About creativity and me.

I'm a creative person.

Drawing
When I draw with a pencil, my problem is often that I get too focused about details. Things I want to show in my drawing, and there is just no possible way of drawing all the details in a wooden plank, when its merely a cm on my canvas. It's like I have a zoom function on my vision sometimes. It's where my "hyper-focus" kicks in. With "hyper-focus" I mean to be so focused about one thing/one aspect not being able to be distracted / talked to.
So I get discouraged to draw, and fall out of practice. So whenever I decided to pick it up again, I have to re-learn how to work with shades, how to draw. I drag around a notebook with clear pages and a pencil with me most of the time, in case the spirit comes over me, and I need to draw something.

Writing
I love to write, when I was younger it was poems, and essays, and now I mostly write on various blogs and write roleplaying games. I have this game I have been working on for a while, which is starting to look "finished" I have showed it to some of my friends, and we are going to playtest it soon. Looking forward to it. Now and then, I still sit down and write poems.

Painting
I like painting with oil paints, but haven't done that for ages. Back in my early teens I used to paint all the time, and would sit for hours and hours painting. Forgetting about eating and just paint. Pouring my hearts content out on the canvas. I just can't keep the focus to do anything for too long. and after a while I started doing something else. I think I picked up sowing, or candlemaking... or even soap making... I am sure it was something.

I constantly distract myself with new things. This blog has been a fantastic journey for me. When I started out doing nail art, and finally make a blog and all that, I thought it was going to be one of those things. Something I did for a short period, and then got distracted with something else. It's been a year and I am still as eager to do nail art as I was in the beginning. the thing is...

As a few of you might know already, is that I got ADHD. I never do anything by half. To me, it's mostly a blessing. It makes me, me. I don't take any meds for it, cause I am comfortable with who I am without. Some people needs it, others don't. I happen to be one of those. I have my tricks as to how to manage my life around, and with my condition.
People with ADHD often feel things a lot stronger than others, so for me that means I am more prone to severe depressions, falling in love with every soul out there, and thinking of every person I know the name of, as my best friend.

Nail Art
Nail art has so many aspects. You can do swatches of polish, nail art with acrylic paint, water colours, or nail polish, then you got all the different kinds of decorations, beads, rhinestones glitters. There are striping tape and stamping plates, tens of different brushes to use. Let's not even go into the whole "nail routine" thing, shaping, files, oils and the choosing of the right base coat for your nails. Endless of options to choose from. I love this. There is so many topics to learn about, and there always appear new ones. When you have learned about all that, you got the photographing, and the writing, and coding of your blog etc. endless of possibilities at your fingertips.  Always a challenge for me to test my skills on, to learn more about.
Then you got the nail polish groups, they got art-challenges, or copy someone else manicure days, and they in themselves are challenging. It keeps me coming back for more and more.

Crafting
But this post wasn't really going to be all about me, it was to be about creativity. For I have something to show you all. I have been crafty, and wanted to show it to you. I used nail polish, which is why this is totally relevant for this blog.

I used 12 mm glass cabuchans that I got from Ebay, and painted them with different polishes.


I have also purchased an acrylic paint set complete with art brushes, so that I can do more nail art in the time to come. I am really looking forward to use this set. I had some liner brushes before from a set I bought from Bundlemonster with 4 different thickness to them, which is really nice. I'm not sure how this liner brush compares to the ones from the Bundlemonster set. If you are interested in a comparison post, let me know in the comments below.

Lady in the Water

For this manicure I used W7 - Silver Suede and stamped using Collistar - Blu.
Loose glitter came from a Nail Art Stack pot I got from New Look, and Models Own - Dream Steam (clear polish) to add the glitter.
Stamping was done with the Cheeky Jumbo plate 8 - Princess Charming.

You might have seen this manicure in my PVA glue testing video on Youtube. 

The really awesome thing about stamping over suede polishes, at least the ones from W7, is that with a little bit of acetone / polish remover you can erase any stamping without ruining the base color. So if you stamp a patch bad, erase and stamp again. Another thing that I really like about these suede polishes is that they are basically one coaters, all of them.

If you use top coat on them, they loose the suede effect and becomes a very vibrant color with a silver tone to it.

This stamp still reminds me of M. Night Shyamalan - Lady in the Water. A fantasy thriller from 2006.  (IMDb)

Easy glitter removal with PVA glue

I just tried making a glitter manicure using PVA glue as a base. I poured it into an empty nail polish bottle, for easy application. Mine didn't need to be watered down, it was a pretty good consistence. 

I made this little video showing you what it looked like when I removed my glitter manicure for the first time. I have never done this before, and this is the first time ever. And it surly will NOT be the last time I do this. Oh My Gosh, this is made of win.

I should have done this ages ago. 

Please excuse my chipped nail polish on my right hand, I was about to redo my manicure, and couldn't wait until tomorrow to see what it was like doing a glitter removal with the PVA glue, so I shot this video before I had redone my right hand.

This is sort of a preview of two manicures to be posted soon, I'm just charging my camera, and need to upload the pictures and stuff. You will see some Cheeky plate - Princess Charming action, that I can tell you.

What do you think about my little videos?

Enchanting Fire

I recently swatched all of the NYC Foil Explosion Collection. I am now back with Enchanting Fire, and one of my new nail art items. Nail Charms. 

I picked them up at Poundland. 3 different types, 2 of ea, for only £1. Bargain. 

Like last time, I used 1 coat of Enchanting Fire, added topcoat. I really like this look. 

The Allura Nail Charms are completely flat on the back, and does therefor not have much contact with the nail itself. With some extra topcoat around the edges it will stick on the nail for a couple of hours, but don't expect it to hold if you brush your hand through your hair. 

So save them for a special occasions where it's okay if they only hold for a couple of hours, if you are careful they might hold a day. Best would be to use nail art glue for these. 

Let me know what you think in the comments below. What kind of dress would you wear for this, and what sort of event would it be?

For a Pound?

This is going to be one of those odd little posts of stuff I have gotten for a pound.  I live in the UK, for now at least. There are stuff from Poundland, other pound-stores or Primark.

It was a bargain. It really was.
There I was at Pound-land, in front of me is the nail art / random girl section. It has glitters all over the place, someone has smudged a lipstick all over the shelf. But in-between all the smudges and dirt I see something shiny.

Caviar Nailart -set from Allura

So ofcourse I had to pick them with me. I grabbed 3 packs with the Diamaté nail charms, in case I where to loose some, or give away. Good thing I did, cause by the time I got back home, I had lost one of them. 

Where did it go?

It could be number of places. The airport (where I dragged them out to look at them), at my friends house in Edinburgh, or in Bristol. No matter where it is, I am sure it will be taken good care of. 

For a manicure using the nail charms, follow this link.

Much later on I was on a trip to town, and decided to take a look at Primarks. This is what I found there. 

Nail wraps, nail file with different grits, and cotton pads.

 First thing I noted about this haul from Primark was the nail file. At closer inspection you see this [picture below]. The numbers are all off. For why would you buff your nails before filing them? That seems odd to me. I took it out of the packaging and inspected it closer. 6 - 5 are for filing, 1-2 are of softer grit almost leather-y and works for even it all out. I would never ever ever in the world use 2 for smoothing out nail surface, it tugs on the surface, so it still has some grit to it.
3-4 are leather-y, and works great for buffing, and shining.

 If we look away from the obvious number-error, this is a great file. I have used it a while, and it's a cheap option instead of diving in and buying more expensive ones. I used to have one like this ages ago, on one of my earlier attempts to stop nail biting from Sally's which was about £5 or something. I remember it was my entire weekly allowance, so it must have been around the £5 mark.

I also picked with me these nail wraps. I'm usually not into nail wraps, I have done a few attempts of applying and using some, but I had to take these with me cause they have a clear base. My other nail wraps have been more foil-like in finish with overall blinding shine and would wrinkle on the nails and never set one even. I can actually see myself get some use out of these. Those little rhinestones are sitting neatly on a line, and I have tugged a bit in them and it seems like they would apply even. Looking forward to try that.

My review and manicure with the wraps can be found here.

For another pound (£1.99) I got myself 500 ml of PVA glue. so  I will be testing out glue base for glitter manis. Really looking forward to that. Have you tried it? Which glitter where you the most happy for being able to wear without the hassle?

Be kind, Rewind

It's a great movie, if you haven't seen it, you should. I recommend it.

Its time for the next plate in the Cheeky Girl Challenge. Today its CH51. Which means there are only 4 plates left! Oh no! What a long, strange trip this has been. It's an end of an era. In 4 weeks time me and Mishka from Lacquer or Leave Her! has successfully made a manicure with every single Cheeky Summer Plate there is, selecting one image from each plate.

One coat of Sinful Color - Snow Me White, used a nail art striper in black to seperate the nail in two, stamped using Wet and Wild - Black.

If you want to know what Mishka did with this plate, jump over to this link right here. 

Mint Manis For Talia Joy

I found the most minty polish I had in my stash, which is For Audrey by China Glaze. For this look I also added a matching ring that I made using CG - For Audrey and A England - Morgan La Fey, and some striping tape.

The beauty community lost one of it's most treasured members on Tuesday morning.
NailPolishWar on Facebook 

Words become poor when we are talking about loss of a human being, and Talia was such a huge inspiration for so many people. First time I heard about her was on Ellens Show, she was so full of life, and energetic. My grandmother call those kind of people for angels:

Angels shine on us with their light and bless us with their presence for a while, until they have to go back to heaven.

Thanks to NailPolishWar for coordinating all of this, what a great way of coming together and show our support and respect to her family.

"You can't change yesterday, you can't predict tomorrow. Live now and don't take it for granted!"
Talia Joy on Twitter

Hashtags on FB:

‪#‎MintManisForTaliaJoy 

 ‬‪#‎taliaslegacy‬