The Digit-al Dozen Does Floral--That 70's Swag!

Hi Everyone!! Happy Wednesday!  I'm not going to lie to you all but this floral week is killing me.  I am really not a floral person!  I mean come on!  How many times have you seen me posting some floral mani's????? Not very often that's for sure!  I am just having a really hard time coming up with something that looks great.  I mean come on have you seen the rest of the mani's everyone is doing?  SMH . . . .

I asked my friends the other night what colors would look good with a nice bright turquoise holo and my friend Ashley spouted off hot pink, yellow and purple.  So hot pink, yellow and purple it is!

So the downside to this pretty bright 70's throwback look was it's been pouring cats and dogs out so no sunlight pic for this pretty holo from Darling Diva

This is the pretty Take Down The God Damn Freda Sign from DDP's Pageant Collection.  If you love it you can find it HERE 

It's very bright and just plain gorgeous!

My flowers are from CiCi & SiSi and I used the decal method.  I can handle the decal method when it's easy like this one!

I'm going to pop over and get insanely jealous by everyone else's stuff, come with me!

An InLinkz Link-up

The Digit-al Dozen Does Floral--Black Eyed Susans

Hi Everyone!  Holy cow talk about a wet one! It has been raining since yesterday for crying out loud.  The only saving grace is the fact it's not too cold.  Cold and rainy is an icky combo--this I can live with.  We're supposed to get more rain tomorrow too! YIKES

That being said I decided to haul out a little bit of sunshine and get some more bright flowers on my nail to ward off this wet and rainy weather.  I was able to get the VL3 plate which can be found on Aliexpress through a group buy and this little daisy image is just too cute so I decided to make some blackeyed susan's out of it!

Now this is definitely something sunny and cheerful!

It's really hard to capture the blue of Pacific Blue with my camera though!  This is as close as I could get it!

Let's tip toe through the tulips and see is anyone did any today for our Floral week!

An InLinkz Link-up

The Digit-al Dozen Does Floral

Hi Everyone!  Happy Monday!  I actually won a Fantasy Football game yesterday AND my mom and I went to see Gone Girl so really great day for me yesterday.  Have you seen that Gone Girl movie?  Holy cow that thing was a real nail biter!  Thankfully I managed to rein myself in and my nails are still intact.  

I recently required the very lovely OPI DS Classic from a friend who just wasn't feeling it anymore.  I was so thrilled to snag it as it's truly gorgeous.  It's a great nude scattered holo and it was the perfect backdrop for my floral mani today!

I also used my FUN 7 plate for the lovely flower stamping

I enlisted the "leadlight" technique and filled in the flowers with a lovely deep red jelly polish. Normally I hate jellies because of visible nail line, but they are perfect for doing leadlighting

I do love this combination of nude/brown and red how about you?

I'm stopping over to see what everyone else came up with today!

An InLinkz Link-up

Going Green For Mental Illness Awareness Week

Hi Everyone.  Last Sunday kicked off the Go Green For Mental Illness Awareness week with a beautiful candlelight vigil.  While some diseases like breast cancer awareness get an entire month while mental illness gets only 1 week.  1 week designated for a disease that affects 1 in 4 people and it does not discriminate against age, sex or nationality.   You would think we could come up with something longer than a week for a disease that affects so many wouldn't you?

Mental Illness affects my life and greatly affected my life when I was growing up.  I have a sister with bipolar disorder and as often is the case in young people she was not diagnosed until she was well into her adulthood.  When you are young and they are young you might just try to pawn off this behavior on the terrible and rebellious teenage years.  When you get older and they get older you chalk up such behavior as mood swings or you try to cite their astrology sign or having their period as all legitimate reasons as to their behavior.

Mental Illness is something that must be diagnosed by a doctor.  And it should be treated by both and doctor and a counselor.  If you are someone who tosses out the phrase I'm bipolar without ever being diagnosed you are doing a great dis-service to yourself and others.  Mental Illness comes in many different forms from moderate to severe.  It's nothing to joke about, and it certainly should never just be excused without medication.

I have chosen the gorgeous Shapeshifter by Darling Diva Polish to showcase one of my Go Green For Mental Illness Awareness mani's.  When you are someone with bipolar disorder or live with someone with bipolar disorder you know all to well that you many times are two different people.  Depending on your manic swings your good days are really good, but you bad days are very very very bad. 

Shapeshifter is an incredibly gorgeous deep olive green that flashes to blue in its linear holographic arc

Living with untreated bipolar disorder you never know from one day to the next the person who will face you in the mirror.  And just like a shapeshifter you are powerless to control the change in your moods

Bipolar Disorder can be treated with medication.  It can help you function on a daily basis and help you maintain a job, a relationship and have a family.   

There is help out there for those who live with a mental illness and for those who love and support someone with a mental illness.  If you are looking for help for yourself or a loved one NAMI--the National Alliance for Mental Illness will assist you in getting the help you or your loved one needs.  You can find more about them HERE including the one closest to you. 

Darling Diva Shapeshifter is part of the Witchee Collection and can be found HERE 

Thanks for stopping by.  If you haven't already please take a moment to read up on mental illness and they many forms it has.  Please be mindful of the everyday phrases you might use and toss out carelessly.  As mental illness DOES affect 1 in 4 people you probably work with, go to church with, live by, are friends with and even love someone who is mentally ill.

Lets work hard to end the stigma associated with mental illness.  It's wrong and has no merit to our lives. 

Tutorial Tuesday--Sveta Sanders!

Hi Everyone!  I fully intended to make this yesterday's Monkey See, Monkey Do Monday and then it took too long and since I'm old I have to go to bed early so I had to stretch it out to a tutorial Tuesday!  The first time I saw this mani I fell totally in love with it.  I had to have this whole entire plate just based on the single mani I'd seen done with it.  But something amazing happened, based on this single mani I'd seen done I feel in love with all of the artist's work and now stalk her Instagram regularly!  You might know who I'm talking about when I say sveta_sanders.  She is AHmazing!

I was able to snag the Konad Square 1 plate on ebay and as soon as I had it in my hot little hands I was able to redo the tutorial I had seen Sveta do

These are all full nail decals which are a pita but in the end look really amazing!

I stamped using the Konad Square 1 plate and then filled in the flowers with Zoya Solange.  I covered the entire decal with Sinful Colors Pistachio.  I let it dry and then peeled off of my stamper and applied the whole decal to my nail.

It really wasn't hard to do at all I just followed the super fast and easy Sveta posted on her Instagram HERE 

I not really a fan of the decal method because it takes up so much time, but maybe just an accent nail here or there isn't a bad idea.

What do you think?  Have you seen any of Sveta's awesome stuff?  Are you a decal'er or just a stamper?

The Alchemist's Lost Formulas

Hi Everyone!! Happy Sunday to you!  It's an awesome day to be a Packer fan because you don't have to worry about Packer football today!  Packers killed the Vikings on Thursday night so today is a day to sit back and relax, get some work around the house done, read a little, and just enjoy the sunny, crisp Fall day.

I recently received some polishes from Darling Diva to review.  I don't often do reviews because I'm not a swatcher and because I like to do things on my own time.  I have a lot of polishes and they don't always talk to me right away and tell me what I should be doing with them.  When I got DDP's Witchee Collection I about peed my pants.  First of all these are ALL colors right up my alley--dark, delicious Fall Colors.  Second of all in my opinion no one does holos as good as DDP.  

Is that too bold a statement? Today a a lot of Indie makers are doing holos.  Sometimes you get to the point you've just seen too many purple holos, or too many berry holos.  You start to think they all look the same and then in end you end up not buying any because you just don't need 80 million purple holos.  

Holos are a trickey polish.  They look amazing in the sun or in the low lamp light.  But if you're like me and work for a living then you spend the majority of your day and you week indoors in a brightly lit office building and your only hope of seeing the gorgeous holo on your nails is to go into the bathroom and stare at your fingers.  And  since this is sort of creepy and weird you try not to be that person.  I need a holo that looks amazing in the sun and low light but is also a gorgeous enough color to look great when I'm sitting at my desk.  This is the exact reason why I love DDP holos so much.  Sometimes she tosses in some amazing flakies or some super beautiful micro glitter.  These being added means your DDP holo looks fantastic no matter what type of light you're in!  I LOVE THIS!

So let's talk about the one in the collection that to me is just the stand out--The Alchemist.  Why is this a stand out?  I'll tell you why.  When I first put it on I was sitting in the shade.  Actually I was playing Farm Heroes Saga when I first put this on and it was just a nice red polish.  Then I got up after not successfully beating level 320 in Farm Heroes Saga and went to my nail table to do my nail art.  I sit with my fluorescent lamp and just about died when The Alchemist came to life.  Seriously people I almost could not do my art that's how freaking gorgeous it is.  I kept staring it, it's mesmerizing--I had to keep focusing on my art!  That's a real stunner in my book!

So let's talk about this nail art shall we? The theme all this week in the Advanced Nail Stamping group was burned parchment manicure. I've seen the look before, seen it done amazingly well by Copycat Claws , and knew I wanted to try it.  The deal was totally sealed for me based on the name of The Alchemist.  Why not do a mani showing The Alchemist's Lost Formulas?

This is the stunning The Alchemist from The Witchee collection.  It's amazing!

Seriously I am not kidding!  Pictures DO NOT do this color justice!

   I can't believe how amazing it is.  And how about my burned parchment look?!  I think it turned out great except I might have gone a bit over board on the middle finger!

 It was really easy to do.  I started with 2 coats of OPI My Vampire Is Buff and then I stamped using Loreal Brownie Points and MoYou Pro 04.  Then I dabbed on some Zoya Louise a nice dark brown and following the same steps Copycat Claws highlight I sponged black in the center.  Then you just remove with acetone and a qtip.  I think matting the mani gives it that real page look.

Have you checked out The Witchee Collection from Darling Diva yet??? If not you can find them all HERE .  They are ALL stunning and must haves for this Fall/Winter season!

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you all have a great day!    

Go Pack! Go!!

Hi Everyone!! Tonight is the Packers vs Vikings game and my little sister and brother in law are on their way up there!  Of course it's supposed to be rain, rain, rain and more rain BUT Packer fans never care about the weather!  It's always sunny at glorious Lambeau Field!

So today to support the big game I did a Packer mani featuring my new custom Packer plate and Packer polishes!  Packer plate is courtesy Fig Tree via a group buy in The Adventures In Stamping Facebook group and the polish is courtesy 10.1 Polish.

This is my custom made Packer polish named 52 Shades Of Clay.  It has yellow hexes, green squares and black circles.  I just love it!  If you're looking for a custom football polish of your own give Kelly a shout out at 10.1 Polish

This is the custom Packer plate created by Fig Tree 

Picture taken before my mani hence a purple thumb LOL!  

And here's my mani!!

I think it turned out great BUT it was challenging!  The full word image did not want to stamp well.  I had to try several times before I got it to go and even then it doesn't all fit on my nail.  But I'm sure with practice I'll nail it.

Here's my thumb!

What do you think?? Is this a winning mani or what???!!!

I can't wait to watch the game in the comfort of my living room completely dry!

Go Pack!! Go!!!!!!