Santa's Getting Ready at the North Pole!

Christmas is just a few short days away; here are Santa, Mrs. Claus and the elves getting ready for the big day at the North Pole!

For some reason, I can't find any notes on this; I'm surmising they got deleted by accident at some point during the year as it's from last year but didn't have time to post it.  So I'll try to mention items if I recognize them. Started with a base of Sinful Cool Gray; probably two coats, no topcoat. 

 Sponged on white and blue for background interest.

I had premade a few stamping decals.....

....using images from Cheeky Jumbo 6 Happy Holidays (index and pinky), MJXVIII (ring), QA19 (thumb).  I think the Santa is a SdP plate but will have to double check. No idea what polishes were used.

I wasn't sure I'd have space for the North Pole sign but decided to add it to the index; the image is from MoYou Festive Collection-01.

Added a few random seasonal dots and top coated to finish (not sure if this pix is before or after topcoat though!)

Top coated to finish.

Thanks for looking!

Funky Valentine's Day Nails

This is another one of those nontraditional themed mani's I like to do every so often; a Valentine's Day mani that's a little on the different side!

I wanted a mani with bright, bold colours and all random.  After applying one coat of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls, sponged using an assortment of colours.  Polishes used were China Glaze Happy Go Lucky (yellow), Sally Hansen Insta-dri Heat Flash (orange), China Glaze Starboard (green), Icing Fifi (pink) and Essie Avenue Maintain (blue).  The sponging didn't turn out as bold and bright as I was looking for but didn't mind it never the less.

Stamped using FUN black stamping polish using Cheeky Jumbo 6, Happy Holidays.  

This is a lot of black to clean up...which is why I used FUN stamping polish for the mani versus the harder to clean up Konad.  This is a pix after clean up!  

Topped with SV to finish.

I did skittles in the same colours on my other hand but no sponging...I actually really liked how it turned out too!  It had more of the bright, boldness I was looking for...but wasn't too thrilled with my recent nail break on the middle finger and the subsequent shortening of the rest a bit to somewhat match...it's growing out slowly, but surely!  Yes, I walk around with mismatching nails and nail lengths....all the time in fact!

Have a fantastic weekend....thanks for looking!

Digit-al Dozen Does Red, Gold and Green; Day 4

When I did this mani, I was all impressed with myself because I thought I found the ultimate challenge appropriate polish......a green base with red, green and gold glitter!  Perfect for the challenge!  So off I did my nails.  Howeverrrrrr, it wasn't until I uploaded these pix I see the blue glitter......making it not as perfect as I thought. While it's still OK I suppose (and will have to do as I have nothing else to post in it's place!) , I was a little disappointed in myself as I was trying to stay true to the scheme of the challenge.   Anyway, here's what I came up with (just pretend you don't see blue glitter!)



Started with a base of three coats of Dare2Wear Mood Polish, Night Stars 2 White Cloud.  I have no idea if in fact this does change and surmise it won't as it's so old.  I've been wearing it for a while now and haven't noticed anything .but if I do notice it changing while I'm wearing it, I will update the post!





It dries on the matte side, so added a layer of topcoat.



This is a fairly busy base, so wanted some simple stamping.  Decided upon Cheeky Jumbo 6 Happy Holidays, using CND Gold Chrome.



I was a little annoyed as the mis-stamping of the star on every finger so decided to add random red star glitters.  No fishing for glitter this time as I happen to have a little pack of loose stars...yeah me!  So much easier than fishing glitter out of a polish.  I initially was going to add a red star to each tree top, which I did do on the thumb which was the first finger I did, but it was far too busy for my liking.  So for the rest of them, I just placed on the flawed star image.



Topped with SV to finish.




I'm on the fence if this is funky cool or if I overdid it with the red star glitter.  It's not as garish in real life as you can pretty much only see the gold and red glitter in the base but I don't know....

Anyway, here's the other ladies Day 4 mani's!




Thanks for looking!

Creating Orange Holo Out of Necessity!

Some of you may have seen Kellie Gonzo's recent post here where she posted a fabulous orange holo, Fancy Gloss Orange Fizz.  I love holo polishes and don't have anything like this in my stash, so I immediately went to the Fancy Gloss store and tried to to buy a bottle....only to find out that there is no shipping to Canada.  Not to let this deter me, I sent an email and asked anyway if they should ship to Canada as I've had pretty good luck with those who say they won't ship internationally on their site say they will when contacted.  I got a response back right away....unfortunately, it was still a no go and I'm out of luck.  Booo!  So I decided to create my own layering combination for an orange holo for a Halloween mani; here's what I came up with!



Started with a base of two coats of Barry M Gelly Mango, no topcoat.



Added a thin layer of OPI DS Shimmer.  While not an exact match to Orange Fizz, I think I came up with a pretty good alternative....if anything, I think my layering combination seems to be a little bit more holo.  While I still love the how Orange Fizz looks, this will simply have to do simply because I can't get a bottle shipped to me up here in Canada!  I also think with a little tweeking and a less holo topcoat, I can come up with something more like it; Barry M seems to be the perfect base, it's just adjusting the holo topcoat.



Anyway, because this is a perfect base for a Halloween mani, decided to stamp some Halloween images on top using Fun charcoal stamping polish.  Images used are Cheeky Jumbo 6, Happy Holidays (thumb), Big SdP K (index), FUN 4 (middle), and Chez Halloween 001 (ring and pinky).



Topped with SV to finish.



Here's a closer look at a couple of the plates used.

FUN 4








Cheeky Jumbo 6, Happy Holidays













Have you ever created your own polish or did a layering combination when you couldn't snag your lemming? Which one?  I'd love to know!

Hope you're having a fantastic weekend; thanks for looking!