Nail Crazies Unite: The Sock Hop ft. MoYou London Time Traveller

Hello Readers!


Today's Nail Crazies Unite prompt is "music," and since I had a 50s-themed plate on my unused list, and because I have sweet spot for oldies, I decided to go with a sock-hop inspired look for this prompt.

Growing up, my Dad (a baby boomer born in 1950) always had a twinkle in his eye while listening to the oldies station in the car. I grew up loving these songs, especially the Beatles and the Beach Boys. They were my first love, musically speaking.

To kind of get a 50s vibe for this mani, I decided to stick to candy colors. I did two coats each of the light pastel shades.

I also ended up deciding to go with a matte topcoat, because this mani seemed to call for it.

Most of the images come from this MoYou London plate from the Time Traveller collection, "Back to the 50s 05". The jukebox was the main inspiration for this mani, because I figured it fit right in with the "music" theme.

That being said, I had a bit of trouble with this plate. I'm not sure if it was the fact that I used black stamping polish, which always tends to smudge a bit, or the open spaces, but I had to do a lot of "fixing" the stamping with a toothpick and nail polish after I put these decals on. I think I may have missed some spots too, as I am looking at it now...

I also used the MoYou London "Rockstar 13" plate for this mani, for the image on my middle finger.

I hope you enjoyed this mani! Be sure to check out the link-up below for more music-themed manis!

An InLinkz Link-up

ABC Nail Art Challenge: Y is for Yesteryear

Hello Readers!

For the penultimate challenge in the ABC Nail Art group, I decided to go with "Yesteryear" and do a 20's inspired mani. My original catchphrase was going to be "years of yore", but then I thought "yesteryear" made a little more sense.

I was excited to try out this polish from the Kyle Jenner collection that I found at the Dollar Tree a little bit ago. It is so lovely and shimmery and a perfect winter shade, since we are getting into the winter months now.

My 20s plate is a dupe of a  MoYou London plate from the time traveler collection:

One thing I was kind of surprised by was how difficult it was to get the darn beads straight on my nail! It's also such an intricate design and the dots are really, really small so this design really does need a good stamping polish or it won't want to show up. I added a small rhinestone to my flapper girl's headband because I felt like it was begging for some bling right there.

I was excited to play with this plate from aliexpress also, which I used for the background images stamped in gold:

This plate is *kind of* a dupe for uberhcic, and I say kind of because the images are the same as images found on uberchic plates, but they are all mixed from different plates so it isn't a dupe of any particular plate. The seller on aliexpress originally came out with uberchic dupes but there was drama so they decided to change the layout, mix things around, and re-release the plates. I had fallen in love with the doughnut images on this plate the first time around so I grabbed it when it came back on, but I'm pretty sure they are all gone now.

Be sure to check out some more "y"- themed manicures in the link-up! Just one more letter until this challenge comes to a close! 

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An InLinkz Link-up

Your Princess is in Another Castle: Featuring MoYou London Time Traveler

Hello Readers!

Today I have a just-for-fun mani not connected to any particular challenge, but just something I've been wanting to do. I used a bucketload of different polishes and plates in this mani, ha ha, but man it was fun to do!

One thing that was slightly frustrating in this mani was the size of Luigi vs. Princess Peach. The images came from different plates, hence the discrepancy. I decided to run with it anyway though.

First, a look at the polishes:

So I started with a base of LA Colors "Fresh", which is one of my favorite blues, and stamped a star pattern from the recent Bundle Monster Blogger Collab plate by blogger Kelli Marissa in a very similar shade of aqua blue stamping polish. I wanted a subtle background image.

My Luigi comes from MoYou London Time Traveler:

And Princess Peach is from this really cool plate from Mundo De Unas, which features many different- but mostly Disney- Princesses. 

So I added dirt and castle walls, stamped a stone pattern (from hehe's harry potter collection) over the gray and added a stripe of green to represent grass. I felt like the dirt needed some texture, so I stamped one of the star patterns from the Bundle Monster blogger collab plate I mentioned earlier over the brown. 

My little square blocks originated as the squares from this useful MoYou London plate:

I mostly stamped them out to use as a guide. They weren't opaque enough with stamping alone, so I went over them with a toothpick and more polish, but stamping them out first is helpful for getting them *about* the same size. I added black borders and white highlights with a toothpick as well. 

Because I don't usually do complicated stuff on my right hand, I just kept it simple for Cindy. Sorry this hand isn't very pretty, ha ha, I don't normally show my right hand because it gets pretty beat up for some reason, but I kind of liked the simplicity of it this time. 

26 Great Nail Art Ideas: Black Base

Hello Readers!

Today's prompt for the 26 Great Nail art ideas challenge is to start with a black base. This is an idea that could go a lot of different directions, but the idea that popped into my mind was to do a Pac-Man manicure, since the background for that game is black and I have been dying to use these cute Pac-Man images on a MoYou London plate.

So I started with a shimmery black polish (Sinful Colors "Nice Guise", stamped a maze pattern over it, and added these cute little pac-man creatures. I used stamping polish in hopes that it would be opaque enough, but I did have to stamp Pac-Man himself twice and I went over the orange ghost completely after I stamped him because he didn't seem vibrant enough. 

The ghosts, pac-man, and little dots came from this nostalgic MoYou London Plate from the Time Traveler collection:

This really has a lot of fun images on it; Pac-Man just barely scratches the surface of possibilities for this plate.

The maze background comes from a Bundle Monster CYO 2014 plate:

Follow the links below to some more manicures with a black base:

An InLinkz Link-up