Oops! Forgot to Post!

Remember the thermal gel I blogged about earlier this year from Madam Glam, What Color is the Dress? The one I wore for a while? To keep from getting bored with one polish on my nails for a month I did some refreshes, one of which I did some stamping!

I felt like a noob, you guys! It has been too long. It took a short time to get the hang of it again and pick the right polish, but in the end I loved the look.

I used Bundle Monster plate BM-604 and Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Brushed Gold To stamp with. I love the clean gold lines over the deep base. When I decided to remove the design I kept the gel on along for at least another week!

How To Block A Zombie

Today I have a quick and easy mani refresh with China Glaze Zombie Zest and NAME. I was getting some slight tip wear but wanted to get a bit more mileage out of my mani so I did some colour blocking. I did this for the same reason this past summer and have been wanting to try it again ever since. It's super easy to do, I literally did this 10 minutes before leaving the house!

The most important and time consuming part is sectioning off the nail with striping tape, although it didn't take that long. I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out to full in the space. Always remember to remove the tape right after application for a crisp line and to avoid having the polish drying on the tape and peeling off. Tweezers are hand in application and removal of the tape.

I sealed it off with Ask Cosmetics top coat and was out the door! I really love this look. I love how something so simple can make something look more than it actually is.


Annnnd... Incase there weren't enough photos in this post, I decided to add a matte topcoat after a few days, which I think I loved even more than the glossy look!

Nuclear Sunrise

I need to find me some more Fresh Paint polishes! I just recently discovered them in late June and I am so impressed. Not only do they have some awesome colours, but the wear is fantastic. I can only comment on the two neon cremes I have purchased, Guava and Honeydew, but if you know neons, you know they chip FAST, and Guava and Honeydew lasted

I wore Honeydew for almost a full week with no chips and only slight tip wear, that is fantastic for a neon. Honeydew is a pastel mint neon creme. Although the first coat was a bit streaky, the second coat evened everything out nicely so I didn't require a third. It dried to a slight shine but as always I added a coat of Seche Vite.

Unfortunately.... I have misplaced my photos for this mani, so sad! I  do have photos of it with a refresh I did. To update this mani I used China Glaze Shore Enough, Bundle Monster Plate 402 and a cosmetic sponge.

I started by stamping Shore Enough on the tips of my nails and blending downward in to Honeydew. On the second coat I added Honeydew to the sponge with Shore enough to blend the colours further.

Once that had dried, I stamped with the centre top full image pattern on Bundle Monster plate BM-204. On the plate the design looks abstract and asymetrical. I'm not sure what drew me to it initially but once stamped in black over the gradient it looked like an abstract sunset. The bold lines representing the rays from the sun, the circle. The green base makes the whole idea even more abstract!

Plate BM 402 is apart of the Create Your Own collection and it stamped perfectly with no issues. One tip I would give should you use this design or any similar (with bold lines), try to scrape in the general direction of the lines to avoid any weird bald spots in the design once on the stamper.

My only regret is not lining up the "rays" perfectly with each nail, other than than I am happy with the final look.

Neon Floral

Totally forgot tot post this earlier today! I thought it as scheduled... oh well.

Today I have a mani fresh with China Glaze Neon, And On, And On. I loved this colour so much and did not want to remove it, I touched up some minor chips on the tips of a few nails and stamped Bundle Monster BM-323, a ful nail rose pattern, over top. My stamping polish of choice was sally Hansen Whirlwind White.

This looked so much prettier in person, the boldness of the neon polish in contrast with the delicate white design was so perfect!

Fresh Tribal

I loved Too Yacht to Handle so much I didn't want to remove it, even when it started to chip a bit. My favourite way to extend a mani is to stamp fun stuff on top! I chose to go with a full nail design, Bundle Monster Plate, BM-315. The geometric pattern remindes me of the strong tribal trend lately.

As always I used my Sally Hansen Insta Dri in Whirlwind White for stamping and finished with a coat of Seche Vite on top.

A Nude Refresh

Today I have a refresh for Orly's Nite Owl. I originally wanted to stamp some lace designs on my nails in black over the nude but changed my mind last minute and went with a flower pattern instead. To keep the design subtle I used a black polish for stamping that I wouldn't normally use, it is much thinner than my regular stamping polish, so the final stamp wasn't so dark or harsh. For the design I used A Cheeky XL plate, E.

Over top of the design I opted to use a glitter topper instead of a top coat, I went with one of the new polishes I just picked up, Silver Lining. It is not shown in the photo, I actually grabbed the wrong bottle of Kleancolor polish lol oh well, you saw what the bottle looks like in my last post. It is a silver glitter with random purple hex glitter. I love how the hex glitter went together with the flowers, they look like they were included in the design and precisely placed. It's nice when things work out like that!

Flakie Refresh!

Today I have a mani refresh with Orlys Androgynie, although I was liking it as is with the subtle glitter, I wanted to add a little more sparkle to it. So what did I decide to add on top? Some Finger Paints flakies! First I layered one coat of Asylum down then added one coat of Flecked on top of that.

Asylum is in both photos above

Asylum is a multicoloured flakie, I see mostly red, orange and blue and purple. Flecked is a green flakie that shifts through teal and blue. I found Flecked to be more of a dense flakie when compared to Asylum.

Flecked is in the photo above only

I really like the overall look, although there are many colours combined I still find it to be quite subtle.

Bubbly!

Tody I have a mani refresh with Zoya's Zuza. I wanted to do some stamping and had this idea of my head of a bold, white lined design over the teal. After looking though my plates I found a design I was happy with from Konad. This bubbly design can be found on Konad plate M-85. I believe this is one of the newer plates they have released.

To stamp I used Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Whirlwind White. It worked perfectly with this image, just as good as the special polish, nice and thick.

To top everything off I applied Claire's Mermaid over the design. Mermaid is a light teal shimmer with a pink/magenta sheen that unfortunately is hard to see in pictures. I wish this polish could be built up to opacity but it is just too thin. It is great over top another colour, so at least it is useful.I thought it was perfect for the bubble design, in the right lighting it has the same reflective sheen soap bubbles have :)

Duochome Refresh

Today I have a refresh for OPI Planks a Lot. I was looking up inspiration and came across this awesome mani from the NailXchange. I pulled out my Red Angel plate and Sally Hansen chromes, but was missing a blue.... No blue chrome, I must substitute! Sitting on my desk was my brand new bottle of Deviantly Daring that you have already seen here a couple times now from China Glaze's Bohemian collection.

I figured why not? It's blue, it has a chrome like shine and it looked to be thick enough. I tested it out and although it worked with the other chromes, I decides it was so pretty it deserved to be stamped on its own!

Now... My continuing annoyance with my Red Angel plates... This particular image on plate RA-107 is ingraved too deeply, an issue I have been having with my set. The result? Not too perfect stamping and smudging :( I guess I will have to try this image out again with one of my regular stamping polishes and see if I get the same issues.

One thing I thought about after was leaving the polish in the engraving a little longer after scraping to adhere better to the stamp when you pick it up. Again, I'll have to try another time. Below you can better see how each nail has a different result.

My fave nail is the pinky :) I thin k the stamp was the cleanest on that nail and the pointer is my second fave, I find the best way to stamp is to have a soft touch. Am I the only one having issues with these plates :(

Cotton Candy

Today I have a refresh I did with Revlon's Whimsical. It looked really blah with my skin tone not wearing a base blue, so instead or removing it entirely, I decided to stamp over it.

I used Bundle Monster plate BM-223 and Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Lively Lilac to stamp.

The lavender polish really brought out the grey tones in Whimsical. But for some reason it reminds me of cotton candy lol maybe the pink and blue glitter peaking through? I was happy with the stamping and wore it for almost a week before removal.

A Sparkly Refresh + BIG NEWS FOR NFU OH LOVERS!!

More glittery nails! Last week I showed you Teenage Dream in it's own, I loved it so much I didn't want to take it off! What to do...

When in doubt, Konad :)

I actually used a dupe plate or fauxnad plate for Konad M77. I call this design the necklace design. I stamped with Konad white special polish, the design came out perfect! I got this plate from the Born Pretty Store, but I find their image plates to be hit or miss, sometimes they work and sometimes not so much :( this one worked great however.

For the thumbs I stamped another design from this plate (you can see this in the first photo above), it has a bow, a heart and some flowers. I added a pink rhinestone to each thumb in the middle of a flower. Loved this! I must do more fun glittery manis like this :D

One last bit of news before I end this post, I just got the word over the weekend that Nfu Oh's are now available to order through NailPolishCanada.com! They are decently priced too considering you get free shipping with any purchase over $29! PLUS you earn polish points towards free polish gifts!

I was lucky enough to be included in a private pre-sale event over the weekend and ordered myself some holos and flakies so I can't wait to try them out, as you can tell I just could not hold in my excitement! I have never seen, let alone tried Nfu Oh's, I hope they arrive soon!

Mani Refresh - Not Feeling It

I had been so excited lately about trying some freehand nail art, probably because I have hardly been doing any nail art at all! I was all excited and planned it for Tuesday night. But when I actually sat down to do it, I was at a loss.

I decided I would stamp instead. But I still felt in a funk.... What colour do I stamp with, what stamp do I use, etc.

I tried out one stamp with a purple foil, did not look good so I wiped it off and grabbed another plate.

I ended up stamping with black and Bundle Monster plate BM-212 over my previous mani of Revlon's Royal Cloak.

To tell you the truth I'm not too thrilled about it. I do really like the design though. I dunno what it is, feel like I'm in a funk, hope it doesn't last too long.

For some reason Royal Cloak is looking darker and darker to me as the days go on lol. I think it's time for a new mani.

Royal

I actually purchased this unintentionally, I meant to pick up Cameo Blue instead! Oh well, I must have liked Mount Royal enough in the store to buy it, right? Mount Royal is a dusty royal blue cream, simple as that. It applied fantastic in one coat, it has a thicker consistency that most of my other polishes but applies nice and smoothly.

To finish this look off I applied a coat of NYC's quick dry top coat. Mount Royal dried pretty quick on it's own, but the top coat added the perfect amount of gloss. And wouldn't you know it, I forgot to take a photo :(

That is before I did some fauxnading. I used Bundle Monster plate BM-224. I used two opiates to stamp with to create a gradient effect. I used Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Brisk Blue and Color Club's Take Me To Your Chateau.

I really like the effect, tone on tone with the gradient gave it some depth.