Blue Tree Manicure

Posted in Matte, MoYou, Stamping, Zoya by Craftynail

Today is friday and I don’t have to work <woohoo> so I wanted to play with my new MoYou stamping plate and have some fun ! Plus, I’m going to see the sexy Chris Hemsworth in the new Thor:The Dark World movie soon so I’m in a good mood. I think a bright bold happy mani is in order!

I’m wearing three coats of Phoebe which is a cool smooth ‘velvet matte’ polish by Zoya. It has some shimmer in there, but when it’s matte you don’t notice. I stamped a tree image over top in grey, Zoya Dove. Then I stamped the tree on top again using a dark blue creme called Jive by Oh My Golly. I like how the grey stamp underneath gives a neat shadow effect.

Lookit my new MoYou plate that I used for this manicure. When I ordered it pre-sale (it took a week or two before it shipped) it was called MOTHER NATURE 03 Plate, and that’s how it’s listed online. But take a look at my plate- it says LANDSCAPE 03 on it. Hmmmmm….

Weird mistake they made, but I am liking all the cute nature stuff in this plate !

After I stamped the grey and blue tree design then I topcoated it with seche vite. See how you can see alot of shimmer in my blue base color? The shimmer was not noticeable when Phoebe was matte, but once I topcoated you can really see tons of shimmer in there! I can’t decide if I like Zoya Phoebe better matte or shiny….. I took some photos of it matte which I can post later if anyone’s interested. My camera was like WHOA at how blue it was!

Well, I’m off to go see Thor. Have a nice weekend everyone! Talk soon!

10Oct2013

Abstract Fall Leaves based on a tutorial

Posted in China Glaze, Fall Season, Nail Art, Nail Art Ideas Linkup (NAIL), Nails by Craftynail

First I wanna say that there’s only about two hours left to enter my giveaway! Get your free entries in right here! Sometime tomorrow I will announce the winners via email, and I’ll put out a blog post too. Can’t wait to pick the winners! Good luck everyone!

The prompt for week 2 of October’s Nail Art Ideas Linkup is Autumn Trees. I’ve had so many great ideas for this theme and decided on an abstract leaf design that MrCandiipants came up with. You can see her youtube tutorial here. Someone commented on the vid and said that the design looks a little weird on square nails- so I wasn’t sure how I would pull this one off! Then yesterday, I had a major nail snafu on my thumb! I had to file the side of my thumb nail way down after a section of it cracked off. 😦 I was being a scaredy-pants but I managed to file my nail to a semi-stilletto shape to disguise the break. It came out great! I loved the way my pointy nail looked! So I did my other thumb too just for spits and giggles. I’m really contemplating making all my nails stilletto. But get real Jac…. who am I kidding? I won’t have the guts! But my new thumbnail shape is a great reason for me to try out MrCandiipant tutorial now. Well, on two nails at least. So here we go!

I used a variety of colors for the leaf design…and it was a little hit and miss. I changed my mind a few times and in the end I wound up using similar shades to what Candiipants used. Here’s a list of my colors:

dark orange ♥ Art Orange from AVON

light orange ♥ Orange Creamsicle from AVON

yellow ♥ Inspire from AVON

green ♥ Limelight from Ulta

teal ♥ Read my Palm from Sephora by OPI

black ♥ Liquid Leather China Glaze

Is it okay that I only did my thumbs? I really didn’t know how to make the design look nice on my other square nails… so the others are painted nice and simple with Kalahari Kiss. I’ve been dreaming of getting Kalahari Kiss for a while now…. and when I recently placed an order on Cherry Culture I had to add this one to my cart. That site sells China Glaze real cheap! I think it was $3.99 and I had a discount code so I made out like a bandit! Kalahari Kiss is one of those fugly kinda colors… but I’m so glad I got it. It’s versatile, smooth and opaque and will be very handy for nail art I think. Believe it or not, I only needed one coat for this mani.

Here are the other prompts for October. Join in whenevs!

30th Sept – 6th Oct Breast Cancer Awareness :

7th-13th Oct Autumn Trees :

14th-20th Oct Things That Go Bump in the Night :

21st-27th Oct Treats and Sweets :

28th Oct – 3rd Nov Hallow E’en :

21Jul2013

Day 21 of OMD Challenge- Green Ombre Leaves

Posted in Cheeky, Nails, OMD Challenge, Orly, Stamping by Craftynail

Day 21 of the nail art challenge is STAMPING! I love stamping- I first started stamping a little over two years ago when I bought a Konad Starter Kit a the Excalibur Hotel in Las Vegas. There was a vendor there selling all kinds of konad stuff and she would demo it for anyone who walked by with fingernails. I was already thinking of buying some konad online (even before my Vegas trip) so when I saw her booth I was like, ‘OK, lady- show me what you got!’ The starter kit had some really puny small designs like tiny flowers and stuff and I really wanted some full-nail designs- so the lady kept trying to get me to combine my order with some stranger standing next to me so I’d get free items or something. Uh, no thank you. Just gimme my starter kit and I’m outta here! I think the kit was about $40 and when I got home I realized I could’ve bought the individual items way cheaper online- but oh well! After that I kept buying individual Konad plates on amazon for $7 a pop… which got kinda pricey! Plus, as my nails got longer I needed plates with larger designs. I did some research and found out about Cheeky Plates. Cheeky is said to have some of the biggest designs on the market. So I purchased this awesome Summer Collection Bundle with 20 plates in it! It was $20 on amazon which basically means each plate is one US dollar- so I was sold! Plus, the designs come in this cool storage box which is very handy! Check it out: