NOTD: Stamped Gradient

Hi ladies! This is a bit of a different post today, I never usually post Nail Art posts outside of a challenge, but since I'm completely out of fresh swatches, I thought I would post this as a substitute. Please excuse the crap photo quality/clean up. It looked a lot better *I thought* IRL and I took these very early morning before running out the door to go to work.

I started out with a base of OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls to bring out the gradient colours that little bit more, then using a cut up make-up sponge, I painted a strip of OPI - Can't Find My Czechbook and OPI - You're Such A Budapest from the new Euro-Centrale collection (swatches of my picks will be coming shortly). After the gradient was dry, I knew I wanted something stamping over the top, so I went through various image plates before settling on CH-53* from the Cheeky Summer 2012 collection, which was stamped using a White polish from the Rio Nails Stamping set*. I finished off with Eye Candy Gel Wrap Top Coat* to smooth out the Gradient and protect the stamping and here is the result.

I was really pleased with the overall look of this mani, and it's only the second time I've ever done a gradient! it took a while for me to make sure the transitions were good enough, but I think I got there in the end. To give you an idea of how pleased I am with this, I did this mani on Monday night and I'm still wearing it now! Yes, that's 5 days of the same nails, which is a rarity. The best thing? There's only minor tip wear!

What do you guys think? Would you like to see more of my stamping adventures or would you rather me stick to swatching terribly.

Challenge: Day 26 - Inspired By A Pattern

Hi ladies! Todays challenge gives us 'Inspired By A Pattern' for this particular mani, I was inspired by the feature wall in my old bedroom at my mums house because I actually miss it! I was so happy when I found that patterned wallpaper in the store what must be 5/6 years ago now! It's a Silver background with a Black baroque pattern throughout, I then had curtains and accents to match. I wish I had taken a photo to add into the post, but since I don't live at home anymore, it's a bit difficult. For this mani, I started off with a base of China Glaze - Devotion then using BM-312 and MASH Stamping polish in Black*, stamped on the pattern.

Sorry for the short post guys! But I hope you liked it, ignore the Yellowish glow in the nails, I was wearing my bright Yellow pajama top, oops. Again, I also forgot to use an untried polish, I suck! Remember, those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Challenge: Day 21 - Inspired By A Colour

Hi ladies! How are you liking the challenge so far?! I'm so glad to see there's still a lot of bloggers soldiering through, if it wasn't for you ladies I think I may have given up long ago. Just 9 days left! 10 if you're doing the full 31! Day 21 takes us into the 'Inspired By' category, which I must say I'm looking forward to getting down and dirty with and flexing my extremely limited nail art 'skills'. Today's mani is 'Inspired By A Colour' now I've always thought this was a wierd one to have, I mean how can you be inspired by a colour? So I took this to mean inspired by a nail polish colour. The nail polish I was 'Inspired By' was China Glaze - Ruby Pumps for obvious reasons right?! So I painted each one of my nails a different colour Index; OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls, Middle; Nails Inc - York Street, Ring; China Glaze - Ruby Pumps, Pinkie; beautyUK - Bon Bon*. I then used Rio Beauty Printing Varnish in White* to stamp with and Mash-50* for my Middle finger and BM-213 for my Ring Finger. I used Acrylic Paints for the Rainbow and 'Road' lines. I then sealed it all in with Models Own 2 in 1 Top Coat.

So there you have my mani Inspired By A Colour. I wish I had switched around the Red & White on my ring finger and actually had 'Ruby Pumps' instead of White ones! Oh well. Remember, those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untrieds Used;

Nails Inc - York Street

Challenge: Day 14 - Flowers

Hi ladies! We're almost half way through the challenge! Who's shocked they've made it this far? I know I am. I'm really surprised how many bloggers have joined in the challenge too, I spent so many hours looking through each and every one of your entries and have found some amazing blogs in the process too. Today is Flower Nails, I was originally going to post a mani that I did a long time ago which hasn't been featured on my blog yet, but since there was no untried polish used for that mani, I created a new one. For the base I used 3 coats of OPI - Pedal Faster Suzi on my index, middle and pinkie fingers and then used OPI - Your Web Or Mine? as an accent on my ring fingers. I then stamped using Mash-42* and Rio Printing Varnish in Pink* over the 3 nails with Pedal Faster Suzi and then added in a mixture of Rio Printing Varnish in White* to lighten the Pink for my accent nails.

I hope you lovely ladies are enjoying reading my posts as I am creating the mani's! Also, I'm ALMOST at 2,000 followers, which is amazing! I have some pretty cool custom polishes from 2 well known indie makers to give away once I reach that milestone and possibly some other cool goodies too! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untrieds Used; 

OPI - Pedal Faster Suzi!

Products in the post marked with (*) have been sent to me by the company or their PR for my honest review. For more information, please see my disclosure page.

Challenge: Day 9 - Rainbow Nails

Hi ladies! Here we have Rainbow Nails seeing us into Day 9 of the challenge. For this, I started off with 2 coats of OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls, I then chose the star design from Mash-49* and stamped with a combination of; Rio Beauty Printing Varnish in Red*, Catrice - Twist Of Lemon, Catrice - King Of Greens, BarryM - Bright Purple, BarryM - Coral, Catrice - Hip Queens Wear Blue Jeans and Bornprettystore stamping polish in Blue*. I then added a coat of Eye Candy - Gel Wrap Top Coat to seal everything in.

So there you have my entry for Day 9! What do you think? Remember to add your link to the inlinkz form below so I can browse your entries for Day 9 too! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untrieds Used;

Catrice - Twist Of Lemon

Catrice - King Of Greens

Catrice - Hip Queens Wear Blue Jeans

Challenge: Day 7: Black & White Nails

Hi ladies! So we've come to the end of the first week of the Challenge! Which means it's time for Black & White nails! Now, this isn't my original idea for this challenge, but after uploading the photos, I changed my mind and decided to do another one instead. For this challenge today I started off with 3 coats of Color Club - Pretty In Platinum (which is more of a Grey than a white, but I don't have any untried whites!) on my index and ring fingers and 2 coats of Essie - Licorice on my middle and pinkie fingers. I then stamped over with the paisley design on BM-315 with MASH Nail Art polish in Black* and Bornprettystore stamping polish in White*. You'll also notice my nails are a lot shorter, since I started my Nail Tech course on Monday, I thought I would trim them down a little.

So there you have my entry for Day 7! What do you think? Remember to add your link to the inlinkz form below so I can browse your entries for Day 7 too! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untried Used;

Color Club - Pretty In Platinum

Challenge: Day 6 - Violet Nails

Hi ladies! Violet Nails is the challenge for Day 6, so I chose to use 2 coats of China Glaze - Spontaneous for my base colour and then stamped over it using BM-314 with Catrice - Heavy Metallic first, which didn't show up as I'd hoped so I added China Glaze - Devotion.

You can see Heavy Metallic ever so slightly in the second photo, I was a little disappointed that it wasn't as opaque as I wanted it to be, but I still think the mani turned out okay. What do you think? Remember to add your link to the inlinkz app below so I can see your entry for Violet Nails! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untrieds Used

China Glaze - Spontaneous

Catrice - Heavy Metallic

Challenge: Day 5 - Blue Nails

Hi ladies! Day 5 of the challenge and I'm still going strong *yayy* I hope you're all enjoying the challenge so far whether you're spectating or participating! Day 5 is Blue Nails so for this I used 3 coats of Collection 2000 - Button Moon and then stamped over it using Rio Beauty Printing Varnish in Blue* and Mash-50*

So there you have my entry for Blue Nails! What do you think? Remember to add your link to the inlinkz form below so I can browse your entries for Day 5 too! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untried Used

Collection 2000 - Button Moon

Products in the post marked with (*) have been sent to me by the company or their PR for my honest review. For more information, please see my disclosure page.

Challenge: Day 2 - Orange Nails

Hi ladies! I'm back again for Day 2 of the 30 Day Challenge, which as you can see from the title of this post is Orange Nails! For today's challenge I started off with 2 coats of OPI - Atomic Orange* and stamped with Born Pretty Store stamping polish in White* mixed with BarryM - Peach Melba and BM-308. I then finished off with a coat of MASH Nails - Matte Top Coat*

Again, it's ALWAYS my pinkie that gets knocked, so please excuse the gigantic smudge, I just can't seem to help myself! Maybe I should wait until my nails are completely dry before I even breathe! What do you ladies think of Day 2 of 30? Remember to check out the other challengers posts! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untrieds used; OPI - Atomic Orange

Products in this post marked with a (*) have been sent to me by the company or their PR for my honest review. For more information, please read my disclosure page!

Challenge: Day 1 - Red Nails

Hi ladies! So today marks the start of the 30 Day Challenge, are you excited, I know I am! To start things off we have Red Nails!
For Red Nails I used 2 coats of China Glaze - Poinsettia from their Let it Snow collection followed by one coat of Catrice - Marilyn & Me. For my accent nail I used 2 coats of OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls stamped with BM-303 and Catrice - Marilyn & Me. I ended up having to go over the stamped image with a small nail art brush to make the image a bit clearer, which is why it looks a little messy!

What do you ladies think? Ignore the little accident I had on my pinkie, I knocked it on the door handle as I was exiting the room >.< If you'd like to join in the 30 Day Challenge using your Untried polishes, add your link to the inlinkz below! For those of you wanting to add the inlinkz to your own posts, click here to be taken to the google doc with everything you'll need for the next 30 days!

Untrieds used;

China Glaze - Poinsettia

Catrice - Marilyn & Me

See you tomorrow!

Day 14: Flowers

Hi, everyone!! I'm Sarah from See Sarah Swatch, and I am so excited to guest blog on here! Thank you, Rachel-Karina!:]

Today, continuing the 31 Day Challenge, I have flowers for you!

This is 3 coats of my franken [a polish that's mixed by hand using other polishes & glitters & etc], Dusk, with Orly's Le Chateau stamped over it! I lovelovelove Le Chateau for stamping, it's so pigmented, but you can still see the teal-ness of it:]

& for fun, here's one coat of my franken alone:

It's a light purple with red shimmer and little white glitter [like clouds!]

I hope you liked my flowers, and thank you again for the opportunity, Rachel-Karina!! :]