Stamping - first semi-success!

Today I have a special post that I am super excited to share with you guys, mainly because I can share with you this major victory I've had! (This is a bit wordy, so scroll down to the pictures if you would like to avoid my monologue).

The victory is related to stamping. I've been wanting to try stamping basically since I got into nail art and starting seeing some of you amazing nail bloggers and what you all can do with stamping plates. I read some tutorials and thought - that looks easy enough! FALSE. So false.
The first thing I bought was the Salon Express from Walmart (I know, I know). It actually worked better than I thought, but not well enough and not consistently enough. I didn't like most of the designs except the patterns, I just wanted to try it. I had problems with the images not transferring completely (or not at all), and also my nails were too big for the designs, I had empty space even when I did get a good transfer.
SO then, I saw these cheap plates on Born Pretty Store (they were like 2.00 a piece for a big sheet of 40ish designs, I think. When they finally came in (with stamping polish, because I thought maybe that was the problem), I was devastated. All of the designs, including the patterns, were even smaller, and I mean TINY. I would need to stamp one image about four times to cover my thumb. Plus, I couldn't get most of the images to transfer at all, even with the special polish.

Long story short, I have been drooling over A Girl and Her Polish's stamping, so I finally decided to just ask for tips. Katee directed me to her tutorial (which helped a lot) AND offered me some more great tips, and I decided not to give up. I ordered Bundle Monster plates, since I've seen so many gorgeous stamping posts using them, and I waited.

Last week, the plates came in..........and I was absolutely stunned how well they work. I'm still using the Walmart stamper, and a Hot Topic membership card as a scraper instead of that metal one, and I've gotten beautiful transfers and SO many compliments on my nails! And now, without further ado - my very first semi-successful (I'm still not perfect by any means) stamping manicure!!!

For this mani, I used a base of Zoya Happi, which I scored during the recent awesome BOGO sale. I love this color! The shimmer is gorgeous. I forgot to take a picture of it before I stamped, though. Anyways, for the snake skin, I used BM-215 and Wet n Wild Black Creme (so no fancy polish needed - this polish costs .67 at Rite Aid and it worked awesome)!

I also did my other hand, just to try another design:

For some reason, this design reminds me of Vans shoes. I used the same colors here, but I used BM-210.

So what do you think? Not bad for a first real attempt, right? ;] My point of this post is really to let you all know that even if it seems like you'll never get the hang of something, you can and you will! And the victory will feel that much better when you finally do get it! Hope you all have a lovely day <3

Kelly