31DC - Day 18 - Half Moons

Hi Goddesses

Today's post finally features a New Bohemian polish from China Glaze - hurrah!  I bought them at the same time as the new Zoyas and OPIs, and sadly they've taken a bit of a backseat.

Today we've got Want My Bawdy which is a blurple, heavy on the blue.  To be fair, it's quite "nice", but it doesn't particularly have the wow factor.

I think the New Bohemians have suffered from expectation. When the first photos appeared a few months ago, they were definitely billed as duochromes.  Now that they are released, they are known as Lustre Chromes, probably for no other reason than that there's not a lot of colour bend.  So, if you want a true duochrome, don't look at these, BUT if you want something a little bit more interesting, but not too far out there, these will probably serve you well.

For some reason, in over a year of blogging, this is my first half moon mani.  All you need is some of those paper circles you can buy from stationery shops (that go around hole punch holes) and voila, you're away.

I wanted to do something a little different, but wasn't confident enough to do some of the amazing stamping half moons I've seen, so I did myself a gentle glitter gradient.

This is CG Cheers to You, a brilliant silver.  You can see the sponging was a little heavy on the thumb, but other than that, I really like the effect.

Enjoy xx :)

Monkey See Monkey Do Mondays - Chevrons

Hi Goddesses  

Crikey, Monday rolls around quicker and quicker!  Luckily, today is a Bank Holiday in the UK which means we've had a 3 day weekend - hoorah!  Guess what I'll be spending most of the day doing lol.

So this week I decided to go for chevrons.  They look so cool when Nailside and other bloggers do them.  There isn't really a specific post or photo that inspired me to do this, but the more I see it, the more I realised I needed to man up and master it.

Lol, well I didn't master it, but it's not too bad for a first attempt, AND I know where I went wrong.  It compares to my first tape mani, and I've gotten better at those, so there's hope for Crumpet Chevrons yet!

To the technicals -

* base colour - Deborah Lippmann - Good Girl Gone Bad

* silver =  CG Cheers To You

I think you can see from the photos, that the thumb - the first nail I did - is the crispest. I had read somewhere that you could keep reusing the same tape to maintain the same  angles, and THAT is where I went wrong.   As we go round the hand, each nail gets progressively worse - the crispness disappears and I ended up with a few wobbles.

So what do you do when it goes wrong?  Well, I decided to colour mine in!   I picked a flat wide brush and basically corrected the lines with it.  It helped, but it's still not perfect - you might be able to see in this photo here.

So, to be fair, it was ok, but then I wondered, "what would happen if I hid things with some glitter" .... and that, my goddesses, leads us to pure magic.

Look at all that sparkle!  Look, look!

In some ways it detracts from the crispness of the chevrons, but in other ways - wow, doesn't it look awesome on top of all that dark berry juiciness ?

So what is this miracle and magical glitter?  Well, I'm keeping it a secret, but only for a couple of days.  It's Independents Week again on The Crumpet, and I'm going to be raving about this polish later in the week.  Suffice to say, I love it SO much I've already been back to buy another bottle :)

Don't forget to check out the other MSMD Monkeys :)   Enjoy xx :)

Missy @ Gnarly Gnails - http://gnarlygnails.blogspot.com

Melissa - http://www.misadventuresofawannabemartha.com/

Laurie - http://dressedupdigits.blogspot.com/

Layka- http://www.kawaiinize.es

Elizabeth http://nailpolishismycrack.blogspot.com/

Kristin http://www.manicuredmonkey.com

Erin http://erinsbeautybumbles.blogspot.com

Nayade at Toxic Vanity - http://www.toxicvanity.com

Jenn at Polish Crazed http://www.polishcrazed.blogspot.ca/

Jen http://jenspaintedtips.blogspot.com/

Amber www.amberdidit.com

Cristina http://theclockwisenailpolish.blogspot.pt/

Kirsten - http://geekyowl.blogspot.com/

Alyssa at Fancy Phalanges - http://fancyphalanges.blogspot.com/

Ashley http://followtheyellowpolishroad.blogspot.com/

Amber http://nevernakednails.blogspot.com

Emily Esqueleta: http://macabremanicures.blogspot.com/

Purple Crumpet Fairy Challenge - Your Favourite Piece of Jewellery

Hi Goddesses

I am sorry to be late posting this, but last night, the flu finally caught up with me and I was in bed by 8pm.  I honestly didn't think I'd be getting up at all today, but as long as I'm not standing, I seem to be ok lol.

This week's PCFC was chosen by the lovely Joy - do a mani based on your favourite piece of jewellery.  Most of my jewellery is silver, and I had 2 manis in mind.  The first was to do dotted layers of silver to mimic the layers of the silver beaded bracelets I like to wear, and the other was to do a mani based on my very favourite piece of jewellery - a necklace.  I thought the bracelets would turn out better, but whaddya know, its actually the necklace, my true favourite, that turned out ok!

I bought this off ebay (of course) - it's a Links of London silver necklace, about a metre in length, that can be worn anyway you want it.  It has a horseshoe link that fastens onto any of the hoops in the design, so you can wear the necklace in one loop, 2 or a mixed pattern. I absolutely ADORE this necklace.  It really defines me.  I love the bubble pattern and the dangliness of it; I love that I bought a £600 necklace for less than £100; and I love that it is something I am not - delicate lol.  However, that has lead to 3 breakages where it had to be soldered back together - Crumpet has now learnt not to wear it in bed or get it tangled in buttons lol.

For my base I used OPI Ogre The Top Blue, and my trusty silver was, as always, CG Cheers To You.  I used a fairly thin dotting tool, because as we know, I am useless with brushes.

I actually think I have captured the design quite well, if maybe a little indelicately.  And it's a sign of how obsessed I am becoming that I look at my nails and go "ooooh, that would be a cool stamping pattern" lol.

I'm going to see if I can make the bracelets look better in the morning, but it's highly doubtful lol.  In the meantime, enjoy xxxx :)

Day 26 - Letting It All Hang Out - We're Shattered!

PURPLE CRUMPET FAIRY CHALLENGE – The 31 Days of Christmas

Day 26 – Letting It All Hang Out

Hi Goddesses

Day 26 is about having an easy mani, a no effort, lounging around on the sofa and feeling like a beached whale mani, and this couldn’t be simpler.

I’d had this idea for a while, but kept it for Christmas.

I want to show you this in 2 stages, because I really do feel the initial stage is worthy of its own praise. 

This is 4 fingers of OPI Vodka and Caviar, the perfect red, and an accent nail of CG Cheers To You silver.  I just love the simplicity of this, love it. I also love (and I can’t believe I am about to say this) the clash of the matte silver with the glossy red – somehow the matteness makes it even better!  How is that possible!

So this for me was a real winner, but it wasn’t the look I was after.  I wanted to shatter them, so used my OPI Red Shatter on the silver nail (I had forgotten how jellyish the OPI was) and my CG Platinum Pieces on the red nails (I had forgotten how sheer this was).

Love!

I haven’t used my silver shatter that much, and lay the blame at OPI’s door for linking it so closely to the Pirates pastels.  Personally, I think  OPI got it wrong, and silver shatter should only be used over strong, bold colours that can take it, but still fight for their own beauty.

Put silver shatter on a pastel and in my eyes it looks naff, put it on a dark or a bright colour and, for me, you get WOW.

Because I am a dumbass, I had a little bit of trouble, especially when I used the red, so remember preciouses, if you haven’t used your shatter for ages, give it a BLOODY good shake.  The red sort of separated with a very thin liquid on the top, so I had to do it twice.

Ho hum, Crumpet continually lives and learns – have a fab chillaxing day xxx

Enjoy xx J

J

Top Tip – if you’re ever unsure what a nail colour looks like, go to Google images, which will give you plenty of contrasts and compares.

Purple Crumpet Fairy Christmas Challenge - Snow Globe

PURPLE CRUMPET FAIRY CHALLENGE – The 31 Days of Christmas

Day 3 - Snow Globe

Hi Goddesses

Well I feel like I have started with 2 MAMMOTH fails in the Purple Crumpet Fairy 31 Days of Christmas Challenge.  They required art work that was beyond my ability, and I have been pooping myself about my Snow Globe.

I did seriously contemplate copping out and just doing a skittle of wintry colours, all layered with CG Snow Globe, but NO, Crumpet riseth to the challenge!  So instead I spent half an hour wandering around the house trying to find a circular shape that would be just the right size for a snow globe.  Obviously, everything was just a little too big or a little to small – aaarrgghh!

Overview – this features 5 nails, 4 of which feature the same snowglobe, taken from different perspectives.  The thumb has the whole, the index finger the top half, the middle the bottom half and the pinkie a super zoomed-in version of the top half.  All the nails have had 2 coats of CG Sea Spray which is not only beautiful but PERFECT for winter manis, and the accent nail has 1 simple layer of CG Snowglobe.

Each nail features the same snowglobe – a ickle Cwismas twee J  I wanted to do something clean and simple and Christmas tree came up a lot for Google images.  The alternative was a snowman, but as I did that yesterday AND there’s a snowman day coming up … well, not an option.

Colours used –

·         Tree = CG Starboard

·         Outer rim of globe = SH White On

·         Base of globe = Barry M Gold

·         Silver tinsel, star and baubles = CG Cheers to You, a really fabulous metallic silver

·         Purple baubles = Milani 1 coat glitter in Purple Gleam

·         Tree trunk = Orly Instant Artist in Chocolate

·         Snow = Nubar White Polka Dot

Phew – for me, that constitutes MASSIVE planning and consideration lol!  I hope this “art” was tolerable for you J

BTW, if you're wondering why some photos are pre-clean up and pre Nubar, it's because Crumpet has learnt that disasters are ALWAYS around the corner, so I took some halfway-through photos *just in case*  :) 

It’s not too late to join us – just click here and do as many or as few days as you want – no pressure, just fun J

Enjoy xx J

J

Top Tip – if you’re ever unsure what a nail colour looks like, go to Google images, which will give you plenty of contrasts and compares.