Pueen 2013 Stamping Plates Collection

Last month I won a giveaway Cazzy from SpecialGirl Nails was hosting - YAY!.  The prize was a $50 gift certificate from any online store of my liking - I choose Amazon because I was drooling over this plates.
Ordered them from my aunt's Amazon account because they had "prime shipping".  I thought the "prime" thing was just to save on shipping, but apparently it speeds it too.  I ordered on Thursday night and they where delivered on Wednesday next week.

The 2013 Collection includes 25 plates that come in this cute orange storage case.  

Each plate comes with a protective blue film cover.  I prefer plates with a colored protective film; this way people that are new to stamping notice that they need to remove it before using the plates.  When a plate is covered with a clear film, you can barely notice it.

Plates without protective film

 

backing of the plates with Pueen's logo

Clear shot of individual plates

You can see the designs on this plates are very well engraved.

I used this two plates for an AIS Challenge, the theme was to stamp over lilac.

Here are the results of my very first time using the plates.  I didn't even made random test stamps, so this was my absolutely first experience.  The first plate to try was 01.  The first stamps didn't came out so well because I was trying to scrape from different angles & directions until I found the right one.  In my experience, the right angle & direction to scrape can vary from design to design.  The accent nails came out great!

Base is Essie Lilacism, stamped with Color Club Wild at Heart, China Glaze Escaping Reality.

My impressions:

- Love the storage & display case!  If you own a vast collection of plates, another case might not be practical; but I only had the Bundle Monster, Salon Express & some randoms from Born Pretty Store  (which are stored in a ziplock bag - I know, shame!)  If Pueen decided to sell this case separately it would be a hit.  Each plate is stored in a clear nylon sheet, which is super convenient because not only you can have them neatly stored in order, but you can browse the design without having to take them out of lil' pocket.

- It is a little bit difficult to take the plates out of the nylon sheet, they are quite snugged in there.  I'm on the fence with this - it requires a slight pull to get them out, but I would hate them to be loose and falling out of the sheet; which is what happened with my BM plates when I put them on baseball card holders.

-  The borders of the plates are very smooth, so +1 for safety!

- Each plate includes 4 big images and 2 small ones (150 images total).  There are no french tip designs, which I rarely care for.

-  The set includes a great selection of designs including geometrical shapes, flowery and abstract patters, hearts, starts, animal prints, single flowers and even fruits!  The small designs are very cute and nicely compliment the big ones.

- The full nail designs are big enough to cover the width of my hole thumb.  With the Bundle Monster & Salon Express I have to do the trick of squeezing the stamper from the sides to make the design wider; which almost never comes out right.

I have a lot more designs to try, but so far I am loving this collection.  I'm really happy that I got them!

Thanks to Cazzy & Pueen Cosmetics for making me a Happy Stamp-a-holic!

Couple ol' manis

More from the random hidden files on my computer  ;)

This mani was inspired in a campaign to raise awareness about animal abuse

What I used:

Bettina Purple

China Glaze Tinsel Town

Color Club Snow flakes

KleanColor Metallic Purple

no name lavender polish

white acrylic paint

dotting tool

 Birthday Mani

I wasn't feeling great, so I went very simple on my nails

What I used:

China Glaze Fast Track, Running in Circles, Atlantis

Sally Hansen ColorQuick pen in Green Chrome

Bundle Monster bm-209

Sinful Colors: Super Star

I promised to reduce the amount of glitter polishes in my collection, but this Sinful Colors got me; is kind of a perfect combo! :)
Superstar is a super pretty blue jelly with purple and aqua glitter.  In my experience, jelly glitters become somewhat difficult to manege when applying the second coat but this one was the exception.  

3 coats of Super Star over China Glaze Blue Years Eve
no topcoat

Sinful Colors: Ice Dream

Ice Dream can be easily described as a glitter explosion!
Its fully loaded with silver and blue glitters.  I recently dropped my camera two times and since then it have been acting up, specially when I try to photograph glitters, so this one gave me a hard time. 

indoors without flash

ring finger: 2 coats of Ice Dream over China Glaze Blue Years Eve

indoors with flash

China Glaze Blue Years Eve

Blue Years Eve (2011 Holiday Collection) has a sheer blue base filled with blue glass fleck with aqua shimmer.
Just Gorgeous!

3 coats, no top coat

outdoors without flash

China Glaze Immortal + Finger Paints Flecked Matte

This manicure story starts with regrets:
I regret not jumping on the matte nails bandwagon before.  I regret not trying to put a matte topcoat over flakies or glitter before.  It feels like my nails life have been boring all this time...dramatic much? hahaha

After swatching CG Immortal, decided to layer Finger Paints Flecked over it.  It looked meh! but I was doing my nails at night but thought it would look better in daylight.  Anyway, decided to give the Hard Candy Matte topcoat a try and I love the results!

After the matte experience I was so inspired that couldn't let my nails alone.  Ended up messing them with a horrible stamping job.  I think that stamping over it would have look really cool, but a different pattern would have worked better. Here used Bundle Monster BM-221

As for the Hard Candy topcoat, it works really nice in terms of the finish and the fast it dries.  Couldn't say much about how long it last before it starts to chip because I took it off the next day.  There are noticeable brush mark on the first pictures.  Its my first time using it, so I don't know if the issue is the brush or the way I'm managing it but I'll keep experimenting.

China Glaze: Immortal

With this shade you can wear work-appropriate nails and have a little fun too!

China Glaze Immortal (from the Halloween 2012 Collection) its a medium grey with subtle pink, blue and purple shimmer.  The application was really nice.  The only down side I could find is that it needs 3 coats to achieve full opacity.  I'm impatient when it comes to wait for my nails to dry.  But since the color is so pretty, the shimmer gives the gray that cute touch, still makes nails look elegant; I can see myself learning to be patient and wearing it quite often :)

The shimmer is lovely! and its stand out more in person, but not to the point of being flashy.

Happy Birthday to me + St. Patrick's Day inspired mani

Greetings to all the Irish community on the web & everyone else who celebrates St Patrick's!

Today is my birthday. Strangely (and sadly) I might not do anything special, no celebration, no cake, no going out; not sure about gifts either.  I'm going to stay home, probably catching up on my favorite tv shows and scheduling posts.

Anyway, here is the mani inspired by this festive occasion!  I used quite a few nail polishes and some acrylic paints too.

outdoors, no flash

indoors, no flash

my favorite part was the design on my thumb

What I used:

pinky

Avon Jade, white acrylic paint, Sinful Colors Innocent & Exotic Green.

ring finger

Sinful Colors Cinderella, Kleancolor Chunky Holo Teal, rhinestones to simulate a rainbow.

middle finger

Sinful Colors Cinderella, Kleancolor Chunky Holo Teal, black acrylic paint topped with China Glaze Agro and gold round glitters to simulate a pot of gold.

index

Avon Jade, green and green glitter acrylic paints.

thumb

Bettina Ortencia, Kleancolor Holo Yellow, green acrylic paint glitter, Orly Monster Mash and heart shaped glitters to simulate a clover.

Green Sponged & Jeweled Manicure

Oh my! I'm on a roll experimenting with the different techniques to do my nails.
There are so many blog, YouTube, Fb pages, Instagram, Pinterest and what not accounts dedicated solely to nail art that every time I see a picture I'm like "Hell yeah, I'm gonna do that!"  LoL

I kept in mind St Patrick's theme to give some love to my green nail polish stash

Used Sinful Colors Beau Khaki as the base color.  Then sponged China Glaze Agro, Kleancolor Metallic Green & Holo Green.  The final touch where the green rectangle rhinestones in the middle finger.  

FC Barcelona Inspired Nails

I got a kit of acrylic paints for Christmas

And while free hand is not my thing, I'm willing to practice.
The FC Barcelona (Barca) is my favorite soccer team I was inspired on their emblem for this design.  Besides the fact that I'm their fan, it proves that freehand is not my thing! LoL

index finger

WnW I Red a Good Book as base. Used a fine nail art  brush to draw vertical lines using Sinful Colors Hot Spot.  Added blue pentagon glitters between the lines.

middle finger

Kleancolor White as base. Using a fine nail art brush to trace a cross and then filled it with red acrylic paint.  Also layered another red acrylic paint that had glitter over the cross and some clear glitter over the white areas (not a good choice)

ring finger

China Glaze Solar Power as base.  Used a fine nail art  brush to draw vertical lines with red acrylic paint.

pinky finger

Sinful Colors Hot Spot as base.  Used a fine nail art  brush to draw vertical lines with white acrylic paint and added black studs (white stripes & black studs to represent the soccer ball)

Essie: Watermelon...and a tragedy

Couple weeks ago, I went to Rio Piedras (metropolitan area in Puerto Rico); in a part where they have lots of sidewalk kiosks selling anything from jewelry, to toys, fruits, electronics to even makeup & nail polishes.  In one of them I found brands like China Glaze, Orly, Nicole by Opi, Rimmel, Revlon & Essie from $1.50 to $2! This where my picks:

CG Cranberry Splash, Essie Watermelon, A Cut Above, As gold as it gets

Sorry for the horrible Instagram pic!

Here I used Essie Watermelon & A Cut Above

Then, something terribly happen after taking the pictures for the blog.... 

Don't know how, but the bottle just slipped of my hands, hitting the floor & staining the wall, my clothes and the sofa :(
I love how Watermelon looks on me, so I plan to go back for a backup.