Matte Stamping and Born Pretty Store Review

I'm always up for a new technique, and matte stamping is an amazing one!  A fellow nail Instagrammer (@jay_jay_bee) posted her own version and I knew I would have to try it out.

The base color is Mentality Nail Polish in Sailor, the most perfect navy ever.  It's got a light shimmer and dries matte, but is equally gorgeous with or without topcoat.  I stamped using MoYou London Explorer 22, a lovely large image plate and Sally Hansen Matte About You.

The people over at Born Pretty Store were also kind enough to send me some items for review, one of which was the studs I used on my accent nails.  I really like them-they lie almost flat on the nail, so they don't get caught up in my hair, or fall off when I catch them on something.  If you would like to make a purchase of your own, there's also a link at the top right of my page, as well as my code for 10% off, UDG10.

C'est La Vie

Holy cow, I've been gone a while. I was looking up swatches for a polish and realized my own poor blog has been neglected in favor of Instagram! Here are some recent favorites:

I used China Glaze Tantalize Me and loose glitter from Born Pretty Store.  I loved these, I kept them on until the glitter mostly fell off!

I used the same loose glitter here, over China Glaze Pool Party, and stamped with Winstonia plate W-04 using Pure Ice Silver Mercedes.

This is Orly Ablaze (over white undies), stamped with Maybelline Bold Gold 70, which seems to have been discontinued in favor of Bold Gold 45.  Stamping plate is Pueen 14, from their 2013 plate collection.

For more available updates, my Instagram is nails_on_nails_xo.  See y'all later!

Stamps on Stamps on Stamps

 So a few months ago, I discovered the joy of stamping! These were all done with this set of Pueen plates and a Konad stamper/scraper set.  I've found that American Apparel polishes work well and that China Glaze Goldie But Goodie is an AWESOME gold.

Geometric! Lil' bit of smudging though, bleh.

WHO DAT! Stamped using Goldie But Goodie.

 More pretties after the jump!

It's Passion, It's Not Love

I found my camera! With dead batteries, of course. Oh well, I still have two finals and the first part of an online course to finish up before I can take a little time off, so I probably wouldn't be using it anyways. It's Instagram again, sorry y'all!

Julep Alice (gorgeous), with OPI My Vampire Is Buff and Golden-I flowers.

MVIB base with Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Lacey Lilac, Zoya Daul, Sinful Colors Enchanted, and Julep Popova flowers, ring finger accent with Essie Ballet Slippers and Born Pretty studs, pinky uses Zoya Daul again! I'd forgotten what a pretty color it is!

My actual current mani! Julep Zelda with loose holographic glitter, from Born Pretty Store.  It's so pretty in real life, like tiny disco balls or fish scales. It's pretty chipped now, though-we got a hail storm with baseball-sized hail last night and I spent a lot of today helping clean up.

Title: City and Colour, Confessions (LOVE LOVE LOVE)

I'm The Worst

So life has been hectic and I've been lazy...and here is a bunch of Instagram pictures of everything I've done for like, the last TWO WEEKS. Three? I dunno, but I'll be back to blogging this week!

Glitter Gradient with Zoya Song and Ivanka

Glitter Gradient (Sinful Colors All About You and China Glaze Angel Wings) with Sally Hansen Lacey Lilac, Coral Reef, and Mint Sorbet. Studs from Born Pretty.

Julep Lynn with Born Pretty studs again.

Sally Hansen Coin Flip (LOVE THIS) with white detail (Color Club striping polish) and Born Pretty rhinestones-I have a wheel of these bad boys, so I should probably use them more.

Lacey Lilac again, this time with China Glaze Scattered & Tattered-seriously love this glitter too, part of their Glitz Bitz N' Pieces collection.

St. Patty's water marble with Sally Hansen Mint Sorbet, White On, and Coin Flip, featuring my wallet (from Urban Outfitters).

Current (until later) mani! Julep Popova with All About You and individually placed glitter for the rainbow and pot o' gold.

A couple of my pics didn't show up in my downloads and I'm too lazy to manually download them (sorry guyz), but they are totally on my Instagram!

Liven Up Honey, It Ain't That Bad

I'm back! For the past week or so I've been sticking to plain colors/not taking pictures/taking tests and crap that happens in school apparently? I also checked in at 99 colors for my grand total, pre-no-buy and swatched all my colors and stuff. Here is a color I somehow haven't used yet, Zoya Yara, which I LOVE, with some Born Pretty studs.

I think one of my first purchases post-Lent will be more army greens, I adore this shade, don't get me wrong, but I want a non-glitter one too!

Title: Wait So Long, Trampled By Turtles

Happy Holidays, Y'all!

So I hope all of y'all had a great holiday season/are still having one (I'm counting New Years!). For the first year in a while, we had Christmas at my uncle's house instead of ours, which was kind of a relief, not going to lie.

 

 I want to name these bad boys, but I don't know if my uncle would approve. I guess I don't have to tell him, right?

 I got to see my cousin's kids, who are the little lights of my life. The three-year-old asked me for help drawing a shark (because that's what big sister was doing), so I asked her if she was scared of sharks. She said no, so I asked her what she would do if she saw one. She replied, "I would feed it. Sharks are always hungry because nobody feeds them", in that self-assured way only very small children have. Did I mention she's the cutest thing? However, I now have to make a dozen reindeer cookies for her big sister when we get back from a mini vacation to the coast. And I've been recruited to do their nails for their next dance recital, thanks to my rhinestone-bedecked Christmas mani!

That magnificent book in the back is Jenny Lawson's (The Bloggess) Let's Pretend This Never Happened and also proof that my hint/threats about seeing a dead (ethically taxidermied) mouse under the tree worked.

I used Julep Delauney and Sienna, and my rhinestones from Born Pretty. I got Sienna in my Julep New Year's Mystery Box-if you want to check that out, as well as some photo blurbs from Christmas, look after the break!