Hi Everyone! Happy Sunday to all. About a week ago I got the entire collection of China Glaze's Electric Nights. I don't know what's wrong with me these are neon and I got ALL of them. I mean seriously what is going on? Where's the pod I clearly have been body snatched!
I've seen tons of super cool mani's done by Opal over on YouTube with this collection so I'm totally blaming her. Here's her channel check out all the cool stuff she does especially with these polishes!
So I decided I wanted to try the water marble decal method where you draw your design in the water but let it sit out over night to dry so you can cut and then apply as decals the next day because it's less messy.
So here's what I found out about the water marble decal method. You don't have to wait over night for it to dry, it's dry in about 30 minutes to an hour. You have to use it right away after drying the water off of it otherwise it becomes very brittle and cracks. While it is less messy OMG it's very time consuming to cut out to the right size and then apply like decals.
Here's the water marble I did. I didn't totally love it but I didn't hate it.
These are neon colors and I had to take indoor pics so really not as bright as they should be.
Also my yellow came out looking a golden orange because of the order I did my polish! What the what?!
So I did this all on Friday and then Saturday night I stamped over them and guess what?! I absolutely love the stamping over them!
I used one of my My Online Shop MJ plates for this isn't it cool?!
This image is from plate XXXIV I love how it looks over this water marble base
It's really hard to get pics of neons! It's like you HAVE to use the shade instead of a light and then your skin looks so wonky!
ahhh the things we do in the name of great manicures LOL!
So what do you think do you like it better with or without the stamping over it? I guess as a stamper I just naturally believe everything looks better with stamping!
Thanks for stopping by! I hope you all have a fantastic day!
Hi Everyone. I have a wonderful friend who I've never met in real life. I've known her for almost 8 years. Even though I've never met her she has been with me through the death of my sister and father and my beloved cats. She and I have a few things in common. We both LOVE animals, we are chinchilla owners, we are definitely afraid of spiders and have a fear of heights. She is one of the sweetest people I know.
For a few years now she has been trying to get the awareness out there about epilepsy. Her life was changed when her oldest son, still in high school was diagnosed. it was not an easy diagnosis and for a very long time no one was really sure what was happening. I have seen her do EVERYTHING she could to help him. She did special diets for him, she worked her butt off to help him in school and make his teachers aware that while he looks fine he is in fact having a seizure. Many times, especially in the beginning, he suffered several seizures a day.
He is on so many medications to help him that he is often tired. His memory and cognition are poor. Because of this school is really hard for him. He is socially shy. He can no longer play sports. And he cannot drive. All teenagers want to drive and because of his epilepsy he can't drive a car.
And while her son has this--epilepsy--he is still a really great kid! Despite the hardships of school for him, he is an excellent student, he is a loving son and a great big brother. He enjoys watching sports and engaging in outdoor activities and will probably be a ping pong champion one day soon. Despite his daily struggle he is a wonderful young man.
Today is Epilepsy Awareness and I wear purple to support my friend Jenn who goes through this struggle with her son Brandon. Through Jenn I have learned some disturbing facts about epilepsy:
1 in 26 people will develop epilepsy.
It can occur in anyone at any time.
There is no cure.
Up to 50,000 deaths occur annually in the U.S. from seizure related causes.
This is more than deaths from breast cancer.
The mortality rate for people with epilepsy is is two to three times higher than the general population and the risk of sudden death is twenty-four times greater.
Research for epilepsy is severely under-funded.
Federal dollars spent on research for epilepsy pale in comparison to those spent on other diseases, many of which affect fewer people than those with epilepsy.
My purple mani today is for Jenn and Brandon and the many people who are affected by this disease we know so little about and hear so little regarding.
I chose the beautiful Pahlish The Human Superpower for my purple. Those struggling with epilepsy and those caring for them have to enlist their superpowers just to survive.
Even though there is such a daily struggle with epilepsy for those who suffer with the disease as well as those who love them and support them I chose the butterfly image for my mani. Butterflies are resilient and despite their fragile appearance are strong.
Butterflies are true beauties much like my beautiful, strong, courageous and resilient friend, Jenn
Today's stamping is with Mundo de Unas Velvet and Uber Chic plates 1-02 and 1-03
In your day everyday try to remember there might be someone who's suffering you cannot see. Just because their outside shows no sign of struggle understand the struggle is real. Our best defense is always education. The more we know the more we can do. As with cancer, I hope someday soon to see a cure for epilepsy.
Hi Everyone! Happy Hump Day! I'm super late posting tonight but I had quite the day and didn't have time until now. A few weeks ago I snagged a couple bottles of Darling Diva's from the Bad Pick Up Lines collection. I really love This Dress Would Look Great On My Bedroom Floor and I've used it before in my tribute to Mr Spock mani but it was really calling to me so I hauled it out again.
I can't help it, I love dark colors!
I decided to use of of the awesome Messy Mansion Bridal plates I received for review and did some stamping with Mundo de Unas. This is just a really, really pretty mani!
First Up Darling Diva's This Dress Would Look Great On My Bedroom Floor
It's a gorgeous black jelly base with blue and holographic micro glitter
I love it!
I stamped with 3 different Mundo de Unas polishes, Aqua, Figi and Turquoise. Figi is from her Fall collection and I just love it!
I chose the rose image from Messy Mansion Bridal 02 plate for stamping and I just think this mani is so pretty
I think aqua and turquoise tones over black are amazing!
I love being able to rock a couple of accent nails along with a beautiful polish
Look at the sparkles!!
Beautiful polish and beautiful stamping today!
Hi Everyone!!! Happy Monday! Good thing I had my flower power mani on yesterday because today we have snow again! Not as bad as other areas in Wisconsin have I think we only got an inch or so but still our green grass is looking like a white blanket again. The good news is with it being March and almost the end of March this snow is definitely not going stick around.
Today is the Monkey See, Monkey Do Challenge in the Advanced Nail Stamping group. The group we all lovingly refer to as the ANUS group because despite being adults we are all totally juvenile lol! A few of us got together and recreated a favorite mani we had seen from each other or online somewhere. I knew right away what mani I was going to recreate. My fab friend @firefly5 over on Instagram has the coolest manicures ever. I just love her. AND she's super nice so I really wanted to try to recreate something I had seen her do several months ago for a MoYou Contest.
Here's what I came up with
Yep just look at this! I had to decal the heck out of this baby!
It wasn't easy I swear there is not a brush skinny enough to ever do something like this!
I used one of my new XL Bundle Monster plates though and loved it!
This is the XL03 plate it's really cool
Here's a close up of the mani
See what I mean about the skinny brush??? OH MY LANTA!
Now here's my inspiration the super cool mani by @firefly5
Why I love hers--it's so bright and cheery! She switched up her colors instead of doing strictly rainbow colors in order like I did. I guess I just don't have her creativity LOL!
Here's a side by side pic of them
She holds that blue thing in all her pictures. I have no idea what it is! I should ask her. I had to improvise with a bottle.
I love doing Monkey See, Monkey Do mani's they are a lot of fun!
Thanks for stopping by! I hope you all have a fantastic day!
Hi Everyone! Happy Sunday! I've got another alcohol ink marker mani to show off today. I did some Born Pretty Store Stamping and then colored in with some of my permanent markers to come up with this really pretty yet really simple and easy look today. I paired these flowers with the super gorgeous and probably best blue creme ever, Nails Inc's Baker St.
Looks like my nails are ready for Spring even though we might get some snow later this evening!
I have to say I really have been enjoying using the markers for some nail art
And they are a lot easier to do than decals!
Have any of you tried using permanent markers and alcohol yet???
Thanks for stopping by!! I hope you all have a fantastic day!
Hi Everyone!!! Happy Friday! And it is a glorious Friday at that! I am happy to report no coughing at all so far today! Yes that is cause for celebration! My strained voice is finally gone, no more coughing and I'm pretty sure I can smell again. I sure hope so since tomorrow I'll have corned beef cooking in beer for several hours!
A couple of weeks ago I was thrilled when I received the entire Bridal Collection set from Messy Mansion to review. Messy Mansion has been doing exceptional plates for sometime now and this Bridal Collection set is no exception. They are the perfect size for my nails width wise and plenty long enough for my long nails too. Not to mention they are etched to perfection!
I was really eager to get started on doing some mani's with them and then BAM struck down by cold from hell. So naturally since I was feeling a lot better last night I sat down to start working with them. I picked the 04 plate right off the bat as it has some really unique images on it. With the help of some sheer tints from Polish 10.1 I did some leadlighting and came up with this fantastic stained glass look!
I stamped over Milani 3D Holographic Hi-Tech and then did some added leadlighting with 10.1 Polish in Blueberry Blue and Lemon Cupcake. As it turns out Lemon Cupcake is not that visible in the light LOL!
If it was a sunny day out I'd get out there and get some pics outside but nope cloudy as all get out today
I really do love how this turned out! The ease of a dotting tool made this leadlighting easy to do too. Leadlighting is actually a technique the stamping world took by storm after Julia from Messy Mansion first coined it
I love this image from the Messy Mansion Bridal 04 plate. It is perfect for a stained glass look and it has a ton of potential with decaling as well. I know this is an image I will use again.
Messy Mansion plates can be found on their site HERE as well as through Amazon.com
If you're like me--too lazy to make your own sheer tints--you can find the 10.1 Polish sheers HERE
Thanks so much for stopping by!!! I hope you all have a fantastic day!
Hi Everyone! I am happy to report I am hardly coughing the past two days! OMG this cold from hell is finally on the run! Man this sucker was brutal. I still have the occasional coughing fit that I can't really stop once it's starts but I know it's just my body's way of getting rid of the residual crap in my lungs. My voice is still a little janked and my throat is strained but still I am finally feeling good.
And thank goodness too, this Saturday I have the epic meal of corned beef to make and spend quality time with the family. I would also really love to spend time with my friend Emily on Sunday doing nails and listening to her play the piano and talking (okay arguing) about who's hotter Ben Affleck or Jason Momoa. I mean come on Emily we all know it's Jason Momoa!
Since I am feeling better I decided to do just a nice little Spring mani to cheer me up even more. We had a 60 degree day here last week but now we are back down to the 40's. No worries, it's been nice a sunny out and almost all of our snow has melted!
My base is actually a failed franken dupe of mine. I thought I could dupe Illamasqua's Raindrops with SH Glass Slipper and ChG Pelican Spray but while it looks great in the bottle you really can't see any of the flakies in the polish. It's still a pretty color though.
I used one of my new Uber Chic plates--1-03 with some Mundo de Unas stamping in Iris.
Sometimes you don't need a fancy gradient or holos or glitters to make a really lovely manicure!
Just some nice tone on tone stamping will do nicely
Here's a close up pic where you can sort of see the flakies in the basecoat but again nothing like the original Raindrops so to me this one is called a fail
I'm not really sure if we are actually moving into Spring or not. It's been known to snow in both March and April here so only time will tell. But I for one and am enjoying this weather we have right now!
Thanks for stopping by! I hope you all have a fabulous day!
Hi Everyone!!! Happy St Patrick's Day!!! I hope the luck of the Irish is with all of you this year!
I have a lovely marker alcohol ink base with same cool Dashica stamping and even topped this mani with a way cool Celtic shamrock image from Messy Mansion.
I started this marker art with a base of Sinful Colors Pistache first and then did some green, brown and black markers over it. I love the look of this one! I stupidly didn't get pics of just the base though
I'm really having a lot of fun with these markers I picked up albeit the pastel and neon ones really do not work. Once the topcoat hits them they completely disappear so I might have to invest in some alcohol inks after all!
My decal is from Messy Mansion MM04 and I believe it was my first Messy Mansion purchase!!! More than 20 plates later I'm still loving my Messy Mansions!
This upcoming Saturday is the annual epic corned beef dinner with the family. I've been doing this for a few years now and we look forward to it so much. My Aunt Lynette came down for it last year and she told my mom it was the best corned beef she's ever eaten in her whole life so guess what??? She's coming back for more LOL! She's a permanent fixture for the corned beef dinner she told us.
I hope this post finds everyone doing well. May the luck of the Irish be with you always!
Hi Everyone!! Happy Friday!!! I hope everyone is having an excellent last day to their work week. I am happy to report today I can actually taste and smell! Woot! I'm still coughing BUT those uncontrolled bouts where you son thinks you might actually be dying seem to be over. I think I am finally on the mend--thank goodness. I was getting so sick of being sick!
I don't have much planned for Friday the 13th EXCEPT the Homicide Hunter marathon that starts tonight on Discovery ID. I might watch a scary movie though too. I'm a scary movie baby but every once in a while I like to find a good one with the least amount of gore involved.
Today I'm showing a cool snake manicure. I saw a picture recently if a red sided garter snake and thought wow for a snake you are really quite lovely so I decided to recreate him!
As you can see from my mani this is a pretty colorful snake
He's supposed quite harmless (LOL!) but truthfully most garter snakes are it's just still he's a snake therefore he will scare the beejubs out of me making him not all that harmless
Here's a picture of him
And here's my mani
And I been feel a little better I think I would have redone it to have less of the aqua color but all in all I'm happy with how this turned out. AND even better I got to use the new XL Bundle Monster image plates so this snake image finally isn't too small for my nails
Here we are all together
I think this has just been another great week for the Ditgit-al Dozen everyone came out for this one with guns blazing and despite a few of us did floral and a few of us did snake no one did anything the same! I love it when that happens!
I'm popping over to check out everyone's last day
Hi Everyone! Hope you are all having a great day. I'm really starting to sound like a broken record with this cold but I just can't shake this sucker. I'm coming up on a week with this baby now and honestly it's like 5 days too much for me! Find a cure for the common cold already for crying out loud!
But the good news I have been feeling well enough to work on some new nail art things which makes me pretty happy. I decided to get in on the alcohol ink/permanent marker craze going around. You can get some really cool bases uses alcohol inks out of the bottle or in the form of permanent markers. The possibilities are pretty endless. I check out a few YouTubes on the process and just decided to play around. Instead of going over a white base I decided to try something over one of my fave Elevation's--Storm In The Morning Light. Here's the look I came up with!
You can do so much with these things! I bought a 24 pack of Bic permanent markers the other day and have really been enjoying some of the things I've come up with. You can do different looks using a brush or cotton swab dipped in alcohol. You can also spritz alcohol on to the nail with a spray bottle too. It's really cool
One of my friends thought this looked like the ocean at night and I thought oh how perfect then as this fits right in with this week's Digit-al Dozen Nature Theme!
I think my favorite is the ring finger but as you can see you can get a lot of different looks just using the same colors of markers put in different spots on the nail
I decided to add some stamping because I think we all know I ALWAYS decide to add some stamping. I hauled out one of my Dashica SdP plates
It's not bad at all but it really looks amazing without the stamping over it I think and you know I rarely say that!
I think this week in the DD has just been amazing. Oh my gosh there have been SO MANY awesome mani's. Everyone is coming up with something completely different and a lot of us were worried it would turn into nothing but a leopard print and floral week LOL.
Here's a little collage of the mani with and without stamping over it
Which do you like better??
I'm going to head over and see what everyone else has come up with for day four of The Digit-al Dozen Does Nature
Hi Everyone happy hump day! So remember yesterday when I said I thought I was on the downward spiral of my cold? Um not so much. UG this thing is killing me Smalls! How can the body possibly produce this much mucus? How has someone not figured out yet how to turn mucus into good since we apparently have so much of it! I might be able to produce enough energy for a small country with the amount I have alone for crying out loud!
And here's the real killer--it's SO NICE OUTSIDE! We have 50 degree weather in our forecast for today and tomorrow! Right now it's 42 and sunny!!! You can see tons of grass out here now which is just really nice AND the grass is even getting green. Soon instead of the sounds of the snow plows scraping by you'll hear everyone and their mother mowing the lawn.
There is a plus side to this cold of mine. I haven't been out of the house since Saturday which means I haven't had the chance yet to see the asshats wearing shorts and flip flops just yet. Because you know when it hits 40 in Wisconsin men come out in shorts and women put on flip flops.
So I guess today I have a shout out to the end of Winter. I've got some birds in the trees on a grey morning to share with you today for this week's Digit-al Dozen Does Nature theme
I don't know why but I'm always drawn to grey
I used Zoya Dove and my base--my first ever Zoya polish and it's half gone! That sort of made me giddy because you know it's well loved. I also stamped with my new MJ XLV plate. My Online Shop plates are SO nice. They always stamp great. I picked up 2 of her new ones and really like them
I decided to matte this mani because you know all the cool kids matte. What do you think?
I sort of think it looks more Wintery matted
I think I would like to do this mani again with some nice Spring colors too!
Okay so here it is the middle of the week for this month's theme and so far the mani's have just been fantastic! I'm heading over now to see what everyone else came up with today
