NOT An Ugly Sweater: Zoya Ziv and Wednesday feat Nailz Craze

Hiya polished prisoners,

Happy 2013! It's my first post of the New Year and I thought I'd start off with my favorite color family - blue greens.  I coveted Zoya Wednesday for so long you would think something was wrong with me.  I kept looking but never buying and then when they did the Zoya Box promotions I took my chance to snatch it up.  Then of course its warmed my tray of wonders until today.  I also have the privilege of being friends with one of the kindest and most sincere women I know Vicky of Boombastic Nails who sent me Zoya Ziv as part of a Christmas package.  Thanks you hunny bunny!  So together Ziv and Wednesday decided to create some magic ;)

Mani-louge

Base coat/Top Coat: CND Stickey and Poshe Fast Drying Topcoat

Base color: Zoya Wednesday

Gradient: Zoya Ziv

Stamping polish: Konad Special Polish in White & Black

Stamping Plate: Nailz Craze NC03

Seriously this manicure was effortless - well almost.  I will admit I found the formula on
Wednesday to be borderline for me. A bit too thick for my liking and yet not quite so thick that I couldn't manage.  Ziv was flawless flawless flawless.  Literally the perfect gold shimmer polish.  The Nailz Craze plate I used is the newest "Russian" plate it has little dolls and sweaters etc and is very cute.  I will say though the bottom portion of the sweater patten did not pick up as well as I would have liked even using a Konad Special polish so that was a little disappointing, but otherwise I love everything about this image and the plate as well.  One thing I will say about Nailz Craze is she always always has images that are the perfect oversize size.  Long nails or short she will have you covered!

So thoughts?  Not bad for the start of the New Year eh?  I'm looking forward to trying out my other Zoya polishes and I also happened to have seen swatches of the new spring line and bottle shots of their new Pixie Dust textured matte polishes.  They look brilliant!  Anyhoo thanks for reading and see you next post!  Toodles...

How Much Is That Doggy In the Window? On Sundays I Stamp!

Hello polished prisoners,

It's Sunday Sunday Sunday and we know what that means round these parts ;)  Adventures in Stamping time!  Hehe - can you tell how much I love these challenges? This week it's all about 2 for 1 i.e. using two different stamps in a manicure.  I do this all the time at least when I'm doing abstracts so I thought for today let me see what I can do without relying on double layering my stamps which I have done a lot before historically.  I wanted something feminine, slightly whimsical, and cute.  Here's what I came up with...

Cute, cute, cute!

Mani-louge

Base colors: Essie Sand Tropez and Barielle Welcome Ohm

Stamping polishes: Konad Special Polish in Black Pearl & White, Barielle Welcome Ohm

Stamping plates: M57 (lace), KD11 (dog), NCO1 (hearts), BM19 (dots), RuiZ02 (paws)

Accents: Kiss Nail Art Stickers (upper lace), Kala Animal Love Nail Art Stickers (bones), 2mm clear rhinestone

For some reason here Welcome Ohm is pulling purple, but it's a deeper berry pink than shown here.

There is so much to this manicure I don't even know where to begin.  Initially, I posted up to my Instagram with just the french tips and accents thinking this would be a relatively simple manicure.  All I knew is that I wanted to use a combination of nail art stickers and stamping and the rest just fell into place.

I love how the nude comes into this manicure in such a subtle way like the supporting role to everything else.

All of a sudden I had five or six stamping plates pulled out from all sorts of different collections.  This is the kind of manicure that's a nightmare to do a tutorial on hahaha!

Do you think the princess will capture her bones?

So what do you think - isn't this just so cute? I have to say Princess Fifi La Fleur (yes I named the dog) is looking good with her little bling accent ;)  Well never let it be said that I can't mix and match stamps with the best of them.  When I see this manicure it reminds me so much of my Giesha girl inspired mani I did many yore ago.  In any case I hope you enjoyed reading about this challenge as much as I did creating it.  Thanks for reading and I'll see you next post!  Toodles...

Buttlerfly Trap....On Sundays I Stamp!

Hallo polished prisoners,

Today is Sunday and you know what that means.  Yes, another Adventures in Stamping post!  This weeks challenge was to use either bronze, silver, or gold as either the base for our stamping or the stamping color itself.  I know it's a touch Olympian in nature yes? But, for one I'm not really following the Olympics (eh-hem I haven't owned a functioning tv in over 5 years), and second I was feeling the need to try out a new plate that arrived this week from Nailz Craze.  So here's what I came up with...

Mani-louge

Base Color: Paints by Allya Automatic

Gradient: Paints by Allya Automatic and Pity and Essie Jamacian Me Crazy

Image Plate: NC1 by Nailz Craze

Stamping polish: China Glaze Passion

This gradient kills me...by itself it would be one fine manicure, but I can never leave well enough alone lol. 

I love the touch of shimmer created by Jamaican Me Crazy. This is one of my favorite Essie polishes.

It just feels vibrant right?

As you can see I love butterflies, but not in a Mariah Carey crazy way more in a they make for great nail art kind of way.  Do you have a type of manicure you keep coming back to? For me it's always some kind of butterfly like creation.  However, I have never done butterflies before using gold for their wings.  I have to say I'm a bit in love!

Shimmy and shake!

 In case you are wondering about the polishes I recently did a little haul from Paints by Allya from her recent Full Ruscha collection.  They are all gorgeous cremes with not a glitterbomb amongst them.  To be frank while I love glitter I always appreciate a good classic polish in my life.  I'll do a review of this collection later, but for now it's safe to say I'm really happy with my purchase. 

I love it!

So here we are another AIS Challenge met and stamped!  What do you think of the final results?  I'm very shocked by the simple beauty of this one myself.  I could have kept going after I stamped but I thought I wanted the polish to have the spotlight.  Thanks for reading and I'll see you next post! Toodles...