Nuvo Crystal Drops...my take on them!

Hey, it's Corrine, and today I thought I'd share with you something that is new to me that I am so in love with, the Nuvo Crystal Drops. They are made by Nuvo, and these came out, I believe, this last CHA 2016. Here are the colors that I got. They come in quite a few more colors than this, and the bottles are one ounces. The bottles are really pretty, actually, so they look great on a shelf, but I'm in love with these, and I'll go over what I've learned about them so far. I mentioned them on Facebook, and I got a few questions, so I thought I'd just share kind of what I've learned from them. Mine I got from a place that I've never shopped at before called Sew Susie Stamps. I'll put a link in the description box, and I was able to get 10% off my order, and there will be a link that, if you were interested, that will give you 10% off as well, so I'll put that in the description box. It's just, I guess, something that she does, but I called her regarding these, and the customer service was fantastic. My shipping was quick, so I was really happy, and what I found is places that I had looked that I normally shop at were out of a ton of the colors, so I love that I was able to find literally every color that I wanted with her, plus a few that are still on my wish list. So, let me just show you the difference. Again, these are 1oz. Here are Liquid Pearls by Ranger, and these are 1⁄2oz, so they're double the size, and I've never really been in love with Liquid Pearls. I actually only own 3 of them, a blue, this ivory, which I don't know what it's actually called, and a pink, and the reason I've never been in love with them is because they leave, when you put them on your page, they leave that teardrop on the top, or that chocolate chip on the top, even if you tap it from the bottom when you put it on, say, a page, you're supposed to lightly tap it from the bottom, and that will help them flatten out. They never quite flattened out the way I wanted them to, and the other thing is, what I like using the Liquid Drops for, is when I do a bracket edge pocket in a mini album, sometimes I want the pearl look to go across the bracket edge, therefore I would turn to these instead of trying to glue a string of pearls on my bracket edge, I would turn to these, and I was just never happy with them, and sometimes they would squirt and make a mess, I could never seem to get the consistent size, so I've never been a huge fan of Liquid Pearls, although I try over and over because I love that look, especially in a wedding album. These are the same size as the Stickles, and I still love Stickles, the Nuvo, I did not get any, but Nuvo has Stickles looking ones as well, and I can imagine that they probably work a little bit better than Stickles, depending on what you're using Stickles for. If you're using Stickles to kind of brush on a flower, they're all going to work just as well, but if you're wanting to make drops out of them, like enamel dots, then I would guess that the Nuvo would work better, but again, I have not tried those. And then also I'll go over Puffy Paint, because some people have referred to Puffy Paint being similar to Nuvo Drops, and it's apples and oranges in my opinion, there is no comparison. The Nuvo Drops, Crystal Drops, they have two different kinds, they have a gloss kind, and then just regular Crystal Drops. So the difference is, it'll say, like this one here is called Sugar Almond, so it says, I'll try and get it close enough so you can see it. It says Crystal Drops Gloss Sugared Almond. Your gloss is going to be similar to enamel dots, it's going to leave with a shiny finish on it. Here's another one that says Crystal Drops Ivory Seashell, this does not have the word gloss in it, and this is more similar to your Liquid Pearls. So this is not going to look as much as an enamel dot as the ones with the gloss do. Here are some enamel dots that I have purchased, and it seems like when you purchase them, you buy them for about $3 for one of these, just depending on if you can get them on sale, and I always end up with either ones that I don't use, or weird sizes, some that don't match, I always seem to run out of the colors that I love the most. So for one bottle of these, these will probably make 100 enamel dots, again I'm just guessing I've not used a full bottle yet, but you're going to save, and it's going to be about the same price as one pack of these. So to me right there, I was sold in at least trying them. You can also make your own enamel dots, which I have done, and I think is a great choice. You can use pony beads, perler beads, I've done a video on these in the past, and I think these are great to do as well, however, the difference is, I have a ton of them, they do last a long time, and the little ones, the perler beads, pretty much turn out perfect every single time. But they're very tiny, so you kind of don't have a choice in the size. Oops, I'm dropping them here. So those turn out great, I really like those. I tend not to use the tiny ones as much though, just for whatever reason, and I couldn't get a perfect match to the tiny ones as the larger ones. I like using them in odd numbers, three different dots, well if I'm using a purple out of this, this purple doesn't seem to match the same, so I never tended to use them together. And that also takes me to the enamel dots. Again, these are really cost effective, you can make your own, but you can't necessarily get them perfect. It's almost impossible to get them perfect each and every time. They turn out really nice, and they really do look like enamel dots, but some of the colors, for whatever reason, melt at a different rate. So if you're going to use these, you probably want to melt all the blue ones at one time, all the green ones at one time, and just keep an eye on them. But as you can see on this one, there's still like a little divot in the center, and then this one is pretty flat. And then this one's pretty much a perfect one right there. I love how that one turned out. And then again, I bake these at the same time, you're going to get a larger one that melted a little bit quicker. So my suggestion with these, if you're going to do these, it's kind of a pain in the butt to separate them by color, but I think it's worth it if you're going to try and get them more consistent. Like if I did all the pinks and kept them at the same time, I'm guessing they would have probably been a little more cohesive than what you see here. The other thing I tend to find with these is I was using the same colors over and over and over. I gravitated towards the same three or four colors. Well, what I like is I can, I was digging through here trying to find, and I was going to have to go through, I use white a lot, I was going to have to go through and pick out white beads and melt just white ones and just blue ones and just, you know, the same colors that I use. And that is going to be a pain in the butt to dig through a container for just the white ones, set them all up, melt them, do another batch. And another thing is it's summer and it's hot, you really, if you're going to do those, you really need to do it in a cool time of year because you need to open up all your windows to do it. So in the end, I will still use these, I'll really go through them and get rid of the ones that I just am not happy with, the real wonky ones, because you're going to get wonky ones regardless. I'll probably just go through the wonky ones, throw those out, and eventually use them. These I had first seen on Jennifer McGuire's channel and she showed a card and my first impression was, you know, I saw white enamel dots all over it. And when she had mentioned that they were these drops, I was sold right then and there because I really thought that they were enamel dots. So let me set some of these aside and I'll go over them. First let me just tell you what colors I have. This is the Crystal Drops Ivory Seashell. This I plan to use a lot in wedding albums or maybe baby albums. This one is Crystal Drops Gloss Redberry, beautiful red color. And again, I think I only got two that were not gloss. The rest, I wanted the gloss, I wanted the enamel dot look. Crystal Drops Gloss Midnight Blue, a gorgeous blue color. This is one of my favorite colors as well. This is Sugared Almond Gloss. This is a non-gloss color. This one is Raspberry Pink. Gloss Ebony Black, love this one. To me, the white, the black are ones that should be staples in your house. Gloss Ripen Pumpkin, I use this color a lot in baby albums because it's similar to some of the enamel dots that I was using. Love, love, love this color. It's Gloss Apple Green. This is a beautiful color. This one is Gloss Duck Egg Blue. It's a soft blue color. Gloss Carnation Pink, really pretty pink color. Gloss Caribbean Ocean, love this color. Gloss Oyster Gray. I love using a light gray color. I might get a darker gray as well. I have a few on my wish list still that I'm going to get soon. Gloss Dandelion Yellow, really, really pretty yellow. They have golds, they have different silvers, they have gunmetal silvers. This one's the Gloss White. Again, they have a whole line that has glitter in them as well. I will get a few of those, I'm sure. This is Gloss Bubblegum Blush, so it's going to be a little bit lighter than the Carnation Pink. Last, but not least, this one is clear. It sort of, to me, reminds me of the Skittles. These will look great if you're doing a stamping image with flowers and leaves. I was really excited about this one. This one's actually called Morning Dew. I've already used them in a couple mini-albums, so let me show you quickly those. Here I've used them right there. You can see those look just like enamel dots. Another example is in this album I used them on the front. I used a couple of the different colors. I have them here and here and a few down here. I believe the only other place is right here. There's two ways that you can use them, like I showed in those two mini-albums. Those I used directly on the mini-album. I did that the very last thing before I went to bed at night and just let them sit overnight. They do take a little while to dry. You can also prepare them ahead of time on a non-stick sheet. Any type of packaging you have, you can prepare different ones and then let them sit overnight is what they recommend. I have found after 5-6 hours they're pretty dry, but personally I'll just try my best to let them sit overnight. But you can use any type of packaging and then they'll come right off. Here's some that I did ahead of time. This is another thing I wanted to share with you. These are some of the first ones that I made. They are a little bit softer than enamel dots. Here is this one up close. It's a little tiny one. As you can see, it looks like an enamel dot. They're self-leveling, so you're going to get that beautiful dome shape, unlike the liquid pearls. You don't have to tap on the bottom. They're going to automatically self-level. If I stuck my nail in it and pressed, it's going to leave an indentation. That's what I mean by they're... There you go. You can see that. It left an indentation. That's what I mean they're a little bit softer than enamel dots. You can't do that with enamel dots. I'm going to just set this aside and let this sit. You'll be able to see that it retakes its shape. Again, I've used them in many albums and have had the books closed. I've not found that to be a problem. They have not flattened out whatsoever for me. These I did probably eight hours. Some of these I just recently did. I attempted a little teardrop, which I saw on their channel that they did. I also attempted a little heart. You could probably get a better heart than this one, but honestly, I don't buy those little heart ones anyways, but if you wanted to, it somewhat looks like a heart there. I went ahead and tested a few that if you make them ahead of time, the best way to adhere them down. These I did directly on paper. This is the apple green, the raspberry pink. This is the apple green with a layer of the clear on top. I wanted to see how that looked. It looks cool. It gives it a little bit different look. It doesn't 100% blend. I did that here with the raspberry. That looks really cool. I think the clear on top of the non-gloss ones really picks it up well. Let me move these off since these are not adhered on. You can see from the side, they take on a beautiful dome look. This is the clear. On this one, I got an air bubble in it. I wanted to see if that's what happens every time if I could take a pin to it. I recently did this one, maybe a half hour ago, and I can't see an air bubble in it as of yet. I had a pin out ready to go to see if you pin it, like Glossy Accents, if it would just pop that air bubble. That may be the case with the clear, that you can get some of the air bubbles. Again, I attempted them here, and I don't see any air bubbles in them. This one might have been a fluke. What I did with these that I didn't do with the first one is I pumped the bottle a little first, got any air out. Maybe that's the trick to the clear. Again, they remind me of those Skittles. Those Skittles have what tends to look like a little air bubble in them anyway, so that doesn't bother me whatsoever. Let me see. I'm going to try to pull these off. These I added directly onto the paper, and they are not coming off. To me, that's going to be my way of doing it personally. I doubt I'm going to make any ahead of time, but you never know. This one I adhered with a little touch of Nuvo. I picked up that trick on their channel as well, that if you make, say, a red one ahead of time, one way to glue it onto your surface or your book or your card is use the exact same color. This one, again, is Redberry. Just a dot. I mean, I added a dot to the bottom and stuck it down. That's a great way to adhere them. Let me see. Yeah, same thing. That is not coming up. Well, okay, I was able to peel it up, but it tore the paper with it. That's going to be a great way to adhere them. This one I used some Ranger Multi Medium in Matte, added a little dot under that. Same thing. This is not coming up. It's going to rip the paper if I take it up, so that's a good way to adhere it. This one I used a dot of Glossy Accents by Ranger. This is a strong adhesive usually. Okay, that came up a little bit easier, but it did tear the paper as well. This one I used a glue dot and that pretty much just came right up. Didn't even tear the paper. Probably my guess is I had to use a really tiny glue dot for this because it's a really tiny dot. I'm sure glue dots will hold okay, and then these were just put directly on the paper. The other thing I want to show is the difference between, say, the fabric paint. I'm just going to quickly do these. This happens a lot. You get those air bubbles in there, and you can't get perfect domes out of them. This fabric paint was not meant to give you enamel dots. I'm not trying to say that these are supposed to look like enamel dots or liquid pearls. They're not. It's meant for a different purpose altogether, but I just heard a few people say that they could use enamel dots or use these instead of the Nuvo if they wanted enamel dots because they are really, really cheap. You could probably get these for about 50 cents, so it's not the same thing. The liquid pearls, now this is similar, and again, same thing. They're hard to come out of the bottle, which is fine. They're not that hard, but they're hard to squeeze. They're pretty thick. They're a lot thicker than these gloss ones, and you get that chocolate chip point to it, which I hate, so then you tap it underneath, and a lot of times you could get rid of most of that chocolate chip point, but it's whatever you're using because I tend to use them after I've already adhered down my pocket or whatever. Another thing I found, if you tap them too much, it will make them off-centered, so this is me tapping it quite a bit, and it still has that ugly shape. I really don't like them. Stickles, however, seem to, this is all if you're trying to get that enamel dots look. Stickles I find work pretty well because they're a little bit thinner on the thinner side, and I love how these turn out, and I'm sure these will level down quite a bit, so I really like the stickles as far as trying to make a small dot. Now I want to show you how to use these. I'm going to go ahead and give you a little bit different camera angle. So here's a little bit different camera angle that hopefully you can see exactly how you're supposed to use these and how you will get the best results from them. I have seen people use them and do it in a circular motion, and that just doesn't work for me. If you just simply, they're very easy to use. You just simply squirt it out, and you don't want to press this up against your paper or you're going to either get splatters or you're going to get a weird shape. You just simply squirt it, let it drop to your paper, and continue squirting for however big or small you want your enamel dot, and again it self-levels, so it's going to level out to that perfect enamel dot, so you can see just how pretty those are. Again, let me just show you, you want to hold your bottle above your paper and let it just basically drop onto your paper, and it will level out on its own. And you can see how beautiful those are. And again, showing you from the side, they have a beautiful dome shape. You can also tap them very lightly if you want them to flatten out a little bit more, but I find that's not even necessary. They will flatten out slightly on their own and give you a perfect enamel dot. The other thing that I wanted to share is you can marble them. This is not a look that I love, but it can be done. So say you take your apple green and maybe your ebony black and just put a little dot in it. If you're working directly on a project, you might want to start off to make sure you're not going to get an air bubble. And now you can take a pin or your craft pick and just slightly swirl that, and that's going to give you a little bit of a marbled look. Again, this is probably not something I will do, but it's definitely an option if it's something you like to do. And I did a horrible job at showing you how to do that. Let's go ahead and try another one. I'm going to start with the black first. This is ebony black. I love it. It dries to a beautiful gloss. And let's go with the red berry. Okay, I think this is a much better example. I don't know how well the lighting or the camera will pick that up, but it has a slightly marbled look to it. It's very cool looking. Another thing I have seen, this is on Nuvo's channel, is them do red and white for a candy cane look. So there's different things you can do. Add the white in between. That's probably one of the wonkiest candy canes you've ever seen, but again, this is not something I'll be doing anyways. Otherwise I would need to work on my perfecting mat. And I also have seen them do, say, a row of two different colors and drag their craft pick through it to give them more of a chevron look. So you can play around with them and see what you want from them. Personally, I want them to look like enamel dots. Yeah, that's a pretty wonky candy cane, but I think you get the idea. I want them for enamel dots and I'm extremely happy with them. You can get the tiniest little enamel dots. And I also mentioned at the beginning, this is the one that I stuck my fingernail down in and I mentioned that they sort of take their shape again afterwards, that they're a little bit softer. Here's an up-close look at that red one. So as you can see, that fingernail mark is completely gone. So even though they're soft, they seem to take their shape again after a little while. Here's an up-close look at all the colors that I have. I also will add a photo at the end that I took in real daylight, so if there's a specific color you're looking for, hopefully this gives you an idea of what it is. So the first one is Gloss Bubblegum Blush, Gloss White, Gloss Apple Green, Gloss Red Berry, Gloss Carnation Pink, Raspberry Pink, this is not a gloss color, Gloss Caribbean Ocean, Gloss Pumpkin, Ripened Pumpkin, Morning Dew, which is the clear one, Ivory Seashell, Gloss Dandelion Yellow, Gloss Midnight Blue, Gloss Duck Egg Blue, really pretty soft blue, Gloss Ebony Black, Gloss Sugar Almond, and Gloss Oyster Gray, because I know it's hard to tell from the bottle sometimes, so hopefully this can help you if you're looking for something specific. So I hope that this has answered a few questions, or maybe it allows you to want to try them, or if you've been curious about them, it answers some questions for you. Thanks so much for watching, and I hope you've enjoyed this review today.