Birthday Mani

My birthday mani for this year. I didn't have much time to do it this year so it was just a quick plastic wrap on index, middle, and pinkie. I did a graidient on ring and thumb of the same colors (China Glaze "Snow" and "Escaping Reality" and Cosmetic Arts "TGIF") with a Bundle Monster stamp BM307 in Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes"

My First Foils

I have always admired nail foils. So shiny! And a fascinating effect that glitter and holos just can't quite copy. I did get some by Fingr's Heart 2 Art collection, but it didn't come with glue. Fingr's directions was to paint your nails and just before it was completely dry to put the foil on then. That seemed incredibly stupid so I just hung onto the foils until I got some glue. I figured it was just a matter of time before I did. A couple weeks ago I proved myself right when I found It's So Easy Foil 'Em Kit. 3 rolls of foil and a small bottle of glue!

My camera didn't want to pick up the patterns in the foil at all. The rolls in the box are, from the left, silver with holo lines running thru it, aqua blue with holo dots, and violet with holo dots.

The directions are more what I expect from a foil kit. Paint your nails with the glue. As it dries it turns from milky lavender to clear. The interesting thing with foil glue is it dries sticky.

Here you see the light purple color of the glue on my thumb. The ring finger is almost dried so you can see how much clearer it is.

I tried to keep the foil on the roll but it was unwieldy so I cut a small square off of it. Press the boring color side of the foil to the clear, dry glued nails. Rub it onto the nail and keep it as flat as you can to avoid wrinkles. Then gently lift it off the nail. You will see the colorful part of the foil stick to your nail leaving clear plastic in your hands. You can see on my ring finger that some glue got on the skin and the foil transferred to it too.

 I've always been told not to topcoat foils. Curious I just had to give it a shot. The topcoat I used (Pure Ice "Girl On The Run") looked like it ate the shiny holo bits and made it look over all kinda foggy. I took a pic then redid the nail. So don't topcoat your foils!

China Glaze "Coconut Kiss"

 You can always go back and fix any bald spots on your nails. I still need practice, but for my first time foiling I am super proud of it!

Holiday Wrap Up Manicures

As promised, here are some holiday manis that I wanted to make into full posts, but time just got away from me or they just weren't interesting enough to warrant a whole post. I could hold on to them for next year, but I'm sure I'll forget all about them by then.

I finally got around to stamping the "prep" nails I did. Stamped with MoYou Festive 04 using Claire's unnamed white stamping polish.

This one and the next were a complete flop. Nothing I could do could make them turn out right. I'm trying to remember what polishes I used, and I think the base is either Wet n Wild "French White Creme" or Sally Hansen "White On". I was trying to mimic the Irish mani and my Grey and Pink dot mani using Christmas colors, but it just didn't work. The dots on the pic above are Maybelline "Bold Gold" and Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes". The dots on the pic below are...umm... I think Sinful Colors "Pine Away" and Salon Perfect "Scarlet Enchantment" with "Bold Gold" again. I was also trying a new topcoat so if you look really closely you will see the colors smeared. The topcoat never hardened so you can also see the impression of my bed sheets on them. Not gonna use that topcoat as a topcoat again. Its gonna be used to make frankens.

And here was a mani I intended to stamp over, but never did. I can't remember if I used a base color of "Bold Gold" or just used several coats of China Glaze "Angel Wings". So sparkly and pretty!

And here is a bonus picture. A Halloween mani using as many stamps as I could find! Fright Night Claw Polish "Phantom" with a white sponged at the tips that is prolly Wet n Wild "French White Creme". I wanted it to look like fog rolling in. I wanted to make a full scene of a haunted house, I just haven't gotten the hang of it yet. Stamped with a lot of BundleMonster plates (BM209, BM213, BM225, BM305) using Wet n Wild "Black Creme".

Silver Snowflakes

Finally I'm getting a chance to upload some mani's I've done over the last couple weeks. I always underestimate just how busy I get this time of year. It seems perfect that I'm sitting in the middle of a snowstorm posting winter nail art! Here is Sally Hansen "Deep Blue Sea" a dusty blue with silvery blue glitter in it, stamped with Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes" using BundleMonster BM323. One of my more subtle stampings, the silver snowflakes just didn't stand out too much from the silvery blue glitter polish. But still very pretty.

3 inches of snow outside and it's still falling! Be safe out there guys <3

Lava Lamps

Oh my! It's December already! I really hadn't noticed. I guess I'm gonna have to start planning winter mani's soon. Till then, here is my Lava Lamp mani. Ever since I mentioned that this stamp reminded me of lava lamps or amoebas, I've been itching to do it in many colors. I started off with very neon colors, but they seemed too much. In summer its fine to rock neons, but this time of year it just seemed too garish. So I went over the neon with a shimmer polish to dull it out just a touch. I used a lot of colors so let me go thru them one at a time. Neon color is listed first, the the shimmer listed second.

Thumb: Sinful Colors "Pink" and "Glimmer"
Index: Warpaint Beauty "Acid Orange" and Pure Ice "Hot Tamale"
Middle: Sinful Colors "Neon Melon" and Pure Ice "Excuse Me"
Ring: Warpaint Beauty "Bad Apple" and Sinful Colors "HD Nails"
Pinky: China Glaze "Blue Sparrow" and Sinful Colors "Love Nails"

And just incase you have no idea what I'm talking about when I mention Lava Lamps: (photos courtesy of Google Images. None of these pictures are mine)

Stamp over the nails with my go-to black stamping polish Wet n Wild "Black Creme" using MoYou Pro Plate Collection 06. I'll try to come up with some winter nails soon, but the last time I tried to force myself to do a seasonal mani, I ended up with a huge creative block. I'll see what I can do tho :)

Mint Shimmer

I tried doing this cute woodland creature mani, but it just wouldn't turn out like I pictured in my head. So instead of trying to be overly clever, I just played. Here is 2 coats of China Glaze "Tree Hugger" followed by 2 coats of Pure Ice "Mint Dream". I adore the pearly, iridescent like sheen "Mint Dream" gave it. I then stamped with MoYou Pro Collection 06 in Wet n Wild "Black Creme". Very simple, but I adore it. Pro 06 is fast becoming my favorite stamping plate ever.

Cybermen Nails ~ Doctor Who 50th Anniversary

I think I found the cure to my writer's block. Instead of doing nails I think I should be doing because that's what you're supposed to do, I'm gonna do what I want to do. I was gonna do all kinds of fall/autumn/Thanksgiving nails, but that's not really me. What I want to do is Doctor Who nails. So I'm gonna. Here is my attempt at Cybermen. I did a coat of Orly "Mirror, Mirror" but it wasn't really the color I was looking for so I went over it again with Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes". I then freehanded Cybermen faces with a dotting tool in Wet n Wild "Black Creme". I don't care if no one realizes what they are, it made me giggle to paint them. Here is a Cyberman reference picture.

31 Day Challenge: Day Twenty-Four ~ Inspired by a Book

Ann McCaffrey. I grew up on her books. She is one of the reasons I became a voracious reader. While this is book 2 of the Harper Hall Trilogy, its also my favorite of all her books. I'm showing you the book before my nails, because they didn't turn out all that well. In the world of Pern there are Dragons and Fire Lizards which are a form of tiny pet-like dragon. Both species come in 5 colors for breeding reasons. Gold, Bronze, Brown, Green, and Blue. Well, here are my nails. Another freehanded attempt.

In my defense they don't look as bad at a distance. Blowing it up in a picture makes the mistakes bigger too. Anyway, the thumb is my gold dragon in Pure Ice "Excuse Me". Index is my bronze dragon but I don't have a bronze polish so I used Maybelline "Bold Gold" and Sally Hansen "Chop Chop Copper" to dull it. Middle is brown dragon in Sinful Colors "Nirvana". The ring is a China Glaze "Tree Hugger" green dragon. Finally the little blue dragon on the pinky is China Glaze "Blue Sparrow". The eyes on the dragons whirl different colors depending on their mood but I stuck with Orly "Blue Collar" on all of them. The outline was done with Orly "Liquid Vinyl". I love the position of the dragon on the thumb and pinky. I even kinda like the close up of the head on the ring. Index and middle I would prolly have redone. Sorry this post is late today, I really had no idea what I was gonna do right up until I did it.

31 Day Challenge: Day Ten ~ Gradient

I wasn't sure I was gonna have time to paint my nails today, but when my MoYou plates showed up I made the time! I couldn't wait to play with this amazing plate. Here I have a green to purple (yes, trust me, that's purple. It always shows up blue on my camera) gradient that I stamped over with the feathers of the peacock. For the accented ring finger I wanted the body but every time I stamped it and cleaned off the bits I didn't need, the stamp was dry. So I did it as a stamper decal. I haven't had to very much luck with stamper decals, the edges always roll up and stick off the finger, but this is my absolute BEST decal EVER! I giggled like crazy when it turned out so WONDERFULLY! Well to be honest I was giggling the moment the mail showed up with my plates. I still am. *giggle* Ahem, this is Wet n Wild "Buffy the Violet Slayer" and "Sagreena the Teenage Witch" stamped with Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes" and MoYou plate Suki 01. Love, love, love this! I might do a review on MoYou soon, but the 31 Day Challenge is keeping me pretty busy. I'll see what I can do.

*giggle*

31 Day Challenge: Day 8 ~ Metallic

Like my Black and White yesterday, this mani didn't want to behave. I didn't want to go with the standard silver or gold mani so I dug around in my stash and found this pretty little gem pushed to the back of my Pure Ice. "First Time" shares the same issues that most metallics have, showing every brushstroke and imperfection in the nail. It does mellow a little bit as it dries, but you can still see brushstrokes in there. Usually I like to pair green with silver, but I thought, what the heck lets go with gold. Gives it a more fall-like vibe. Maybelline "Bold Gold" is stamped with BundleMonster BM217. Again, I'm using this challenge as an excuse to use things I don't usually, and I ignore my french tip plates a lot. Well, this didn't turn out as much of a tip. To get the leaves to show up I ended up stamping nearly half way up the nail and to me that doesn't look much like a french tip. The lines aren't all that crisp either. I need to stop staring at it, I keep finding things that aren't quite right.

It's My Birthday!!

Yes, today is actually my birthday. I've had a bad week, so I decided to paint my nails to cheer me up. This is my first real attempt at a birthday nail manicure. Last year I attempted it, but it was so horrid I don't even think I took a pic of it. This year I'm much happier with it. After the jump I'll explain each nail separately.

Mermaid Tail

I love the idea of the mermaid tail mani. A glitter blue green polish stamped over with a fish scale stamp. Well, problem is I don't have a fish scale stamp so I tried this 2 ways with different stamps. The polish below is Orly "Halley's Comet" stamped with Pure Ice "Silver Mercedes". The stamp above is on my left hand and is BundleMonster BM319.

On my right hand I used the same polishes but instead used BundleMonster BM209. I liked this one better but had some issues after I bumped it and scratched off the stamping on the end. Happens to my right hand all the time *sigh*. This one works better as a Mermaid's Tail but I'd like to add some chunky glitter to the polish before stamping next time.

It Can't Rain All The Time

The weather has been gorgeous for the last couple days, but thunderstorms are rolling in and soon. I tried to do this mani as almost a progression of a storm. The thumb is the darkest heart of the storm (Orly "Liquid Vinyl" stamped with Milani "White On The Spot") followed by the dark grey clouds on the index finger (Pure Ice "Kiss Me Here" stamped with Wet n Wild "Ebony Hates Chris"). The middle finger shows the storm lightening up (Orly "Mirror Mirror" stamped with "White On The Spot" again). A rainbow on the ring finger (China Glaze "Hey Sailor", Sally Hansen "Lightning", Sinful Colors "Exotic Green" and "Sweet Nothing", and just a touch of Wet n Wild "Buffy the Violet Slayer" that barely showed up on the finger) And finally happy puffy white clouds on the pinky (Sally Hansen "White On" stamped with "Ebony Hates Chris" again) I almost stamped in a royal blue, but I really wanted the rainbow to be the only color on the fingers. I think it turned out alright. Stamped with BundleMonster BM312. Wow, that was ALOT of polishes.

Butterfly Wings

There is a stamping plate that makes this image, but I don't have it so I decided to give it a shot freehanded. I  LOVE it!! I'm just not sure I can do this on my own nails. If I can successfully do it on my real nails I'll  write up a tutorial for it. Pure Ice "Hot Tamale" and Stripe Rite black and white stripers. Out the Door "Northern Lights" topcoat.

Blue Flowers

April Showers bring May Flowers, or so the poem goes. I hope the flowers get here soon. The nails are Sally Hansen "Blue It" with the accent nail Pure Ice "Bikini". The stamping on the accent is also "Blue It" but the pastel blue of Pure Ice didn't want to show up well so I stamped in white instead, Sally Hansen "White On". Fing'rs B17 (a copy of Konad M20) was the stamp for the fingers with the accent nail being BundleMonster BM224. A very simple and easy stamping.

Vintage Mint

This is one of the manicures I entered into a contest last year. The theme was Vintage/Retro. Now when I think of the word "Vintage" for some reason I think of kitchen appliances. Fridges that come in colors with names like "Harvest Gold" and "Avocado". Coffee makers from the 70's. Get what I'm saying? This is a mint green by Pure Ice called "Home Run" stamped with Wet n Wild "Ebony Hates Chris" using BundleMonster.com BM 209. The dots were made with a knitting needle using the colors "Hey Sailor" from China Glaze, "Lightening" by Sally Hansen InstaDri and the burnt orange was an acrylic craft paint that I don't remember the name of. If your curious the record is George Carlin "Class Clown".

Oh, I didn't mention it was a video contest? :)

Harvest Festival

While we wait for winter to be over and spring to get here already *glares at grey gloomy skies* how about a look at a fall manicure? Here is a 3 color gradient of China Glaze "Hey Sailor", Pure Ice "Hot Tamale" and Sally Hansen "Lighting". Stamped over that is BundleMonster BM205 in Maybelline Color Show "Bold Gold" perhaps the best gold stamping polish I've found so far. I was trying to use colors that reminded me of falling leaves and the stamp image worked so well with that. Not sure why I used gold for the stamp color other than I had just bought "Bold Gold" and was eager to use it for anything o.~

Plants Vs Zombies

This mani I did nearly a year ago. I know it's not the best picture, my cuticles are dry, and there is barely any clean up done, but I am still proud of these nails to this very day. This is perhaps my first successful freehand painting. It was so long ago that I don't remember what polishes I used but I can guess. Sinful Colors "Irish Green", Sally Hansen's "Lightening" and "White On", Pure Ice's "Silver Mercedes", and Wet n Wild's "Ebony Hates Chris". The brown I think was acrylic paint. Most of this was painted with a toothpick and knitting needle. At the time, I was obsessed with the game "Plants Versus Zombies" and I was itching to do a mani with cartoon characters. I'd say if you haven't played the game give it a shot, but after days of nonstop playing you will all hate me. So play at your own risk o.~

Pink Crackle Heart

Another simple Valentine's Day manicure. Here I have Pure Ice's "Shell Pink" a very soft pastel pink with China Glaze's "Haute Metal" crackle from their Crackle Glaze collection. I lucked out on the crackle at my Sally's Beauty Supply Store and got them on clearance for like a buck and a half each I think it was. Got 4 colors that day in crackle. Stamped over that is a heart from Salon Express plate #SE21 in Sally Hansen's "Quick Brick". I had heard that most of the Insta-Dri collection stamped well so I wanted to try it. Not bad but not as well as I thought it would stamp. The whole manicure is nice, but rather subtle. Subtle is fine but I like manicures that stand out a bit. A little "Hey-Look-At-Me!-I'm-Nail-Art!!" is what I go for.