Seriously love this mani. In my quest to recreate pinterest winter manis, I came across this one. I really love gray, white and glitter together. I am a huge fan of mixed media as I like to call it (really it's just mixed patterns and ways of nail art). I used quite a few polishes in this mani but here's the rundown:
Index- Zoya Dove, Middle\little- OPI Alpine Snow, Ring- London. The glitter is OPI Snowflakes in the Air  and I stamped with Essie No Place Like Chrome using the Bundle Monster Holiday plates. I forget where the snowman came from but he's stamped using Milani White On The Spot. Whew, lots of polishes in this mani but it's super cute and I love the Pixie Dust on my thumb and ring finger. Plus, I'm a sucker for a good gray, silver and white mani for the winter.

Winter Challenge: Christmas Traditions- Ornaments!

Winter Nail Art Giveaway! 

Hi Monkeys, today's challenge theme is "Christmas Traditions" so I did tree ornaments! I tried out something new today.. my skills with a dotting tool. My ornament mani didn't quite turn out the way I had in my head but meh, I'll take it. I started with a base of Essie No Place Like Chrome which is an amazing silver foil (also great for stamping). I used Zoya Sookie and Holly with Milani Black swift to dot on ornaments. I made their "hats" a little too big but the idea is really cute! Be sure to go vote on my nail art giveaway to be entered to win prizes!
Check out everyone else's manis after the jump!

Essie: Toggle To The Top & Some winter nail art

Have I mentioned how hard it was to photograph Essie's Toggle To The Top? I haven't? well it is.
Leading Lady and Toggle are similar in idea but Toggle is much deeper.  I did a side by side of the bottles for you but my pictures are of toggle, 3 coats. It's a dark raspberry jelly with this pretty glitter that shines through in red. It seems pretty sparse though, hence the 3 coats so it looked more like a jelly sandwich. I then went all nuts and did some Christmas winter designs over it in white.. My freehand skills are not that great and not that steady.. but Toggle made for a good background.

#33DC - 3 Patterns (Sable Collar and BMh- 11\12)

Today's challenge theme was 3 patterns. I sort of cheated... sort of. I started with 2 coats of Essie Sable Collar which is a deep plum brown shimmer. I then used a gold Milani to stamp over it with Bundle Monster BM-H12 and H11 in three different pumpkin patterns. So ya, I used pumpkin as a pattern. It's fall and almost Thanksgiving so I think it's appropriate :) Be sure to peek at all the non-cheaters manis too!

Winter Nail Art Contest and Giveaway Info!!

Hey Monkeys! I'm hosting a winter nail art contest and a giveaway on the blog. You can participate by submitting nail art or just be a voter, there's 2 winners.. official page HERE when voting begins. In the meantime, submit a mani!

Submit your best winter nail art- it can be freehand, non-freehand, holiday or non-holiday, traditional or not- where ever your creativity takes you! Nail Art entries are due by November 27th, 5pm pacific time (email manicuredmonkey@gmail.com). I'll announce shortly after that when voting will begin (give me a day or so to get photos posted). 

There will be two winners: 1st winner will be the winning nail art participant (will have priority choosing prize).  2nd winner is someone who participated in voting (you can get multiple entries daily to increase your chances). Nail art participants can also vote daily for themselves. Prizes are shown below and I'll have an image with a direct link you can re-pin\tumblr\tweet when voting begins. Let the nail art commence! 

#33DC - Based on a Pattern in Your Wardrobe- Purple Stirpes

There's no doubt that purple is my favorite color- it's everywhere from my wardrobe to my polish drawers. I may have a problem. Today's challenge is supposed to be a pattern from my wardrobe. I have purple a purple striped sweater I really love and while it is not the same tones of this mani, I used it as inspiration. 

 I started off with two coats of Essie Using My Maiden Name which has a great pink shimmer to it and is a very cool toned purple/lavender. Formula on this was fine but I want the shimmer to show more! I taped it off and used Sable Collar (a deeper muddy plum) and then NOPI Aren't Families Grape which is one of those purples that doesn't photograph at all purple but rather blue. It's pretty much a blurple anyways. This mani was not that awesome. I thought it was a good idea than it started to fall apart. I should have used all cremes, no shimmers and stayed of of blurple territory. Oh well. Be sure to check out everyone else's challenge manis!

Essie: Cashmere Bathrobe + BM-H08-- updated

Happy post Halloween everyone! Hopefully you are recovered from all the sugar consumption by now.  This was my mani that I wore for a whopping 3 days before it started chipping. Pretty par for course. I started with two coats of Essie's Cashmere Bathrobe. Love. This. Polish. It's dark gray but has these wonderful little specks in it and almost looks like a dark granite. The formula was excellent. 

Then I gave it the Halloween touch. I used Bundle Monster's H08 plate in bats and the creepy cauldron, then added these great little studs I found to highlight the brew bubbles. I did a top coat of China Glaze Ghoulish Glow over the Essie and I must say, I want to use glow in the dark polishes year round.. why not?! Love seeing it glow.I used Milani Black Swift to stamp with (my go to black to stamp with). Overall, a cute mani and I'd actually stamp a less creepy themed image over Cashmere Bathrobe because the effect is pretty great. 

Halloween: Sugar Skulls!

If you follow me on Tumblr or Pinterest, you have already seen this mani, but... if you haven't, take a look. I was watching Cute Polish on You Tube and she did a sugar skull mani so this was inspired by her tutorial. She is so great with a dotting tool and makes it look easy. This was a bi of a challenge. I used OPI Alpine snow as the base for the skulls and a blue Essie for the base to my stamping with the Fun2 and Cheeky CH50 for the flower images. I used black polish but also black acrylic paint and it got a bit messy at that point. Overall though, it's cute enough and unique enough to draw attention when out and about.

Halloween Challenge: Zombies!

Today's Halloween challenge was zombies so I attempted some freehand for you. I suck at freehand (that's no secret) but I've discovered acrylic paints finally! Acrylic paints make it so much easier to control the consistency of your art, plus if you mess up, you wipe it off with water (do a quick dry top coat over your base before your paint). For this mani I stared with Bettina Mojito and sponged Essie Mojito Madness (total coincidence) then worked my way around doing eyeballs, stitches, a brain and failed blood drops on my little finger :) This was quite fun and I really want to do a patchwork mani now using the acrylic paint colors *puts it on to do list that's forever long*.
check out some of the other amazing girls participating in this challenge!

Goonies Never Say Die

This week in Sunday stamping was metallic madness. I took the opportunity to do a blue manicure to support my favorite MLS team: San Jose Earthquakes! Their colors are blue and black but since I don't have any black metallic polishes, I chose Zoya Song for a base and Essie Blue Rhapsody to stamp with. I stamped Cheeky's CH49 plate which is all pirate themed. The full pirate image on the right is from the pre-production set and the left is the production set. You can see the image is a little bit larger and stamps much more clear (my skulls have eye sockets!).  I have a picture of the pre-production set (black on back) and the production one that's for sale now for $24.99.

 There are a few things I love about the final set: images are clear, plates are larger which means the full nail images are larger, back is nicer (does not come off with acetone). Things I  wish they would have left alone would be the individual images because they made them smaller on the final plates. There are so many great images on these plates: aliens, pirate ships and flags, flowers, etc. I just wish they were the quality of the final plates but size of the pre-production image- make sense? Now, there's nothing wrong with the images and if anything, they are much more clear than the pre-production set I reviewed so a smaller, more clear image is still better than a larger unclear one. I like that Cheeky listened to their fans and incorporated images they wanted to see. In the next set, I'd like to see larger individual images and the images that are in full nail size, scaled down (the stamp size is perfect, just smaller scale of image so there's more image on the nail). If you're looking for a unique first stamping set, these are for sure a front runner: the images alone are unique enough to keep you coming back for more.
You can follow Cheeky on Facebook for pics of fabulous manis and upcoming news (they're awesome at interacting with their fans).
UPDATE: from Cheeky on the size of their images:

1.       We made the small images smaller in order to fit all nail sizes (before they were big and you could fit some of them only to your largest nail). It is actually easier for us to create larger images because we can show more details (cost is the same). Many of our customers actually like the fact that the designs can fit all nail sizes so we think that it is really a matter of taste. In next plates we will try to make both large and small designs.

2.       We think that you readers might want to know that the set comes in a high quality branded box and not a plastic bag and that it includes a nail art license that can be used as a scraper, many customers find that these features are a big added value to the product.

*plates provided for review*

Essie: Mojito Madness + Bikini So Teeny

Summer is all but over which makes me happy because I love Fall/Winter but will miss the bright cheery colors of summer (hello neons!). Essie Bikini so Teeny and Mojito Madness are a duo that could take you into Fall if you're a confident polish wearer. BST is a pale baby blue that's great in two coats and Mojito Madness is a delicious grassy green creme, also perfect in two coats. Lately I've been into doing accent fingers as ring and thumb fingers, sometimes I get carried away and do skittles or reverse the colors on my other hand (which really confuses people when they look at my manicures). Just a simple mani but still cheery and I'd rock this in Fall even though the trend is always deep hues of reds, grays, blues, greens, golds etc. Change it up a bit, if you're confident, people will think you're inventing the trend, not off-trend.

Essie: Nothing Else Matters+ OPI Black Spotted

Quick post for you today, here's Essie's Nothing Else Medals with OPI Black Spotted over it. :)

Essie: Mirrored Metallics- full swatches

I have the full collection swatches of the Essie Mirrored Metallics for you today! I've had these for a while and have been slacking on posting them, so enjoy!

My favorite out of all of these would have to be Nothing Else Metals (go purple!) and Blue Rhapsody because well... they're unique. The formula on these are a bit tricky; either do one thicker smooth coat or do two thinner coats and let them dry between. I also added no top coat on these swatches. I think the top coat dulls the mirrored effect so I'd recommend sandwiching them: base, color, top coat, color. I think that would help with the chipping as well because they do like to chip. Overall though, totally worth it and the collection is out now. By the way, these look amazing as a pedicure and they all stamp like champs :) 

Essie: Mojito Madness + CH52

You have to love Mojito Madness from Essie; it's a soft grassy green that can transition from summer to fall and spring to summer. I used two coats, the formula was great like a normal creme would be. I then stamped using the new Cheeky plates CH52 using Essie Nothing Else Metals from their Mirrored collection.  Check out how great that stamps! I love purple and green but a metallic stamped over a creme is fantastic. Over all was a great mani, even without an accent finger :) 

*plates provided by cheeky*

Essie: Penny Talk + CH54

Today's Stamping Sunday was metals/metallics. I used Essie Penny talk from the new Mirrored collection. It's a faint bronze metallic that is so reflective it looks like liquid metal on your fingers. Given the polish name, it seemed appropriate to stamp dollar signs with the new (hopefully releasing soon) Cheeky plates using the dollar image from CH54. The trick to the Mirrored collection is to use either one thick coat or two thin coats and wait for your first coat to completely dry (if you don't you will get drag and will have to redo your mani).

Essie: Midnight Cami & Essence Blue Addicted

Just a quick swatch today because I'm exhausted lately. I started with two coats Midnight Cami which is a deep blue with a hint of shimmer... silver barely-there shimmer. It was the perfect base for Essence Blue Addicted which is the dupe for Deborah Lippmann's Across The Universe. It sits in a pale blue jelly base with large blue and green hex glitter that mingles with smaller light blue glitter.. it's a favorite of many because the price tag is more pocket friendly than the real thing. Midnight Cami and Blue Addicted, great pair, these two!

few more days for my giveaway, check it out. 

Monkey See Monkey Do Monday: Matte\Glossy Zebra

I've been wanting to do this mani for a while now from Natalie but I changed it up a bit. I started with 2 coats of Milani Black Swift then used Essie Matte About You followed by stamping zebra in the Black Swift again. It's quite the awesome effect in my opinion. It reminds me of embossed velvet. It's quite the easy mani to do and it has a cool look if you want that black manicure, or dark manicure, but want a bit of sateen finish to it a la stamp. I'm big on different textures and this mani hits the spot! Plus it's easy and that's always a huge plus, you don't have to worry about your top coat smearing your stamped image because there is no top coat!

Few days left for the giveaway!!

Stamping Sunday!: Things I Love (CH40)

This week's Adventures in Stamping theme was "something you love". Clearly polish was a no-brainer. I took the opportunity to show you another Cheeky plate preview: CH 40. It is all about beauty and polish.  I messed up my index finger stamping so you get three stamped fingers today, sorry, it's that kinda day. I started off with Essie Trophy Wife; a great blue shimmer with green undertones. I stamped using Milani White on the Spot and the Cheeky CH40 plate. You can see the I <3 polish full image on my middle finger and the polish bottles, hearts and brushes on my ring finger. My little finger got a but smudged (remember these are pre-production plates) but it says "Nail Art" and it has cute hammers and nails. Cheeky has said that the plates will be released in approximately 6ish weeks as they are working on getting them perfect instead of questionable quality. You can follow them on Facebook and see status updates and plate previews.

Random question: Would you be interested in a write up of nail products I use like treatments and files etc?
The Giveaway!!!

*plate set sent for review/preview*

Neon Smilies: BM 304

*sigh* I loved this mani so much! I used three coats of China Glaze Kiwi Cool-ada which is a super lime neon green and then three coats of Essie Bright Tights which is a tangerine neon that is amazing as well. I stamped using Milani black and the new Bundle Monster 304 plate with the happy face images. I also did the colors opposite on my hands to change it up a little, love the way this turned out! I had it on for a few days before it chipped (darn neons!!). Kiwi Cool-ada was streaky and both were over a white base coat but you couldn't see the streaks once I stamped so it was all good. Great summer mani!

Black (matte) & NYX Delectable gradient with CH44

I have been wanting to do a black matte glitter gradient and well, this is what I came up with. I started with Wet N Wild Black Creme, and a random NYX pink glitter that had gold flecks in it then topped it using Essie Matte About You. I took Konad special white and stamped an image from the new Cheeky CH44 plate. I like that the flowers are matte but because they are pre-production plates, the images aren't as clear as they will be, but still it's pretty cool. I like it without the stamping and with so I'm a bit torn, but I do know I'd do a black and glitter gradient matte mani again.