Loot

So this month I decided that I was going to throw caution (and money) into the wind. I bought a BUNCH of new stamping plates (96, to be exact), and I bought $27 worth of stuff at the Dollar Nail Art store (it hasn't shipped yet).

I got the first shipment of stamping plates on the 15th-two days before the first day of estimated arrival.
They were from RedAngel (link here). I was so excited I took The Book to work with me to put them in! (What's that? I haven't told you about The Book? We'll get to it, all in due time.)

Fast-forward to this morning.

I get woken up by my mailman, knocking at my door. He's holding TWO packages for me! One is from amazon, and the other is a little envelope. It has a few things inside (including a belated Christmas present for my mom), but the thing I was waiting for?

This little oddity

What is that, you ask? This makes my mani's like 90% easier on my carpets. NOT that I'm constantly spilling, but I am knocking over my bottles like 85% of the time...

Maybe I shouldn't have used such a transparent color...

This little doodad keeps my polish in place. It's fairly stable, pretty hard to knock down. And it's made of silicone, so it adjusts to the shape of my bottle. It's got a fairly good grip, too. I love it! I got it from SammyDress. The shipping speed isn't great (I bought it around the 11th of December), but it's worth the wait. Mom loved her Christmas present.

In the Amazon box, were three packs of stamps. Gals Fairy set, Gals Princess set, and Mash's 26-50 set. I put them in The Book asap.

Okay there's that thing again, I guess I'd better tell you (even though you might have figured it out already. You're pretty sharp, aren't you?)
I got a binder to organize my plates!

Giant glowy tome. Can you hear the angels singing?

I looked into getting this, but it's just a little out of my price range. This binder was $6 at Walmart. It's one of those old-school scrapbooking binders with the sticky pages to keep the pictures in place, and it does a decent job of its job!

Empty pages

Full pages. 

The biggest downside is that the seal doesn't always hold, and the ones at the bottom tend to fall out. But that's okay. It just means I need to keep a close eye on things.

So I'm really stoked about all these plates. Biggest downside is that now I have so many things I want to do and not enough nails to do them on!

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***Disclaimer: NO companies discussed in this blog have been contacted or have contacted me for review.***

Love Letter Nails

Look! A watermark!! ...Please ignore the black nail polish on my palm...

Hello, ladies and gents! Today is a GREAT day! For nails, anyways! Today I'm going to show you pic-by-pic how to get the newspaper look on your nails! (It's super easy!)

When I started doing these, I couldn't remember how exactly I was supposed to go about doing them. I thought I'd read somewhere that I was supposed to soak the nail for like 5 minutes in the alcohol and then press the newspaper onto my nail. That dissolved my nail polish. So I thought it's gotta be like doing a temporary tattoo, and attempted it that way. It worked!!!

First, paint your nail white (or light grey, if you want it to look like a real newspaper). Let it dry COMPLETELY.

Cut your newspaper down to just larger than your nail. I used the smallest type I could find in my newspaper.

Soak a cotton ball in alcohol, place the newspaper on your nail in the direction you want it, and place the cotton ball over the newspaper. Let it rest for about half a minute.

Gently peel off, and voila! Newspaper print on your nails!  Let it dry for a minute and then GENTLY add a topcoat. I used a very subtle glitter topcoat by Pure ICE.

To finish, I took some stamps (like, the type you use for stationery) I found at Walmart for $1 and stamped L O V and E. (On my right hand, I messed up and stamped it backwards... I was trying to get it to match my left hand which I'd stamped first >.<). Then on my thumbs I drew a heart and outlined it in black to make it stand out a little, added a matte topcoat, and enjoy!

It's been two days, and I'm STILL wearing this mani. I absolutely love it, and it was so simple to do! I hope you like it as much as I do!