Subtle Pink Gradient with Stamping

I decided to play with my mani from last night. I did a sponge gradient and because it's been awhile totally failed at take pics of what it looked like before the stamping. Sorry. Anyway, since I used Sinful Colors Cotton Candy for my mani yesterday, I decided to do my gradient with Cotton Candy and her sister, Sugar N Spice. It only took two rounds of sponging to achieve the look I was going for.

I said the other day (Wednesday?) that I missed stamping so I went through my stamping plate collection and found a design I liked and hadn't used before. I used the large swirly design from m51 Konad plate and stamped with Color Club Miss Bliss, an awesome pink holographic polish.

On a side note, now that school is over for the semester, I finally have some time to wade through the 2 TB of data I recovered from my destroyed PC a few months ago. I hope to be able to recover a couple of reviews I was working on, a handful of posts,  and a ton of pictures including the photos from my nail art contest. Thanks to all of you for sticking around through the random & scant posts and failed PC.

Much Love, The Dragon Lady

Pink Wednesday: Wet n Wild Tickled Pink and Sinful Colors Glass Pink

I decided to go with a pastel look for today's Pink Wednesday being how it's Spring and all. I Just picked up Wet n Wild Tickled Pink for $0.69 at my local Walgreen's this morning. I used three coats of Tickled Pink over one coat of Barielle Growth Activator. The formula was on the thickish side and left horrible streaks and drag marks, hence the 3 coats. It all took forever to dry even after I topped it with a coat of Seche Vite. It probably also didn't help that the brush was all wonky too.

I decided it was ok but kind of bland so I added one coat of Sinful Colors Glass Pink which gave this mani a lovely glass fleck finish.

Still though it needed something so I added a glitter gradient using some loose, iridescent, light pink, bar glitter. I topped this with two more coats of Seche Vite to help smooth it out. Notice I skipped doing this on my accent nail...I had other plans for that nail.

I realized it has been a while since I stamped skulls on a mani, figured it was overdue. I used plate OB5 and Konad Special Polish in white. Then added one of my newly acquired rhinestone bows in light pink to match. Then topped it with another coat of Seche Vite. I really like the effect of a creme stamp over the glass fleck finish. I think I will have to repeat this with other colors that aren't so close.

Accent nail macro

Much Love, The Dragon Lady

Final Review: SHANY Image Plates

Once again, I purchased these myself a few months ago and I have used a few of the images in some stamping, but I figured it was time for an all out review of all 25 plates. I bought my SHANY plates from Amazon.com here.

My final take on the SHANY image plate set, a total of 181 images from 25 plates – four of these being repeats. I have to say that the four repeated images kind of ticked me off. They couldn't make four more different images? Really? I expect the occasionally duped image among different brands of image plates but this is my first experience with dupe images in one set from the same brand. Other than that, I was happy with how most of the images came out and how easy most of them were to pick up. Most of the image were pretty crisp as well. The images themselves seemed to be deep enough that I didn't experience that “insta-dry” problem as with some other plates. It is very frustrating to scrape an image and discover it dried before you could even pick it up. Happily that wasn't the case here! I tested these plates with Konad special polish in black and also China Glaze Joy. They stamped well with both.

I was even shocked at how well some of the more detailed images came out! I would look at an image, like the last image on SH25, full nail spider webs and think, “No way! This is only going to be a partial pick up or stamp.” Then imagine my surprise when I got every single little web line. Awesome sauce!!!

I definitely think I’ll be using these plates more now that I have tested all 181 and only had issues with maybe 3, and that was fixed with a simple change of scraping direction. I have no qualms about buying a set down the road for a giveaway now. But you probably want to see some images stamped on nails, right?

Here you go, I embellished my Pink Wednesday mani with scroll work (SH03) using China Glaze Admire and then again with the scroll work butterflies (SH24 & SH12) using Konad stamping polish in black. I am loving this!

Don't forget to enter my current giveaway here! It ends at midnight on 4/1 so hurry!

Much Love, The Dragon Lady

Review: SHANY Image Plates – Part 5

Again I am not a 100% sure of what some of these designs are on these plates but all the images below are shown one the first stamp (no test stamping) in Konad Special Polish in Black onto white 3x5 index cards, until SH23 when I realized I was running out of my Konad black polish and switched to China Glaze Joy.

Plate SH21:

Scalloped lace strip, scalloped lace bow strip, flower whole nail design (same as SH20), flower whole nail design, whole nail design, butterflies (same as SH13)

Plate SH22:

Tip design, whole nail design, circle/oval whole nail design, grape? whole nail design, abstract triangle whole nail design

Plate SH23:

Crosses curved stripe tip design, dots whole nail design, whole nail design, stripes whole nail design, bubbles? whole nail design

Plate SH24:

Star-shaped flowers, scroll work butterfly, scroll work design, feather, flowers, heart/scrolls (ivy leaves)

Plate SH25:

Fancy tip design, whole nail design, flower whole nail design, cheetah print whole nail design, spider webs & spiders whole nail design

Much Love, The Dragon Lady

Review: SHANY Image Plates – Part 4

Again I am not a 100% sure of what some of these designs are on these plates but all the images below are shown one the first stamp (no test stamping) in Konad Special Polish in Black onto white 3x5 index cards.

Plate SH16:

Flower, eye, flower?, flower, flowers, flowers, squares

Plate SH17:

Flowers (same as SH13), leaves, star design, hearts, flowers, hummingbird, snowflake

Plate SH18:

Flower (similar style to one on SH16), flowers, flower, tribal? Design, flowers, flowers, flower whole nail design

Plate SH19:

Music note, lips, kite, fish, palm tree, wave design, strawberry

Plate SH20:

Heart nail tip design, whole nail design, flower whole nail design, flower whole nail design, flower whole nail design

Next up the last five plates from this set, SH21-25…Much Love, The Dragon Lady

Review: SHANY Image Plates – Part 3

Again I am not a 100% sure of what some of these designs are on these plates but all the images below are shown one the first stamp (no test stamping) in Konad Special Polish in Black onto white 3x5 index cards.

Plate SH11:

Scroll waves?, flower, flower, flower, paw prints, tribal scroll design, striped heart design

Plate SH12:

Flowers, happy face, heart/clover design, ladybug, stars, flowers, butterfly

Plate SH13:

Dot design (firework burst?), butterflies, flowers, deer (reindeer), gecko, stars (same as SH12), star (flower?)

Plate SH14:

Zodiac symbols x 12 (in stamping order: Taurus, Aries, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, Sagittarius, Scorpio, Libra, Virgo, Leo, Cancer, Gemini), pirate skull with swords

Plate SH15:

Tribal double heart design, leaves, scroll work cross, scroll design, tribal design, flowers, tribal-ish heart design

Next up SH16-20…Much Love, The Dragon Lady