I concur: Alcatraz...Rocks!

Good evening!  Brr, it's gettin' cold in here, so put on lots more clothes! :P  ...yet another frigid fall evening here in Minnesota...  I really hope that perhaps some of you are lucky enough to live in places that aren't the closest thing to another ice age! ;)
Okay, it's not quite that  bad at the moment, but come January I can assure you I'll be yelling on a daily basis (as I clean a mountain of snow off my car for the millionth time): "Why on earth do I live here?!?!"

So I think that besides the ever-plummeting temperature (and the fact that I watched The Day After Tomorrow  over the weekend), this mani has me thinking about snow and ice.  See what I mean?

I hate winter, but I LOVE this!! :D  I do have to admit however, that I got the idea from Polished Elegance.  Her post confirmed that I needed Alcatraz...Rocks.  It really is a gorgeous texture polish with soooo many pretty sparkles!  Here's AR "naked":

The base has more purple in it than is showing up here, for some odd reason.  I used two coats, no base and of course, no top coat.  Although I really did want to try some over this polish because I've seen a lot of people show the other side of a texture polish once it's transformed by a glossy top coat. :)  

Compared to my Zoya & Julie G textures (and even OPI Jinx), I must say AR did not wear quite as well (4 days vs. 7 or so) before I got some noticeable tip wear and a couple decent sized chips.  Maybe next time I'll use some Orly Bonder under it.

Dry time was average, maybe 7ish minutes for it to get completely textured.  GAH those sparkles get me every time!  They're by no means holo, but oh so purty!

After wearing nakey AR for a couple days, I knew I had to try the stamping thang over it, so I busted out my Pure Ice Silver Mercedes and Bundle Monster plate 214.  Although I really like the full-size image that Polished Elegance used, this design is one of my favorites from the set I have, and it's got a similar aesthetic.  

Several of my blogger buddies have insisted lately that they could never do stamping, so I also wanted to add this to show how pretty and easy it is!  Seriously took me 10 minutes, start to finish to do both hands.  I wish I could say I have a tutorial video to show you the process, but I have never tried making one and wasn't about to start at 12:30 in the morning!  So you'll hafta settle for watching this one; the video that sparked my addiction to all things nail related. ;)  For reals!

Oy, speaking of 12:30 am, it's nearly that time again so I really need to get to bed before my under-eye craters get any deeper & darker - if that's possible! :-/  For everyone's sake, I sure hope not! :P

I leave you with a parting shot:

Have fun, be merry, and stamp like your life depends on it!!

OPI Malaga W(h)iiiiiine

As per Melissa's (of Lacquer Reverie) request, I did a full mani of Malaga Wine yesterday evening.  It is a luscious - dare I say seductive? - shade of burgundy red that looks much brighter in sunlight.  It dries to a pretty high shine on its own but I still topped it off with Seche Vite because apparently I love me some tip shrinkage.
Mmm, just can't get enough of it!

Fluorescent lighting in my cube at work . . . makes it look almost
chocolatey brown.  Weird.  It is very dark like this when not in sunlight.
(just not really this color)

Dry time is decent, and it's almost a one coater IMO, but I did two just to get a deeper, richer color.  Formula-wise, it's quite liquidy, so careful around the cutes, because of course it stains like CRAZY.  Hence why my fingers kinda look bloody in these photos . . . it is SO hard to do even the tiniest bit of cleanup because inevitably, the remover will touch a spot on the nail near your cuticle & eat away the polish so the edge looks all choppy.  Maybe this is why I only have two reds in my stash!  I do like the brush . . . I'm guessing it is the standard OPI brush (not sure if it's the Pro-wide?), but it has a good "bend & snap," that somehow makes painting with it feel nice & smooth.  Now why didn't I take a photo of the brush?!  Darn.

Eeek!  Look at that deplorable tip shrinkage!
I'm shrinking back from the screen in HORROR.

After taking some shots of just Malaga Wine by itself, I decided to do some stamping since I haven't for quite some time and my plates were feeling neglected.  Poor plates. :-(

I used Pure Ice Silver Mercedes (NOT Mercades, like the darn shelf said at WM!) and Bundle Monster plate 201.  If you've never tried stamping before, it does take a bit of trial & error to get the hang of it and to discover what polishes work (if you don't shell out for the Konad special polishes - I only have the white).  But you'll get the hang of it pretty quickly & it allows for some seriously awesome nail art!  My roommate asked me if I did this by hand. LOL!!!!!!!

Pretty accurate color shot, and not too shabby for featuring my right hand!

You can purchase sets of Bundle Monster plates here.  They are really very reasonable (I think I paid $19.99 + free shipping for my set) as compared to around $6 a plate for Konad, the original stamping plate brand.  There are LOTS of other plate makers now: Red Angel, Shany, Cheeky, Mash, Gals . . . etc.  Ebay and Amazon are good places to get the other brands, or individual Konad plates.

Konad is obviously going to be higher quality (the impressions are usually deeper, thus giving a crisper image), but my Bundle Monster set does a pretty darn good job!  My sister got a Red Angel set for Christmas, and hers look about the same quality as mine - and there are really awesome designs in her set. 

One last parting image:

Drinking limonada in León (Spain) last year during Holy Week.
Limonada is a regional drink made with wine and some really sweet lemony stuff. :-P

 Ok, two images!

I guess this is technically water from the Bay of Biscay, north of Spain.
My friend was living in the city of Gijón (Asturias) when I visited her last year.
We took a quick bayside walk just before hopping on the bus to get me back to the airport.

I LOVE to travel!!!!  And I love SPAIN!!!!  ¡Viva España! :-D  

Do you have a favorite travel destination?