30 Days of Colour - Harvest and Thanks Giving

The eighth prompt for the challenge was 'Harvest' and my other half suggested I do something around a Harvest Moon. I lacked the imagination to make that manicure happen so instead chose to do another stamping manicure with leaves.

Again making use of the the new Revlon polishes I've recently bought, I started off with a base of Revlon ColorStay in 'Fall Mood' a rather appropriately named polish for this manicure. It's a gorgeous copper shimmer polish with really fine glitters. 

I then used a variety of polishes to stamp the leaves using MoYou's Mother Nature Stamping Plate 02. Polishes I used included OPI, and other Revlon ColorStay polishes in Red and Orange, the yellow is Revlon Parfumerie in 'Sunlit Grass'. 

It was such a task to take a photo of this manicure, I top coated everything with Leighton Denny 'Gold Save the Queen' which is a fine Rose Gold Glitter to give it extra sparkle. So getting a picture without the light bouncing and reflecting off my nails and obscuring the leaf pattern was tricky. The Extreme Close up above gives you a better idea!

Next was 'Thanks Giving' and being British I didn't really know what to do. After googling it I opted for more leaves in Thanks Giving themed colours, no Turkey!

Not overly happy with this one, it look's very child like and I made a couple of errors whilst creating this design. I decided to use acrylic paint for the leaves and after painting a base colour of white, I remembered to put a top coat on so I could remove mistakes. But what I should have also done, is paint a matt top coat so that the paint would adhere to the nail rather than just pool on the shiny top coat.

I'm happiest with the thumb on this design, this was the first nail I painted. It all went pear shaped from there! Again I topped this design off with the Leighton Denny 'Gold Save the Queen' to tie all the design in and Bob's your Uncle!

nailbox - July Review

This week I received my second box of goodies from nailbox and was very impressed with what I found inside. Apparently nailbox usually post about the content of their monthly subscription service but this month was a mystery with the teaser of a Tropical Theme.

Here's what was inside!

OPI - Kiss Me I'm Brazilian

Barry M - Need for Speed 

China Glaze - White on White

Elegant Touch - Cuticle Eliminator

AND a MoYou Tropical Stamping Plate and Squishy Stamper

Here's the plate with images in full:

These images are slightly smaller that some of the ones I've seen on other MoYou plates, but plenty big enough for my little nails. I did a couple of stamping manicures with this and the squidgy stamper you also get in this box works a treat.

Here was my first go, I painted a black base and then used two MoYou stamping polishes I already had in pink and blue to stamp with and create this gradient stamping. I fancied a matt look so popped a matt top coat over the whole caboodle to finish the look.

Rather pleased with the overall effect. Then I decided to use the polishes in the box to create a new manicure with palm trees.

First I painted my nails with two coats of China Glaze 'White on White' let those dry and then sponged the Barry M and OPI polishes over the top to create the gradient. The Barry M was picking up the previous gradient layer, not sure if this was due to it being a quick dry polish or if my white base wasn't completely dry. So I sponged the gradient three times to get the colours bright. I also used a liquid latex to cover my cuticles before sponging the gradient. Much less clean up.

I topped coated with HK Girl and as it was late, left the stamping bit for the next morning.

I used all three palm tree designs from the Plate and I also wanted some birds in the design too, but didn't have any stamping plates suitable, so just painted these on free hand. Then when dry just finished off with a regular top coat as I didn't want to smudge the design.

As for the polishes the OPI and China Glaze as always were spot on. The China Glaze was a little runny so make sure you do thin coats as it will pool in your cuticle if you load the brush up with polish. Also my step daughter painted her nails with the Barry M polish and it dried super quick.

Well done nailbox I love what you sent me this month, and what I'm also super impressed with is that as I have A LOT of polish, so far not received anything I have already!

Can't wait till August's box. Have you subscribed to nailbox, and what do you think of the service and what designs have you created with this months Tropical Treat? 

Days 7 & 8 of Nail Art Challenge

OK, I cheated a bit, back at work and training on Monday evening has made me fall behind a day so I painted both hands with Models Own Hyper Gel 'Naked Glow'. Did Day 6's Half and Half on the left hand and this on the right. The theme was Pink and Aqua, so I did some pretty stamping in those colours using my first and December purchased MoYou stamping set. 

Been after some of these bad ass stamping plates for a while, but their range is so vast and so gorgeous I really didn't know what plates to pick first.

This was solved just before Xmas, when I was alerted to the fact that Boots were selling MoYou sets. These sets include two plates, a stamper and scraper, and three stamping polishes for £22.99. SOLD!

There is three to choose from and I got the Mother Nature set pictured below.

I used the pink stamping polish from the set, and because the blue wasn't quite aqua enough, I used Sephora by OPI in "Mermaid to Order', which stamped surprising well.

You can use normal polish to stamp with, providing the colour and pigmentation of the polish is bright and opaque enough. It's just a process for trying them out to see which ones work and which ones don't. General consensus is that Barry M Gelly polishes work really well and the MUA polishes you can get a Superdrug for a £1 do too.

My understanding of Day 8's theme was a little off. The theme was 'Monochromatic' rather than 'Monchrome'. So I could have gone with different hues of one colour rather than just Black & White. But here's what I did anyway, using a bit of striping tape, no cheating here and both hands were painted the same.

Again I can't take the credit for this design and copied this this from Polly Polish. I used Butter London's 'Cotton Buds' as the white base and Revlon 'Espresso' from their Parfumerie range for the black. I smudged the lines by applying my top coat before the black was dry, but overall fairly happy with my attempt!

Untrieds cont... and Xmas Nails

My birthday is in the first week of December so I took myself off to Manchester on a little shopping spree and in search for a MoYou stamping set that Boots were selling. I'd already scoured my local Boots to no avail and my mission was to find one in Manchester. 

I finally tracked the sets down and picked up the Mother Nature set for £26.99. This includes two stamping plates, three stamping polishes and a scraper and stamper.

This is my first go over Sephora by OPI in 'Mermaid to Order'. Overall very happy with the results and I had no issue picking up the image and transferring it onto my nail. Much better than the Konad stamper I have which tends to stretch the image, or that may be my application. But the worked much better for me. A few more practises and consideration on placement and these will look the business.

Next I wanted something a little more Christmassy and tried one of Primarks PS textured polishes. This was three coats to ensure the nail line was completely covered and the finish was so pretty and sparkly, perfect for Christmas. One thing I did notice with this polish is that it didn't want to dry quickly. Maybe it was the three coats applied without ample time for drying fully inbetween. However with my experience in polish it was taking much longer to dry that expected. I decided to top with HK Girl for a quick finish which didn't spoil the finish at all as it's not an overly textured polish. 

The Nail Group I'm a member of have some really talented people who post some beautiful manicures, not only is the nail work great but also their execution and skill at capturing the polish on camera. Puts my dingy photo's to shame. This manicure is inspired by a lady called Anna Wheeler who posts some gorgeous pictures. Her version is flawless and she has managed to make the crackle much finer than mine.