... Guest Post by @LilyandJinks ...

Continuing on with the months theme of "Things I like", it's time for a Guest Post!!! Now it's been a long while since someone came over to do one but I've definitely missed showcasing the fantastic work that others create for the world to see!!! Todays post is the fantastic nails that is lilyandjinks over on Instagram. Seriously clicky click click and check out her work as it is divine!! Her link is http://instagram.com/lilyandjinks

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My name is Sylvia and normally I post my manis solely on my Instagram account, @lilyandjinks. I was very excited at the chance to write a guest post for Sarah Claire, whose blog I’ve been enjoying
immensely for the past year and a half. So, welcome to my first official nail related blog post!

I wanted to do something special for today’s post, so I’ve opted to combine two of my favourite nail
art techniques, stamping and water marbling. I discovered this combination around Halloween last
year when a marble went terribly wrong. Rather than removing it and starting over, I tried stamping
over it and was delighted with the result.

The great thing about this technique is the marble does not need to be uniform or precise. To start
with, I marbled two fingers at a time using China Glaze Escaping Reality, Happy Go Lucky and Shore
Enuff. On the whole, I’ve found China Glaze crèmes to be excellent for marbling.

After applying top coat (I use HK Girl Glisten and Glow) I then stamped with one of my all-time
favourite images, MM20 from Messy Mansion, using Konad White. I really like how the openness of
this stamping image lends itself to a myriad of different colours, backgrounds and techniques.

Finally, a big Happy Blogiversary to Sarah Claire. Three years is quite an achievement! Thank you for
having me as a guest. Can’t wait to see all the other exciting things happening this month

... AN Monday - Winter ...

I wanted to showcase things this month that make me happy! Aussie Nail Monday always makes me smile. Even though I don't always find the time to showcase nails on Monday, I do give it a go and I always love to see what the other Aussie ladies come up with weekly. There are so many creative souls out there!! So  ... Happy Aussie Nail Monday everyone! Todays theme is "Winter" being that down here in the southern hemisphere, June signals the first month of winter.

I was rather excited about doing todays manicure. Mainly because I really wanted to use my MoYou London festive plates at Christmas but simply ran out of time between the day my order arrived and the big day itself!

I've gone for a simple black and white festive sweater look using OPI Alpine Snow and Black Onyx. The design is from the MoYou London Festive Collection 04 plate

I was really pleased with how these turned out and I love the contrast accent finger. Plus the design itself is extremely cute and I had a really hard time narrowing down which to use since this plate seems to have some gems on it.

I will definitely give these sweater designs another go in the future!

Wanna see more Aussie Nails? Check out these links or check out #anmonday on Instagram!

Lily Jinks - @lilyandjinks

Ann - Nailovelogy

Tracy - @oliviajade19

Holly - @nails_by_holly

Naomi - @nadeekay and Nananaisnails

Erin Wu -  @erinzi and Erin Zi’s Nails

Elissa -@tenlittlenubs and Ten Little Nubs

Kate - Pimped Out Nails

Astrid - @lovessweetas

Sarah Claire - @shattermeclaire or Shatter me Claire

Julia - Fancy Nails and Cups of Tea

Sylvie - @smudgedpolish

Relle - @lazylacquerista or Lazy Lacquerista

Tammy - @ohmygoshpolish

Christinemay - @xtinemayyy or Nails at 2am

Tash Birch - @tashisdead

Nicki - @celestialcosmetics

Briana -

Loz - Polish Patterns

Kelly - @kellyskolors and Kelly's Kolors!

Tara - @lokislacquer or  Osiris and Loki paint their nails

... Happy 3rd Blogversary plus Ozotic 504 ...

"I had a dream last night that I had a pretty blog about nails and polishes. Dreams intrigue me - especially ones that I can actually remember."  - Shatter me Claire, June 1 2011

Wow. Just Wow! I can't believe my blog is now the big 3!! More importantly I can't believe I've actually managed to still be motivated enough to update it. Generally I lose interest with blogs and journals pretty quickly even though I have good intentions but I'm so pleased that I managed to stick it out even though I have massive hiatus periods.

While visitors (and posts!) have dwindled over the years, I am thankful for friendships that have been made via SMC and also that I can clearly see where I've come. My skills still have a long way to go but it's clear that my painting, nail art (and my photography!) have come far over the years. Also I was clearly following the crowd in my early posts and I like to think I've found my own style now.

I decided to go back to where it all started for me. Ozotic 504 was the first polish I featured here and it seemed right to go back to the beginning. That and the fact that I wanted to make amends for the cringefactor that was my first post.

504 was one of the first polishes I brought from piCture pOlish. Sadly they no longer carry the Ozotic range but back when I first received this, multichrome polishes weren't as common as they are now so it was such an exciting time to see something that changed colours before your eyes.

Back in the day, Ozotic 504 was called "Twilight" and it's so easy to see why. The colour shifts from that orange/brown/red right through to a purple/blue. 504 is also quite sheer so I've layered it over a black polish.

I highly doubt I'll ever EVER be able to take a shot like this again with a clear split of colour down the middle. I haven't mastered underwater shots so natural light it is!!

As I mentioned earlier, 504 has been discontinued but you can still find bottles popping up on blogsales and on storenvy if you are super wanting it but there are many dupes now on the market that don't require layering which is handy for those lazy people like myself!

Thanks for popping by and if things go to plan then June should be a great month. Hope you pop your head back in to see what's happening! :)

... Polish Party - Splatter ...

I joined a new Facebook group in the last few days called Polish Party who are doing monthly challenges! That sounds right up my alley! A whole month to complete the task!! Woohoo! I have great intentions with my weekly ones but often I run out of time to paint (or in most cases, photo and edit!)

This months theme is Splatter Nails and thankfully I am just scrapping this into the month! Woohoo!

I've chosen to use a 2 coat base of Nails Inc Cadogan Place and splatter over it with the vibrant Nails Inc I <3 Ita. If you are new to splatter manicures, the straw is everything. Too big and it won't work and you just end up with polish everywhere. I personally love the straws that come with kids Fruit Boxes/Poppers/Juice Boxes. They seem to be just the right size to dip and spray!

It's been awhile since I've done a splatter mani and I'd forgotten how easy and simple it is to get a fantastic looking mani. I'm very much liking how this turned out and how the contrast in colours works.

With any luck the inlinkz will appear below and you can check out all the other lovely nails featured in the Polish Party! YAY!

An InLinkz Link-up

... Mario and Boo ...

It's not often I'll tackle a theme twice but I had so much fun with the AIPAS "Revenge of the Nerds" theme this week I wanted to do another. I really do love Boo from the Mario series. He does get forgotten about a bit behind all the other villain characters but I'm glad I had a chance to feature him.

The base for this mani is Pretty Serious Creature Crush which I guess is appropriate! It's an extremely pretty dark blue with black and silver glitter. I really like how the larger hex pieces are not overwhelming if you are like me and not a huge glitter fan. Sadly it's being discontinued so if this looks like a polish you need in your life, run over now to Pretty Serious and grab your bottle!

Boo is from the ever loved FUN3 stamping plate while Mario is from MoYou London - Back to the 90s 01. Both have been filled in using acrylic paint. Marios overalls got a tad smudged when placing the reverse stamping which is due to my impatience in not letting the paint dry! But who can blame me when this looks so good!

I've got big things planned for the 1st of June so I hope you pop back then to check it out!!

... AIPAS Hulk Nails ...

Woah! Better grab a chair as 2 days in a row never happens! Shocked!

The Australian Indie Polish Appreciation Society had a theme this week of "Revenge of the Nerds". Now I don't really consider myself nerdy but I have wanted to do Hulk nail art for awhile and here's my chance. I've always had a soft spot for him and for a bit of an odd reason.   Until recently my grandparents had a massive hulk fridge magnet which I presume was left behind from my Uncles when they moved out when I was really little. Anyway ... onto the pics!

Now the polish is the super beautiful Lilypad Lacquer Peita's Potion which now has the proud award of being featured on the blog more than once!! It's honestly so beautiful! The Hulk himself comes from my super favourite stamping plate FUN11 and even though I seem to use it all the time, I'm not even half way into using all the characters! I'll get there though!

The Hulk is painted using acrylic paint and his hair is actually Zoya Veruschka for a bit of extra sparkle. Not that this needed it! It's gorgeous! Today has been extremely gloomy with rain and I got so lucky that as soon as I finished painting, the sun appeared for a few precious seconds! Score!  It's not often that I get a mani looking as fab as this first time with minimal effort and then get rewarded with sunlight aswell.

To say I'm happy with this mani is an understatement. Everything just went so right and the purple worked so well with the green. Loving that green acrylic paint though *makes note to use it again*

... AN Monday - Disney ...

Hmmmm ... *insert excuses for not blogging here* ... Well that definitely wasn't the way I was hoping May would turn out but hey! Live and learn :)

Guess what ... It's AN Monday!! Todays theme is "Disney" and with the exception of the Pixar movies, there are only a handful of Disney movies/characters that I seem to like but my favourite of all time is Tigger!!

T-I-DOUBLE GRR-ERRRR!  I gave this my own twist from the many Tigger inspired french manis on google images (I'm crediting the first one I saw which was here). I've used piCture pOlish beige for the base and then have used piCture pOlish mellow yellow, candy and popsicle for tigger himself. The image is reverse stamped from the FUN11 plate! LOVE!

It's been so long since I used Popsicle and I'd forgotten how much it shimmers! Divine! Even though I painted Tiggers tummy the wrong colour (doh!) I'm pretty happy with how these turned out. Simple yet effective! I can see I need to work on my french manicures but practice makes perfect. I'd love to revisit this another day.

Wanna see more Aussie Nails? Check out these links or check out #anmonday on Instagram!

Lily Jinks - @lilyandjinks

Ann - Nailovelogy

Tracy - @oliviajade19

Holly - @nails_by_holly

Naomi - @nadeekay and Nananaisnails

Erin Wu -  @erinzi and Erin Zi’s Nails

Elissa -@tenlittlenubs and Ten Little Nubs

Kate - Pimped Out Nails

Astrid - @lovessweetas

Sarah Claire - @shattermeclaire or Shatter me Claire

Julia - Fancy Nails and Cups of Tea

Sylvie - @smudgedpolish

Relle - @lazylacquerista or Lazy Lacquerista

Tammy - @ohmygoshpolish

Christinemay - @xtinemayyy or Nails at 2am

Tash Birch - @tashisdead

Nicki - @celestialcosmetics

Briana -

Loz - Polish Patterns

Kelly - @kellyskolors and Kelly's Kolors!

Tara - @lokislacquer or  Osiris and Loki paint their nails

... Untried May ** Celestial Cosmetics - Sun Kissed ...

I have this gorgeous beauty to show you today. The weather here has definitely turned to gloomy autumn now and I really got lucky taking these shots in the one bit of sun that managed to shine on through!

This is Sun Kissed by Celestial Cosmetics and it's a real beauty. I'm so glad that I pulled this one out of the box to try first. This is 2 coats of pure holo droolness! It's a fantastic colour that I thought worked really well with my skintone. There needs to be more orange in the world!

The holo in Sun Kissed is what I've come to expect from Celestial. Instant! BAM! All these shots are taken in full natural sunlight which is always the way to go but you definitely won't be disappointed in the shade. It's a gorgeous colour.

Sadly I only own 5 orange holo polishes (note to self - remedy that!) and Sun Kissed is nowhere near the same shade as any of the others. While the Celestial website doesn't ship worldwide, if you drop the owner Nicki a line I'm sure she will be able to help you acquire these pretties via her stockists.

Also I'm trying something different and devoting the whole month to untrieds in my pile, and pile is probably putting it midly. After realising that probably close to 50% of my stash and overflow collection is untried, things have to change!! So I've started something called "Untried May" both here on blogger and on IG. I know that I'm not the only one in this boat and let's face it, I love inspiration and motivation from others. So jump on board! There is plenty of room and hopefully we can all make a dent into our pile!

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An InLinkz Link-up

... AN Monday - Subtle/Neutral ...

Hurrah! It's AN Monday!! Todays theme is "Subtle/Neutral" so I've chosen to go with a Shellac colour with stamping and gemstones.  Now I haven't had a gel colour appear on the blog before so feel loved that you are witnessing this moment!!

Originally I was going to just go for a simple French mani but I saw this design on a stamping plate and thought it would work well.

So this is 2 coats of Shellac "Beau" with stamping on top using Konad White. I was really impressed with Shellac Beau to be honest. Even though it's on the sheer side, it still managed to cover up things like stains that I had on my nails previously that I'm trying to grow out. The stamping is from a plate I brought from Cheeky that seems to be the L plate. I've just rotated the image so that it runs along the nail.

I added the gemstones as a last minute thing as I felt it needed something else. I really like the combo but I can see I need to do a lot more practice with placing the gemstones down where I want them to go!

Even though this mani has some major visible nail line going on, I really like it. It's simple yet effective. I really think I'll be revisiting this in the future if I have an event where I need my nails to sport something subtle.

Now I wanted to point this out incase you haven't had a bottle of Shellac before in your little hands. The packaging shows how sheer it is! I love that and it's so simple!! How I wish general nail polish came with a similar system!! I would have saved a lot of money on things that I thought were something they weren't.

Wanna see more Aussie Nails? Check out these links or check out #anmonday on Instagram!

Lily Jinks - @lilyandjinks

Ann - Nailovelogy

Tracy - @oliviajade19

Holly - @nails_by_holly

Naomi - @nadeekay and Nananaisnails

Erin Wu -  @erinzi and Erin Zi’s Nails

Elissa -@tenlittlenubs and Ten Little Nubs

Kate - Pimped Out Nails

Astrid - @lovessweetas

Sarah Claire - @shattermeclaire or Shatter me Claire

Julia - Fancy Nails and Cups of Tea

Sylvie - @smudgedpolish

Relle - @lazylacquerista or Lazy Lacquerista

Tammy - @ohmygoshpolish

Christinemay - @xtinemayyy or Nails at 2am

Tash Birch - @tashisdead

Nicki - @celestialcosmetics

Briana -

Loz - Polish Patterns

Kelly - @kellyskolors and Kelly's Kolors!

Tara - @lokislacquer or  Osiris and Loki paint their nails

... AN Monday - Animal Print ...

YAY! AN Monday is back and I've combined it with the "Paint it Blue" theme for Autism Awareness. ASD is a big part of my daily life but I'll get onto that another day soon. Todays theme is Animal Print and I had a really hard time narrowing down my choices for this! Recently I had a bit of a complaint about striping tape hating me and someone kindly sent me some nail vinyls which appear to be all the rage lately!

I've chosen to use the stunning Pretty Serious Crystal Lake as the base with an unamed black on top covered with a matte top coat and I've used the zebra print nail vinyls. I think the blue and black works really well.

For a newbie I'm quite pleased with how these Zebra stripes turned out! They need work but compared to how much rage striping tape produces, I can see we will be friends.

And because I've had this in my head for the whole time I was doing this mani ... Sit back, relax and enjoy! Zebra Zebra Zebra!!!

Wanna see more Aussie Nails? Check out these links or check out #anmonday on Instagram!

Lily Jinks - @lilyandjinks

Ann - Nailovelogy

Tracy - @oliviajade19

Holly - @nails_by_holly

Naomi - @nadeekay and Nananaisnails

Erin Wu -  @erinzi and Erin Zi’s Nails

Elissa -@tenlittlenubs and Ten Little Nubs

Kate - Pimped Out Nails

Astrid - @lovessweetas

Sarah Claire - @shattermeclaire or Shatter me Claire

Julia - Fancy Nails and Cups of Tea

Sylvie - @smudgedpolish

Relle - @lazylacquerista or Lazy Lacquerista

Tammy - @ohmygoshpolish

Christinemay - @xtinemayyy or Nails at 2am

Tash Birch - @tashisdead

Nicki - @celestialcosmetics

Briana -

Loz - Polish Patterns

Kelly - @kellyskolors and Kelly's Kolors!

Tara - @lokislacquer or  Osiris and Loki paint their nails