Guest Post by Mandy's Polish

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is from Mandy at Mandy's Polish!  She creates some stunning stamped manis as well as amazing nail art!

Thank you so much Mandy! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hi, I am Mandy, from Mandy's Polish  I am excited to be guest posting here today for Kirsten.  I want to share with you an awesome holo I recently received.  I have had this on my wishlist for a little while and when it came in the mail, I just couldn't have been happier.  Nubar Reclaim is a beautiful green holo that is perfectly opaque in 2 coats.  I don't know about you, but I can't just paint my nails with a single color and go about my day.  So, I got out my stamping plates and got to work.  I chose Mash49, cause let's face it.  They are new,  I had to try them out :)  I used Konad Special Black and stamped with 2 different designs to spice it up a bit.  I love having 2 different mani's, every one notices when your hands don't match LOL.  Here is what I ended up with.  

I used to think that Nubar was such an expensive brand and figured I would never own any.  BUT.....you can get them pretty cheap on eBay.  Awesome holos don't have to cost an arm and a leg.  I hope you will try out some of the Nubar Holos, so far, I love them!!

Thanks for having me Kirsten and enjoy your vacation!!!

Guest Post by Munia's Nails!

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is by April over at Munia's Nails! I love her nail art and layering ideas (she comes up with some amazing layer concoctions!)

Thank you so much April! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hey everyone! I am THRILLED to be doing a guest post for the lovely Kirsten! She is the sweetest girl!! I have never done a guest post before so this is quite exciting for me!! I wasn't quite sure what do for my mani because I wanted it to be perfect! Of course nothing/no one is perfect right?!

Anyway, I decided to go with some new polishes that I received in a swap. The base is Evelyn 05, it's a similar color to CG Secret Peri-Wink-Le, but the Evelyn is more purple. So I started with 2 coats of Evelyn 05, and was going to keep it as just the creme but I wanted more! So I used GOSH Rainbow (546). I put 1 coat of GOSH over Evelyn and it came out like this:

I hope you all like my mani here! You can see more over at my blog Munia's Nails! Thank you Kirsten for letting me do a guest post!!! <3

Guest Post by Gnarly Gnails

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is by Missy over at Gnarly Gnails! She does some insanely crazy nail art that it spectacular!

I have posted this one today because she has chosen an Indie polish for her version of TGIF: Thank Goodness, Indie Friday!

Thank you so much Missy! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hey there friends of The Geeky Owl!

I'm Missy, I do the thang over at Gnarly Gnails and today I'm doin' the thang over here!

When Kirsten asked for some people to guest post, I offered since she's a pretty swell lady and all. I'm sure ya'll know it already!

So, we share a love for Indie polishes, who doesn't these days, right?

Knowing this, I told her to go through my Pinterest stash and pick out a polish she'd like me to use in my guest post. She chose 3 and I narrowed it down to 2, both of which were Dollish Polishes, both of which were untrieds that had been sitting in my stash for far too long with no love.

My first choice was Cold Winds Are Rising, because it's just not one I ever see posted. Unfortunately, that polish kind of sucked, I'm sorry to say. It was a thick nightmare and getting any of the larger glitter out of the bottle proved a huge fail.

Enter Zombie Flesh.

Yes, I got this polish solely for the name.

And just like the other polish, it proved to be a bit of a nightmare.

Thick, not well pigmented and I could barely get the larger glitters out, as you can see, there must be a total of 6 pieces.

The good thing is that the pics look fantastic. In real life I loved this mani a lot less. It's kind of like when people say the book is better than the movie...well the movie is better in this case!

Alas...I'm not a complainer by nature..I do like the pics and in blog land that's about all that matters!

The base on Zombie Flesh is a sage green with green, black and gold microglitters and then larger black hex glitters.

These photos are 3 coats over one coat of Orly Luxe (a metallic champagne gold)

I can't do a guest post without a little nail art...so true to it's name, I turned Zombie Flesh into Flesh Eating Zombies with Gnarly Teeth!

Thanks for having me!

Guest Post by Manicurity

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is by Emma from Manicurity! She does some pretty bomb-tastic nail art and shares the geekiness with me!

Thank you Emma! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Apparently when I am asked to do guest posts I resort to glitter gradients! Sorry, I feel a little like a one-trick pony, but perhaps I can distract you with the shiny?

I've heard some nail ladies voice their disappointment in not seeing more attainable polish swatched and used on nail blogs lately, since some indies are just so hard to obtain - and I agree! So, I wanted to create a beautiful look with drugstore polishes that are easy to find.

First, I did one coat of Sally Hansen Pacific Blue! Sally Hansen XtremeWear is a brand I feel gets overlooked a lot, but it has some great colors and is usually on sale (like $2-$3). I paint slightly thick coats, but I only needed ONE! It was glorious. I topped it with SV and then did some glitter gradients starting from my cuticle.

I was inspired by my friend Elizabeth at Nailpolish is My Crack to do glitter gradients from the cuticle, plus a ring finger all-over accent. I sponged on Sinful Colors All About You, which has both micro gold and copper glitter. Then I sponged on some Milani Jewel FX in Gold to give it a more dimensional, molten metal look. On my ring finger I did a blobby coat of All That Glitters Gold Spotty Dottie (sorry, an indie) and sponged some of the Sinful Colors All About You on top.

Psst. Sally Hansen XtremeWear, Sinful Colors and Milani are available at a variety of drugstores and supermarkets for reasonable prices - and usually on sale. I'm a big fan of using CVS Extrabucks and they have a 'beauty' extrabucks program, to boot!


Thanks so much for letting me grace your blog for a post, Kirsten! I'm so glad we got to know each other at the beginning of this year doing the 31 Day Challenge and we share some geekery :)

Guest Post by Sweet Sugar

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is by Sweet Sugar! She does amazing stamping and nail art all with crisp bright pictures!

Thank you so much Sweet Sugar! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hi dear Geeky Owl readers !

I was very honored when Kirsten asked me to write a guest post for her blog ! I just received my new Bundle Monster plates when she wrote me, so was there a better occasion than this one to use the cute little owl pattern from these ?

I know Kirsten used this stamp not so long ago in another post, but I just couldn't resist ;)

Here's what I did:

I started with two coats of Essence Show me the Way, a pretty blue-green creme. I wanted something sparkly so I layered one coat of Essence Glisten Up, a pretty sheer aqua polish with small flakes and tiny holo glitters. It's too bad they discontinued this one, I don't even have a back up !

Then I stamped the flowers and the cute owl from plates BM 306 and 309, using black Konad polish.

I love how the flakes pop under the black stamping, I tried different layerings combo on plastic tips for this manicure and this was definitely my fave.

I hope you like it, too :)

Thanks again to Kirsten for giving me an opportunity to make a post here, I had a good time choosing a manicure and writing for you ! :D

Guest Post by Time On My Nails

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is from Julie at Time On My Nails! She does some amazing nail art and uses such awesome bright colors!

Thank you so much Julie! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hello! I'm Julie from Time On My Nails, and I am extremely thrilled to be here! I generally stick to simple nail art - although right now I am addicted to jelly sandwiches - and get inspiration from all over, including other nail bloggers' fabulous tutorials! Recently Sarah at Chalkboard nails did a tutorial for a "Fishtail manicure" that looked like a fun and fairly easy way to combine multiple colours, something that I love to do!

My colour palette was inspired by an installation at the recent Luminato Festival in Toronto, which had a Windscape theme and included wavy blue bits and these really cool orange windsocks! And yes, that's the technical description! :P

My base colour was Essence Wake Up!, a great (cheap!) red-orange creme. My first swoops were China Glaze Secret Peri-wink-le, and the tips were Nails Inc. Baker Street, which might just be my favourite blue. Ever.



This design was fairly easy to achieve and had a great pay-off! The daring colour combination worked well for me and for the occasion, but with more subtle colours this could be adapted for any purpose.

A festival that celebrates creativity in all forms, from literature to music to theatre to magic to food, I think that Luminato fits in perfectly here at the Geeky Owl! Thanks so much for this opportunity to share my nail art with all of you, and Happy Canada Day!

Guest Post by Sassy Lacquer

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is from Carrie as Reflections, Sassy Nails, & Sill Diversions. She creates some gorgeous polish (Sassy Lacquer) and some awesome nail art! :)

Thank you so much Carrie! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog over after reading this post!

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Hi there! I'm Carrie and I blog over on Reflections, Sassy Nails, & Silly Diversions! I am also the Face behind Sassy Lacquer, an Indie hand mixed nail polish line. Ever since I got into nail polish about a year ago now, I have been wanting to start my own line, and this year I did just that! I am a stay at home mom to four wonderful anxiety producing children! :)

I've decided to show you a few mani's from my vault....or memorable ones...

Bubbles

Sassy Lacquer, Read between the lines, my favorite of my line.

Sassy Lacquer, Uncle Sam, also a big favorite

My first water marble

Chick Chick

First time using a Matte top coat

A fun mani, but classy

fun, on the wild side

eeeew toes, but so neat!

More fun, but with polka dots!

I did this for my son, Hunter's, first birthday

eeewww more toes, but this combo is just so nice.

More polka dots

ugh! ewwww more toes, but santa clause style

another water marble

Can't forget my beautiful Daughter...this was for her Kindergarten Graduation, or sing along one of the two.

Lady bugs for my lady Bug.

I hope you all loved them as much as I did. Come on over and check my blog out sometime. I want to thank Kirsten for letting me post today.

<3 Carrie

Guest Post by The Crumpet

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is from someone I mention a lot, Debbie from The Crumpet! Love her style of writing and her attitude, and of course her absolute obsession with polish! ;)

And I have scheduled this post today, it being friday, and she chose an Indie! So here is her version of TGIF: Thank Goodness, Indie Friday! :)

Thank you so much Debbie! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hi Goddesses

It's Debbie from The Crumpet, and I am thrilled to be doing a guest post for one of my best polish friends.

I've only known Kirsten for a few months, but we connected over a love of polish, Lost and nail art.   We both suffer from depression, and we've both written of it on the blog, so we try to look after each other on our down days.   I thought it would be appropriate to do a green mani, as green is the colour for depression awareness, but a happy green, not a murky, sad, gloomy green!

The base is one of my favourite green and one of my favourite polish names - Bossy Boots from Butter London.   It's a lovely soothing creamy mint.   I then layered it with Nostalgic Lacquer Envy - a sort of green version of Connect The Dots.   

Don't they look awesome together ?    I love how the glitter complements the base, yet stands out from the base.   I'm a known hater of hairy glitter, but even I don't mind the bar glitter in this one.

This is cool and fresh as a summer's day .... not that I'd know, living in England.

Enjoy xx :)

Guest Post by Cuti-CLUE-les

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is by Cuti-CLUE-les. And her nail art is to die for! And Disney! Wow! I wish I had this much talent! Nope not me, I can only draw stick figures!

Thank you so much Cuti-CLUE-les! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hey all!

I am really into nail art at the moment so when Kirsten asked me to guest post I did a bit of detective work and checked out her blog for ideas :P Luckily I read the "about me" section first and discovered that she is a fan of Disney movies. I love animated films! So here's what I went for...

It's been years since I've watched Beauty and the Beast and doing this manicure just makes me want to watch the film so badly!
It's awful but I didn't even know they had proper names :P  My bad!

From left to right: Lumiere (candle), Mrs Potts (teapot), Cogsworth (clock) and Chip (teacup).

 I use a basecoat-any will do but I use Stargazer 114- just to protect against stains. All of the details are done using acrylic paint. Then just to finish  it all of I put on 2 coats of Essence Quick dry topcoat. I find that acrylic paint really sucks up your top coat so you might need 2 coats just to give it a nice smooth, glossy finish. I would recommend a topcoat when using acrylics because it really blends the image together.

I really hope ye liked this Beauty and the Beast inspired post! Freehand nail art takes a bit longer than stamping but I really think it's worth it and it's so satisfying :) Thanks so much Kirsten for letting me post today. It was such a fun mani to do :)

Cuti-CLUE-les

Guest Post by A Girl and Her Polish

Good Morning Owlets!

Today's guest post is by A Girl and Her Polish. She is the Queen of Dotticures! Her nail art and stamping are fantabulous! And today she's given you some awesome techniques--owl style! ;)

Thank you so much A Girl and Her Polish! :)

Don't forget to check out her blog after reading this post!

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Hello Everyone!!  I was so excited when Kirsten asked me to do a guest post for her!  I feel really lucky that I have gotten to know her in the past couple months.  She is an awesome nail blogger and person! :)

Okay...on to the nails!  Many of my readers have contacted me about stamping.  They want to know how to do it, why it won't work, tips, etc.  I decided that this would be the perfect opportunity to share my stamping techniques.  Plus I just got the brand new Bundle Monster plates and they have the perfect design for this post!

When stamping the first thing  to do is gather everything you will need.  You have to be fast with stamping and running to get the things you need will lead to a frustration.

My Tools:

I have my polishes, Orly Decades of Dysfunction, Barry M Denim and I later added Barry M Raspberry, not pictured.  My stamping tools are my plate, stamper and an old Starbuck's card that I use to clean the plate.  My clean-up tools are a make-up brush and cuticle pusher.  Not pictured are my Q-Tips, acetone in a small glass (for clean-up), and paper towels that I put the plate on while stamping.

The plate I am using, BM309 is perfect because it is an owl stamp!  So cute!

Before I get started with polish I use a Q-Tip dabbed in acetone to clean my nails and the plate.  Everything always works better with a clean palette!  I also always use a base coat, which changes depending on my mood.  My go to base coats are butter LONDON Nail Foundation and OPI Nail Envy.

For today's design, after my base coat, I added 2 coats of Orly DoD.  I love this polish.  It's a dirty white with a pink tone and yes, it's from the Dark Shadows collection.  For some reason I had bubbles with this application, so annoying!

You want to make sure that your base polish dries before stamping.  I don't recommend using a fast drying top coat.  The tackiness of the polish helps pull and hold the stamp to your finger.

Alright, the actual stamping.  You want to make sure that the polish you are stamping with is opaque in 1 coat.  You don't have to buy the special stamping polish! A nice thick polish is all you need.  Place some on the stamp, scrap off the excess using a plastic scraper, like my Starbucks card.  You can purchase a plastic scrapper, but I'm sure you have extra plastic cards laying around somewhere. In picking up the stamp, I have found that firmly pushing down works better than the roll method. DON'T move the stamper around or you will smear the stamp. Just push down.  Once you have the stamp on the stamper, roll it on your nail.  You need to move quickly through these steps because the polish will dry fast.  You don't always have to clean the plate between each stamp, it usually depends on the polish.  Sometimes it works better when you leave the extra polish on the stamp.

My nails after stamping:

After I cleaned up my nails I decided to add some accent dots, using the same colors.

Lastly, you want to add your top coat.  It is always a good idea to give your polish time to dry or else it can smear.  Some top coats are horrible with stamping and will always smear, typically the thinner ones like butter LONDON Hardwear.  I have recently started using HK Girl which is AMAZING!! I have not experienced any smearing with this polish, it's fast drying and has a great shine.

My finished product:

Stamping can be a very difficult and frustrating technique to master.  It took me awhile to get good at it.  My best word of advice is practice.  The more you practice the better you will get at it.  Don't give up, you will get the hang of it! 

If you have further questions please feel free to contact me through my blog. I am more than happy to help those who want to learn this technique! 

Thanks Kirsten for letting me share with your readers! :)