Polish Ornaments

I had always heard of the make your own ornaments where you take clear glass ball ornaments and swirl the inside with paint, but I never thought to use nail polish instead of paint! Polish is so much prettier than paint, with the glitters, shimmers, holos, metallics and all the other types out there! It's so much fun, but I need to warn you, it does use alot of polish. Not as much as you might think, but maybe a bit less than a quarter of a full bottle? That is alot.

Start off with a clear glass bauble and a bottle of polish that you don't mind using alot of. I used China Glaze holographic "Infra Red". I usually would balk at using an expensive bottle, but I accidentally got 2 of these when they went on clearance. That and I really wanted to see if the holo would translate to the ornament.

A neat trick I found was to pull up on the wire bit on the cap. It will come up but then stop where there is a little bend in the wires. This keeps it from pulling all the way out and you can lift the cap off easy. If the wires pop out all the way don't fret. You can thread them back into the holes in the cap.

Pour your polish into the ornament. Don't be stingy. I usually pour nearly the whole bottle into it. You will swirl the polish inside to coat the whole ornament. If you are working with a older polish, maybe thin it with polish thinner before pouring it into the glass to make it easier to swirl. Then pour the polish back into the bottle. Polish is thick so you might be holding the bauble over the bottle for a while and it drips slowly back in.

When you get tired of holding it and you think most has dripped out turn it upside down and let it dry. You can try to balance it on a paper towel, but I live with cats and that was a mess waiting to happen. So I found this plastic container at work. I have no idea what was packed into it, but it was being thrown away so I grabbed it. I think you could use maybe an egg carton or ice cube tray to prop up the ornament while it dries. Something that can keep the drips from making a mess. You could use the packaging the ornaments came in, but I like to use them to store the finished ornament in. I left them overnight to dry.

In the morning you will see a puddle formed under the ornament.

Put the cap back on the ornament and you are done! You can see the holo effect in this photo. I love it!!

I had so much fun making these that I gave them all to my coworkers for Christmas. It was a hit!

The Glory of Proper Lighting

I work retail, so from Thanksgiving to Christmas I'm working non-stop. So while I feel guilty about it, this blog kinda goes into hibernation while I am busy. Sorry, I'll try to make it up in a Christmas Wrap Up post. Maybe. I'll put it in my queue.

But today I want to talk about the Magic of Proper Lighting. Many bloggers have talked about making sure you have good lighting, but I was fairly restricted in just what I could do. I didn't have a light box, and all the ones I made were disasters. So I just stuck with natural lighting (in winter you don't have many hours to get the manis done and photographed and it's just cold.) or dealt with the lighting in my room. I tried to fix the photos before posting them, but I never got real good with that.

Picture taken in my room with current lighting and no
fixing on computer.

That was until I got an Ott Light for Christmas! Well, to be really honest, I didn't so much "get it for Christmas" and more "found out Dad wasn't using his so I stole it from his office". Shush, don't tell. Here is a pic using that lamp.

The color is so much better, but that glare in the middle is bad. On nails it might not be so terrible, but on this nail polish pendant, it makes it so you can't see the design at all. A light box would fix that, but I've yet to make a light bow that works for me. So what I need is a light diffuser of some sort. So I took a sheer white shirt and tied it over the end of the lamp so the light shines thru the shirt. The light is softer, but still bright and white. I should take a moment and say this is dangerous and that you shouldn't do it. The shirt can get hot and catch fire. I did it because I ignore common sense. Anyway, here is my results of that:

The detail is so much better, but it changed the color a bit. It's kinda greenish and I don't care for it. I prolly won't do it for mani pics, but I had to get rid of the glare for my other nail polish projects. So while it's not amazing yet, it's better than the regular light in my room and crazy better than my photography skills a few years ago.

Photo taken Dec 2011. I thought I was hot stuff back then.

Red and Green Prep

I was gonna use this as the base for stamping with MoYou Festive 04, sweater patterns, but I got called into work and never finished it. Maybe I'll try and get back to it, but its fine as is for now. The green fingers are Sally Hansen "Emerald City" with China Glaze "Running in Circles" on top of it. The red fingers are Salon Perfect "Scarlet Enchantment" with Sinful Colors "Decadent" over it. They are so much more sparkly than this photo gives them credit for! I got nice complements even tho I never got around to stamping them.

Silver Snowflakes

Finally I'm getting a chance to upload some mani's I've done over the last couple weeks. I always underestimate just how busy I get this time of year. It seems perfect that I'm sitting in the middle of a snowstorm posting winter nail art! Here is Sally Hansen "Deep Blue Sea" a dusty blue with silvery blue glitter in it, stamped with Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes" using BundleMonster BM323. One of my more subtle stampings, the silver snowflakes just didn't stand out too much from the silvery blue glitter polish. But still very pretty.

3 inches of snow outside and it's still falling! Be safe out there guys <3

Lava Lamps

Oh my! It's December already! I really hadn't noticed. I guess I'm gonna have to start planning winter mani's soon. Till then, here is my Lava Lamp mani. Ever since I mentioned that this stamp reminded me of lava lamps or amoebas, I've been itching to do it in many colors. I started off with very neon colors, but they seemed too much. In summer its fine to rock neons, but this time of year it just seemed too garish. So I went over the neon with a shimmer polish to dull it out just a touch. I used a lot of colors so let me go thru them one at a time. Neon color is listed first, the the shimmer listed second.

Thumb: Sinful Colors "Pink" and "Glimmer"
Index: Warpaint Beauty "Acid Orange" and Pure Ice "Hot Tamale"
Middle: Sinful Colors "Neon Melon" and Pure Ice "Excuse Me"
Ring: Warpaint Beauty "Bad Apple" and Sinful Colors "HD Nails"
Pinky: China Glaze "Blue Sparrow" and Sinful Colors "Love Nails"

And just incase you have no idea what I'm talking about when I mention Lava Lamps: (photos courtesy of Google Images. None of these pictures are mine)

Stamp over the nails with my go-to black stamping polish Wet n Wild "Black Creme" using MoYou Pro Plate Collection 06. I'll try to come up with some winter nails soon, but the last time I tried to force myself to do a seasonal mani, I ended up with a huge creative block. I'll see what I can do tho :)

Dandelions

These last few weeks have been freezing cold, but today it is almost nice. 50 and 60 degree days have put me in the mood for summer and autumn nails, not the winter ones I've started to plan. Here is a stamp of dandelion seed heads blowing their bits of fluff away. A gradient of Sally Hansen "Lightening" and Sinful Colors " Sweet Nothing" gave the hint of a green color where they met. I love when my gradients do that! Stamped with Wet n Wild "Black Creme" using MoYou Pro Plate 06. I bought 7 plates this order, but Pro 06 is what I seem to be grabbing every time.

Mint Shimmer

I tried doing this cute woodland creature mani, but it just wouldn't turn out like I pictured in my head. So instead of trying to be overly clever, I just played. Here is 2 coats of China Glaze "Tree Hugger" followed by 2 coats of Pure Ice "Mint Dream". I adore the pearly, iridescent like sheen "Mint Dream" gave it. I then stamped with MoYou Pro Collection 06 in Wet n Wild "Black Creme". Very simple, but I adore it. Pro 06 is fast becoming my favorite stamping plate ever.

MoYou Madness!

So Excited!! The MoYou plates I ordered came in! Squee! Sorry, I need to get control of myself. I just love these plates so much. I just couldn't decide what image to play with first, so here I am rocking several at once. This hand is sporting MoYou Pro plate 06. I was afraid the images would be too big for my nails, and they are large, but as you can see that can be worked around.

A quick tour or what I did. Sorry for the poor quality of photos. I'm gonna eventually have to make a light box if I insist on taking pictures in my room at night. The thumb is sporting Milani "Mr. Sandman" stamped with Wet n Wild "Black Creme". This one and the index are my favorite of this hand. There is something simple and elegant about the light netural brown and crisp black lines that is so appealing.

The index also turned out super pretty. China Glaze "Tree Hugger" stamped with "Black Creme". Actually all the fingers except for the pinky were stamped with Wet n Wild "Black Creme". I want to do a mani of this image with all different colors. It reminds me of lava lamps, or amoebas. Something bubbly or science-y. The middle finger is rocking Wet n Wild "French White Creme". This stamp reminds me of the BundleMonster stamp I use all the time and love.

The ring finger is Sally Hansen "Red-io Active" and I really need to get the hang of larger stamper decals because I really have plans for this stamp. I'm thinking stained glass windows. The pinky is Milani "Mr. Sandman" again but this time it's stamped with Milani "Dark Coffee". This stamp screams henna patterns to me. I want to stamp this one so it overlaps my skin. Have the pattern on the skin and it drifts onto the nail.

And there is the full hand again. I want to keep playing but it's getting late and I still haven't come up with a Thanksgiving mani yet. 

TARDIS

A quick post as I'm walking out the door to see the 50th anniversary special in 3D! Rocking my TARDIS nails in Sinful Colors "Endless Blue" which I will always refer to as Tardis Blue. Pull to open plaque and St. John's circle done in Wet n Wild "Black Creme" and "French White Creme". I still have a nasty cold and the smell of polish makes me hack and choke right now, but I had to do something for today! Happy 50th Birthday Doctor Who!

Oh and this happened on Saturday. I'm still giggling that I got to go into a TARDIS!

Fake Nail Polish

Great, just when I get in the mood for polishing and posting, I get sick. What did I do to make the universe so unhappy with me :( Well, since another Doctor Who mani has to be postponed I wrote up a review on some makeup I bought for Halloween this year.

Zombie Nail Polish & Lipstick

Picked this up for Halloween and just now got around to playing with it. I don't have much when it comes to greys so even though I bought this for the lipstick that it came with, I was excited to have a new grey. It is made by Fun World, a Halloween costume/makeup company. It was very cheap, I think we only paid a buck or two for it. Good thing too, this was a disaster beginning to end. The packaging is very attractive and shows a model sporting shiny grey tips. Yeah, right.

The lipstick was fine, rather sheer but fine. I didn't use it on myself tho, I used it for dad's face make up for Nightmare on Chicago Street. Today, however, I need to talk about the polish. Despite what it says on the package, this is NOT nail polish. I don't know what to classify it as. I think its closer to acrylic paint than any thing else. First, when I opened the bottle it has nearly no scent. That is HIGHLY unusual for nail polish. Then when I painted it on a practice nail it beaded up and didn't want to adhere to the plastic nail at all. Then when it did dry it cracked and flaked off, just like paint on plastic would.

2 coats and it still didn't want to cover the nail. This polish is a HUGE fail. I'm glad I got some use out of the lipstick or this would have been a complete waste of money. For the sake of science I'll swatch it on my own nails, but I have no hopes for this "polish" and I strongly recommend against it.

Cybermen Nails ~ Doctor Who 50th Anniversary

I think I found the cure to my writer's block. Instead of doing nails I think I should be doing because that's what you're supposed to do, I'm gonna do what I want to do. I was gonna do all kinds of fall/autumn/Thanksgiving nails, but that's not really me. What I want to do is Doctor Who nails. So I'm gonna. Here is my attempt at Cybermen. I did a coat of Orly "Mirror, Mirror" but it wasn't really the color I was looking for so I went over it again with Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes". I then freehanded Cybermen faces with a dotting tool in Wet n Wild "Black Creme". I don't care if no one realizes what they are, it made me giggle to paint them. Here is a Cyberman reference picture.

Dalek Nails ~ Doctor Who 50th Anniversary

I am so excited for Doctor Who's 50th anniversary celebrations! Nov 23rd the BBC will be airing a special episode for the 50th, and while I'm still trying to pin down some tickets to the 3D showings in theaters, I will be buying the episode the second its available on iTunes! Until then I'm watching trailers for it on YouTube, avoiding spoilers on Facebook, and painting my nails. Here is what I've done so far:

DALEK Nails!! This makes me giggle so much. I considered using studs for them, but I like the dotted better. The base color is Milani "Dark Coffee" and the stripe and dots were added in Maybelline "Bold Gold" using a dotting tool. Very simple to freehand. For those of you that don't know what a Dalek is, here is a photo that I think is from the episode "Parting of the Ways" but I could be mistaken about that.

So much fun! I'm really gonna have a blast coming up with Doctor Who nails. If you don't like the show you might wanna avoid me for a bit, I've been babbling like a fangirl about it for a month :D

Matte Ornaments

Beaching Nails posted this picture just a few days ago, and I fell in love with how the nails look like those thin glass ball ornaments. I think they are referred to as mercury glass, but I'm not sure. Anyway, I was staring at them trying to figure out how she did it and I think I got it. A metallic polish with a matte topcoat over it. Testing my theory I painted my nails with Sally Hansen "Red-io Active" a strong metallic red then topcoated them with Seche Vite. I used the Seche because my matte topcoat tends to smear and smudge my nails, so I wanted to protect them first. Then I used my Warpaint Beauty matte topcoat to give it that brushed glass look. I think I matched her effect pretty closely!

Then I added some gold ornament stamping just to dress it up a bit. I used Maybelline "Bold Gold" and BundleMonster BM225. I wish I could somehow topcoat the stamping because after one day it's already rubbing off. Than and a top coat would make the gold brighter, but my matte topcoat smears stamping and shiny topcoat ruins the matte effect. 

Sorry for the bad pic, I took it after getting home from work
last night.

I really do like the over all effect tho. I'm gonna have to add this to my list of Christmas Mani ideas this year!

Writer's Block-ish

A couple false starts on mani ideas I did today.

Ever have one of those days where you try so hard to design something, but nothing wants to turn out? I tried so hard to create mani ideas today, but nothing jumped out at me as "awesome". I wanted to do something autumn-y so I pulled out a yellow, orange, red, and green polish. Those colors together made me think of fall leaves.

I stared at them. Flipped thru my stamping binder. Looked at the polishes some more. Put a DVD in for background noise. Pushed the 4 polishes around some. Watched a couple episodes of Doctor Who. Stared at the polishes again. This goes on for another hour or so. That is how my day has been. I want to paint my nails, but inspiration is being elusive.

Fine, so painting my nails today isn't working. I'll write a blog post instead. Seemed like a good idea. I've written 3 posts (this one will make 4) but after re-reading them, I'm gonna have to give up for the night. My thoughts are disorganized and the sentences either run on or trail off. I'll look them over again in the morning, but for now I'm gonna go kill some creepers in Minecraft.

Jack-o-Lantern

Well time really got away from me. I got slammed in Oct trying to finish Halloween costumes and I went weeks, WEEKS, with naked nails. In late Oct I broke nearly each nail when I went camping. Nubby nails is depressing so I didn't do much painting. Shame too, because I had so many ideas for Halloween nails. Then real life took a turn for the worse in Nov with medical issues in the family. So while I'm sorry for the unannounced hiatus, I'm trying to get back in the swing of things now. No promises tho, work is picking up and I'm working a lot of hours these weeks.

Enough of that sad talk. Let's get to the nails!

My mom is the best :) I was talking to her the other day about my collection of polishes and mentioned all my oranges are so red or fluorescent. That my only good pumpkin orange was a tiny bottle that didn't even have a name. That day while I was at work she hit a couple stores and got me 2 new oranges. "Sun Kissed" by Sally Hansen and this one "Clementine" by Sinful Colors. A week later a friend gave me "Tangerine Tint" by Finger Paints. I went from one tiny bottle to 3 full sized bottles. I love my friends and family! The detail of the Jack-o-Lantern's face is done in Wet n Wild "Black Creme" freehanded with a dotting tool. This was the last Halloween mani I did before real life got in the way, but I might do more just for fun.

Candy Corn

It's that time of year again! Fall is on the wind and I've started reaching for the more subdued earth tone colors. I really didn't think this mani was anything special, just a 3 color gradient inspired by something my mom said about candy corn (a weakness of mine this time of year). I was actually planning on stamping something over it later, but ran out of time before work so just topcoated it for now till I could decide what more to do to it.  At work, however, I got so many compliments on them that maybe I'll leave them as is for now. They are so simple, but people love them! I was surprised, I mean, it's only a gradient. A base coat of Wet n Wild "French White Creme" with Sally Hansen "Lightening" and L.A. Girls no name orange. I really like this no name orange, but its a tiny bottle and I've used a lot of it. I think it will be time to replace it soon. This time of the year with Halloween coming up it shouldn't be too hard to find a good pumpkin orange.

Owls and Cherry Blossoms

I saw this amazing manicure by Diana using MoYou's plate Suki 01. At the time I had something else on my nails so I borrowed Mom's nails to replicate it. I love how it turned out! An undercoat of Sally Hansen "White On" and a gradient of Sinful Colors "Cotton Candy" and "Sweet Nothing". Stamped with Wet n Wild "Black Creme". I was a bit scared to try the dotted flowers and eyes that Diana did, but I still like how it turned out. Mom did too :D

MoYou Review

I am totally and completely in love. I want every single plate MoYou has ever made. I touched on it last month during the 31 day challenge, but now that the challenge is over I get to show you my first pretties I got from them. I placed my order for 2 plates at the end of September and will place a larger order in November (gotta save my pennies up). Back in Sept there was only one "mural" style plate and I had to have it! Now there are 21 to date. What do I mean by mural style? So glad you asked!

This is what a regular stamping plate usually looks like. Squares of images laid out in a grid on the plate.

This is the "Back to the 80's 02" plate by MoYou. Some size comparisons to BundleMonster 300's set. As you can see these are smaller than BundleMonster full size images. Just after I got these plates they came out with "Extra Large" images, but I don't have any of them yet.

That was the standard layout for a stamping plate. The mural style plates are like individual artworks all by themselves. This was the first mural they made called "Suki Collection 01".

I was simply blown away by the beauty of it! Just look at all the detail in there!

As much as I love them, I would caution new stampers to gain some experience, especially in isolating images before tackling them. Then can be intimidating to a new stamper. If you're an old hand at it, I highly recommend them.

These pictures make them look very large, but I was surprised that they were much smaller. They are about the size of 2 round plates side by side.

               

Instead of the standard paper backing to keep from cutting yourself on the plates, they have a thicker plastic backing that is just slightly larger than the plate so it looks like its framing it.

I know, you want to see some manicures done with it. I'm working on it, but here is the picture from Day 10 of the challenge last month.

And me just playing around with my new toys. I was super excited and didn't take the time to place some of the stamps properly so some are off center. I'll be better next time.

I'm losing my mind over these plates. I've compiled my wishlist, just waiting for November to place my order. 

31 Day Challenge: Day Thirty-One ~ Honor Nails You Love

Wow! 31 days of nails. I'm exhausted but that was fun. I slacked off at the end as work suddenly got crazy busy (I had to sew several costumes for an ornament party our store threw, more on those on my brand new blog Needle of Sewing +3 ) but here it is, the last day of the challenge. "Honor nails you love" I interpreted as I should pick someone else doing the challenge and do a mani they did. So I chose Chalkboard Nails Day 15 Delicate Print. I wasn't happy with what I came up with on that day so I'll try it again using Chalkboard's version.

Chalkboard Nails picture:

And mine:

Ok, so not an exact copy, but not too bad for an amature. I used Sinful Colors "Endless Blue" (which I've renamed TARDIS blue because that's what I bought it for :D ) and Wet n Wild "Black Creme" in a gradient. I then freehanded the spiderwebs in Wet n Wild "French White Creme" and over that for added sparkle China Glaze "Ice Cap" and hand placed glitter from Wet n Wild "Explosions After Dark". I hope some day I'm half as good as Chalkboard and the other bloggers I follow.

Here is Chalkboard's thumb:

And my little spider:

And there it is, the end of my first 31 Day Challenge. I figured I'd take a break and just do some Halloween manis this month, but a friend just started a halloween challenge that would take place Tuesdays and Thursdays in October. I might join but not sure yet.