Saturday Stamping w/ Dashica Beauty Big SDP-A!

Hello lovelies!! I have great news! You may remember this post, where I shared my results with Daring Digits incredible cuticle scrub. It's now available for purchase on DDPolish.com in 4 scents: Peppermint, Vanilla, Citrus, and Unscented. The scrub runs $5.25 for 2oz, which is a steal considering how well it works. Also available is Ashley's incredible Cuticle Oil Balm, which I'll be showing you within the next day or so. I suggest picking up a few of both - they have totally saved my skin!

Today I have some stamping to share with you. I really miss stamping sometimes, and I'm trying to make a point to break out my stamping supplies more often. A couple of weeks ago I ordered one of the big plates from Dashica Beauty along with the XL Stamper, and they arrived yesterday. Once I had the plate in my hot little hands there was no way I could resist doing some stamping.

I chose Nina Ulta Pro Li-Lacing Discipline, a soft lilac purple, as my base color. I used one of the swirly images from Dashica Beauty's Big SDP-A Plate and stamped with Konad White. The images picked up perfeclty and the XL Stamper is just amazing. The only issue I encountered was that the XL Stamper head tends to either sink down into the stamper, or, if you choose to use the cardboard disc to keep the head where it should be, it falls out. This made for some uneven transfer and I wasn't able to line up the image correctly. After I was finished, I glued the stamper head into the handle with gorilla glue, cause there is no way I'm messing with that thing every time I want to stamp. ;)

I love this image. I've seen this on a few blogs before and knew that I had to have it. There are actually 2 versions of this image on the Big SDP-A Plate, this one and a smaller version. I'm sure you'll be seeing them both several times since it's my fave image.

I love how this turned out. I don't stamp with white often, but I love the contrast of the white against the purple. It's definitely one of those manicures you can't miss! I do wish my stamping were cleaner and that I had been able to line up the stamper correctly, but now that I've gorilla glued the stamper head, that shouldn't be an issue. Gorrilla Glue - can you tell I wasn't messing around here? ;)

I'm already browsing the Dashica Website for more of these image plates. The images are engraved perfectly and transfer with little to no flaws every single time. They are large enough to cover longer and wider nails and they have the reverse images so that your left and right hands match instead of one hand being kinda backwards. 

What do you think of this mani? Do you have any Dashica Beauty plates?

I'll be back with BGCosmetics and Daring Digits tomorrow, as well as Laquerlicious and White Owl Lacquers to start the week!

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!
-Kimber

Daring Digits Peppermint Cuticle Scrub

Hello Lovelies! I was feeling a touch under the weather yesterday, and am still hurting today (darn trapezesius muscle!). I still wanted to share some awesome polish and new products with you all, so here I am, despite not being able to turn my head to the right!

Today I am sharing a brand new product from Daring Digits. So new, in fact, that it isn't even listed on the website yet! Ashley was kind enough to send me a couple of new products to try out, and among them was her new Peppermint Cuticle Scrub. First, let me say that my skin is insanely dry and almost impossible to get to normal, so I'm always looking for something to help out with moisture, as well as with smoothing rough skin and exfoliating. I've tried so many products,  and my skin and cuticles still looked horrible without a ton of oils and balms and lotions. I'm a pretty good person to use as a guinea pig for hand and nail care products since literally nothing has worked for me. Lemony Flutter, Burt's Bees,Various Oils and scrubs. You name it, I've tried it. This Peppermint Oil Scrub (as well as another new product from DD) has been my savior.  I've been using this for over a week now, so what you will see isn't what I started out with, but my skin still has a ways to go. What I'm going to show you is what my skin looks like now with no lotions, oils, balms, and after a nice dip in some acetone.

Daring Digits Peppermint Cuticle Scrub is a mix of Sugar, Brown Sugar, Canola and Safflower Oil, Beeswax, Salt (preservative), Vitamin E and Peppermint Oil. It comes in a sealed plastic container filled with enough scrub to last a good 2-4 weeks, depending on how often you plan on using it.

So, let's take a look at what my poor nails and cuticles looked like before I used my Peppermint Cuticle Scrub the other night. (This is also a great example of how different angles have different lighting conditions, if you're like me and are actually into that stuff!) WARNING! Graphic nail nudity ahead!



So, here are my cuticles and fingertips after removing my polish with straight acetone (sorry about my horrible vertical ridges and white damaged spots. The white areas are from trauma - slammed my hand in a door, and I've always had the ridges.). There's also one of my friendly neighborhood cat hairs in one shot. You know how it is - never see it until you've already polished and put the camera away!

Take a close look. My nails are dry, my cuticles are dry and I have flaky, dry skin all around the nail. Sexy, right? This is actually a huge improvement.

Using the scrub is simple. Take a pinch and drop it right onto your nail and cuticle:

Then use your finger to gently rub the scrub all over your fingertips, cuticles and nail. Make sure you're gentle though! Especially on the nail itself. All it really takes is a gentle rub.

After you're done with all 10 fingers, just rinse the scrub off. Make sure to rinse under your nails as well, since some of the scrub will inevitably end up there.

And here is what my fingertips and cuticles look like after using the scrub. Keep in mind that all of these photos are after over a week of using this scrub, and my cuticles and nails are already vastly improved.

Can you see the difference? I can! When I first started using this scrub, there was a huge difference. Since I've been using this stuff my nails, cuticles and fingertips are entirely different - the dryness has decreased considerably, my nails, cuticles and skin are less flaky and scaly, and my nails feel healthier. In fact, I love this so much that after using this for only 2 days I emailed Ashley to order more! I'm also using another fabulous product from Daring Digits in conjunction with this, but that's for another post!

Daring Digits Peppermint Cuticle Scrub will be available on DDPolish.com soon.  I think it's going to retail for around $5, which is an amazing deal. I cannot rave about this enough! I can't believe how different my nails and skin are, and I do not miss having to spend my time nipping away at flakes of dry skin.

What do you think? Were you able to see the difference?

If you are interested in purchasing DD's Peppermint Cuticle Scrub, you can email Ashley through the DDPolish.com site, or let me know! I'll be posting an update as soon as it's available through the website.

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!
-Kimber

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