Sunday Stamping - Stamping Over Stripes

Hey there!  This week's Adventures in Stamping theme is Stamping over Stripes.  So just like last week during the Picture Polish Blogfest, I pulled out some nail vinyls (straight ones this time) that I've purchased and got to work on making some pastel stripes using some bright pastel Lime Crime polishes, that I then added some flowers on top of.  I think it's clear from my colour choice that I'm not ready to give up on summer just yet.

Rainforest Animal Nail Stamping & ILNP Reminisce

Hey there!  Today I have some cute animal nails to share with you.  This mani has all kinds of stamping: layered stamping, stamping decals, gradient stamping...woohoo!  And all the images are from Winstonia W-03 (the rainforest plate) and all the stamping polishes used are Mundo de Unas polishes.  

Formula X Prophecy Swatch

Hey there!  The other day I saw a picture of Prophecy from Formula X's Brushed Metallics collection on Facebook and ran out to Sephora the next day to buy it.  I honestly haven't purchased too many Formula X polishes because the price can be a bit high ($16 CAD) and I'd rather give my money to a good indie for that amount but I'm happy I bought this one.  The following photo is without and with top coat with more swatches after the jump.

piCture pOlish Blog/Insta Fest 2014!

Hey there!  I've never been as excited for a post as I am for today's post.  Today is Picture Polish's annual Blog Fest.  Just in case you haven't noticed, I'm a huge fan of the Picture Polish brand with all of their innovative colors and finishes.  As such, I'm so honored to have been chosen to be amongst the many talented bloggers that are participating this year.  

2014's Blog Fest posts are divided into two parts.  Part 1 is a review of one of Picture Polish's amazing shades.  Part 2 is the creation of some nail art using two Picture Polish shades featuring the use of Nail Vinyls.

Part 1

For part 1, I was given Bewitch, a blogger collaboration shade from a fellow Canadian blogger, The Obsessed.  Bewitch is a purple-leaning brown with a scattered holographic finish and a strong golden shimmer as you can see in the photo below.

For this swatch I used two easy coats of Bewitch and top coat.  With the first coat, the purple colour of the jelly base is apparent.  With the second coat, it appears to be more of a warm, vampy brown.  Perfect for autumn.  

In this macro shot, you can really see the holographic particles and the shimmer that set this colour apart from other browns in my collection.

To show more of the scattered holographic effect, here is a photo taken in direct light.  Check out that sparkle.  

Part 2

For part 2, I was given Chillax and Bonkers, both from the Urban Shades collection, and mini chevron Nail Vinyls.  We were given the option of also using a black/white polish for our nail art.  I also used a pair of tweezers to place the nail vinyls and an angled clean up brush.

When it came to creating some nail art with only the items provided, I was tempted to come up with some wild design with zig zags going in all directions but instead I decided to just showcase how easy nail vinyls are to work with.  

To create this look, I started with a white base (1).  Once that was fully dry, I used the tweezers to place the mini chevron Nail Vinyls at an angle (2).  Make sure the stickers are well secured otherwise you can get some bleeding underneath and at the edges.  Then I went over the Nail Vinyls with Chillax on the top half of my nail and Bonkers on the bottom half (3).  Then, immediately I removed the Nail Vinyls, cleaned up the edges and finished it with top coat (4).  If you wait for the polish to dry, you're more likely to get lifting at the edges of the polish.

I really hope you guys like what I came up with.  

Thank you to Picture Polish for providing me with this thrilling opportunity to participate in this year's Blog Fest!  Don't forget to give Picture Polish and Nail Vinyls some love by following these links.  

Picture Polish

Store: www.picturepolish.com.au

Every Day Deal: http://picturepolish.com.au/everyday-deal

International Stockists: http://picturepolish.com.au/network

FB: https://www.facebook.com/piCturepOlish

IG: http://instagram.com/picturepolish

Nail Vinyls

FB: https://www.facebook.com/nailvinyls?fref=ts

IG: http://instagram.com/teismom

Store: http://nailvinyls.com/

'Til next time...

An InLinkz Link-up

Sunday Stamping - New Colour Combination

Hey there!  How was everybody's weekend?  Mine was great.  We had our ultimate frisbee league finals and my team finished second which isn't bad at all.  I came away with a sprained ankle but now that league is over I have lots of time to heal.  I'm sure it'll only take a couple of days until it's back to good and, in the meantime, I get to have fun examining the swelling that is making it look like I have an egg under my skin.

This week's Sunday stamping challenge theme is "colour combination I have never tried before".  While there are tons of combinations I haven't used, I decided to go with this simple one - white and silver.

Stained Glass Nail Art

Hey there!  As the title suggests, today's post is my take on stained glass.  I've seen so many awesome stained glass nail art looks so I decided to give it a shot...with stamping, of course.  So for these I used Winstonia W206 and the 10.1 Polish Icing collection.

Dragon Scale Nail Stamping

Hey there!  Tonight I have one of my favourite nail looks I've ever done.  I did these last night and couldn't wait to share them.  One of the stamping groups I'm in had a "scales" prompt and, since I'm re-reading the Game of Thrones books (technically called the A Song of Ice and Fire),  I knew I wanted to do dragon scales again.  I did them shortly after I started my blog last year here but I think these are turned out even better.  So much so that I couldn't narrow down my photos.  I just liked every step so much.  Don't say you weren't warned...

Sunday Stamping - Over a Yellow Base

Hey there!  I have to start this post by wishing my little sis a very very happy birthday!  Happy birthday Kiddo!  Now onto the nails.  This week's Sunday Stamping challenge theme is "over a yellow base".  I'm not particularly drawn to yellows but this one gave me a good excuse to use my new bottle of Lime Crime's Crema de Limon that I just bought from Harlow & Co. and my new MoYou Tropical plate.  Win win!

Meteor Shower Nail Art

Hey there!  As I've mentioned approximately 1000 times, I love going to the lake.  One of the reasons I love the lake so much is the sky there.  It's huge!  Alberta (where I live) is known for having a big sky but at the lake, away from hills and all the city lights, it's particularly amazing, especially at night.  Once it gets dark you'll frequently find me down by the water just staring at the stars.  I try to plan my summer vacation around the Perseids meteor shower.  So when a stamping group I'm in had a galaxy nails prompt, I decided to do this mani as my tribute to the meteor shower.  Unfortunately this year that darn super moon was so bright that it bleached the sky and I only got to see a couple meteors.  I didn't think it was so "super"...

Glam Polish You're Never Too Old To Be Young (partial collection)

Press  Sample

Hey there!  Today I have a few more polishes from the Australian brand, Glam Polish, to share with you.  These are from the new You're Never Too Old To Be Young collection, inspired by songs from Disney movies, new and old.  I'm sure you'll recognize a few of these names...

Glam Polish I Found A Dream & Incurably Romantic Swatches

Press  Sample

Hey there!  Long time, no see!  I apologize for my absence while I was on vacation.  I had a mobile router but it just wasn't up to snuff for uploading photos.  I can truly say I missed you guys.  The entire time I was away I was thinking about all the blog posts I would write up when I got back so prepare to become sick of my nails, haha!

For my first post back, I want to show you a couple of polishes that I was sent for review when the good folks at Glam Polish visited the USA.  Luckily I received them right before I left for the lake so I had the opportunity to swatch them at the cabin.  These are Glam Polish's I Found A Dream and Incurably Romantic, two polishes from their Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend Collection.

Sunday Stamping - Over A Holographic Polish

Hey there!  If all goes well, I'll be enjoying myself at the lake on vacation while you're reading this.  I have the next week-ish off from work.  I'm hoping to have the internet there but there's a possibility I might disappear for a bit.  But I am scheduling this Sunday stamping post because I was so excited about this theme.  This week's theme is stamping over a holographic polish.  Sounds easy, right?  But it was really hard to choose between all my lovely holographics.  In the end I went with my old standbys, the 2013 Color Club Halo Hues.