Sweet Baby Octopolish!

It's the height of summer dragonfly season, and I've been seeing so many beautiful jewels flying around that I was absolutely inspired to bring some with me everywhere I go. On my "jelly donut mani" base of 1 coat Fancy Gloss Got Milk + 1 coat Ethereal White Smoke, I've stamped several different dragonfly images from KADS Flower 015 and any other plate I found with a realistic looking design.  I then filled in the dragonfly bodies were with various holos, some as leadlighting and some as reverse-stamping... but then promptly could not get a bright sunlight photo to show off the sparkle.   I totally loved this look, wearing it for a whole week.  Hope you get out to enjoy some summer sunshine while it lasts! ~Michelle 

 Our most recent book club pick was Barbarian Days, by William Finnegan, a memoir about surfing and life.  Though the subject didn't appeal to me at first (neither nonfiction in general nor autobiographies in specific are my cuppa), the book is genuinely fantastic, and I wanted to pull out the stops for our meet-up.  And it occurred to me I had a plate for that... outdoor, bright daylight for both I've started here with 2 coats of Fancy Gloss Lace, a soft pink that she sells as a "sheer" and we can certainly debate whether this is jelly vs crelly.  In any case, you'd need perhaps 4 coats for opacity, which is not actually what it's for IMO.  This polish is absolutely the best ever "my nails but better" shade at just a couple coats.  The sheerness keeps it neutral to the point I think it'd provide an utterly perfect clean nail art base on any skin tone. KADS Nature 011 is a square plate with 4 images of waves crashing in 3 layers, which means you ...

Well, my alternating vampy and ethereal nail looks theme was going to get derailed at some point, and what finally did it was an amazing trip this week to the Jersey Shore to see Harlequin Ducks. indoor, bright CF lighting Harlequin Ducks are utterly striking creatures that look like they were done as a graphic designer's masters project.  There's patches of midnight navy, stormcloud blue, and cinnabar, flashed with snips of black and white, all in bold patterns across the whole bird's body.   I've picked out a few of these dramatically graphic designs to make this look - the dot on the side of the head, the layered V of the back of the head, the black & white bar across the shoulder, and the big cinnabar patch on the side.  I picked all crème colors since the design is flashy enough without added sparkle. outdoor, bright daylight For the stormcloud blue on my index & middle finger, I used the perfectly apt Cirque Storm King.  The warm orange-leaning red...

 I've blogged a couple of times before about my birdwatching and nature nerdery, but this weekend's amazing sights truly inspired me to create some art on my fingernail canvases. outdoor, shady/overcast daylight for all While out in the woods this weekend, my birding buddies and I came across this utterly magical grey-morph Eastern Screech Owl.  S/he's been seen in the area for a few weeks now, and we were beyond lucky to catch a glimpse of this creature emerging into the twilight I was struck by the pale green eyes, and the earthy grey-and-brown camouflaged colors, and wanted to recreate that look with my nail art. I'm using the owl eye image and the feathers from Creative Shop 50, stamped in a chocolate brown crème over Aliquid Make a Wish.  The plate only comes with one eye, though, so I attempted to reverse the image by immediately rolling it off onto another stamper as soon as I'd lifted it from the plate.  Success!  The outline of the eye and iris were ove...

 I live in the middle of the east coast, which means that I'm in the area that's inundated with the Brood X cicada emergence.  Cicadas are totally harmless, so I'm not at all freaked out by the insect horde, quite the contrary!  The genus for these guys is literally Magicicada, and they are truly magical.  After living a very long life underground, they head to the surface not because of some ideal condition of weather or food supply or anything else practical, but simply when their utterly amazing internal clock tells them all it's been 17 whole years.  They also have a lot of personal significance for me - I left my home state, family, and friends behind for the job opportunity of a lifetime, and the first summer after my arrival here, the cicadas made their arrival too.  In China, cicadas represent resurrection, a new start, and lofty goals .  I've been looking forward to their return all spring, and they're here and just as amazing as the first tim...

 Everybody has a quarantine hobby, and mine is birdwatching.  Being able to get out into the world for a hike meant that I got to see so many new wonderful things while the rest of the world was closed, and this is utterly responsible for my ongoing sanity.  Now that things are gradually opening up again, I don't find that anything about this in particular has changed - my love of nature zen is still going strong. indoor, CF lighting Still being very new to the hobby (just a year of birds, and of course only those in my local area), I'm still constantly surprised and delighted by new-to-me species.  Baltimore Orioles are summertime residents in this area, returning in spring and raising their kiddos here, then leaving for the tropics in the fall .  Despite my looking for them all last summer, no luck, and many people in the local birding groups lament the lack of these bright citrus-colored jewels being lured to their feeders. OMG!!!! The first time I saw one of...