Crystal nails with scales

I recently won a giveaway over at Nails done by a Blimbo !  Isn’t that one of the most exciting things about reading blogs-  opening your email to find that you won a giveaway?  It’s like… best day ever, cha cha cha! !

One of the polishes I graciously received from D. was this stunning blue foil called Crystal by Zoya.  LOVE IT!  Then I decided to stamp on top of it and this mani got even better!  These scales are too cool!  I used Mash-39 plate and Illamasqua Vice for my stamping.  Vice is a rubber-finish lacquer so it really has a neat appearance that almost pops up off of the blue.  I loved this manicure so much that I made a little collage for you….

Since my base color is so gorgeous I have to show you some swatches of that too!  Crystal is from a winter collection a few years back and I’m surprised that I’ve never seen it before!  It’s a shiny blue foil that has tiny flecks of gold glitter (I’ve seen it described as ‘irregular shaped glitter’ online).  Here’s a swatch of three coats plus topcoat.  I could’ve gotten away with two coats, but I couldn’t tell if parts of it were transparent or not in direct light, so I went with three coats….

Isn’t it lush?  Thank you D. for picking out this Zoya for me!  Crystal is a perfect combo of icy blue and warm gold.   It’s just my style and I can’t wait to wear it this winter!

Crystal is part of the 2010 Winter Flame Collection which I’ve also seen called the Fire & Ice Collection.  Do you own any of these and are they all as awesome as Crystal?  Here’s the collection on the Zoya website if you want to check them out.

Zoya Frida Swatches

Frida is a sheer teal jelly from the Fall 2012 Gloss collection.  Yes, it’s from last fall, but I don’t care since I’m loving fall right now!  The crisp air, the cool mornings… it makes me so happy and also kinda reminiscent.  I can’t quite explain why, but fall makes me feel all warm and fuzzy about the past.  So today I’m more than happy to wear an old fall release.   Here’s how Zoya describes Frida: A sheer, dark, warm-toned teal blue with a buildable jelly gloss finish. The jelly gloss formula can be worn alone or layered to create an endless variety of custom colors and effects.

I’ve been longing for this polish (or any part of this collection!) since they came out last year.  Well lucky me!  Julie, aka Short & Sweet in Texas, just sent me this polish in a swap.  Yeah!!!

As you can see it’s very sheer.  I could’ve done more coats, but I thought I’d bask in it’s teal translucence!  Still, I was a little curious to see how the jelly would build up, so I did a couple nails with 3 thin coats, and a couple with 2 thick coats.  Surprisingly, you can’t tell which are which!  So I vote for two thicker coats!

This last photo below was taken in the bright sun.  You can really see how transparent it is here!  And extremely glossy too!  I’m not even wearing topcoat with Frida and look at how shiny it is!

So what do you think of this kind of polish?  Would you flaunt Frida or would it annoy you to have visible nail line?

Nail Art Ideas Linkup has started up!

Brijit, Eeeek and I had so much fun with our OMD Nail Challenge!  We don’t want to lose the momentum of this nail art excitement so we’re starting up Nail Art Ideas Linkup (NAIL)!   We’ll have four nail art ideas for each month so you’ll never run out of inspiration!  The themes for NAIL August 2013 are sun, sea, sand and a good read (book).   Stay tuned for the themes for upcoming months which will be found on my NAIL reference page posted on the main menu of my blog.  Of course Brijit and Eeeek will each have the details posted on their sites as well.   🙂

The first theme for August is SUN and we’d love for you to create a sun-inspired manicure too!  The inlinkz for the SUN theme will be open til Aug 11th so make sure to click this link to submit your mani!  Here’s the linkz:

N.A.I.L. Theme 1 – SUN :

Now I’ll share my sun-inspired manicure!  I’ve been in the mood for something dark and edgy so here’s what I came up with.  I’m calling it my abstract solar design……

I’m wearing three coats of Zoya Paz which is an electric orange cream.  It was funny, the first coat was very opaque and I was like WOW this will be great as a two-coater, but strangely the second coat looked almost the same as one coat did!  So I ended up doing three.  Then I hand-painted a black abstract solar burst shape on my tips… and added some black studs for visual interest.  I painted my other nails straight black using wet n wild Ebony Hates Chris.

If you’re interested in doing a sun manicure on your blog, facebook instagram, etc you have til Aug 11th to submit your link.  When the links close we’ll open up the vote and you can pick your nail genius of the week.  FUN !

N.A.I.L. Theme 1 – SUN :

Day 20 of OMD Challenge- 3D Spiral Wire Nails

Day 20 of the Oh Mon Dieu Challenge is 3D nails!  There are so many options for this theme….and I contemplated for a long time on this one.  Since I make jewelry I kept feeling inspired to use jewelry findings to make my own 3D nail art embellishments.  I started with two coats of Zoya Zuza and then the 3D fun began……..

I used some 20 gauge silver beading wire to shape some spirals!  Crazy cool, right?  Creating spirals is a common technique for jewelry makers since they can be used in a lot of designs.  Also, spirals are used to make the cage part of a ‘caged bead’!

After I shaped my spirals I pounded them with a jewelry mallet to give them a nice hammered finish… and then bent the sides down with some pliers so they’d have a nice curved shape (like my nails do).  I stuck them on with some clear polish called My Nails Are Sealed.  I have no idea when or where I got this polish- I just know I’ve had it foreverrr and it works great to secure 3D stuff to my nails.  I’ve been wearing them for 3 hrs and washed my hands a few times too and they’re still stuck on there.  So we shall see how long they last!

So, what do you think of my crazy 3d nails?

20. 3-D Nails :

Day 13 of OMD Challenge- Midnight Blue Stars

Today is DAY 13/STARS DAY of the Oh Mon Dieu Nail Challenge! I love celestial-themed stuff, especially in blue and yellow… so that’s my inspiration for today’s nail art!

This blue polish is amazing!  It’s called Midnight Blue by Sinful Colors.  If you apply it carefully it could definitely be a one-coater.  I love how intense it is- so bright n shiny!  Then I used a short skinny striper brush to paint the yellow stars using Zoya Pippa.  Pippa was not the best for this type of nail art.  It kept getting stringy when I pulled the brush off my nail.  I’ll try to remember that next time I do sugar spun nails.  It’s stringy-ness could come in handy for that!

I can’t wait to see the other star designs today!  Here’s the link:

13. Stars :

I’d also like to mention that someone recently contacted me asking if it’s too late to join the challenge- but I’m unable to email you since the messages all come back undeliverable.  Just know- it’s not too late!  You can start now at day 13, or you can start on a previous day if you like any of the past themes.  I hope to see you soon!

Day 12 of OMD Challenge- Warm Brown Dotticure

Hey nail fans!  Day 12 of the OMD  Rather Awesome Challenge is DOTS!  For me, dotting is one of the easiest designs to do.  And normally I don’t do a lot of dotticures because I feel like it’s cheating somehow.  I know that doesn’t make any sense at all…. but I guess I feel like they’re so simple I wonder if people will be like, “Come on Crafty, gimme something more original than that!”  That’s dumb, I know.

For today’s dotticure I wanted to go with a brown and pink combo.  I love those colors together- but after rifling through my stash I realized I have like NO browns!!  I have a few shimmery/metallic shades, some nudes and some that are kinda orangey…. but as far as regular old browns- I got nothing.   I feel an online shopping spree in my future!!!!!!!  So instead of brown and pink I dug into the dark recesses of my stash to find a few nice warm brownish colors.  Here’s what I’m wearing:

creamy yellow base color ♥ 2 coats of Zoya Jacqueline 🙂

putty colored dots ♥ OPI Don’t Pretzel My Buttons

brown shimmery dots ♥ Maybelline Ultimate Wear in Tarnished Taupe (this polish is as old as the hills!)

mauve dots ♥ Sally Hansen Teflon Tuff in Wood Violet Cream (another verrry old bottle)

All dots were applied with a large dotting tool from amazon.  What do you think?  And do you have a favorite brown?  I think I need some nice creamy brown shades so lemme know if you have any recommendations!  Thanks!

12. Dots :

OMD Rather Awesome Challenge: Day 1 Pink- Birthday Cupcake

Hey nail fans!  Today is such a great day!  July 1st is day one of our OMD Nail Art Challenge AND it’s my birthday!!  To commemorate this momentous occasion I’ve got some birthday cupcake nails to share with you!

I started with one of my absolute favorite summer polishes called Ali by Zoya (you can read more about how much I love it here on Trine-Marie’s post).  Then I painted on a cupcake using a bunch of different polishes- I won’t bore you with all the specific nail polish names lol.  However, I will tell you that I dotted the cherry on top with a Sephora by OPI color called And a Cherry on Top.  LOL How cute is that?  I also added some Party of Five glitter topper by Wet n Wild to look like confetti…. and some hand-painted white streamers using OPI Alpine Snow.  I decided against painting candles on top.  I could never fit 36 candles on there.  How did I end up being 36 already?  I feel like I’m 25!  I guess I’m testament to the fact that immaturity keeps you young!  hehe

I hope you like my pinky cupcake nails!  I can’t wait to see what the other Day 1 pink designs look like!  Check them out here….
1. Pink :

http://craftynail.com/2013/06/15/oh-mon-dieu-its-the-rather-awesome-31-day-challenge-giveaway/