The 31 day Challenge 2013

This time last year Jules and I were contemplating attempting the 31 day nail art challenge for the first time. We had watched bloggers from 2011 give it a go and the prospect of doing different nails every day for a month seemed daunting. I'm not going to lie, there were tears and drama queeny moments! But at the end of those 31 days I had tried a tonne of designs and was proud of what I had managed to do. So what's in store for the next 31 days...check it out!

But before we dive in the 2013 challenge let's take a look down memory lane. I had only started playing around with nail art 9 months previously so I had a lot to learn but some of my favourite designs that I have ever done came from the 2012 challenge.

Day 1: Red

Day 2: Orange

Day 3: Yellow

Day 4: Green

Day 5: Blue

Day 6: Violet (Jules tag team!)

Day 7: Black and White

Day 8: Metallic Nails, another Julsie save.

Day 9: Rainbow

Day 10: Gradient and Day 11: Polka Dots

Day 12: Stripes. This is one of my all time fav designs. Maybe I should recreate it this year?

Day 13: Animal Print

Day 14: Flowers

 Day 15: Delicate print

Day16: Tribal Print

Day 17: Glitter (Julsie tag!)

Day 18: Half Moons

Day 19: Galaxy

Day 20: Water Marble ( I was so proud of myself for pulling this off because up until then I had only suffered epic water marbling fails. The fact I got the polish to spread in the water let alone create a design  was a super happy nail moment.)

Day 22: Inspired by....a song. Lady Gaga - Heavy Metal Lover

Day 23: Inspired by....a movie. Totoro. Another all time fav design. These were so rad!

Day 24: Inspired by....a book. Snugglepot and Cuddlepie, an Aussie classic.

Day 25: Inspired by....fashion. Miranda Kerr is a goddess.

Day 26 Inspired by....a pattern. My bedspread inspired this design.

Day 27 Inspired by....art. Jackson Pollack Blue Poled

Day 28 Inspired by....a flag. Japan!

Day 29 Inspired by....the supernatural. Aliens. This is when I fell in love with Barry M Silver Stamping Foil. Made me want to stamp again.

Day 30 Inspired by ....a tutorial. This is first time I had tried using craft scissors and tape. I much prefer the decal method now.

Day 31: Honour nails you love. Manicure Mommie on IG did this originally and I couldn't wait to try it...loved this mani.

I hope you guys enjoyed looking at all our designs from last year's challenge. If you are thinking about joining in this year tag your pics with #31dc2013 You don't have to do every day, just join in on designs you like. Or take the plunge and dive right in! I'm so excited to see what everyone comes up with this year. 

Follow DQN on the #31dc2013 on Facebook, IG, Tumblr, Twitter and of course here on the blog. I'm so pumped!! 

Special thanks to Chalkboard Nails for creating some awesome graphics for this year's challenge.

Bundle Monster - The 00 series

Flashback! Turn back the clock to 2010 and jump in and explore...or revisit!....the original Bundle Monster stamping set. BM were one of the first manufactures to sell plates in sets and with 21 different plates to play with, the 00 series was hot property at the time.  There was a lot to be learnt for BM though as despite the popularity of the plates there were some "cons" that thankfully have dissapeared with each new BM set. So let's explore....

A good way to describe this set is that it was "a good all-rounder". It contained a mix of mostly accent images, some French tip plates, with a few full nail image plates to top it off.

The accent images were cute and girly and stamped well (mostly - I'll explain later). They were a great size and fitted nicely on the nail. 

CON #1 Accent images with very little detail and big patches of space can be very hard to stamp well. You have to be very delicate scraping the polish across as you easily end up with bald patches in the image. Stamping with a plastic scraper or old credit card etc improves this greatly but just be mindful of applying very little pressure as you scrape across so as not to remove too much paint.

CON#2 The whole nail images. Great prints, a mix of girly and geometric but just far too small for the average nail. When customers come to the markets and enquire about good sets for children I point them to the 00 series as they are the perfect size...for kids. They are 1.2cm in height and 1cm in width. You would need to be very precise with your stamping to get them to fit even a medium length nail without having a big empty strip down one side....but a plus if you are good at stamping and have short nails, hardly any cleanup!

CON #3 If you know me you know I am not a fan of French tip nail designs. But plenty of people are. These images can be a little hard to stamp straight. Practice is definitely required. Making stamping decals would be a good way to utilise these type of designs and give you a better chance of applying it straight.

For those taking a stroll down memory lane do you remember when you first got this set....ahhh the possibilities, so many images to choose from and not enough fingers! This was the first stamping set I ever owned and I was thrilled it had a poodle in it. It made me realise that I really loved stamping with full nail images but that I just wasn't going to be able to use these due to their size...sad face!

If you have little nails or kids wanting to get into stamping this is the perfect set! Available now from www.dramaqueennails.com