Before & After: The Walking Dead

(Bunny Nail plate HD-C and MASH pen originally sent for review)

Hello!

It's here, it's here it's here!!!!! The ghosties and ghoulies are among us, coming in search of our souls--but they'll settle for candy, so make sure you have plenty!!

Today is also the last day of the Challenge Your Nail Art Halloween challenge, and the theme for today is to do a mani inspired by scary movies/tv.

For the last few years, I've been obsessed by The Walking Dead, but this season...OMG, this season. THIS SEASON! I will say no more in case there are fans out there who aren't yet caught up. Suffice it to say, this mani was an easy call for me.

I started with a base of Lucky 13 Fool Of A Took, which turns out to be a continuous Halloween favorite for me:

Lucky 13 Fool Of A Took

Lucky 13 Fool Of A Took

Lucky 13 Fool Of A Took

Then I stamped three fingers with awesome zombehs from Bunny Nails plate HD-C (click to see my review), and then wrote the title using a MASH nail art pen:

What did the zombie lose his lawsuit?

He had no leg to stand on!

For this one, I decided that I wanted a little negative space on the thumbs:

To finish up, I want to share a little trick with you. You might notice that I'm showing you my left hand; you might also remember that I am left-handed. That means I wrote that title with my non-dominant hand. Not too bad, if I do say so myself--want to know how I managed it, especially in that little teeny writing?

Shhhh...don't tell anybody...

I wrote it upside down. 

Yes, you read that right. Write the words in block letters on a piece of paper, and then turn it upside down. Then copy it on your nail--because when you do it this way, you're not 'writing', you're drawing straight lines and half circles, and that's it. Your brain doesn't try to 'write' and it's a lot easier to get something you can read.

Now I don't know if this will work for everyone, but it works for me, so there's a chance it will work for you--so give it a shot and see how it goes. :)

Happy Halloween everybody!!!
M.

An InLinkz Link-up

Monday Blues Before & After: Decorated Denim

(Press Samples)

Hello!

Well...it's that time of week again. Monday. Time to try to get past those Monday Blues...and here's my contribution to that cause, something you can grab a peek at during your morning break (of course you'd never be looking at nail blogs when you're on the clock...ahem.). ;-)

Today we're gonna take a look at the subtly radiant InDecisive Nail Lacquer Denim, a navy blue scattered holo that looks like the prettiest jeans you'd ever want to own:

InDecisive Nail Lacquer Denim, outside light

InDecisive Nail Lacquer Denim, outside light

InDecisive Nail Lacquer Denim, outside light

InDecisive Nail Lacquer Denim, artificial light

InDecisive Nail Lacquer Denim, artificial light

Ah...there's nothing like a beautiful holo...And this one is nearly a one-coater, you'll certainly get full opacity in two. :)

For my decoration, well...you know those jeans that have the cool bling on the tush or down one leg? Pretty rhinestones or appliques or studwork? I have a deep love of that look, and I wanted to put together a manicure that would match.

I drew stitches with my white Mash nail art pen, and then I stamped on the accent nail using Konad White polish, and Bunny Nails plate BuNa-A. Then I added decorative touches with some studs and dots of Barry M Silver Foil:

Every pair of jeans and every manicure deserves a little bling. :)

On my right hand, I decided to go for an acid-wash look. So before I did my stamping, I added a coat of InDecisive Nail Lacquer White Speckled:

InDecisive Nail Lacquer White Speckled over Denim

InDecisive Nail Lacquer White Speckled over Denim

 And then I decorated again as I had the other hand:

Retro acid wash 80s FTW!

Retro acid wash 80s FTW!

So which look do you like better, the regular or the 'acid-wash'? Either way the holo is gorgeous and that's what's most important. :)

Hugs to you, and I hope your Monday's done before you know it!
M.

An InLinkz Link-up

Before & After: Stripes 'n' Kitties!

Hello!!

I've learned the sad lesson that beautiful nails and vigorous play with my dog don't go well together...sigh...I now have a case of the right-hand nubbins again, and even though I've tried to file them down as best I could, they still look a teensy bit janky.

Can something look a teensy bit janky? Idk. I'm gonna go with it.

Today's theme in the Crumpet Nail Tart's Got Polish challenge is 'Stripes'! Hey, vertical stripes make things look longer, right?

Because nail bloggers tend to always be showing new (or at least new-to-them) polish and tend to neglect the old beauties in their collection, this challenge is about using polish you've had for a long time, ideally over a year. I am so happy about having an excuse to blog about some old favorites, I can't even tell you. :)

For this one, I pulled out Cult Nails Iconic, a blood-rust color with very subtle rust-gold flakes in it:

You can see that the flakes are very subtle, and show up a little more or less depending on the sort of light you're in. This is the sort of flakie that is definitely work appropriate but still gives you a little dose of happy when you look at your nails. :)

For my nail art, I wanted to go for a Victorian-room sort of feel, so I drew on some scroll-type stripes with a Mash nail art pen, and put on some rose decals I bought somewhere ages ago (sorry, the packaging is long gone, so I don't remember the brand, but I'd guess Kiss). And since no cozy home is complete without a cat, so I pulled out some kitty water decals that Born Pretty Store sent me for review:

I was very happy with how extremely easy to use these are--you cut them out, submerge them in water for about 20 seconds, slide off the design, and position it on your nail. Cover with topcoat, and you're done, done, done. And these are very thin, unlike some other decals that are on thicker plastic which make them more difficult to position; These went on easily and stayed put where I wanted them to once I dabbed the water off.

Here is the final look:

What do you think? I am annoyed that the nails are a bit messed up, but I do think the design is cute, fun, and very fast to do. :)

If you like these decals, you can find them by clicking here; there are a ton more designs besides. I have a discount coupon for Born Pretty Store that my readers can use (not an affiliate link):

In fact...drumroll please...enough people have used my code that Born Pretty Store is hosting a giveaway on my site for a $20 gift certificate to their store! I'll have that giveaway all set up by the end of the week. :)

Thanks for stopping by, and don't forget to look at the other manicures linked below. :)

Hugs and loves,
M.

Before & After: My Halloween Mani

Argh!!

I can't believe it's Halloween already! I have two other manicures to show you that I didn't get to show you and I'm out of time! Oh well...maybe I'll post one later today, or maybe I'll just save them for next year. I have had so much fun doing manis for my challenges, and the funny thing is, I have ideas for about 10 more manis that I didn't get to...that's okay, soon enough it will be Christmas time, and I'll be happily immersed into that. :)

But for now, here is the actual manicure I will be wearing as part of my costume today. During my spooktacular tag, I told you I was planning on building a costume around this make-up (if you follow me on instagram, you will have seen my dry run of the make-up):

(source)

I am wearing a gothic dress with this, along with gothic jewelry, in an attempt to look like an old-fasioned doll. :)

For my nails, I started with a base of Julep Winter, which happily just came in my November Julep box (never had one come that fast!!). Winter is a light gray creme, and I've been needing one like this: 

Julep Winter, two coats, artificial light

Next, I drew stitched lines to match the ones on the costume's mouth; I drew them on with one of the MASH nail art pens they sent me for review a while back--I loved them then and I love them now. I freehanded some blood with acrylic paint; I wanted it to look like it was coming from my cuticles, so I put it right on up in the cuticles. The effect works in real life, but it looks a bit messy here:

I think the idea is that the doll either has some sort of horrid virus that is taking over her body and killing her, or she was killed in an unpleasant way and is coming back for revenge. What do you think, creepy??

Thanks for looking, and Happy Halloween!!!!!!
M.

Review: MASH nail art pens

Hello!!

Today is turning into review day, apparently, and maybe I should have waited to post this until tomorrow, but I'm really excited about it and couldn't wait, and because there is currently a good deal going on for this product (25% off the bundle). You know I love a good deal, and have to pass it on. :)

A while back when some British nail art pens were announced, I was a little sad face because they aren't easy to find here in the US. Shortly thereafter, though, I was contacted by Mash to see if I'd like to review some of their products, and my heart did a little flutter at the chance to try their nail art pens.

They sent me 4 different colors to try out: White, Black, Silver and Gold. Here are what the pens look like in their packaging:

Mash Nail Art Pens in their packaging

Here is what they look like outside of the package:

One of the things that have made me hesitant to use nail art pens in the past is the type of nibs they have. I've struggled through the ones with the fibers that fray almost the moment that you try to use them, and then make all your nail art messy because the fibers and polish go everywhere. I've gone through felt-tip types of pens that give you clumsy lines and uneven polish control. So I was extremely happy to find that the tips of these pens are really well designed; they're made of plastic, and the polish comes down in a controlled manner to the very tip of the nib:

No fraying. No uneven polish. Very fine tip, with excellent control. Things were looking good.

I decided to play around a bit with them, just to see what I could do with them. Could I color in large areas without it looking striated and uneven? Could I do precision work with the tips? The answer to all of this is yes, and the possibilities were marred only by my artistic limitations. Here I played around with some flourishes and filigree, over a base of InDecisive Sugar; keep in mind there was no intent to create a unified manicure here, this was just my very first, initial attempts to work with the pens, presented to you as is:

I had no problem drawing big flourish shapes, the pens gave me perfect control to get curves and points. Filling in with the same color worked wonderfully--the color blended into itself perfectly, and didn't look like it had little stripes or goopy overlapping areas (although this close up I see a couple of tiny little bare spots I missed, lol, which was my technical error). I didn't shake the white enough, so it came out milky; once I shook it up a bit more, it was fine and solid, so make sure you shake up the colors thoroughly (this probably goes without saying, lol).

My favorite thing about these pens is the fine-tip control you get from the pen nib. The flow is continuous, so you don't get bald spots, but not so much that you get runny polish that compromises your design. Look at these precise lines, and keep in mind these were my very first attempts using the pens:

Now that you've seen the precision, here is another design I did that I wanted to be a little more thick and rustic, like a metal-work grate:

Also, I used the silver to make dots of various sizes so you could see that you can make dots of different sizes (This is over D&R Apothecary's Oatmeal Raisin Cookies, if you're wondering, and I'll be reviewing that soon. :) ).

Okay, so...I had to do the ultimate test: The Off-Hand test. Yes, that's right--I attemped to do a manicure with my off-hand, to see if I could get any sort of relative precision with my shaky, poorly controlled right hand. I wanted to do a cat in profile, watching birds (yes, I love this theme):

Base polish: InDecisive Brick

I'm pretty impressed with that as an off-hand mani. Of course no nail art pen is going to make you able to draw with your off-hand as well as your on-hand. But what it can do is not make things worse, and give you the best control you possibly can have on those occasions when you need to do some nail art on both hands. And these pens pass that test, in my opinion. :)

My conclusions? These pens have an excellent delivery system, the nib is long-lasting, the colors are rich. These are wonderful for nail art, and I highly recommend them. The only issue I had was that I had to make sure to shake up the white well, and that's the case with any creme nail art pen, really. :) Oh, and? While they don't need topcoat--they were shiny and pretty without it--when I did apply top coat (my normal Seche Vite), it didn't smear at all. And I tried to make it smear. I brushed over it slowly, brushed over it more than one time, brushed over it hard--no smearing no matter what I did.

You can find these pens by clicking here. The pens come in a variety of 6 colors, and if you buy all 6, you get 25% off--which, if my math is correct, is 6 for the price of 4.5. if you buy them separately, the sell for $5.99 each.

Thanks for reading, and happy nail-arting!
M.

(The pens shown in this post were sent for my honest, unbiased review.)