AND SUMMER ENDS

I guess it's now officially safe to say that summer is over. Last night dropped down into the 30's. It has warmed up to about 60, but it looks like the cooldown has begun. I even remote started my car this morning so I wouldn't freeze on my way to work. 

I've even started wearing socks around the house again. I'm still barefoot in my shoes at work, though, as I fight the urge to start wearing boots. This time of year I never know what the hell to wear. Most of my sweaters are too warm for this weather, but most of my other stuff is too summery. Too cold for sandals; not cold enough for boots. It's that weird in-between weather, and my closet isn't filled with in-between clothes. Such big problems, right?

This mani I did when I was stuck at home after surgery. I don't remember if I did a complete mani or if I was just playing and did one hand.

The light green is Color Club Blue Ming. Anytime I grab this one I wonder why it's called that. This polish is not blue by any stretch of the imagination. It's friggin' green. The end. I topped it with Mundo de Unas Dark Gray using the Dana 10 stamping plate.

Actually, I think I might have just been playing that day because my Dana stamping plates arrived. Lord knows I wasn't going anywhere. If you're looking for a nice set for cheap, I would suggest grabbing them.  $12.00 with free shipping is a great price for ten plates. Just sayin'.

If you buy them, instead of blaming me for "making" you spend money, I think you should thank me because it's such a small amount this time.

HOW DO THEY DO IT?

My weekend was filled with dogs. I had Razzie from Friday morning until late yesterday afternoon. My friend Laura brought Seven over on Friday night and on Saturday so she could play with her brother. Watching the two of them play for hours is too fun.

It also gives Tinlee a bit of a break from being bothered non-stop, too. I will say, though, that Razzie isn't as pesty as he was before. It's like he grew up all of a sudden. He still has the adorable habit of just randomly climbing halfway onto my lap to kiss me, which I just love. He is just the smoochiest of all the puppies, I think. And he is quite the bed hog. Luckily Kev was gone so it didn't matter so much. He waits for me to get in bed and then makes sure he is slammed up against me for the entire night. He is also kind enough to not wake me up before 8 a.m., unlike Seven who thinks 6:30-7:00 is get-up time when she sleeps over.

Tinlee was oddly sad when Razzie left yesterday. She kept standing by the truck looking sad before they pulled out of the driveway, and she didn't want to come inside after they left. She  just kept looking down the driveway as if they were going to come back. Then she pouted inside for about an hour. I actually felt a little bad for her. Maybe she appreciates him more now that he isn't so pesty with her. Of course, she's also in heat so maybe she just liked the male company, however pointless. LOL

Here's one I did last week. I just took it off last night because I had to do a soak off and reapplication of my nails. They'd been on since the 1st or 2nd. I'd knocked them around Wednesday night while cleaning, so several of them were hanging on by a thread. My right index was hanging on by less than that. I'm lucky Razzie didn't end up with that one as a snack.

This one actually leaned more purple than the picture shows. The base is China Glaze Fade into Hue, and I stamped over that with Sinful Colors Mesmerize. The design is from the Dana10 stamping plate.

After I finished it and took pictures, it was then that I really noticed that I didn't get the design placed very well on that index or ring finger. I don't know that I would have bothered to remove it and try again, but it was annoying to look at. Other than that flaw, I liked this one.

I often wonder how some people always seem to have perfect stamping every time. Are they just that much better than me, or do they re-do stuff and just don't admit it? 

It's just like when I see when somebody says they can do a stamped mani, start to finish, in a half hour. How?? I can't even do two coats of polish, topcoat and cleanup in a half hour. I can easily stamp all ten fingers in 5-10 minutes, but I still have to do my base, topcoat, stamp, topcoat and clean up my cuticles afterwards.

I've been stamping for probably three years now. I guess this is as good as I'm going to get, which makes me super envious of all of those other perfect people.

COMPLETE COPYCATTING

Just going to be a quickie post today. The only thing I really have to bitch about is the migration of the hummingbirds. I still had one little girl as of last evening; I'll find out later if she's still around, but last year September 21st was the last day I took a picture. I tried to get shots last night, but she was very skittish for some reason. I'm crossing my fingers she's still around.

As I wander the web, if I see a mani I like I'll pin it on a Pinterest board that I've reserved specifically for things I want to try. This mani I did over the weekend is a complete copy job, right down to two of the three gradient colors. The original mani was done by @wackylaki.

I used Zoya Kennedy, Rue and Brigitte for the gradient and then stamped with Mundo de Unas white and the MoYou Pro 10 stamping plate.

I loved this when she did it, and I still love it. I loved it enough to put it on Thursday night and leave it on until last night. It was a hit at the doctor's office on Friday, and I was determined to wear it to work at least one day. I did finally remove it last night even though I wasn't tired of it.

I was actually halfway through doing my nails last night when I noticed I was actually putting the same stamping design on all over again. I guess that means I really liked it. Luckily I was able to remove the stamping without wrecking the base manicure.

I must not be getting enough sleep or something. I consider that to be a pretty good sized airhead bleach-blonde moment, even for me.

BETTER IN MY HEAD

This was my first week back to work, and it has been a bit of a struggle. I was pleasantly surprised to see a bit less of a work pile than I was expecting, and I was completely caught up before the end of Monday. Thankfully.

I'm also thankful today is Wednesday, the end of my work week. I'm very much looking forward to a quiet weekend. It might even be warm enough to lay on top of the pool water. We've had some pretty cold nights so I have no desire whatsoever to actually get into the water, but that doesn't mean I can't get some lovely warmth from the sun while lounging on my raft. 

I've still got at least three hummingbirds hanging around, too. I'm sure I'll spend some time sitting with the feeder. My routine the past week has been sitting on the deck with the feeder and basically having a staredown with my juvie male that sits across from me up in the trees. He sits and watches to make sure nobody else tries to come to my feeder. The minute another bird buzzes over to me, he buzzes over to chase them away. Monday evening I had them vying for the feeder using my head as the buffer, a bird right next to each ear. They were so close my hair was moving from their wings beating. Adorable, but he is hateful as hell. He'll let another bird eat at the garage feeders which are right across from me, but he just will not share the one I'm holding. At least when he does leave his tree perch to eat, he tends to stop and sit on my finger while he drinks. It makes it worth sitting like a statue for long periods of time.

I did this mani Sunday night. The vision in my head was better than this, but of course I started way too late to start over with something else.

I used my usual white, Cult El Porto, and then stamped with Mundo de Unas Pink, Lilac and Mint. the design is from the Uber Chic UC 1-03 stamping plate.

In my mind's eye this was adorable. In real life, it was just okay, so I only wore it for a day.

I've actually done my nails three whole days in a row this week. I can't even remember the last time I did that. I'm still suffering from lack of inspiration. I guess the slump continues.

Now for a quick VOTD.....Charter Spectrum has simply the worst homepage email setup on earth. My work computer has Windows 8.1, and it doesn't let me use Outlook Express anymore for my Charter email. The level of irritation this causes is immeasurable. I have to go through the Charter webpage, and it is nothing but trouble. I do sweepstakes via the internet, so I get at least 200 emails throughout the day. Deleting is a nightmare. And emptying the actual trash bin is not even possible since it takes at least 1/2 hour just to delete out of my inbox.

They should spend less money on their non-stop tv advertising and spend some money on tech. Vent over.

ACTUALLY LEFT THE HOUSE

Yesterday I had my follow-up appointment with the doc in Green Bay. It was the first time I'd left the house in three weeks. The appointment went as expected, and my next follow-up is in January.

It felt pretty good to be out and about, and after we got back to town we went out to dinner. I'm kind of paying for it today because I'm pretty sore. It sure will be nice when I feel completely like myself again.

Wednesday night we rented a few movies so I played with my nails while we watched. It was the first time I'd done anything on both hands in awhile. I had kind of played just on one nail the night before but ultimately went with this foil.

I wanted my nail underneath to kind of be a natural tone so I used Zoya Loretta, which is a really sheer, very light pink. 

The foils went on reasonably well although the pinkie had to be done twice. It didn't really go on any better the second time, and you can see the missing area near the cuticle.

I'm still wearing this now, and I'm surprised at how well it's wearing. I think it's a really cute pattern. I like that the non-shiny foils aren't ruined by topcoat.

It's probably a good thing that it's holding up so well. I've got Seven here for the weekend, and since she has been bringing me toys non-stop since she got here over 2 hours ago, I don't know how helpful she's going to be if I decide to do my nails.

I'm leaning toward "not helpful". At all.

JUST PLAYIN'

Every 20th of the month, I check my Julep Maven account to see what my monthly box is going to be. It's been awhile since I bothered to buy it. This month, though, about a week or so before that I got an email from Julep giving us a chance to get an extra free polish if we got the monthly box.

So I signed in and reserved that freebie and then hoped I'd actually want my It Girl box for September. As it turns out, the polishes for the month were absolutely something I knew I'd like. I also had enough Jules in my account to get my set for free, and I even had enough to add on another polish. So the other day I got five polishes in the mail for free. Gotta' love that, right?

I was sitting here last night and decided I would try out the purple holographic polish just on my thumbnail to see if it looked as good on as it did in the bottle. 

Today I finished swatching all five and finished painting my left hand. So this is Julep Delores.

It is much better in person. I wouldn't say it's the most holo of the holo's, but it's really pretty.

Since I'm not leaving the house anytime soon, I didn't bother painting my right hand with it, but I did decide to throw a design on it just for shits and giggles. 

Horrible picture. Just horrible. The design is actually hearts from the Fab Ur Nails FUN 13 plate, and I used the Mundo de Unas fuschia stamping polish called Tutti.

You'll just have to take my word for it being cute in person. It's actually cute enough that if I had any reason to do my nails, I'd do the other hand.

MARBLED IT UP

I've never had such a difficult recuperation from anything. I'm so over it. I'm not sleeping worth a damn. I actually have a call in to my doctor's office and am waiting for a call back to ask a few questions since yesterday I noticed a couple of popped stitches. Of course I noticed them ten minutes after their office closed for the day. The whole thing is just depressing. I'm hoping at some point today I'll be able to at least clean the house because it's filthy after not getting a good cleaning for two weeks. 

I did do a water marble the other night, and I'm semi-happy with how it turned out.

I started with a base of Cult Avalon and then used that along with Julep Sasha and 10 Professional And the Winner Is.....

Instead of using my usual orange stick to marble with, I used the water marble tool I bought from Whats Up Nails. I'm pretty impressed with it. It's very pointy and cuts through the polish very nicely. I'm glad I spent the $7.75 to get it.

In looking at this one now, I'm kind of wishing I had taken the time to redo that ring finger. It looks a little cloudy to me. Since I haven't left the house in two weeks it didn't really matter, I guess. 

Right now it is thundering outside like crazy. Summer has returned this week with temperatures in the 80's and humidity to match. Even the pool water is back up to 80 degrees which at this point is downright depressing since I'm not up to actually getting into the pool. At least if it rains today I don't have to pout about missing out on pool time. Dang. Power just went out for a minutes while I was typing this. I'm glad that didn't last very long!

That's my whining for the day, hopefully. Right now I'm sitting here with freshly applied nails that are naked. Hopefully later today I'll think of something fun to do with them.

In this mood, I'm not counting on it.