31 Day Challenge 2013 Annoucement and Giveaway!

Gooooood Afternoon my friends!

I hope you are all having a wonderful Saturday! My life has been crazy busy with packing and moving and preparing for graduate school so that's why I haven't been around on my blog as much as I would like to be! I miss blogging like crazy! However September should make up for my prolonged absence around here! One thing I will be doing this September is The 31 Day Challenge! Emily of The Lacquerologist and I did the challenge together last year and we have decided to try it again this year! I am really excited to see how far we have come in a year and to try it all over again!

Emily and I decided that since we were redoing the challenge we should have a celebration with all of you so we have put together a wonderful little giveaway! The giveaway is for 2 Born Pretty Store Gift Cards, each valued at $30! There are a number of ways you can enter in the Rafflecopter below, and the giveaway is open INTERNATIONALLY as Born Pretty Store ships free worldwide! Please enter using the Rafflecopter widget below :D

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Emily and I will be starting the 31 Day Challenge 2013 tomorrow morning at 7:00AM EST! We will be posting daily following along with the challenge prompts at 7:00 AM EST. I hope you all follow along to see what Emily and I come up with over the next month! I hope you're all excited because I sure am!! :D

Guest Post Megan of Will Paint Nails For Food

Good Morning friends and Happy Monday!

I hope you are all having a great start to your week today. We are still doing guest posts here on Sincerely Stephanie as I take a little more time to recharge before school starts in a few weeks! Today's guest poster is Megan of Will Paint Nails for Food. If you aren't already following Megan you need to start now! She is a fabulous nail artist and has gorgeous nail beds! Let's let Megan take is away!

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Hi everyone! My name is Meghan and I blog at Will Paint Nails for Food. I’m very excited to be doing this guest post while Stephanie is on her much needed vacation. I’ve been following her blog for some time now and admiring her nail art, so I was extremely flattered when she asked me to do this.

Guest blog posts can be a tad stressful, and I went back and forth several times over what to do for this post. However, last week I received an order of polishes from Harlow & Co. including Femme Fatale Cloudburst, a polish that has been on my wish list for quite some time now. And luckily it didn’t disappoint.

Cloudburst has a sheer mint base with a golden shimmer, and a gorgeous mixture of neon pink, fuchsia, white, black and holographic gold glitter. I knew right away that I wanted to create some abstract patterns to go with the polish.

To get this look: I started with two coats of Pure Ice Home Run (pale mint crème) on all nails except the accent nail for which I used piCture pOlish Metallic Mush (pale gold metallic foil) as my base polish. On my pinky, index and thumb I used two coats of Cloudburst. I had to fuss a bit with the glitter but otherwise the application was great.

The abstract designs were done carefully with a detail nail art brush. I used Misa BreakAway (dark purple shimmer) and Metallic Mush for the design on my middle finger, and BreakAway, Sally Hansen Back to the Fuchsia (fuchsia shimmer), and Sally Hansen White On for my ring finger.

Other than some minor smearing when I applied my top coat (yikes!), I’m pretty happy with this design. I really wanted the abstract designs to complement the Femme Fatale polish.

What do you think of this design? Have you ever done nail art that is inspired by a polish?

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This is fabulous! I love being inspired by a polish and Megan knocked it out of the park with this one! Make sure you head on over to Will Paint Nails For Food to follow this fabulous girl! Thanks so much again Megan for being here today!

Guest Post Sam of Polished Art

Morning friends!

Today's guest poster is the lovely Sam from Polished Art. Sam posts some great nail art so let's let her take it away!

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Hello everyone!

I am SO excited to be doing a guest post for Stephanie today! I absolutely love this blog – her nails are complete perfection. So when she replied to my email and said she’d love me to do a guest post for her, I will admit I had a bit of a girly screaming moment...

So anyhoo, I ummed and ahhed for aaages about what to do for this post. I finally settled on an Aboriginal art inspired manicure. Well, that was a complete disaster (cue mini meltdown), so this is what I’m showing you instead! A little while ago I was lucky enough to win a giveaway hosted by the lovely Rebecca over at Polish Etc . The prize was a polish of my choice from Pretty Serious. I hadn’t heard of the brand before this, so I looked through some of Rebecca’s swatches, and oh my giddy aunt! So many pretties! I eventually settled on this lovely:

This is Liquid Leprechaun – a gorgeous green glitter, with some gold hexes thrown in for good measure. I used two coats over Barry M Spring Green, although actually I don’t think you need undies with it.

Naturally, I had to add a leprechaun!

I used the DIY decal technique that’s been around on a few blogs recently, where you paint topcoat on to a poly pocket, do your design on there, and then top coat again and peel it off. I extra cheated though by tracing this little fella (you wouldn’t like to see my freehand attempts at drawing faces!). Although I traced him off my computer screen, and my computer BSOD’d mid-leprechaun...not ideal.

I hope you’ve all enjoyed my post, and thank you again to Stephanie for this amazing opportunity! I hope she’s having a lovely time relaxing after finishing her degree :)

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Aww how cute is that leprechaun! It looks perfect against Liquid Leprechaun! Thanks so much to Sam for being here today for me! I hope you are all having a great day!

Guest Post Jessie of Nailed it NZ

Morning friends!

Even though I am back from my vacation now, I am continuing on with guest posts for the next little while. By the end of my thesis I was feeling a little burnt out so I'm using this opportunity to take a break from blogging and let some more awesome people take over my blog! I had a serious outpouring of people willing to guest post for me so I figured why not!

One of those fabulous ladies is Jessie from Nailed it NZ! Jessie actually won my nail art contest back in February, she is a very talented lady! Let's let her take it away!

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Hi everyone! Just a quick intro - I’m Jessie from Nailed it NZ, and Stephanie has very kindly let me guest post today. I’ve been nail-blogging for just over a year and YouTubing for the last few months, and nail art is a huge part of who I am now!

I must admit I haven’t done a guest post in ages, and had forgotten how much more self-conscious I am about putting my nails on someone else’s blog, rather than my own! After a bit of tossing up ideas and internal debate, I decided to do a then-and-now post (One Nail to Rule Them All has heaps of these!).

Here are my old tribal nails – my first attempt, thirteen months ago.



And here are my new ones! I had to change some of the colours, as I had gotten rid of some of my old $2 shop nail polish that I used in my first one. Other than that I tried to keep the pattern as similar as possible.

Looking at the two pictures, the main differences are;
< - The lighting and photography
- Cuticle clean up & care
- Thinner/more quality polish (first one looks very thick)

The actual technique involved wasn’t much different, which is interesting. What a difference a good photo and clean-up can make! Although looking at them, my hands look a bit too white. It’s the middle of winter here in New Zealand, and if I have my nails exposed for an hour while painting them I find my hands go an attractive zombie-like colour :P.

The nail polishes I used for this design were:
OPI – A Roll in the Hague
OPI – Suzy Loves Cowboys
China Glaze – White on White
Kleancolor – Catch Me

I have a confession, regarding these nails – I only did them on one hand and I took them off straight after taking photos! Normally I’d have the same design on both hands and wear them for a few days, but I really wanted to get my birthday nails done (it’s my birthday tomorrow, at the time of writing this) so off they came. That’s the beauty of photos though, and it means that I’m never too precious about my designs. As long as I’ve got a photo of it, I’m okay if they come off a bit early. It is a bit disappointing if they chip off early when I hadn’t planned it though.

Anyone got any recommendations for a top coat that doesn’t chip or peel easily, and doesn’t get gluggy half way through the bottle?

Well that’s it from me, thanks for reading and a big thanks to Stephanie for letting me guest post today! I love your blog and there are so many designs on here that I have on my “to-recreate” list!

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These are so cute! I do love tribal nails and it is always fun to go back and look at how you have improved over time. A big thanks to Jessie for being here today! Hope you are all having a great day!

butter LONDON Colour Clash Giveaway & Nail Art Contest!

Hey friends!

I hope you are all having a wonderful Friday! Today I have something very special to share with all of you. I've partnered with butter LONDON Canada and few other wonderful bloggers to bring you a fabulous giveaway and nail art contest!

The Colour Clash Collection is butter LONDON's new Fall 2013 collection and includes 6 bright fun shades that are very atypical for fall. You can gain entries to win one of the Color Clash shades of your choosing by liking any or all of the Facebook pages listed. If you would like to win the whole collection, you can create your own butter LONDON nail art look and share it on the butter LONDON Canada Facebook page.

NOTE: Since this contest is hosted by butter LONDON Canada, it is limited to residents of Canada.

I have created some looks in the past using butter LONDON products, and here is one example!

I'm really excited because I am going to be one of the judges who chooses the winning nail art look! There are also two other extremely talented bloggers/judges that I'm honoured to be working with to choose a winner, they are Kayla of Nails by Kayla Shevonne and Winnie from The Rawr Shop.

Feel free to enter as many ways as possible to win one or all of these fabulous butter LONDON polishes!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck and I can't wait to see your nail art looks!!

The Digit-al Dozen Does Fashion: Ombre Bark Dress

Purchased by Me

Happy Friday Friends!

It is the last day in the Digit-al Dozen's Fashion Week and tomorrow will resume with some awesome guest posts from some more absolutely fabulous bloggers. I found today's inspiration while doing nothing other than just browsing around on Pinterest!

Simple, clean and black and white, based on this dress from French Connection,

These nails were super easy to do, but I love the statement they make!!

I started off with 2 coats of my favourite Cult Nails Tempest and then using my favourite cut down nail art brush and Wet n Wild Black Creme I freehanded on the pattern of the dress! I started in the center and made all of the larger dots first and then went outwards and added the smaller dots in the pattern.

These are one of my favourites! I love how simple they are, yet they are majorly eye catching and I think I did a pretty good job at capturing the dress!

What are your thoughts on these nails?! Remember to check out the rest of my comrades posts below!

The Digit-al Dozen Does Fashion: Chevrons and Dots

Purchased by Me

Morning ladies and gents!

Here we are in Day 4 of the Digit-al Dozen's Fashion Week and I am back at it today with another outfit inspired post. I stumbled upon the blog Happily Grey and instantly fell in love with her creative style. I found this post and although I don't think I could ever quite pull off the outfit I thought it would make for some wild nail art!

Now it kind of looks random, but check out the outfit,

Blue polka dotted shirt, with some wild black, white and orange pants!

For the 'shirt' nails I started off with China Glaze Splish Spalsh and then added the dots with a small dotting tool and Pure Ice French Kiss. The 'pants' nails were a little harder, I started off with Cult Nails Tempest my favourite white creme. Then using my small cut down nail art brush I started painting on the chevrons with Zoya Kafuda and Wet n Wild Black Creme. I was careful to leave empty white chevrons so I could speckle them after to get the effect of the pattern. Once they were done I added the white strips in the black and orange chevrons. Coat of Seche and I was good to go!

It might seem random, but I'm actually digging how different these prints are next to each other! The contrast is quite interesting, and I think that's what makes it unique. I never would have paired these together without this week so I'm super happy for the challenge!

What are your thoughts on this contrasting nails?! I hope you're having a great end to your week! Check out the rest of the participants below!

The Digital Dozen Does Fashion: Snakeskin and Stripes

Purchased by Me

Morning Dolls!

It's mid week in Fashion week here and today I have some nails inspired by a really cute outfit I found on Pinterest! As usual I was browsing around for inspiration and found this outfit that was screaming to be turned into nail art.

Here is the outfit, which can be found here.

On my thumb and index nail I was replicating the shirt of the outfit, so I used Cult Nails Scandalous. Not only because it was the perfect colour, but it's also a jelly adding to that sheer quality of the shirt. I added the gold stripe down the center, with Orly Luxe to capture the gold zippers.

My middle nail is replicating the snakeskin bag. I started off with OPI My Vampire is Buff and then sponged on Essence cafe ole, OPI You Don't Know Jacques and black creme. I went over snakeskin pattern with my small nail art brush and MVIB. On my last two nails, replicating the skirt, I started off with Cult Nails Tempest and then using a dotting tool and black creme I created the dotted pattern on the skirt.

I love this outfit and this is something I would love to wear! I'm a fan of all the aspects and it translated nicely into nail art.

Would you rock a look like this? Either on your nails or as an outfit? Check out the rest of the Digit-al Dozen below!

The Digit-al Dozen Does Fashion: Marc Jacobs

Press Sample Purchased by Me

Morning!

I'm still out in Vancouver, hopefully having a great time enjoying the sights and the beauty that I've heard comes with BC! But don't fear I'm on the ball and have scheduled another Digit-al Dozen post for today!

Today's nail art inspiration comes from the lovely Marc Jacobs. I stumbled upon this dress and instantly fell in love. Buuuuuuuuut is is by Marc Jacobs and costs 890, which is approximately $1,150!! Since never in my life I would be able to afford that, I decided to replicate it on my nails instead.

Here is the fabulous dress in all its glory!

I started off with China Glaze Highlight of My Summer, which I am completely obsessed with. Then to replicate the floral gradient on my nails I started off with a white creme and my small cut down nail art brush. I freehanded on the outlines of flowers on all my nails and then added the colour.

Going up my nail I added flowers in China Glaze Passion For Petals and then in China Glaze Snap My Dragon near the top of my nail. I went back and added details in those flowers with black creme and white creme. Finally I added leaves using Essie Pretty Edgy.

I really like the gradient of flowers here. I would totally rock this dress, buuuuut I can never afford it so here's to settling with it on my nails :) What are your thoughts on these Marc Jacobs inspired nails?

Check out the rest of the Digit-al Dozen below!

Guest Post on The Lacquerologist!

Press Sample Purchased by Me

Good Afternoon loves!

You're getting a double post from me today! I'm still off on vacation. Today we will have docked in Vancouver, BC and will be getting off the boat. Since we have never been out to BC we're going to stick around for a few days just to take it all in!

Last Monday the lovely Emily did a guest post for me! When I asked her she immediately turned around and asked if I would return the favour to her! I obviously agreed because Em and I are tight like that. I'll give you a sneak peek at what I did for her here, but you'll have to head over to The Lacquerologist to see the rest!

Head on over to Emily's blog to see how I did it!