Purple Crumpet Spring Challenge - Day 18, Lambs

Baa!

Ever count sheep when you can't sleep? I have to admit I don't, but that's probably because I don't usually have any problems in the sleep department! Head hits the pillow and I'm gone. But I thought it would be fun if my nails did! I used China Glaze Sky Scraper as the base, Barry M Spring Green for the grass, 17 Moon Dust for the fences, and generic black and white for the lambs.

Sorry about the lack of cleanup - it was fun but I didn't keep it on for long!

I'll leave you with my favourite lamb!

Hx

Pin It

NOTD - Magnetic lurve

*LeGasp* a NOTD that's not part of a challenge! I have quite a few magnetic polishes now, but they all have the same wavy magnet. So I was placing a Born Pretty order and slipped a pink magnetic polish into my order. It came with a little magnet on a stick, with diagonal lines across it, which I was worried about using since I'm used to having the little "lip" to rest on my finger, but actually it was fine. And the magnet is strong! I find with my other magnets you have to hold it there a long time or the pattern kind of "slips" back into the polish, but with this the pattern jumped onto the nail immediately and stayed there. Fab. You can order Born Pretty magnetics here - don't be put off by the crackle pattern on the lid! I thought they'd sent me the wrong thing at first! I also got this Claires magnetic polish from my birthday club friend Alyssa B and decided to do an accent nail with it. It's really shimmery, almost glittery and I love it! It has a diagonal pattern magnet on the lid too, but spaced further apart than the BP one, so I used the BP magnet.

I LOVE these polishes! How shimmery is the silver! If all the Claires magnetics are like this I want MOAR! And how pretty is the BP one? So elegant. And it's called Blushingham Palace - how cute! I didn't wear top coat because it was a quickie mani, but I really didn't need it. Both polishes faired well and lasted a day of intensive laundry folding, dish washing and sock pairing - which usually kills polish within seconds - with just a little tipwear. Can't say fairer than that.

Hx

Pin It

Purple Crumpet Spring Challenge - Day 17, Bulb to a flower

I really had no idea what to do for this challenge. The only thing I could think of was to draw a bulb growing to a flower over 4 nails, like drawing a life cycle at school (hands up if you did that!) and while I'm sure some of the ladies on the challenge would rock it, I knew if I tried it would suck. So I came up with something different and love it :)

I started with 2 coats of Color Club Rebel Spirit, a dark, marmitey brown. Super shiny and lickable! Worryingly streaky on the first coat, but the second made it perfect.

Then I stamped with Color Club Perfect Mol-ten and the rooty, leafy pattern from fauxnad M64. I took a chance with Born Pretty again for this plate, and they must've upped their game because it's perfect.

The flower part comes from a dried flower, which I added to the tips of my ring fingers as an accent. I used lots of topcoat here! Because the background was so dark the flowers didn't show up that well and looked kinda brown, so I used Color Club Hot Like Lava and dabbed with an almost dry brush to bring them out a little bit.

I liked this manicure, after I thought I'd hate it, so that was a bonus! I got lots of compliments on it actually. I think dark creme bases with metallic stamping is really eye catching. Think I may have to invest in more foils for stamping....if I ever get off this damn no-buy!

Hx

Pin It

Adventures in stamping - circles

Hi guys,

First off, a sob story. The only luck we seem to be having at the moment is bad luck - things are just not good here! Mr NN was made redundant a few weeks after christmas and money has been very tight around here. We had to buy a new car, tyres for new car and have generally had a lot of expenses to pay, which is why I'm on a no-buy indefinitely. Now, last night, literally within hours of each other, the car broke down (3 whole weeks after we got it) and my laptop died. It has been on the cards for a while, but now I think it's beyond repair. So the long and short of it is, I wont be getting a new one any time soon and will only be able to blog from a useless old netbook that only starts in safemode and whose a, s, w, and z keys dont work. I cant upload  photos directly to it either. I think I've worked out a way round this, but they wont be great quality or cropped and watermarked like usual. Please someone send me some luck! To top it all I've woken up with a bug this morning and I feel like death. Urgh.
*EDIT* Mr NN tinkered with the laptop (ie took it apart and put it back together again) and it seems to be working...please pray to WEYBI that it doesn't die again!x


Anyway, onto the nails. At least my manicure is making me happy! This eeks stamping theme was circles, and when I was going through my plates and saw the peace sign on BM07 I couldn't resist. First I painted my nails with 2 coats of white, then added stripes in neon pink, orange, yellow & blue from my Orly Hot Shots minis. Then I added topcoat & another layer of white. Now this is the good part! I used a cotton bud dipped in polish remover and sort of rolled it around my nails to take off some of the top layer of white and give it a tye dyed look. Another layer of topcoat, then I stamped the peace sign using Barry M Silver Foil. I thought it was going to be a whole heap of fail, but it isn't! I even got most of the stamps centred!

I'll leave it there because writing with the onscreen keyboard is slow and painful. And if any one knows of any cheap (aka free) laptops going, let me know...

Hx

Pin It

Purple Crumpet Spring Challenge - Day 16, Spring Gradient

For today's Spring gradient I tried a ne technique, and surprisingly it didn't go wrong! I don't think I'm very good at sponging, and I wanted to use pinks which I have done a sponged gradient with fairly recently. I saw these spun sugar nails at Neverland Nail Blog and inspiration struck! It's really simple to do - just blob some polish out onto paper like you were going to dot with it (I use foil because the polish doesn't absorb into it), leave it to start to dry a little, mixing it with a dotting tool until those annoying strings start to form, then wrap them around your nails. It's not as messy as you'd think! Although it was quite awkward doing my right hand and I put my finger in the polish more than once... I used a bade of Collection 2000 French White (2 coats) then used Barry M Strawberry Ice Cream, Models Own Pink Blush and Barry M Shocking Pink for the gradient. You'll need a good thick topcoat afterwards.

You can see on the first two finger I hadn't let the polish go "stringy" enough before I started, so it went kind of blobby, but in person it didn't matter too much. Definitely going to do these again!

What do you think?

Now, I got super excited the other day when I realised it's almost my blogaversary! At the end of the month I will have been blogging for a whole year *LeGasp* I was planning an international giveaway for when I hit 300 followers, and it would be amazeballs if I could combine it with a blogaversary giveaway! So, tell you friends or something :) 20 followers by 23rd March, can it be done?

Hx

Pin It

Purple Crumpet Fairy Challenge - Day 15, Mr Blue Sky

Hello there!

For today's mani I decided to follow a tutorial by Jane at Nailside. I wanted to try her freehand cloud design for a while, and thought China Glaze Aquadelic and First Mate and Barry M Silver Foil would look great - and fit the bill for Mr Blue Sky! Fortuitous! I started with a base of Aquadelic, then the fist cloud is in Silver Foil and lastly First Mate on most nails apart from the ring and thumb, which I started with First Mate, then Aquadelic, then Silver Foil. LOVE the result. Simple, classy, endless possibilities and did I say simple? Think this is going to become a nail art go-to.

Favourite nail art ever? I think so!

Hx

Pin It

Goodbye GFC...

As my blog is hosted by Blogger, I didn't think I'd be much affected by the removal of GFC (Google Friend Connect) on March 1st - I wouldn't lose any followers at least (although I did add other ways to follow my blog into the sidebar just in case, if you're interested!) But I was affected, even though my blog wasn't. All of the blogs that don't use blogger as their hosting platform which I follow have vanished from my Blogger dashboard. Since this is the main way I read blogs I simply wasn't aware of new blog posts by some of  my favourite bloggers. And those bloggers have lost a lot of their readership.  So on behalf of all non-blogger blogs who have suffered the consequences of Google’s termination of service I am reposting this from the lovely Lipglossiping and Liloo/Tsunimee.

http://twitter.com/lipglossiping/goodbye-gfc/members

I am posting this today, exactly a week since Google withdrew GFC from non-Blogger blogs to spread the word! If you are a blogger whose blog has been affected by the loss of GFC, please get in touch with @lipglossiping on Twitter and she'll add you to the list. And even if you haven't been affected, check out the list and make sure you follow your favourite blogs in another way. I like to follow by email - blog posts directly to my inbox!

You can help by spreading the word too! Grab the image above and write a post about it!

Pin It