Pink Purple Gradient

I put on this design a week ago today, and they're still looking really good. Must be the high-quality nail polishes. :) I've gotten a lot of compliments on these over the last week. Feels pretty good!

Ingredients:
Seche Vite Base Coat
Sephora by OPI "Lost Without my GPS"
Finger Paints "It's an Original!"
Nicole by OPI "Razzle Dazzler" (black tips)
Konad Black
Konad Plate m79
Sally Girl 812031
Seche Vite Top Coat

Inspired by "Nailed It"

On Friday April 13th (dun dun dun) I saw a nail post from BlogNailedIt on Facebook and loved the photo so much I decided to try copying it. I didn't have either one of the nail polishes used in the original so I made up my own. Here's the original photo.

Ingredients:
1. OPI "My Private Jet" -- 2 coats
2. China Glaze Crackle "Oxidized Aqua" -- 1 coat
3. A glitter glue stick from the dollar store for the gold sprinkles
4. Sally Girl "812031" for the silver sprinkles -- 2 coats

That crackle sucks, but it was the closest in color that I could get to the photo -- which apparently isn't a blue color at all, now that I've researched the two polishes that were used. I like these nails, though. I'll wear them for a while.

2012 Nail recap!

Sorry for the lack of posts this year. I've been doing my nails but not posting them regularly, so here's my cheater catch-up batch of nails that I've done. Keep in mind these are over the last few months, so I'm trying my best to remember what I used but can't really guarantee my accuracy!

January 20, 2012:

Just a quick one, using striping brushes.  SEPHORA by O.P.I in "212-SEPHORA"

I didn't actually intend for this one to come out so abstract, but I got to this mid-way through and  ended up liking the random corner paint job. Sally Hansen Color Quick pen in "Pink Chrome" ($1.00 at Dollar tree!)  covered with OPI in "Ski Teal We Drop" (which I love love love)

This one is by far one of my most favorite nail sets I've ever done, because it's so busy-looking. Huge combination of different colors, including (but probably not limited to, since I'm having some trouble remembering after two months) Black undercoat, China Glaze "Cracked Medallion," Art Club black striping polish, Konad plate m64 with Konad White polish, plus some random rhinestones I had in my nailpolish box. So much fun!

My first gradient! I loved these nails, they were so pretty and they lasted a long time, too. :) Colors included:  China Glaze "718 Watermelon Rind," Orly "Green with Envy," OPI "Ski Teal We Drop," Savvy "Totally Teal" (on sale at Sally's for 1.99! Yay!) and Nicole by OPI "It's up to you." 

Evil Ruby Slippers plus no video tutorial

I originally had grand plans to upload this one with a video tutorial on my youtube channel and everything... but my computer can't really handle it. I recorded the video clips with my new digital camera that takes really good resolution video and apparently when I open all the clips in Windows Live Movie Maker I get glitches and all these little icons pop up on my status bar next to my desktop clock. So... nevermind.

I call them Evil Ruby Slippers because they're red and sparkley but in a villainous sort of way. ;)

What I used:

• Basecoat: Avon smooth beginnings base coat
• Base: OPI "My Private Jet" -- 1 coat
• Top: Forever 21 in "brick"
• Stamp:
• Konad black polish
• Konad nail plate m64
• Top Coat:
• Seche Vite -- 1 coat because it doesn't blur my Konad polish
• Avon UV Gloos guard top coat: as an extra top coat just cause I wanna!

Mermaid nails

The idea with this one was supposed to be a mermaid-under-the-sea-with-pearls deal. It didn't quite turn out as great as I had hoped but it's still cute. I like the different kinds of blues and greens I made up, and they each have their own unique shimmer too.

Sorry for the messier-than-usual. I ran out of q-tips and cotton pads so I had to do the best clean-up I could with just soap and water. :(

What I used: Unfortunately there was a lot of experimenting with layers so I don't know how many coats of each color I have on each finger. The listed colors are in order of application on each nail.

• Base coat: Avon Smooth Beginnings Base Coat
• Top coat: Seche Vite 
• Pinky: Sally Girl 812047 + Nicole by OPI "It's Up to You" + Konad white w/ plate m27
• Ring finger: Avon mirror shine "Glisten" + ORLY "Green with envy" + Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear "09 Disco Ball" + Konad white w/ plate m60
• Middle finger: Zoya "Pippa" + Sally girl "Luv it" + Konad white w/ plate m79
• Index finger: Sally girl 812047 + ORLY "Green with envy" + Sally girl "Luv it" + Konad white w/ plate m79
• Thumb: Zoya "Pippa" + Sally girl "Luv it" + ORLY "Limelite" + Konad white w/ plate m79

Half-moon manicure

I've hopped on the bandwagon! This week I decided to try to calm myself and continue with the simple designs. What better way to do it than by following the current trend of half-moon manicures!

What I used:

• Base coat: Avon Nail Experts Smooth Beginnings Base Coat
• Gold half-moons: Savvy Nail Lacquer in Golden Honey -- 1 coat
• Blue color: OPI Nail Lacquer in Ski Teal We Drop -- 2 coats, applied over some circular reinforcement label stickers  used as guides
• Top Coat: Seche Vite Dry Fast Top Coat

What I've learned:

• I had no idea what I was doing. First off, you don't paint the moons on afterward. You paint the bottom color over your entire nail, then put the next color on top so that a moon-shaped hole shows the color beneath. This is actually my second try at the same colors in a half-moon manicure because the night before I had done the blue first, then painted on the half-moons by hand. Didn't look so great, even when I slept on it gave myself time to get used to it. 
• Reinforcement labels are key. I suck at drawing the half moon shapes, and the reinforcement label technique worked wonders. The only bad thing is that if you have sensitive, dry fingers like I did the day I painted these, removing the stickers may hurt your skin a little bit. They're permanent stickers so when they stay on, they stay on. (They're not super sticky like duct tape or anything but they still hurt, so I'm throwing that warning at you)
• I still love that color. I love this blue color. Seriously. I want all my clothes to be that color. (not really but you get what I mean)

I be haulin' - Beauty Outlet

I am apparently not over my "it's Christmas time to spend money" bug... so that combined with my laziness equals multiple blog entries that make me look like I went on a spending spree of nail supplies. Hoorah.

I kinda went crazy at my local Beauty Outlet because their nail polish inventory has increased immensely since the last time I was there. Another thing that got me to buy stuff was that they now have a roll of scotch tape hanging by the polishes and you can use that to test out the colors. No more blind purchases. Yay!

From Left: OPI Nail Lacquer "My Private Jet"; Seche Vitte Dry Fast Top Coat; Orly "Limelite"; OPI Nail Lacquer "Ski Teal we drop"

1. OPI "My Private Jet" : Haven't used it yet but I got it because it basically dries with a really "dense" and "mineral-y" look, like a granite countertop. So cool.

2. Seche Vitte: I joined the ranks and bought a bottle of this so-called "Best top coat" from all the nail blogs I read. And I love it. It's thick but doesn't smudge my Konad nail polish and only needs one coat, versus the 2 coats I needed with my Avon top coat. Looks like I'll be changing that blog entry that says what my top and base coats always are. Oh ya and I just realized I actually bought this on eBay, not at Beauty Outlet. Yay eBay bucks that get me a free top coat that's way better than my old one.

3. Orly "Limelite": Not much to say yet, since I haven't used it. But I had never seen a shimmery color like that before so I went ahead and bought it. 

4. OPI Ski Teal We Drop: I love this blue. My sister commented last night that it looks like algae green, which is true in indoor colors. Then in daytime it's blue again. Nail polishes with color-changing-trickery are always awesome. I used this color already on my recent half-moon nails. So lovely. 

And one last thought ... am I the only one who imagines cheezburger cats saying "o rly" when I see the brand "ORLY?"

Flowers and sprinkles

I finally had time to do some nails tonight. Yay!

LEFT HAND:

RIGHT HAND:

What I used:

• Base Coat: Avon Nail Experts Smooth Beginnings Base Coat -- 2 coats
•  "Sprinkles" (as my sister calls them): Sally Girl #812005
• Stickers: 
• Cina 3d nail decals in "blossoms" -- 133040
• Other cina flowers and butterflies -- unfortunately I don't have the name/numbers anymore.
• Top Coat: Avon Nail Experts UV Gloss Guard Top Coat -- 2 coats.

Christmas Nails!

Yaaaay Christmas Nails! I love Christmas. I love the corny songs, getting the same presents every year, even the Christmas junk that I used to hate when I was little and now would love as a Christmas present.
 
These are my favorite nails yet! They look like wrapping paper. Sooooo cutie. I hope they last a LONG time because I'm not gonna wanna get rid of them anytime soon. The idea is thanks to a youtube tutorial and a suggestion from my sister to put snowflakes on red instead of blue. The snowflakes and larger white dots (snowballs) are stickers, the little white flecks are painted on with white nail polish.

Note to self: I need green nail polish. I don't have any green!

What I Used:

• Base Coat: Avon Nail Experts Smooth Beginnings: Base Coat --1 coat? I can't remember if I did a second.
  
• Red: Wet n Wild Rock Solid Nail Lacquer:  #227 "Rockin in Rubies" -- 2 coats plus touch-ups
  
• White specks: OPI Nail Lacquer: "Alpine Snow" -- applied with a #306 Winning Nails by WorldWide Nail Art brush
  
• Stickers: Professional Nail Sticker, Sinyemei Nagel-Kunst from eBay.
  
• Top Coat: Avon Nail Experts UV Gloss Guard: Top Coat -- 2 coats
  
• Drying Agent: Drip Dry by OPI -- 2 drops on each nail
  

What I learned?

My left hand is INCREDIBLE shaky right when it matters, when the brush has white polish on it and it's about to touch my right hand fingernail. I'm steady up until 1 cm away and then BAM shaky shaky shaky. It's kind of nerve-wracking, actually.

Glittery Blue tips and flowers

My sister said these are her favorites of all the nails I've done before. She said that she always wishes I would buy the ones in the store but that I always end up going for the ghetto ones instead. *shrug* ... 's true.

This week's glitter and blue tips are inspired by a set of fake nails that I keep seeing in stores. Of course, I love looking at the nail section in Target and Walmart and now that I've copied an idea that I've seen before, I can't find a picture of them online. But yea, I did copy the idea from somewhere.

  

What I used:

• Remover: Equate Regular Nail Polish Remover to remove last week's nails -- four cotton pads did the trick (soaked and used all four sides).
• Base: Avon Nail Experts Smooth Beginnings -- 2 coats
• Glitter: Sally Hansen Hard Nails Xtreme Wear Nail Cor in 4860-09 Disco Ball -- 1 coat over half the nail and some touch-up dabs after the first coat dried
• Blue Tips: Nicole by OPI in "It's Up To You" -- 2 coats, then some more glitter on top of the tips again
• Stickers: Combination of the flowers found in
• Cina 3D Nail Decals Item #CI-18013 and
• Kiss Nail Accents #NS13
• Top Coat: Nailene Acrylic Strong Topcoat -- 2 coats
• Drying Aid: Sephora by OPI Nail Colour Drying Drops -- 2 drops per nail
  

OTHER NEWS!

Coming up in October!!

I'm really excited because I just won an auction on eBay for 5 sheets of Christmas nail stickers. Now I'm on the prowl for a good deal on halloween stickers. I love halloween and plan on doing Halloween Themes for the entire month, so be on the lookout for that. :)

Also -- I found this awesome site that's an online nail community / message board system. CoolNailsArt.com Lots of nails and lots more nails. Most of them are way longer than I can handle, but I love all the designs. I've never gotten my nails doen professionally so it's pretty exciting for me to see what people are capable of doing with nail polish...