Random Nail Plate - Halloween Themed!

Wow...I don't know how I got so lucky. My very first random plate draw and it's holiday appropriate! Hurray for randomness! Note: I will not be so fond of randomness when say a Christmas plate comes up in January, but for now I'm happy with it!

So the plate that came up on the very first draw was BM-222. Which is this little guy here:

I quite like the full nail designs on this one, the scrolly one in the bottom is so nice. And the right side is so intricate too, either would make a very classy manicure. I've actually been itching to try out the top image to make Dalmatian nails. The butterfly would be cute for some springy nails, but since it's fall here I figured I would pass on that one. The left hand full nail image was out because, well, it's not Christmas yet. But as I'm sure you got from the title of the post, I decided to use the little pumpkin to design my manicure around. This is definitely not the sort of image I'd usually gravitate towards (I really like the full nail images on this plate), but I figured I should embrace the Halloween spirit!

So today I have a Halloween manicure for you featuring the little pumpkin from BM-222. Since it's a skittles manicure I'll list them out finger by finger, it's just easier that way! All the stamping is done with Wet N Wild Black Creme.

• Pinky - 2 coats of Essie Chinchilly with a glitter gradient of Sinful Colors Black Magic (sidenote: I LOVE this glitter gradient! It looks even better in real life. I think it would look really awesome to do a black to white ombre with this glitter over it in a gradient)
• Ring - 3 coats of Sinful Colors Cloud 9 stamped with the pick of the day BM-222!
• Middle - 2 coats of Essie Chinchilly stamped with BM-H08
• Pointer - 3 coats of Sinful Colors Cloud 9 stamped with BM-H06
• Thumb - 2 coats of Essie Chinchilly stamped with BM-213

Look at that gradient, yummy! It worked way better than I ever imagined.

And now a picture of the claw pose as awkward as it is to show some thumb love!

A close up of the glitter gradient in all it's yummy shimmery goodness! Black Magic is from Sinful Colors' 2013 Halloween collection - run out and get it now if you don't already have it! It's amazing, I love it!

Thanks for reading!!!

OMD 31 Day Challenge - Day 8 - Matte

I know, I know...almost late again! I know I said I'd have more time this week, but I had to get some immunizations today and my arms hurt...I'll be better tomorrow I hope!!

Since I'm all sore in the nail painting muscles I have a super simple mani for you today for matte day. My thumb, pointer, and ring finger are all one coat (yes-one coat!) of China Glaze Concrete Catwalk. My middle and pinky are two coats of Barielle Life of the Party. I probably could have done one coat of the pink but I didn't do the best first coat so two was required. I added a thick coat of NYC Matte Me Crazy. When everything was all dry and matte I added in dots using regular shiny top coat.

The pink is more similar to the last photo in real life, it was hard to photograph so only one sort of color accurate picture, sorry. I really liked the grey nails, I'd probably do this again with grey, the dots are more obvious.

Thanks for reading!!

Check out everybody else's manis here

OMD 31 Day Challenge - Day 4 - Black and White

Today is black and white! I love black and white mani's, they're so sharp and eye-catching.

Unfortunately my mani today is neither sharp nor eye-catching. I attempted to do an ombre saran wrap look, but I think my color choices could use a bit of work.

All fingers started with three coats of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls. Here's what I used on each of my fingers for the saran wrap effect:

• Thumb: Sinful Colors Tantalize
• Pointer: NYC Sidewalkers
• Middle: Maybelline Express Finish Cool Couture
• Ring: China Glaze Concrete Catwalk
• Pinky: Wet N Wild Black Creme

I'm kind of meh about this whole manicure. I feel like there's not enough difference between the shades when I used the saran wrap. I think this would be a neat look but needs better color choices than the ones I made. Maybe I'll try it again sometime with different polishes. Lots of potential, bad execution. Oh well, part of blogging is about sharing the good with the not so good right?! 

 Thanks for reading!

You can find the other participants mani's here

Essie with Striping Tape Accent

Today I have a manicure using all Essie polishes. I opened up a polish drawer and these colours were all together and looked so tempting all lined up that I just had to use them all!

I started with three coats of Da Bush on my pointer, middle and ring fingers. (what's with that name?!) On my thumb and my pinky I did two coats of Armed & Ready. It's a gorgeous olivey green with a beautiful copper shimmer. The shimmer shows up really well in the bottle but is sort of hidden on the nail, but when the light hits the nail just right, wow...just wow. Anyways, on my ring finger I taped off four sections and filled them in with Armed & Ready (dark green), Eternal Optimist (pink creme), Chinchilly (grey), and Antique Rose (pink shimmer).

Three of these polishes can be completely blamed with starting my addiction! The first three polishes that I bought in my collection are Chinchilly, Eternal Optimist and Armed & Ready. I stood in the store mesmerized by Armed & Ready and just had to buy it. I guess this manicure sort of pays homage to my start on the spiral of way too many nail polishes!

Thanks for reading!