Pop Art Zombies ft. Bundle Monster House of Horrors, MoYou London Holy Shapes

Hello Readers!


Today's post is an unusual one for March, because the prompt today for the #clairestelle8challenge on instagram is "unseasonal". I had a couple of Halloween plates on my "unused" plates list and I figured this was the perfect opportunity to play with them.

As I was contemplating what exactly I wanted to do, I remembered this pop art ghost mani I did around Halloween time last year, and decided to follow that sort of theme, but with a Zombie twist.

I stated off with a base of Sinful Colors "Snow Me White", and then had some fun with Bundle Monster stamping polishes. I did use an actual stamping polish for my black here. That means I also used a different topcoat than my normal to try to help prevent it from smudging. Black stamping polish is always the worst smudger! I find the Revlon Gel Envy topcoat works well over black stamping. You can see in the pic that it did still smudge in one small spot on the zombie's neck, but it's better than if I had used my normal quick-drying topcoat.

While we are on the subject, I also like to use the "gel" formula topcoats when making decals. Not actual lamp cured gel topcoats, just the kind with a gel-like formula. They tend to work better and crack less when moving the decals around to apply them to my nails.

I started off by stamping the large right triangle image from this MoYou London Holy Shapes plate.

Next, I stamped some polka dots from this other plate from the Holy Shapes collection. I just turned the stamp diagonally and purposely overlapped them onto the purple triangles just a little bit.

Once I had by base down, I stamped on some zombie themed images. My zombie face and the word "zombie" on my middle nail came from this Bundle Monster plate, from the House of Horrors collection. It was a really awesome Halloween collection that came out last year, and I used all the the plates except for this one, because it was a bit more gorey than the others and it's not my usual style. Hence the bright colors on this mani, ha ha.

My eye splat images come from this other Bundle Monster plate, from the original holiday collection.

For my middle nail, I actually lifted an "I <3" image off this plate from MoYou London's Rebel collection, and then stamped the word "zombie" under it. That's one great thing about these types of images- it's pretty easy to switch it up to say whatever you need it to say.

So I think this mani just about wins a "use-a-million-plates" award, ha ha. It was really fun to do though, and I'm happy to return to a pop-art nail art look; I always seem to enjoy them.

30 Days of Color Challenge: Up-to-no-good Cat ft. MoYou London Animal

Hello Readers!


Today's post is for the 30 Days of Color Challenge, and this week's prompt is "blue". I decided to go with an image on a plate that I have always wanted to use as my inspiration: the little fish bowls from a MoYou London Animal plate. I figured, the water in the fishbowls would be blue... but what would I pair with it... and then I decided my fish bowls needed a mischievous cat.

Tee-hee.

For the 30 Days of Color Challenge, we are encouraged to use a polish that we have never used before, and for this mani that was the light blue "Cinderella" color. It was a polish I've heard a lot of people talk about but I always shied away because it is on the sheer side, but I thought it would be the perfect light blue color for this mani. I really love this polish, even though it took 3 thick coats because the shimmer in it is really lovely.

Bee Mine ft. MoYou London Animal

Happy Valentines Day, Readers!

I have a little fun mani for you today to celebrate the day of love.

Because I think bees are adorable.

I pulled out my favorite rosy pink and my favorite yellow for this mani. Both these polishes are shown at two coats here. 

Nail Crazies Unite: Fall Foliage

Hello Readers!

Today's post is for the facebook group, "Nail Crazies Unite", for the second prompt: Fall Foliage. I feel like I have been doing a LOT of fall foliage manicures, (like this owl one, this pumpkin one, this sunflower one) but I had at least one more idea for it so here we go.

I decided to recycle the technique I used in the owl and pumpkin manicures I did earlier this fall and place leaf decals over a stamped pattern, but this time I was thinking about curling up on the couch with a good book in the fall, so I went with an "old book pages" look. 

For the script and beetle pattern, I used a plate from the Bundle Monster "House of Horrors" collection that features Edgar Allen Poe:

And my leaves, once again, come from this handy plate:

My polish palette was pretty limited this time:

I have to say I am loving the Wet N Wild "Yo Soy" as a neutral. It did need two coats, but for some reason I have a hard time finding very many neutral colors for a decent price, and the wet n wild line is always a decent price. ;) I stamped with the OPI "Love is Hot and Coal", and I like the way it turned out. 

To check out more fall foliage manis, be sure to follow the links in the link-up below! 

An InLinkz Link-up

Challenge Your Nail Art: Red

Hello Readers!

I created this mani for the Facebook group "Challenge Your Nail Art" October prompt, "red". When I was coming up with the idea in my head, I pictured the red being more dominant, but hey the mani uses red as a main color so I'm saying it counts!

For this mani, I used these polishes:

..as well as several stamping plates. I was excited to try out a couple of plates from new Bundle Monster "House of Horrors" Halloween collection. I used the "Cabinet of Curiosities" plate for the skeleton image, and the one with phrases on it for my phrase:

I also used this classic MoYou London plate from the Holy Shapes collection to stamp in my background triangles:

I used the triangle image with the triangle cutout from this plate exclusively on this mani. I simply put the polish on the top triangle and scraped up so the only thing in my stamper was a smaller triangle image. I overlapped two of these on my pinky finger for the double-point effect. 

My playing card image comes from the MoYou London "Alice in Wonderland" collection:

And there you have it: A Halloween mani that leans more towards the spooky side of things.

Challenge Your Nail Art: Witches

Hello Readers!

Guess what I got in the mail today? Bundle Monster's new Halloween collection, which is super creepy and awesome and perfect for Halloween manis! I bought a bunch of the new blogger collaboration plates a week or so ago when they were having an awesome buy 2 get 1 free sale and I decided to pick up the "House of Horrors" collection as well. Today's prompt for the Challenge Your Nail Art group on Facebook is "Witches".

I loved this witch plate from the collection, so I decided to try to pull a bunch of the images together in a kind of muted color palette. I think the crystal b all and the crystals are my favorites! So much fun. Here is my nail polish spread:

I used the Pure Ice "Shore Bet" for the background color and filled in with the other polishes, stamping with the black. I have found that this particular LA colors black works great for stamping, but not so much for actually painting on your nails. It goes on fine and is nice and opaque, but it is a terrible chipper. 

Here's a look at the nail plate:

I've considered doing a review on the full collection, but with it being so close to Halloween I thought maybe people wouldn't really be interested because if you wanted to buy it, it would be almost too late in the season now.  I did notice a lot of awesome images for Harry Potter manis in this collection, including the phrase "I solemnly swear I am up to no good" on the phrases plate, so if you are into Harry Potter you may want to check it out.