26 Great Nail Art Ideas - Love, but no pink or red

This week's prompt was Love, but no red or pink so I have gone with blue, green and grey.
I started with a base of a new thermal, 'Ard As Nails Umbrella which is a medium denim blue when cool and pale grey when warm.
I stamped my favourite image from Dixie Plates Love 2018 - the patchwork heart image with Esmaltes da Kelly Frogger.
The stamping was a bit too subtle over the blue phase, I can see it but not very clear for the camera. It was much clearer in the warm, pale grey, phase.
It's very cold here so I had to sit waiting anxiously for my hands to warm up before it got too dark to take photos, oh the dilemmas of a nail painting woman!
In the end I could not get a pure warm state photo, even the next day when it was a bit warmer but you get the idea, I hope!

Dixie Plate Love 2018

 

 

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26 Great Nail Art Ideas - Autumn

This weeks prompt was Autumn. I do love Autumn - despite not liking yellow or orange I love a good autumn leaves mani!
I was already wearing a dark red base, with some subtle red stamping so I went straight on top of that. I wasn't entirely sure how many layers I was going to do but I just kept going until I was happy with what I had done.
I used UberChic Lovely Leaves and started with Esmaltes da Kelly Bee. It's not a yellow I particularly like but it always seems to work well in an autumn mani.
Then I used Colour Alike Scary Pumpkin with the same plate. I do love this polish despite its annoying shimmeriness which makes clean up impossible!
Finally I added Esmaltes da Kelly Frogger, with two different images from the same plate again.

Uber Chic Lovely Leaves

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December Challenges - Christmas Candy

The challenge for #clairestelle8dec was Christmas Candy.
I didn't have any plates with the traditional candy canes on so I used UberChic UC3-03 and Hit the Bottle Snowed Under over Fancy Gloss Eternal Love.

Fancy Gloss Eternal Love is a dusky red with bright red shimmer. Application was bit patchy and I could have done with three coats but it it is a lovely red.
Although Hit the Bottle Snowed Under normally stamps well I think the polish spread a bit too thin here and I didn't really get a good red/white contrast. I do have a problem sometimes with these image where there are large blocks of stamped colour. I probabaly should have tried again with another white, although the HTB is usually the best!
To add to my pre-Christmas woes, the light was poor so the picture aren't good either.
In defiance I added some green stamping using Uberchic Christmas 01 and Esmaltes da Kelly Frogger. I think the end result was sort of ugly but cool! It was just one of those days!

Fancy Gloss Eternal Love

 

 

UberChic UC3-03

 

 

Uber Chic Christmas 01 

November Challenges - A birthday collage

Lovely Mary @dreamymm invited me to join a group creating a birthday collage for another wonderful IG friend @sharnailstar. We all had to recreate one of Sharon's manis.
Looking through Sharon's IG page it was a difficult choice as Sharon does such lovely manis but this green one really stuck in my mind, and I bought Esmaltes da Kelly Frogger and Bruce after seeing this particular mani. I also used the same plates as Sharon Uber Chic UC 2-03 and 4-01 but despite having a millon greens I couldn't match the base, mine is a lot darker - Barry M Black Pistachio.
I am still loving the Barry M Black Gellies, just the cherry one to try now. Despite being too dark for the recreation I did, Pistachio is a lovely colour.

Barry M Black Pistachio

 

Uber Chic 2-03 and 4-01

 

Sharon's original mani

The birthday collage - pulled together by dreamyMM

October Challenges - Harvest and Thanksgiving

I have combined two prompts as there seemed to be such an overlap - when I looked for images of Canadian Thanksgiving I figured that if Thanksgiving was for a successful harvest then I could combine the two.
I started with a nice harvesty colour, Nails Inc Hamstead Gardens, which I think I love as long as I am wearing the right colours and my hands are warm!
Then I added some wheaty stamping with SV By Sparkly Vernis Gilded Lemon Drops & Born Pretty BP-L 003.
Then more wheat, or barley or some such harvestable crop with Born Pretty BP-19 and Esmaltes da Kelly Bee and Frogger, smooshed together on the stamping plate.
I am British so the concept of Thanksgiving is a bit of an unknown and until my husband put me right I didn't realise Canadian Thanksgiving was earlier than the American one! Now I know.
Anyway, it seemed a maple leaf was a must and maybe a pumpkin so I used Colour Alike Red Wine and Born Pretty BP-19 and Colour Alike Scary Pumpkin & Cici&sisi 10 to add some maple leaves and pumpkins to the harvest.

Nails Inc Hampstead Gardens

SV By Sparkly Vernis Gilded Lemon Drops &
Born Pretty BP-L 003

Born Pretty BP-19 and Esmaltes da Kelly Bee and Frogger

Colour Alike Red Wine and BP 19 and
Colour Alike Scary Pumpkin & Cici&sisi 10

 

An InLinkz Link-up

An InLinkz Link-up

October Challenges - Quilted

The prompt for #30daysofcolourchallenge was Quilted. I was wondering what to do for this whilst making the bed one day last week and realised that I have a stamping plate with same image as the stitching on my pretty floral throwover, so that's how this design came about.
I had to try out my lovely new Sascha Gossen plates from Nail Artisan so I started with a leafy base using Esmaltes da Kelly Frogger and Yours Cosmetics Sascha Gossen YS06 over Jacava Kings Road.
Then, on a whim really, I decided to try stamping with OPI Skyfall as I had dug it out to use later. I was pleasantly surprised how well it stamped and I used it with YS06 to add flowers over the leafy base.
Then I added the quilty bit with Barry M Cotton and Born Pretty BP-L 003.
Finally I added a coat of OPI Matte top coat.

Esmaltes da Kelly Frogger and YS06

OPI Skyfall and YS06

Barry M Cotton and Born Pretty BP-L 003

Barry M Cotton and Born Pretty BP-L 003 - matte

 

An InLinkz Link-up