Category: Stamping

Of Life and Lacquer > Stamping

RGB Haze

Posted on by Cynthia

It’s about time I use this nail polish. I think that because it was associated with the whole SpaRitual/Beauty.com debacle a couple of months ago, I wanted to give myself some time to forget how they sent me empty nail polish boxes twice! I’m still wondering how that even happened. Eventually, I ended up getting the nail polish set and they refunded my money for all the aggravation. This is my first experience with RGB and I’m not really blown away. It’s a pretty color, but the formula seemed kind of strange: it was kind of streaky and goopy. At $16 for .40 oz, I guess I was expecting something better. I don’t know if I just got an off bottle because I’ve heard a lot of great things about RGB. It’s too bad because these are the colors I enjoy the most: dusty, smoky and PURPLE!!!

 

 

I haven’t used this design from Konad plate M73 in a while, but I really love it. This Wet N Wild silver polish called I Can’t Stand Up Straight is my favorite silver polish to use for stamping.

 

I decided to build a better lightbox today so I went out to purchase some posterboard. While I was at Dollar Tree, I saw packages of Big League Chew. Remember that stuff? It’s like little shredded strips of bubble gum that gave kids the impression that they were using chewing tobacco like their favorite baseball players. That stuff is almost as bad at the gum cigarettes that had a powder in them that you could suck and then blow out…like you were really smoking…at 5 years old. WTF? Anyway, it took me so long to build the darn thing, but I refuse to pay for one because they are super pricey.  For you ladies who are also nail bloggers, do you use a lightbox? I’ve been using mine a lot more lately which is why I decided to make a new and bigger one.

Today I chopped off my nails down to the nub so I’m going to lay off the nail polish for maybe a week and just work on hydrating my skin and cuticles.  I have a stockpile of pictures so I’ll still be posting regularly. Don’t worry…I know you’d die without my random nail/life ramblings. 😉 I am also putting myself on a no-buy. Yeah, yeah…laugh it up. I know I’ve said that before but I really need to tone it down a bit. I’m inching closer and closer to 600 bottles and I just can’t outgrow three melmers…I can’t!  The last time I put myself on a no-buy, this happened. Yeah. I will say that I will get the China Glaze New Bohemian duochromes…no  mater what. I think I am over the idea of getting the Essie Mirror Metallics because I know that I won’t use them too often so at least I’ll save some moola on that end.

And lastly, my giveaway for the Saved By The Bell nail polish collection is ending in a couple of days so don’t forget to enter. Today I went back to my lucky dusty and purchased a couple more bottles of the OPI DS linear holos for a future giveaway. I’m really enjoying all the new ladies who are stopping by and interacting on my posts so I want to make sure I thank you all by sharing some of the polish love. These are the two polishes I bought for future giveaways.

 

Thanks for reading, ladies, and have a nice Wednesday!

Color Club Hydrangea Kiss

Posted on by Cynthia

Did you know that the hydrangea is the 4th wedding anniversary flower? I didn’t. I didn’t even know there were “anniversary flowers” to begin with. Who comes up with this stuff? I mean, isn’t it completely arbitrary? Maybe I can start saying that a can of Hormel Chili is the new 1st anniversary present. Forget the whole “paper” thing. I mean, what’s more romantic than a can of Hormel Chili? Despite my annoyance with certain weird traditions, I have to admit that hydrangeas are gorgeous.

Hydrangea Kiss is the only color that I purchased from the Color Club Spring 2012 Blossoming Collection, and I don’t know what really attracted me to it. Yeah, it’s pretty but is it really unique? Not really.

I don’t know if it’s the same with other polishes from this collection, but I found that the formula was a little thin and sheer. The first coat was seriously like a wash of color on my nails. I ended up applying 3 coats because the second coat dragged a bit, and I had to even it all out. It’s important to let the polish dry a bit in between coats to avoid this.

Are you surprised that I did more stamping? I used a design on BM 314 to stamp the area between the silver striping tape. I bought my striping tape on eBay, and it doesn’t seem to stick very well. I wonder if maybe the heat from the trip from Hong Kong made the glue go bad. It was definitely a pain to manipulate the tape, and it was almost curling up on a couple of areas. Ugh! Still, I really like how this turned out.

Did you purchase any colors from this Color Club collection? What do you think of these nails? Let me know what you think about this and my Hormel Chili idea.

Sara Smile

Posted on by Cynthia

Has there ever been a song named after a person and you secretly you wish that was your name…even just for the length of the song? Well, that’s me with Sara Smile.

I don’t really know why I thought this would be a good way to open up this blog post, but the only reason I can think of is that I heard a bit of this song when I watched The Fighter tonight. Believe it or not, I had not watched this movie until tonight, and it was freaking awesome. I think I’ve stated on here before what a huge H&O fan I am, but I don’t think anyone understand what an understatement that is. Any time I hear a H&O song, I have to sing along with it…no matter where I am.

Let’s move along from Hall & Oates and back to nail polish! OPI DS Coronation has made quite a few appearances on my blog and rightly so! It’s a freaking amazing scattered silver holo.

DS Coronation applies like a dream. It only take two coats and it really settles and flows perfectly on my nails. There is absolutely no way that you can mess up a mani if you’re using this polish. And since my Bundle Monster obsession continues, I stamped this baby up!

I used plate BM 319 for this design. I really like the design but I keep thinking that these nails look Christmas-y because of the color combination I used. Maybe I would have liked them better if I had used black for the design. Despite my reservations about my color choices, I adore this design. Ugh…I am a stamping fool lately.

What do you think of these nails? Do you have any Designer Series OPIs? Do you think they are worth the extra money? What different color combination would you use for this stamping look?

“Hello Oscar Mayer Weiner…Lover.”

Posted on by Cynthia

My hot dog looks a little anorexic and frankly kinda burnt. So what?! It was still good. Oh, 4th of July was a day of ridiculous feasting for my family. We had a bbq and endless snacks. My mom made a beautiful fruit platter so that she could fool herself into thinking that at least we were eating one healthy thing. Yeah, right! The city where I live allows fireworks so we went outside to watch everyone set off their fireworks. My youngest brother bought a bunch and was creating his own by ripping up picolo petes and the like. Boys! Overall, I had a really nice time playing Scrabble and watching movies. I finally watched Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid and I really liked it. I mean, what is there not to like? Robert Redford. Like! Robert Redford. Double Like!! And Robert Redford…

 

I’ve been super excited about playing with my new Bundle Monster plates so I tried stamping without using my special polishes. I really like the look of the special polishes because they are so pigmented and always produce really crisp designs.  I started with a base of OPI French Quarter For Your Thoughts.

I seriously love this color. It’s so different from all the bright and crazy colors that I have been wearing lately.

 

I used OPI Ski Teal We Drop as the stamping color and plate BM 319 for the jigsaw puzzle design. This color stamped better than I thought it would. I usually don’t have much luck with stamping using regular nail polish so I’m glad this wasn’t a total disaster. If you like stamping or are interested in getting started, you MUST get these new Bundle Monster plates. They are so much fun and will change the way you do your nails.

How was your 4th of July?

P.S. Do you know where the title of my post came from?