This is another remnant of my vault cleanout!  I think ultimately after I had this one on my computer I just didn't think it was clean enough or that it photographed well enough to make it on the blog.  That being said I really loved this mani too and I wore it for a considerable period of time. I started out with just wanting to do the stripes and then I decided later to jazz it up a bit with some glitter. I hope you enjoy it!! :)

Ok so today I'm cleaning out the vault and while most of the things I did ages ago were deemed not worthy of the blog, this was a look I thoroughly enjoyed and so, despite the nubs and the not so great lighting (and that TEENSY chip on my thumb!) I wanted to go ahead and share it with you.  I actually did this art last fall and I'm not sure why they never made it on here because I really LOVE them.  At any rate I digress.  I hope you like my little fall birdies!  Thanks for following along!!

It's day four of The Digital Dozen's skittle challenge! Today is kind of a throwaway! I had some new stamping polish I picked up super cheap at my local Five Below and I wanted to try it out PLUS I've been itching to try free hand tiger and giraffe so it kind of came together from that! The stamping polish is kind of a fail. It's no darker than my regular black polish and it also smeared a little. Otherwise I'm pretty happy with these nails though! I wish I had used a different color for the leopard because it kind of runs into the design and for some reason the nude background made my light brown color look purple-ish. But you win some you lose some! Don't forget to check out what the other ladies came up with for today!!

For today's Love and Heartbreak mani I decided to go a little outside my box!! I got a canister of flocking powder from a wonderful friend in the UK and I literally couldn't wait to try it out! I've used flocking powder before from the craft store but I had heard that nail flocking is finer.  I can say with a fair amount of confidence that this is the truth.  The nail flocking made a much softer finish on my nail and it seemed to last longer.  It was just a happy coincidence (or the result of having over a thousand polishes!) that I had a polish color which very nearly exactly matched the powder she sent me!  I polished on two coats on all nails and then dipped my accent in the powder and pressed it around.  This lasted on my nail for about three days before I took it off to try something new.  One warning: if you have pets, this nail will be FULL of pet fur!! My kitty left so much fuzz on my fuzzy nail when I petted her!  Anyway I jazzed up my other nails with a simple patchwork stamp. I tried t make it kind of random but it didn't really turn out.  Oh well. You can't win them all!!

Don't you just want to touch it? :P

...AND THE GRAND FINALE!! Ok, let's face it; these aren't that exciting.  The colors from yesterday reminded me SO much of poker cards.  The combo got me thinking it might be fun to add some poker type art onto it.  I didn't have a ton of room to do anything super elaborate so I decided to go with just a little dice in the corners.  I think it came out pretty nice actually.  It's not a mani I'd have done otherwise and I don't think I've ever even looked at this dice stamp before.  But I think that's one of the cool things about it.  The challenge really pushed me to go outside my comfort zone and do something different.  That said I'm still not going to be rocking the red nail trend anytime soon. BUT I appreciate the creative process of what I did here. :)  AND I'm super proud of myself for actually completing a five day NO removal challenge.  It was more difficult than I suspected but it was a lot of fun!! I hope you all enjoyed the series!  Thanks for following and check out my fellow red lover's blogs to see some more awesome art work!!!

Enjoy and thanks for following!!

So I joined a new challenge group recently.  I know what you're thinking...you're already doing A LOT of challenges. And it's true, I am.  But I don't know how often I'll do these challenges it's just something I'm playing with right now.  I have a TON of stamps and yet I hardly use them.  When I first got started with nail art I got them because, when used properly, they create instant and stunning art.  But since I've gotten more into free handing, I almost feel lazy using them.  I want to find a way to, ultimately, combine both free handing and stamping to make crazy amazing mani's!  So the Adventures in Stamping group I hope will inspire me to use my stamps in new ways.  This week's stamping challenge was green.  Myself being the environmentalist I am, I immediately wanted to do something to do with recycling and 'green' living.  But...that idea was scrapped when I found that I have zero stamps with anything to do with anything 'green'.  So instead I used GREEN polish.  It's vegan, three free, and thanks to a special offer...actually was FREE for me.  I'm talking about Zoya of course.  I have a love/hate relationship with Zoya and you'll see why in my picture...

The base for this was Zoya Jewel and the stamp is BM-225 using Zoya Veruschka.  If you look at my ring finger, you'll notice why I hate Zoya polish.  This picture was taken about half an hour after I did this mani and along the top edge of that nail and also along the top side of the middle finger, you can see it cracking as it peels off my nail.  I don't have this problem with any other brand (so far) and before you ask, I've tried a ZILLION top/base coats and nothing seems to help the issue.  It doesn't ALWAYS happen.  But when it does, it sucks.  So as you can imagine these didn't last long.  Shame because I wanted to take a picture in the sun.  Zoya Jewel is SO sparkly! Anyway I hope you enjoy the nails and thanks so much for following!!

December is finally here and that means one thing: Christmas nails!!  Over at The Purple Crumpet Fairy, Debbie was kind enough to make this list of challenges for the month of December.  Emma made the lovely list you see above. :)  I love this 31 Day Challenge because it's not demanding.  We're not asked to participate in everyday, but rather, the rule is that if you participate you post on the day of the challenge you did.  Easy enough for someone who gets SUPER busy this time of year like me!  I'm going to try to do as many as possible, though there are some I know I won't be able to do.  If you'd like to join in and do the challenges, we'd love to have you!! If not, that's OK too. Just sit back and enjoy the nails! :)

What I love most about Christmas is the Christmas spirit and spending time with my friends and family.  I had NO idea how to get that on my nails so I went with the thing I love second most!  Snow! Especially at night.  :)  My stamping on this got a little screwed up so you'll have to forgive the accent nail.  Stamping is still a work in progress for me and it seems like when I don't use it often my skills only decrease!  But I think overall it came out pretty nice. 

Enjoy and thanks for following! What's your favorite thing about Christmas?

Base is: Barry M Navy

Glitter is: China Glaze Snow Globe

Don't forget to check out what Debbie, Claire, Kerrie, and Emma came up with for their Christmas mani's!