Konad m83: Konad Returns

Good morning, Dear Reader!

As I hunted down some supplies to add a bit of Konad to OPI Big Hair... Big Nails, I realized that this has probably been the longest stretch that I've gone without stamping since I first tried it out, and for no good reason!  I'm glad a stop has been put to that bleak period.

I settled on Konad plate m83, using a full nail pattern with Konad White Pearl Special Polish.  I thought I'd done a really good job and I like how it looks, but as I went through pictures I discovered that I made tiny smudges over all the stamping in applying the top coat.  The good news is that it doesn't look smudged at all in real life, the bad news is that you're sitting at home looking at a picture I took, not standing here looking at the manicure in person, so I have no way to show you how it really looks.  The best I can do is say that it looks like the picture only without smudges.

Konad m83 in White Pearl over OPI Big Hair... Big Nails

I like it quite a bit, but anything I use this particular pattern for will simply be a substitute for the manicure I want to use it for until I finally get the one I picture out of my head.  My mom had some flamboyant taste in home decor in the '70's and '80's, and if I were to double-stamp this pattern on very long nails in gold over a burgundy base, it would really look a lot like the early '80's dining room wall paper I associate with that.  For some reason, that makes me really want to do it, even though double-stamping this pattern seems like it would be a bear.  For now, white on orange on short nails is the best I can do, so I'm enjoying it just the same.

My coffee is now ready and waiting for me, and the details of this manicure are just about all I know with certainty at this hour without any coffee running through my veins, so I should wrap it up here and get started on caffeinating myself.  Until next time, Dear Reader, love and nail polish to you!

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Posted in Konad , Nail Art , nail polish , OPI , OPI Texas Collection , Orange

OPI Big Hair... Big Nails

Good morning, Dear Reader!

Today I thought I'd take advantage of shorter nails and use OPI Big Hair... Big Nails.  It's one of the jelly polishes (or "sorbet" if OPI is paying you) from the Texas Collection, kind of a reddish orange.  The name of this one tickles me because I have big red hair and usually have some pretty big nails, so it seemed entertainingly fitting.  I don't have any sense of whether the stereotypical Texan big blonde hairsprayed crowd finds humor in their huge hair and nails, but somehow the name is even funnier to me if they don't.

I didn't get any of the OPI Texas jellies until I'd been assured that they don't require a zillion coats and the VNL isn't too bad, and I found those things to be true as well.  I used three coats of Big Hair... Big Nails, and that's given me even and almost opaque coverage.  With a short free edge, the remaining hint of VNL doesn't creep me out, so I like how it looks.  When I sat down to change my polish, I'd planned on using white Konad of some sort on this, but was surprised that I like it well enough on its own that I'd prefer to wear it plain for a while before adding to it.

OPI Big Hair... Big Nails Nail Polish, Two Coats in Artificial Light

Using nail polish again this week after having gotten accustomed to the soak off gel, I really have no idea which I'll end up sticking with.  At this point, having done some damage to my nails that I have to grow out that's unrelated to either polish or gel, they're so little that they hardly need the protection of gel, and I'm not too enthusiastic at the prospect of the additional application time of gel.  I wouldn't use it right now anyhow because as you can see, my application skills are much weaker with shorter nails and I think gel would take me an eternity to get right, so for now, I think I'm going with polish.

That's the update for today, Dear Reader.  Until next time, love and nail polish to you!  

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Posted in Jelly , nail polish , OPI , OPI Texas Collection , Orange

Misa Shake It to the Samba

Good morning, Dear Reader!

I woke up hungry this morning, and you know what I really wanted?

Cantaloupe!

I like to have it for breakfast with cottage cheese in the middle, but I couldn't find any decent pictures like that - they all had gross things added, like a ton of brown sugar (brown sugar's not bad in general, but on this...).  I just did the manicure like plain cantaloupe anyhow because the lack of pictures the way I like it kind of indicates that mine is not a universal preference.

I did this manicure in the ruffian style on all ten nails, having built a bit of confidence with that technique yesterday.  For the outer rind I used OPI San Tan-tonio and for the green I used OPI Don't Mess with OPI, both from the OPI Texas Collection.  I don't really count them in this manicure since you can't get a good look at them.  I really just wanted to see how opaque the OPI's are, and they're more pigmented than most recent OPI collections have been.  I used one coat of each, and they were opaque enough close to the cuticle that no more was needed.  It looks like either would need two coats for a regular manicure, but we'll find that out for sure soon.  To complete my cantaloupe nails, I used two coats of Misa Shake It to the Samba.

Misa Shake It to the Samba Cantaloupe Manicure

I like it but for the fact that the tan section blends in with my skin so well - it shows up in the picture alright, but is really hard to see in person.  I don't think I could have done better though - the tan is about as dark as I could go for the rind color, I'm just kind of pale to wear this one as well as someone else could.  Looking at it, I think this would work much better against dark brown skin, where the tan would show well and the cantaloupe color would really pop.  But I'm stuck with zero pigment in my skin and I don't expect that to change today, so I'll just have to wear it as well as I can.

I don't have any fabulous stories starring the cantaloupe.  I did grow some gorgeous ones in that garden I told you about yesterday, but harvesting them was a little anticlimactic after several months of answering the daily whine of "When can we pick some cantaloupe?" from my then-stepson.  It would have been cute had he been eight, but he was nineteen, and his use of the word "we" followed by any verb generally meant "you," so that sort of sucked the fun out of it over time.  Ahhh, fond memories...

That's today's Produce I Wish I Had manicure, and just about all I know at this hour.  I'm still hungry, but have come to acceptance of the fact that cantaloupe and cottage cheese isn't in the cards for me this morning, so I'll go find something else.  Until tomorrow, Dear Reader, love and nail polish to you!  

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Posted in Long Nails , Misa , Nail Art , nail polish , OPI , OPI Texas Collection , Peach