Before & After: Tainted Love

Hello!!

I have very mixed feelings about Valentine's Day.

I love romance and love and relationships and all that. There's nothing better, and any excuse we get to celebrate the people we love is a good one.

That said, I think Valentine's Day makes a lot of people unhappy unnecessarily. If you aren't currently in a relationship, it highlights that fact very dramatically, and can make you feel very bad about yourself. And even if you're in a relationship, it can be hard to live up to the expectations that Valentine's Day puts on you--both in terms of commercialism and artificiality. Especially for men, but for women too, there is the stress of worrying if you're expected to create/buy something special for them, and you don't want to disappoint. It's nice to believe that a single flower is enough--and it should be--but what if it isn't? And why today? Shouldn't we be remembering the person we love everyday?

Okay, that's a lot of complexity for something that should be a joyful celebration of love. But a lot of people have negative associations, and while I don't necessarily myself, I can understand that perspective and I empathize with it. And I can imagine for anyone who is having a painful Valentine's Day, maybe they'd like to see something other than OMG-ANOTHER ooey-gooey Valentine's mani, lol.

So this year, I'm going to be a little bit different and represent that underrepresented point of view by doing two anti-Valentine's Day manicure. Today I'll show you the first, and tomorrow I'll have another; this one also does double duty as my Valentine's week manicure for the Let It Snow! challenge. :)

I started with an incredibly beautiful polish from A'dor Beauty Supplies called Tainted Love; it's a red jelly with amazing orange-gold holographic glitter, and a couple of black hexes and diamonds here and there. I just love the way the holographic glitter feels like embers burning  in a fire place...:

Once I ran to you...

Now I run from you...

This Tainted Love you've given

I give you all a boy could give you

Take my tears and that's not nearly all...

I decided to follow the lead of the black diamonds by stamping part of a diamond pattern, using Konad plate m60 and Barry M Gold Foil. Then I stamped torn hearts using Bunny Nails plate HD-A and Wet n Wild Ebony Hates Chris:

Now I run from you...

Whaddya think? Easy to modify with full hearts if you don't like the broken heart effect, hee hee. :)

Thanks for looking, and please check out the other Valentine manis below. :)

Xoxox,
M.