from you.

If you did not win anything this time round, do not despair! I may or may not have something up my sleeves for you! *winks*

Yup, so that's all I have for now! See you around soon!

xoxo,
mich

Hi-atus!

Hi everyone!

I'm just popping by for a short while to say hi!... and bye :(
After a short preparatory course, the dreaded bar exam is finally lurking round the corner. All the times spent slacking instead of studying are coming back to haunt me. Looks like I'll have to work extra hard during this revision period so I apologize for not being able to post during this period! xP I'm crossing my fingers that I will be able to survive the papers and make it back to blog sometime in December.

Meanwhile, I've managed to fill up the orders over the weekend:

The army of minis

Oops I didn't include the larger bottles because I was too lazy to arrange them all for a group shot.
Anyway, all of them are mixed and ready to be labelled and packed. I should be able to get them all out by this week. Thank you all so much for your patience and support! <3

Urgh. I'm missing you guys already. :c
Hope to see you when I'm back! Wish me luck for my exams! :k

xoxo,
mich

The Polish Well turns 1 year old!

Yayy!! We've officially turned one year old! :party
Although our first post here says 3rd October, we first started out on Tumblr a day earlier on the 2nd so I'm taking that as our birthday!
As always, our heartfelt thanks goes to you for making this such a wonderful journey! I really appreciate you taking the time to read and comment on our posts. :L

Now before I get all mushy and soppy, I have to apologize for not having anything planned up for our big day. Well, in my defense, I did plan something but I couldn't get it ready in time for our bloggiversary so I'm postponing it for now. Hopefully I will get it up in a month's time or so. :et

In the meantime, here are some peektures for what is coming up this week on the blog!

HARE polishes! *shrieks with joy*

HARE | Midsummer's Midnight

HARE | Magic Mist

HARE | Rad Cloud

HARE | Twilight Savings

Drooling yet? ;)
Good. Stay tuned!

xoxo,
mich

Of Nail Mails and Hauls...

It's Swatching Sunday!!

Well, it was supposed to be... until Mother Nature decided it should be Storm Sunday instead - and the thunder rumbled in agreement just as I finished typing that. Freaky. :~

Since it is way too dark for me to get decent pictures on my camera, I've decided to do a haul update and show you the nail mails that I've received since the last haul post in.... May (can't believe it was so long ago)!

So, here we gooooo~

L-R: Brummingbird holo top coat, Essence Choose Me, Fingerpaints Easel-y Entertained, Spoiled Plastic Flamingo

These are the awesome polishes that I've won from @brummingbird's nail art contest on Instagram! You can see the design I did here.
The bottle with the adorable label is a spectraflair topcoat made by Laura herself. I've tried it on one nail and it was... *wow* intense! :o :rainbow She also makes some pretty cool polishes. You can find her etsy shop here.

L-R:  Lynnderella Nosegay, Glitter Gal Lizard Belly and Kiko #255

I also met up with my friend sometime in June to collect these pretties! I feel a little embarrassed that I have left them with her for so long! :$ She was also really nice to help me get the Kiko on her Euro holiday trip! Thank you, babe! :k
You can see my swatches of Nosegay here.

L-R: Essence Midnight Date / City that Never Sleeps, Michelle M33, A38, 55

Jayo, Cherily and I had another stayover at our friend's house towards the end of June and I collected these from Cherily! She was in town a few days before that and kindly helped me grab some of the local Michelle polishes to try. I've worn each of them as a full mani at least twice now. That's really saying something considering that I still have quite a few untrieds in my stash. :i

In July, I...
actually survived a whole month without a single new polish! woohoo~ :mj
That must be a personal record for me ever since I've started this little hobby of mine. I'm actually pretty impressed with myself! xD

Anyway, the cold turkey didn't last long and here's what my mail lady brought for me in August:

L-R: Gosh Rainbow, Gosh Holographic, MaxFactor Fantasy Fire

Now, I hardly need to introduce these, do I? I was lucky enough to be the winner of The Nailasaurus' giveaway - and even luckier to win the set of HTFs! I've heard so much about these polishes but never had hopes of owning them myself. As you can imagine, I literally jumped for joy when I saw the email she sent! I may or may not have shrieked as I jumped. Heh. :r

L-R: NailTek Foundation II, China Glaze I'm Not Lion, Exotic Encounter, I Herd That, Cast A Spell, Immortal, OPI Alpine Snow

So, the giveaway prizes didn't exactly count towards my no-buy, right? But these China Glazes definitely do! After going cold turkey for a month, I broke my no-buy in a huge way by hauling more than 5 polishes at one go from a local etailer! Apparently, all it needed was a 10% discount for all hell to break loose. So much for a polish-free July! :||

L-R: a-england Elaine, Galahad, Guinevere

Our mail lady also delivered our a-england purchases from their recent July promo - the 5-day Mythical Fair! You know me. I'm a relatively huge a-england fan. It would not have been humanely possible for me to miss this chance to grab some of the shades I'd been eyeing. And so, I caved in. Yet again. :||

And that's not all!
I am expecting at least 2 other polishes this month - Butter London All Hail the Queen and Cult Nails Time Traveller. I've also splurged on another gigantic order but that will only be coming 3 weeks later. >.<
On top of that, I have also spent some money on a few polish-related orders. (If all goes well, I hope it will be in time for our blog-anniversary in October! ;) )

The moral of the story?
Going cold turkey is not a viable long-term solution at all. :ice

So what have you hauled recently? :brow

xoxo,
mich

Sending Out Giveaway Packages

Hello.
Last week was very hectic for me. I had lots of studying, homework and tests to do. I also shipped out the giveaway packages.

Here are some of the packages I shipped to the winners. I sent packages to so many different countries besides the US: England, Italy, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, South Korea, and Sweden.

I was nervous going to the post office with so many packages and thinking that other customers waiting in line would be upset that they had to wait a bit longer. If you could see the sales ticket, it is very looooong :)

I never spent so much on shipping but I forgot about it thinking that once the packages were received by each of the winners, they would be very happy.

Thank you for reading :)

SF Japan Town Trip and Haul

Hello again!
Very strange for me to make posts two days in a row, but couldn't wait to share this with you.

Last Sunday, the day of the Super Bowl, I took advantage of the fact that so many people stay at home to watch the game and spend time with friends/family. I knew this day would not be as crowded, so, my boyfriend and I went to my favorite place... Japan Town in San Francisco! I love to go there and shop lots of things from Japan as well as eat delicious Japanese food.

I know I'm not good at holding the chopsticks ^ ^; but eating Japanese food without them would not be the same.

Mmm... Yakisoba... I eat it every time I go to Japan Town's Mifune Don restaurant. Sometimes I eat okonomiyaki as well but on this occasion I had less appetite. This is delicious, I really recommend it :)

Inside one of the malls located in Japan Town, you will find Japanese decoration and objects with cultural significance such as these Mikoshi (portable shrines)...

Or this Bunraku theater puppet. I think it looks beautiful.

One of my favorite stores to shop at is Daiso Japan which is the Japanese equivalent of dollar stores in the U.S. but way better. It is filled with all kinds of goods from Japan at only $1.50 each item.

(Not my picture, I forgot to take one. Source here.)

Now, to the haul...

I bought all kinds of beauty and healthcare items: A huge box of woven cotton pads (perfect for removing nail polish, leaves no lint), eyelash curler refills, face massager, peel-off charcoal mask, nail & hand lotions, packs of 250+ oil blotting paper sheets, mimikaki (for cleaning ears), and a little bottle of nail polish.

(Pictures can be enlarged)

I love Japanese packaging of products, very kawaii (cute). This is a bag of 10 packs of tissue paper.

Here you can see: deco tapes, colorful staples, two very cute mugs, and trading card albums (I will use them to store my nail stamp plates).

I also bought very cute notebooks. Though I'm a univ. student, I can use any notebook for taking notes and I wanted to use kawaii ones. I love having cute stuff around me, makes everyday life sweeter ^ ^

I wanted you to know a little bit more about me besides nail polishing. I hope you enjoyed this post!