The Digit-al Dozen Inspires Each Other: Day 3!

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Hello!

Today's day three of The Digit-al Dozen's inspire-each-other week, and this week I'm inspired by this mani from The Polished Koi:

What I love best about this mani is the interplay between the delicate blossoms and the opalescent glitter, and the way the texture of the glitter still shows through the leadlighting. So, I set out to recreate that.


I knew I wanted to use Zoya Saldana for my base coat right from the start, but was surprised to discover that I don't have any cherry blossom images like this--all of mine are smaller and solid, so not really leadlight-friendly. So instead, I chose a similar type of image from UberChic Beauty 14-02, and stamped with with Kaleidoscope St-01 Black. I did my leadlighting with LA Colors Nuclear Energy (at least, that's what my bottle says the name is, but I'm doubtful, because I got it at the dollar store, and when I google that name, a green shade comes up...), which I cut with a one-to-one ratio of topcoat:

UberChic Beauty 14-02 over Zoya Saldana

UberChic Beauty 14-02 over Zoya Saldana

The texture doesn't show quite the same way as Oksana's, but I do love the way the purple in the leadlighting plays with the purple shimmer in the polish, so I'm happy with how it turned out. :)


Tune back in tomorrow, same bat-time, same bat-channel, for another inspired mani! And in the meantime, check out the awesome work of the other ladies, linked below. :)

Big hugs,
M. xoxo

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Before & After: Lovely Leadlight Flowers

Hello!

This month's theme in the Nail Challenge Collaborative is Black & White, so I decided this was the perfect time to try out the 'lead light' technique everyone is talking about.

If you haven't heard of it, it's basically an extremely easy way to get a stained glass effect for you manicure. Here's what you need:

(1) A white/very light base color
(2) Black/very dark stamping
(3) Several colors of very sheer nail polish.

And here's what you do. First, start off with your base polish. I used Color Club Look Don't Tusk, and ivory creme:

Color Club Look Don't Tusk

Color Club Look Don't Tusk

Next I stamped, using Konad Black and MoYou Explorer 21 and Tourist 20 (I will have videos for these before too long). I put on a coat of Seche Vite before the next step:

Finally, I used a variety of LA Colors polishes in orange (Tahiti Sunrise), magenta (Fiji Purple), lime (Current), light blue (Radiation), and purple polishes (Tropical Breeze), and went over the stamping with a dotting tool:

This was so easy to do, and it gives such a lovely look--very elegant and eye-catching. :)

I'll have another look using this technique next time...Hope your weekend was wonderful!

Hugs,
M.

An InLinkz Link-up

Review: Mash 3D Nail Art Confetti

Hello!!

I was very excited to be approached by Mash recently to review some nail art products for them. The first item I sat down to play with was the 3D Nail Art Confetti that they sent to me...because it's sparkly and pretty, and 3D nail art is all the rage right now!

This set contains 12 different types of 3D confetti, in different shapes (hearts, stars and flowers) and colors:

Mash 3D Nail Art Confetti

The pots are huge, as you can see by the relative size of my thumb (which is a normal-thumb sized, lol); unless you're doing nails for everyone in your neighborhood every day, these will last you a long, long time--years and years, unless your cats spill them everywhere (::gives warning skunk-eye to her cats::). Here is a close-up to see the confetti better:

Even though there are 12 pots, there are actually more types of confetti than that; the ones that have a hollow center also include the shapes that were punched out of the center, so you get a two-fer, as you can see below:

This also gives you a sense of just how many are in each pot--what I dumped out there barely made a dent in what was left, as you can see. These are excellent quality, and the shapes are uniform, so you won't find yourself with uneven shapes when you're trying to make a pattern (see the manicures below). They're also very sturdy, so you're getting good stuff here.

When I look at glittery wonders like this, the little girl in me screams out, and I have to play play play! For the first manicure I did, I thought I'd do a simple skittle mani using the different gold hearts above. I started out with a base of Hare Polish Rusty Hearts, a beautiful gold-flaked red. Then I staggered the hearts in an alternating pattern down the nails:

Look at how they sparkle in the light!

Note how the shapes are all the same size and color (except when the light hits them); you can't tell from these pictures, but they are all uniform height, as well, so they all sit at the same level on your nail.

I love how it came out--this would be such a fun mani for Valentine's day, or for any romantic occasion. :)

For my second manicure I went patriotic, in honor of the upcoming Memorial Day holiday, and did a flag manicure with the white stars. I started with a base of Risque Azulcrination (holla, Janaina!), and  L.A. Colors Hot Blooded. I stamped the stripes of the flag with Konad white, and Winstonia plate W107:

How perfect is that? Rock out that flag, baby. :)

A couple of questions you might be asking yourself. First, how easy are these to apply? If you use the dotting tool technique or the pick-up pencil technique I've showed before, these are fast and easy to apply--both of these manicure took me only minutes from start to finish. You're probably also wondering if the confetti stay put...I covered them with one coat of top-coat, and they stayed put just fine--in fact, I had to pry them off with a lot of effort to get them off (using nail polish remover makes this easier, but I did a pull test to see how they'd hold up). You shouldn't have any problem getting several days of wear out of them (probably longer with the hearts and flowers, since they don't have the sharp edges that catch more easily).

This set goes for $5.99 on the Mash website, at the time of this posting. I've seen similar nail confetti at my local beauty supply store go for twice as much for half as much product, so I was impressed with the price as well as the quality. If you're into the 3D trend and want some options in fun colors and shapes, I highly recommend you check this out. :)

Thanks for taking a look! Peace and love,
M.

(The 3D Nail Art Confetti in this post was sent for my 100% honest review. I am not affiliated with Mash, and the links are not affiliate links.)

NOTD: Vampire bats bite

Hello!!

Today's prompt in the 'This Is Halloween' Challenge is: Bats!

I've had several bat images that I've been waiting to use since I started stamping back in April, so I was excited for this theme. But what I'm most excited about, what I've been absolutely dying to use, is a bat/vampire bite image from Bundle Monster. So, I designed my manicure around that image...the story behind it is that the vampire has flown into the room in bat form, and bitten his victim, and now is flying away with the rest of his bat companions, leaving behind his victim and her blood:

That's gonna leave a mark...

To put it together, I stared with a nude polish on the accent finger, Sally Hansen Beige Blast; this was a little too beige, so I added a coat of LA Colors Mega Watt as a topper. On the other fingers, I used Pure Ice Siren. On the accent finger, I also used Siren to stamp the vampire bat bite using BM301. On the rest, I stamped the flights of bats with Konad black and plate QA26

So what do you think? Is it...BAT-tastic?

(I apologize. That was just wrong.)

Thanks for looking! Please check out the other bat manicures in the challenge, linked below. :)

Xoxox,
M.

NOTD Before & After: Surfin' USA!

Hello!

Today's theme in CNT is Surfin' USA! I had a bit of manicure-block on this, and wasn't quite sure what to do...well, that's not exactly true. I wasn't sure what to do that didn't involve freehand of some sort. Everything I came up with that didn't require freehand was just plain lame...so I decided to say 'what the heck' and freehand it.

I started with Sinful Color's Ciao Bella, which is a gorgeous deep blue with lighter blue glass flecks in it. You should click on this pictures to enlarge them, because they don't do it justice in this smaller size:

Sinful Colors Ciao Bella!

Sinful Colors Ciao Bella!

Sinful Colors Ciao Bella in direct sunlight (sort of)

I decided I wanted to do a glitter sandwich for my ocean, and I wanted to make a surf board on my accent nail. So I removed the blue from my ring finger, and put on a neutral beige. Then I put Orly Mermaid Tale over the remaining blue fingers:

Sinful Colors Ciao Bella! + Orly Mermaid Tale

At this point I started to wonder if something was wrong wit my camera, because I could not get a good picture of the glitter on top of Ciao Bella. I took these at a different time of day than I normally do, but still, it seemed odd that I had a problem with the focus. If this keeps up, I may have to get a new camera...:(

Anyway. My next step was to put a coat of L.A. Color's Radiation over the blue nails, to create the glitter sandwich. This made the blue a little less deep, and made it more sparkly like the surface of the water (or, that's what I'm telling myself). Then I freehanded the surfboard and the wave tube...Here's how it came out:

Let's go surfin' now, everybody's learning how

Come on and safari with meeeeeeee

To make the surfboard, I put a stripe of Spoiled Pumping Gas down the middle, and then four thinner stripes of Sally Hansen Night Flight, two next to the first stripe, and two down the edges of the nail (barely visible here). To create the wave tube, I started drawing parts of the wave with Sonia Kashuk Fairy Princess, and then tried to put accent white caps on with Sally Hansen White On.

I'm pretty happy with how it came out...I'm clearly still learning how to freehand well, but you can tell it's a wave tube, and it's kinda cool. I love how the glitter sandwich came out, and if you ignore issues of proper perspective, that part is very cool. And yes, if you're wondering why my surfboard is standing straight up in the air? Well, we're not all very good surfers even here in California, and sometimes we just wipe out...hee  hee hee.

Thanks for taking a look, and please check out the other surfing manicures done by the other participants, linked below. :)

M.

MSMD Monday: Galaxy Nails!

Hello!

Today for Monkey-See-Monkey-Do Monday I decided to finally try my hand at galaxy nails. I fell in love with this look back before I even discovered nail stamping--my niece linked me a tutorial of it, and it was beautiful. Here is the most recent version I've seen; you can see it by clicking here.

Here is my version of the galaxy nails look. I wanted to go for a more purple look, but I think I took it a little too pink (this is what happens when you only have two pinks to choose from):

Galaxy nails in the shade

Galaxy nails in the sun

To make them, I started with a base of Orly's Galaxy Girl (seriously, how could I not?). On top of it, I sponged Sally Hansen Insta-Dry Beige Blast in a swirl across the nail; then I sponged LA Colors Tropical Breeze over it, covering most of it except here and there; then I sponged China Glaze's Flirty Tankini down the center of the purple, to give it depth.

Then I covered the full nail with China Glaze's Fairy Dust, and while that was drying, I used a dotting tool to add some random stars in white. In my opinion, that was too stark, so I covered most of them with Pure Ice's Silver Mercedes. Next time I'll use that to start with. :)

I do love this look, and I want to try it in different colors--next time I'm going to try blue and purple.

Hope you like it, and thanks for stopping by. Please check out the other ladies who participated in MSMD monday, shown below. :)

M.

TOTD: Embrace Ladybug Diversity

Hello!!

First, because I will be sharing this with fellow challenge participants who might not want to see a thumbnail with feet on it, I will put this image first:

If you hate feet you have now been warned, and it is completely your own fault if you clicked on the link and/or read further! And now I can move on to my pedicure. :)

My group's challenge today was 'Ladybug', and I have a soft spot in my heart for ladybugs...possibly due to the fact that I spent much of my young childhood wondering how their houses had caught fire and what had become of their children. My love of them continued as I planted a rose garden and discovered they feast on destructive aphids, thus helping my flowers to flourish. Along the way, I learned two other interesting facts about ladybugs. One, that ladybugs bite. Google it if you don't believe me; it's not dangerous and they don't bite hard, it's like a teeny weeny pinch you barely feel, and I like to think of it as their way of saying 'Hey, don't forget I'm here and squash me or something, okay?'.  

The second is that ladybugs aren't just red, they also come in yellow, orange, and yellowish-green (greenish-yellow?). Sometimes people don't realize these other colors are also ladybugs, and they kill them thinking they are bad bugs. So I thought I'd raise some Ladybug Diversity Awareness! Love ALL da ladybugs, I say!

My pedicure is simple but shows two ends of the ladybug rainbow:

Don't the little toenails look a teensy bit like ladybugs in the grass? :)

Picture in the light without water on my toes, lol

I used Sinful Colors Ruby Ruby, LA Colors Current, and to make the dots, Wet n Wild's Ebony Hates Chris.

Thanks for looking, and don't forget to check out the other bloggers that participated in the challenge, listed below. :)

M.

NOTD: Relaxing day at the beach :)

Hello there!

The manicure I'm wearing today is a project that was inspired by a nail art contest; the theme of the contest is 'Fun In The Sun'. My idea of a fun day in the sun is a relaxing day by the ocean, watching for sea life, looking for shells, or just lying on the beach. So, here is what I put together as my entry:

To make it, I used the following. For the sky, I used LA Colors Radiation (from my recent haul!). For the ocean, Orly's Halley's Comet (it sparkles blue and green although you can't see it in the picture), and for the sand I used China Glaze's Fast Track. To stamp the dolphins I used China Glaze's Concrete Catwalk and Mash plate 35; for the ocean waves I used Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear in White On and Mash plate 49. For the sun I used Sally Hansen Insta-dry's Lightning and Sinful Colors' Serena And Chloe, with Bundle Monster plate BM01. Finally, for the seashell I used White On again and Shany plate SH04.

If anyone would like a tutorial or a fauxtorial on this, let me know; it wasn't too hard, just a question of layering the polishes correctly. There were two tricky bits; one was making the sun two different colors (just carefully place a dot of orange in the center, yellow around it, and scrape in the direction that will show least) and the other was muting the white waves so they weren't too stark (I swept a layer of sheer blue over them).

Looking at this makes me want to go to the beach, so I guess I did okay with it. :)

Thanks for looking,

M.

LA Colors haul

Hello!

Just a quick post to let you know that I found a bunch of LA Colors polishes at Dollar Tree today:

If you have a Dollar Tree nearby, check it out! If you haven't tried these yet, you should consider it. When I swatched them on my color wheels, the colors were as nice as they looked in the bottle and the formula seemed good. I haven't worn them on my nails yet, but I checked with some polish-aholics and they confirmed they are solid cheap polishes. The only downside I've seen so far is two of the ones I got have slightly wonky brushes, but not too bad, and the other ones are just fine. I'll update if I have any problems when I wear them. Not sure how often or how long these show up, so I thought I'd post about them quickly! I'm always looking for an inexpensive way to get a variety of polishes to play with. :)

Thanks for stopping by,

M. :)