Nail Polish Canada Holiday 2018 Nail Art Contest

Nail Polish Canada is again hosting a Holiday Nail Art Contest!  Here's my entry!  Please go here to vote for me your favourite nail art mani!  You can also use this link to enter your own nail art mani for the contest!  On behalf of all the contestants, thanks for voting!

Started with a base of Zoya Shawn, Sally Hansen Miracle Gel Can't Beet Royalty, OPI Onyx.

Topped some nails with Polished For Days Seraphine.

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

I had made a stamper decal using an image from Marianne Nails n.118; applied it to thumb.

Stamped using Lina 4 Seasons-Winter 02 (pinky and index), UberChic UC Christmas 02 (middle) and Powder Perfect Christmas 1 (doubled stamped on ring).  Dotted holly berries.  Used Mdu 1, 9, 48 and 106. Added China Glaze There's Snow One Like You on ring finger tip.

Topped with a coat of KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

Added words on thumb from Powder Perfect Christmas 1 using MdU 1, then various dots using MdU 1 and 106.  Individually stamped snowflakes on ring finger and thumb with images from Infinity Nails 75 using MdU 1.



Finished with a coat of KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

Ok.  I was a bit obsessed with my thumb image!  I love how it turned out!

I also thought that this would look kinda vintage like if matte top coat was added (plus bring out the flakies from the Polished for Days), so added a coat of My Indie Polish My Perfect Matte.  I can't decide if I like it best matte or glossy??!!??

Again, here's the link for the Nail Polish Canada 2018 Nail Art Contest; please make sure you vote for your favourite mani!

Thanks for looking....and for casting your vote!  Thank you as well to Nail Polish Canada for hosting the contest!  Good luck to all!

Polished for Days Antarctica

I hope you've been enjoying all these blue polishes!  I still have lots to share so I hope you aren't tired of them yet....at least until the end of the month!  

This is one of those mani's that I absolutely love the base but wrecked it with the stamping.  Really too bad but I'm going to share it anyway; here's what I came up with!

Started with a base of two coats of Polished for Days Antarctica no top coat.

Topped with a coat of KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

Stamped with an image from Apipila Super Placa G using MdU 3, Jolifin Stamping Polish Caribbean Sea and FunkyFingers Gesso.  Unfortunately, I didn't scrape well and gradient the polishes well, plus they are all stamped in different stages of gradient, not my best stamping by any means.  :(

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top to finish.

The good thing about nail fails is its easy enough to change and I always take away the experience of what went wrong so I hopefully don't do it again!

Thanks for looking!

Stars and Confetti!

These were nails I was going to share for Digit-al Dozen indie love challenge but didn't!  Not that I don't love them; in fact, I love this amazing top coat from an indie polish maker; Polished For Days.  Here's what I came up with!

Started with a base of two coats of Morgan Taylor Anime-zing Color! no top coat.

Topped with a coat of Polished for Days Confetti.

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top.  These photos unfortunately do not do Confetti justice.

Stamped with an image from BP-64 with FunkyFingers Gesso.  All the nails are using the same image; I just mixed it up how I stamped each finger (which is one of my favourite things to do to give the nails a little bit more interest!).

BP-64

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top to finish.

Try as I might, I couldn't really capture the awesomeness of Polished For Days Confetti until the next morning, when I was outside and in kind of overcast conditions.  These pictures show it so much better than the artificial lighting.

Thanks for looking!

Polished for Days Dance It Out

Some of the more creative polishes lately have been coming from Polish Pick Up (in my humble opinion, anyway).  I haven't been doing a lot of polish buying for a few reasons; one, I have a ginormous stash already and there's only so many polishes you can store/wear and know I will be downsizing in a few years.  In fact, the great destash has already started (and thank you to anyone who has bought from my blog sale!). I'm saving for two special occasions; one will be coming up this September (my 25th Anniversary) and the other in about 5 years, or sooner depending on several factors (hopefully Freedom 55!). Plus somewhere in there, I need to plan a 50th Bday surprise for the hubs; whatever that might be! Lastly, and perhaps the biggest reason, is that I haven't seen a whole lot of polishes that aren't close to something I already have and I don't need 189175657590 polishes in the same range/finish, etc. so am being a bit more selective of what I have been buying.  I'm not disciplined enough to go on a no buy so have bought here and there but it does seem that the majority of any money I've been spending on polish has been from the monthly Polish Pick Ups.  This is one I bought from November 2017, Polished for Days Dance It Out; here's what I came up with!

Started with a base of two coats of Polished for Days Dance It Out, no top coat.

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

Decided to stamp with Esmaltes da Kelly Edwiges so (hopefully) bring out the pink flakes seen in the base using an image from UberChic UC 6-01.  I picked this image so that the base still could be seen underneath the stamping.

While I didn't mind this, I was looking for a bit more bang, so shadow stamped using same image with FunkyFingers Dark Knight.  My double stamping still needs some work but overall, not too bad of a job!

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top to finish.

March's Polish Pick Up theme is books; the store is open for orders on March 2nd and I have a few added to my wish list already.  Like I said; no discipline!

Thanks for looking!

Shadow Stamped Roses

I don't do shadow stamping that often as the few times I've tried it, I've failed at lining up the images well and either stamped so far off it's a stretch to be a shadow or exactly on the image and then no shadow at all. It never fails; I go to stamp and just as I press down, the stamper takes on a life of it's own and moves a few millimeters one way or the other and messes up the stamping!  But I did these bright nails right after Digit-al Dozen black week as looking for something a little brighter and didn't do too bad of a job with the shadow stamping this time so thought I would share!  This is what I came up with!

A few polishes that I had my eye at Harlow & Co. were stocked; I knew I wanted to try this Polished For Days Akitla as soon as it arrived; this is two coats, no top coat.

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

Stamped with an image from Marianne Nails Professional n.11 using FunkyFingers Gesso.  This is all I had initially planned to stamp on my nails but it was just looking too plain to me.

Marianne Nails Professional n.11

So did the double stamping using same image with El Corazon Kaleidoscope 28 which I think was a better decision then leaving it plain.

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top to finish.

Decided to add a coat of OPI matte.

I really liked how this turned out; kind of antique or vintage looking...like one would find on old wallpaper except maybe it's just a bit too bright! I also think something along these lines might be cool with some cherry blossom stamping when spring arrives!

Thanks for looking!

Loads of Valentine Hearts!

These are probably the least favourite of the Valentine's Day nails I did this year; I guess they are OK, just not my favourite.  I was trying to do something with a black base for Digit-al Dozen them coming up on Monday, but did a few others I like better so will share them instead!

Started with a base of two coats of ILNP Varsity Jacket with accent of Polished for Days Hoodie Weather.

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

Stamped using images from UberChic Love & Marriage-03 using Mdu 1, FAB red and Esmaltes de Kelly Flufi.  For the small hearts, used the same image and double stamped the image.  

UberChic Love & Marriage-03

This is Ms. Cindy (aka, the test hand); I actually triple stamped the thumb but didn't like how some of the images overlapped which is why I ended up doing two above.

Finished with  coat of KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

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