Daffodils

Every year I use this stamp, and every year I try something slightly different. This year I went with a two-tone yellow center and used a teal/pink shimmer as the background. I forgot, however, that this teal polish loves to become all wavy when I stamp over it! It actually looks pretty cool as a result, but is NOT what I intended. Sometimes too much shimmer is a curse!

Colors:

~ Teal shimmer: Emily de Molly – Pending Perfection
~ Black: Maybelline – Onyx Rush
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Teal: Zoya – Cecilia
~ Yellow: Zoya – Darcy
~ Dark yellow: Zoya – Honey
~ Stamp: BP – L067

I feel like I should make a list of ways to use this stamping plate in the future: color combinations for the flowers and the backgrounds. Maybe I can try to go psychedelic with it in the future and venture away from the classic yellow/orange/white. Who knows. But it is lovely to see all the bright daffodils outside in early spring!

Overwhelming Roses

There HAS to be a use for this polish that doesn’t render nail art overwhelmingly extra. But I have not found it yet. This neon pink glitter is SO fun to look at, and yet whenever I try to use it (even for Valentine’s day, the pink holiday!) I end up regretting it. I tried to tone this down by adding a dark red ink (in place of the black jelly polish I wish I owned) and it somewhat worked, at least there is some dimension to this nail art instead of just PINK IN YOUR FACE, but even so. Nope.

Colors:

~ Neon glitter pink: Atomic – Silicate
~ Black: Maybelline – Onyx Rush
~ Red ink: Born Pretty – Watercolor 005
~ Stamps: BP – L067, BP – Valentine’s Day L002

This was fun to wear but so darn difficult to photograph. Cameras don’t like neon polish to begin with, and if you add a ton of glitter to a neon polish, you end up with…a bright shiny blob. So have some blob roses! Sorry. Also sorry for the 3 week absence, I had some nail art lined up but forgot to post it. Whoops!

Winter Stars and Snowflakes

I love this base for winter nail art! I just looks like a snowstorm, but with subtle glints of color and glitter. With the snowflake stamping I still thought these nails looked a hair dull, so I went and added purple dots. Do they match? No. Did it add color? Absolutely!

Colors:

~ Grey flakie: Different Dimension – Come One, Come All
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Purple: Station – Happy Wine-y People
~ Stamps: BP – 185, Nicole Diary – 120

This year I am going to try to avoid adding off-colored dots when they don’t make sense (of course, if I can pretend they make sense then everything will have additional dots). So far so good, but we are only two weeks into the new year…

Berried in Berries

Fun and easy! Just what I want to paint on a weeknight. This is a simple green stamped design with tiny red dots added by hand. It is festive, seasonal, rather elegant, and took 30 minutes in total (not counting removing the old nail art and adding base coat).

Colors:
~ Nude: KBShimmer – Caught on Tape
~ Green: Zoya – Shawn
~ Red: Covergirl – Forever Festive
~ Stamp: Floral BPX – L018

Were I to do this again I would probably use a grey base rather than a nude base, but otherwise it worked quite well! Hope you enjoyed!

And just for bonus fun, a photo of my nails with corresponding berries! I don’t have any idea where in nature I found these, but they are excellent props for this nail art :-p

Moroccan Tiles

I adore this nail art, and I adore this new creme polish! This is another find from the My Mood polish brand in Ireland. I was inspired by @nails4cocktails to create a moroccan tile design using shades of teal, and I love it! Really my only complaint is that my two palest teal shades looked more similar on the nail than they did on my swatch sticks. Still pretty!

This two coats of Happy by the brand My Mood. It is a stunning bright teal, that applies like a dream. The coats were applied a little thick to cover visible nail line, but the polish was wonderfully easy to control despite the wide-ended brush, so it was not hard. As with the other polish I own by this brand, I highly recommend it! It is rare to find a polish this pigmented that applies so easily. The name is accurate: this polish makes me happy!

Colors:

~ Teal: My Mood – Happy
~ Light teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ Pastel teal: Glitter Gal – No Worries
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamps: BP – L003, BM – XL205, BC – 06, hehe – 024

I am so happy with how this came out. I am not so happy with how cold it is outside though! I get that it is December but still. On the plus side, I did manage to stall my husband (well, life stalled my husband) and so our holiday decorations did not go up until after December 1st, which (to me) is when the season is officially allowed to begin. Win!

Turkey Feathers

I never know what to paint for Thanksgiving. Fall-themed does not seem specific enough, food is weird, and pilgrims are jerks. So, turkey! Again. This time with bonus feathers. I lost the post where I got the idea for this design, but decided to try and stamp everything but the turkey body as opposed to freehand it all. The end result was hideous, so I went back over all my feathers/leaves by hand using the same color combination and ended up here. Its a bit messy, but whatever. My husband, the day before Thanksgiving, looks at my hand and goes “why did you paint a girl with big hair?” Because apparently context clues are irrelevant to him. I then took a poll at Thanksgiving, and everyone else agreed it was a turkey without prompting. Take that, husband!

Colors:

~ Light orange: OPI – Freedom of Peach
~ Dark brown: Zoya – Louise
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Maybelline – Onyx Rush
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Moment
~ Orange: Emily de Molly – LE 197
~ Hot red: Emily de Molly – LE 199
~ Red: OPI – All I Want for Christmas (is OPI)
~ Dark red: OPI – Visions of Love
~ Stamps: UC – Lovely Leaves 2, BP – L008

If I wanted to do this again I think it would be a lot easier now that I have actual stamping polishes! My regular polishes just aren’t quite pigmented enough to show up over darker colors, or with the vibrancy that I would have liked. Win for stamping polish. Happy Thanksgiving!

Well-Defined Leaves

I did this manicure almost as a dare. I had seen a beautiful manicure on the Emily de Molly website where someone stamped Goddess of Rays over black. Goddess of Rays is a multichrome but is not the most pigmented polish ever….but the result was STUNNING. So I decided to try it myself. This was the result, and I am BLOWN AWAY. Now I need to go find other ultra shimmery multichrome polishes to stamp over black and make beautiful nail art that shifts color and somehow comes out perfectly.

Colors:
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Gold multichrome: Emily de Molly – Goddess of Rays
~ Stamp: BPX Floral – L018

I decided to post this now, because I am longing for the cooler weather of fall. It is far too hot and humid out (it went a month without rain, and then we got torrential downpour for 4 days straight)! Hope you enjoyed.

Fireworks

Twice every year I try desperately to come up with some way to create fireworks that does not involve free handing tiny lines for hours. This year I tried a semi-floral stamp in silver, covered with different bright colors of jelly polish. I tried to use my jellies (of which I do not have nearly enough) to mix and match colors and patterns (alternating spokes, center different than rim, singe color), and it kind of worked? I don’t know if these are identifiably fireworks but they are at least appropriately colorful and festive. I also used a seldom-used (and unfortunately mostly dried out) black jelly base with lots of small metallic glitters to add to the fun.

Colors:
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Black with metallic glitter: KBShimmer – Dark & Twisty
~ Silver: A England – Excalibur
~ Pink jelly: Zoya – Paloma
~ Red jelly: Zoya – Aphrodite
~ Orange jelly: Azade – S220
~ Yellow jelly: Esmalta da Kelly – Yellow Soap Bubble
~ Green alcohol ink: Born Pretty – Blooming Constant Jade
~ Teal jelly: Zoya – Frida
~ Stamp: BP – L003

Here ends my attempt to cheer myself up about this country. I do love fireworks, and I spent the 4th of july with good friends, tasty food, 3 puppies, and many fireworks…oh well! Enjoy.

ShamRock Around

A second St. Patrick’s day manicure? This is unheard of! I think I have bought more green polishes in the past 12 months than any other color, and it shows. Half these polishes are new. I think I can consider my green polish collection complete now. Hopefully.

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Light green: Formula X – Quantum
~ Green holo: A England – Dragon
~ Dark green: Zoya – Hunter
~ Stamps: BP – L049, MoYou Pro – 02

My only real complaint about this manicure is that I messed up my ring finger accent nail. I was trying to double stamp green-over-gold but I didn’t line the stamps up the way I wanted, so I went back and colored in the lines. The end looked cool but messy, since I applied the colors after the stamp and the line work isn’t perfect. Hope you enjoyed anyway!

Daffodil in Orange

I get tired of seeing yellow daffodils everywhere, but my neighbor has some fancy ones with ruffly centers that are orange-on-white. So this is dedicated to my adventurous neighbor and her pretty colored flowers!

Colors:
~ Orange: Emily de Molly – LE 197
~ Grey/blue glitter: Different Dimension – Come One, Come All
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Green: Zoya – Hunter
~ Stamps: Nicole Diary – 145, BP – L067

I forgot while I was painting this that I have not actually used this neon orange polish before. It was an LE from Emily de Molly numbered 197. I just really wanted a neon orange that went on smooth and didn’t lean red (the only neon orange I had before was a mini polish that is almost red and takes 4 coats). This covered well in two, although it dried with the typical semi-rubbery neon finish. I love it! It paired really well with the grey-blue flakie glitter polish that I used on my accent nails. Overall, absolutely a good manicure. Hope you enjoyed as much as I did!

Strung On Hearts

This was one of my Valentine’s manicures from last year! I still don’t love pink, so I decided to use a purple with pink glitters and PAIR it with pink instead. It also gave me an excuse to swatch this beautiful purple glitter shimmer :-). Overall I think this came out quite pretty!

The base is two thin coats of Ava by ILNP, a dark purple scattered holographic polish that is swimming with pink/gold/green shifting shimmers. I am currently not into chunky glitters so this polish is perfect! Interesting without being a PITA to remove. It also helps that my name is Eva and I like accumulating polishes that sound like my name (…or in this case, names people have called me that are not my name).

Colors:
~ Purple shimmer: ILNP – Ava
~ Pink: Born Pretty – Crimson Cheeks
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Stamps: Nicole Diary – K28, Valentine’s Day BP – L002

And with that, I end my Valentine’s nail art! Also, hilariously, I found out that my husband (who I have been with for 12 years) though that Valentine’s day was the 13th not the 14th. Because “a 13 sort of looks like a heart”. Men. Anyway, enjoy!

Heart Array

I never had any idea what to do with this stamp. It looks cool but the size is weird? Why is there a heart? Voila! Lets just use the heart part and of course add some random dots. The background ended up a little busy (and holographic) so the design is a tad harder to see than I wanted. This is the problem with having so many absolutely stunning nail polishes, when I use them with nail art (which is always) the designs tend to disappear!

Colors:
~ Red/gold holo multichrome: Enchanted – I am the Walrus
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamp: BP – L084

On the plus side, all the colors went well today, even with the shifty goodness of I am the Walrus. Friday’s post is a bit more….bright. And matches itself less well. Hope you enjoyed!

Leaf Peeping

I had been saving this polish to use in a fall manicure. Unfortunately, it is very sheer and I ended up placing it over too dark a brown! It is very squishy in the bottle and on my swatch stick; I will have to use a lighter base next time around.

This is three thin coats of the flakie-filled carmel brown jelly called Leaf Peeping with Sasquatch (which might be one of the best names for a polish I have ever seen) by Knight Owl. Although the polish would be near impossible to build to opacity on its own, it looks beautiful over a brown base (even if this one is too dark) and with the jelly base the flakies really pop!

Colors:
~ Brown: Zoya – Louise
~ Brown flakies: Knight Owl – Leaf Peeping with Sasquatch
~ Rose gold: Essie – Penny Talk
~ Stamp: BP – 19

I imagine this would also be lovely with a matte top coat. The density of the flakies is really impressive! I count this as a win. Hope you enjoyed!

Jewish Stained Glass

I don’t know exactly where I was going with this, but I ended up creating a stained glass-like base using blobbed on jelly polishes, and then putting a jewish star stamp (highlighted in silver) over it. And I actually really love the end result? Since today is Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the jewish year, I figured it was fitting to post this nail art today.

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Pink jelly: Zoya – Paloma
~ Yellow jelly: Love & Beauty – Yellow
~ Light yellow jelly: Esmalta da Kelly – Yellow Soap Bubbles
~ Teal jelly: Zoya – Frida
~ Silver: Nails Inc – South Kensington
~ Silver glitter: FUN Lacquer – 24 Karat Diamond
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamp: BP – L049

Traditionally on Yom Kippur, jews are supposed to fast and atone for the sins of the past year, to start the new year (which began 11 days ago with Rosh Hashanah) with a clean slate. Since I am working in the hospital today, I will be eating so I do not pass out, but saving a life is a good deed so I am exempt from fasting! Anyway, hope you enjoyed and easy fast for all the jews reading this!

Sideways Rainbow Ombre White Glitter

What a mouthful of a title. I bought almost the entire collection of white glitter crellies from Emily de Molly when they came out just to be able to use this in manicures like this! It is rare to have interesting and pretty polishes with similar enough finishes that they work well together, other than cremes. I couldn’t resist. I made these by painting each nail a base color and then making a loose gradient using the color of the neighboring nail. Since they are jellies, the depth of coat of the polish I put on dictated the amount of blending I got. It isn’t perfect, but it is pretty! When I went to stamp over the top with the weird weaving design, I used a corresponding pastel color for each side of the nail (a gradient stamp) to reflect the underlying polish (so my pinky has both the pink and purple glitters as well as a pink-to-purple horizontal gradient stamp). It sounds complicated, but other than having the correct polishes in the correct finishes, it was actually pretty straightforward!

Colors:
~ Pink glitter: Emily de Molly – 4th Chamber
~ Purple glitter: Emily de Molly – Common Feature
~ Blue glitter: Emily de Molly – Already Done
~ Teal glitter: Emily de Molly – Mantra
~ Green glitter: Emily de Molly – Green Light
~ Yellow glitter: Emily de Molly – The Way I’m Wired
~ Pink: Zoya – Tobey
~ Purple: Zoya – Malia
~ Blue: Zoya – Yummy
~ Teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ Green: Zoya – Tilda
~ Yellow: WOW – #301
~ Stamp: BP – L070

I need to come up with some other fun ways to use this entire collection at the same time. The polishes are pretty and the go so well together! Although, they are a bit of a pain in the butt to remove because of how glitter-loaded they are. Still worth it! Hope you enjoyed.

Danbury in Purple

So, I became low-key obsessed with Bridgerton on Netflix last year during season 1. It was fun, lively, had actual good romance and banter, and AMAZING costumes. As such I did a few different designs modeled after some of my favorite characters and dresses! I decided to post these designs now since season 2 came out recently (although I am embarrassed to say that I haven’t watched it yet, I was on vacation!).

It will not be a surprise that my favorite character from season 1 was Lady Danbury, she is just such a badass lady in a man’s world and I love it. So I did a take on this dress of hers: <>. It is hard to see the lace details at the side and bust, but honestly other than the color and fabric of this dress it was quite subtle!

Colors:
~ Purple multichrome: ILNP – Undenied
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamps: MoYou – Frenchy 14, BP – L084

This was fun to do, if a bit challenging to make the pattern stand out. Stay tuned for Wednesday, when you get to see my take on one of the queen’s dresses! Hope you enjoyed…and let see what dress (if any) I decide to copy based on the second season!

Grey Shimmer Fronds

Really simple but quite elegant in the end! All I did was color some white stamps in with a rainbow shimmer polish, and put it over a grey/gold shimmer base. The whole manicure took less than an hour, and really embodies dark cold days! The shimmer of the see-through polish picked up mostly green and orange tones from the grey base. In retrospect, the design looks a bit like the one I posted on Monday although they were painted months apart, maybe that is why I felt compelled to post them in the same week.

Colors:
~ Grey shimmer: Zoya – Yuna
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Rainbow shimmer: Different Dimension – Intergalactic Dolphin
~ Dark gold: ILNP – Sparks May Fly
~ Stamps: BPX – Floral L018

I need to use Yuna more, it is a pretty polish! And shimmery flakie-ish. I have a lot of grey polish, and I have slightly gotten out of the habit of wearing them! They are pretty, for all that they are not bright colors. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!

Children’s Arches

The scrubs at the Children’s Hospital where my husband works (and where I briefly worked on my pediatric neurology block) are a beautiful shade of darkish teal. So, I decided to paint my nails to match! Of course, I could have gone with a creme color, but thats boring. So I went with a metallic! And then I decided that since the “n” in Children’s was shaped like the St Louis arch, that I would grab my most arch-like stamp and play with it. This was the (rather abstract) result!

Colors:
~ Teal metallic: P2 – Lost in Paradise
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ Stamps: BP – L050

I had planned to get rid of Lost in Paradise because I never ever wear it. I am glad I still had it on my give-to-a-new-home shelf, its pretty! Although being honest this is the first time I have worn it in at least 3 years, and I have a very similar but more opaque polish that I am keeping. Hopefully it finds a new home soon! All of that being said, I found this manicure a little boring and I am too lazy right now to edit two photos of a boring manicure so you only get one :-p

Halfway Circled

This was an idea I had bouncing in my head for a while: what if I took a metallic and a creme of the same shade and painted half of my nail with each? And then added stamps to the creme side? And maybe a dividing line? Well, I finally did it. And the end result was that you cannot tell I used two similar shades of nude/pink. That said, this looks like a slightly weird french design and it isn’t half bad!

Colors:
~ Nude creme: CND – Cashmere Wrap
~ Nude metallic: ULTA – Freshwater Pearl
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Stamp: BP – L003

This week has been a bit of a mix, but it was fun to post at least :-). I hope you enjoyed something between the dark and stormy, the bright and sunny, and todays pink mix! Now I just need some freehand in there somewhere…

Swirl Veins

I have no idea what to name this. I started by making squish-veins (I have done this before) using black and light grey, put them over the white grey, and then just stamped a whole bunch of black swirls. I have no idea what I was thinking, but the end result is at least interesting to look at?

The base here is another new-to-me-but-discontinued Forumla X polish called Delightful. It is a very pale grey creme, and covers well in two thin coats. I had been looking for something to replace my utterly exhausted Bare Escape by Maybelline, and I think I found it!

Colors:
~ Grey: Forumla X – Delightful
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamps: Floral BP – X43

Overall I think I am happy with this? I need to trial the squish-veins method more, I am still not great at getting a consistent squish pattern and that is important to me. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!