Blooming Blossoms

I decided that I wanted to make a set of pink gradient-like flowers on a beautiful teal (rather than green) background, and this is where I ended up! I was torn between tulips and cherry blossoms, and so actually went with neither, but ended up with pink in shades of cherry blossom. I don’t understand my brain either! I also have to say, this may be some of the most perfect advanced stamping I have ever done, my colors are IN THE LINES. Go me!

Colors:
~ Bright teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ Light teal: Glitter Gal – No Worries
~ Teal: L’oreal – Not a Cloud in Sight
~ Dark teal: Zoya – Cecilia
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Dark red: OPI – Visions of Love
~ Dark pink: Zoya – Ciara
~ Pink: Zoya – Kelsey
~ Light pink: Zoya – Tobey
~ Pastel pink: Zoya – Jordan
~ Stamp: Moyra – 45 I Fill You

I was also supposed to post this on Wednesday and had different art lined up for today, but real life interfered so here we are. Still floral, just late! Enjoy.

Painted Eggs

Happy Easter! I wanted eggs. Painted colorful eggs. The last time I used this stamp, I had a minimal of 5 colors on EACH EGG and it was far too busy. So this time I decided to just do two colors per egg and pair them across the color wheel, and I like the results much better. It is legible! And only took 1.5 hours instead of 3 hours to paint. I got the idea of sticking to two colors per egg from @polish.maven, and I am glad I went with that. Maybe for next years annual coloring-of-this-stamp I will vary it slightly more?

Colors:

~ Green linear holo: Serum No 5 – Jaded
~ Green scattered holo: ORLY – Sparkling Garbage
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Pink: Zoya – Tobey
~ Orange: Formula X – Incandescent
~ Yellow: Zoya – Darcy
~ Teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ Blue: Makeup Selective – 105
~ Purple: Zoya – Abby
~ Stamps: Whats Up Nails – B017

Happy easter this weekend to those that celebrate! Hopefully I will keep on top of editing my nail art and will have some more posts next week, we shall see. Enjoy!

Pink Tulips on Teal

Every single spring since I purchased this stamping plate, I have made use of the tulip stamp. And every single year it looks slightly wrong. Too dark, too bright, wrong base color, wrong mix of petal colors. Something is off. This time, however, I think I finally nailed it. I love the three-tone teal base (a pastel teal that glows in the dark with a darker teal and white sponged on haphazardly), I love the two shades of cooler toned pinks, and I love that I used a teal-green for the leaves. I am also happy that I studied the stamp more closely and realized that the leaves are not one solid mass, there is negative space in there! The end result is much lighter than my previous attempts. Flower win for me!

Colors:

~ Pastel teal GITD: Serum No 5 – Glowin’ of Eden
~ Teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Maybelline – Onyx Rush
~ Light pink: Zoya – Jordan
~ Pink: Zoya – Sandy
~ Dark teal: Salon Perfect – Escape to Neverland
~ Stamp: Whats up Nails – B017

Of course, as a bonus, the design glows in the dark (the flowers are outlined). I love using GITD polishes in the spring when the sun comes out, even if it means my nails sometimes scare me when I wake up overnight and see something bright in my bed!

Do you guys think there are any other color combinations I should try? Yellow on dark blue? Orange? I don’t know. I am just happy I finally got one right…I have a whole year to put together a color palette that works again!

Daffodils

Every year I use this stamp, and every year I try something slightly different. This year I went with a two-tone yellow center and used a teal/pink shimmer as the background. I forgot, however, that this teal polish loves to become all wavy when I stamp over it! It actually looks pretty cool as a result, but is NOT what I intended. Sometimes too much shimmer is a curse!

Colors:

~ Teal shimmer: Emily de Molly – Pending Perfection
~ Black: Maybelline – Onyx Rush
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Teal: Zoya – Cecilia
~ Yellow: Zoya – Darcy
~ Dark yellow: Zoya – Honey
~ Stamp: BP – L067

I feel like I should make a list of ways to use this stamping plate in the future: color combinations for the flowers and the backgrounds. Maybe I can try to go psychedelic with it in the future and venture away from the classic yellow/orange/white. Who knows. But it is lovely to see all the bright daffodils outside in early spring!

Stained Glass Bees

It is tradition for Jewish New Year (a holiday called Rosh Hashana) to eat apples dipped in honey to symbolize the sweetness of the coming year. However, I find painting apples on my nails a bit juvenile, and I have done honey a few times now. I have not painted many bees! And then I found this inspiration by @nailscassi and just knew that I needed a creative interpretation and to make stained glass bee nails for Rosh Hashana. I actually demoed this twice: once with cream polishes for the art, and once with holos, and the holos just looked better. The only downside is that the bee wings, because holo greys out white, blend a tad too well with the background. Oh well!



Colors:

~ Grey holo: Cadillacquer – Memory Palace
~ Flakies: Emily de Molly – Cohesion 

~ Black: Pueen – Black Jack
~ Red holo: A England – Rosebower
~ Green holo: A England – Dragon
~ Black holo: A England – Fated Prince
~ Gold holo: ILNP – Sparks May Fly
~ Silver holo: Darling Diva – Diamond
~ Stamp: EDK – Mosaic

Now…Rosh Hashanah isn’t until the fall, but I feel like bees are more appropriate for the spring. Which means I am posting it now rather than waiting for early October because, bees! Hopefully I remember that I did this and can reference it again in October, but for now enjoy your random spring bees that were intended for a celebration of honey in the fall :-p

Glitter Hearts

Grey and pink go very well together, so I thought I would use them to make a heart-filled Valentine’s day manicure. I actually quite like the result! The pink/green glitter popped well, and the grey-green background set it off nicely. I don’t quite know where I came up with this particular combination of polishes, but I have a hunch I will use it again!

Colors:

~ Grey: Zoya – Evvie
~ Pink: Born Pretty – Warm Tea Cherry Blossoms
~ Pink/green glitter: POP Polish – Watermellon Bubbleslick
~ Stamp: BM – 317

I always feel like I need to cram every heart stamp I own into a few weeks in early February, because otherwise I am going to ignore them the entire year. I am glad there is at least a holiday that lets me use all these stamps! And that low-key forces me to focus on my collection of pink polishes for a few manicures. Enjoy!

Ridiculous Orange Neons

Why. Why did I think this was a good idea. Why did I think these colors would go together (and pink 6 neons and one normal polish). Why did I spend so long on my accent nails. THE WORLD WILL NEVER KNOW. I don’t hate the end result, but for how long I put into this, it should look better. I think it was a combination of my not-quite-perfect color choices, and the clown-like addition on my other three nails. I wanted something easy and geometric, and I made a clown bib. Womp womp.

Colors:
~ Pastel yellow: Maybelline – Citrus Collide
~ Neon yellow: KBShimmer – Orange You Glad I Didn’t Say Banana?
~ Pastel orange: Zoya – Cole
~ Neon orange: KBShimmer – Papaya Don’t Preach
~ Pink: Revlon – Bubbly
~ Hot pink: WOW – #371
~ Neon red: Emily de Molly – LE 199
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamps: Moyra – 45 I Fill You, 60 Cuts

Even stranger, because these are neon colors, and orange neons at that, my hands look weird and grey. I tried to do a bit of color correction, but honestly I think its a lost cause. I live and learn! Hope you enjoyed anyway.

Purple Tulips

Every year in early spring I use this stamp, and every year I love the result. Next time I will likely use lighter colors, but I am really pleased with how this came out! Even my dots look nearly perfect :-D. I also remembered that I have some dyed wooden flower, and the purple one was the PRECISE shade that I used in my manicure! So I grabbed a photo with it, and the photo turned out to be my favorite from the day. Go figure!

Colors:
~ Light purple: Zoya – Abby
~ Purple: L’oreal – Paparazzi Pleaser
~ Dark purple: Zoya – Danielle
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Green: Sinful Colors – Exotic Green
~ Dark green: Zoya – Shawn
~ Stamp: Whats Up Nails – B017

I have a few more spring flower specific manicures to share, but I think I am mostly past my obsession to create 230948 floral manicures for early spring. We will see. Maybe it will snow again (we had an ice storm this weekend, apparently. I slept through it) and the flowers will have to double back and try again. Hope you enjoyed!

Vivid Flowers

This was FUN. I was inspired by @len4ik_nails to create some brightly colored orange and pink flowers on a green base. My only regret at the end is that I didn’t use more of the neon shimmery green leaves! Talk about a bright manicure… I am also glad that the inspiration post stopped me from putting the flowers on ALL my nails, that would have been overwhelming. I like my lines instead.

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Orange: KBShimmer – Papaya Don’t Preach
~ Bright orange: Emily de Molly – LE197
~ Pink: Revlon – Bubbly
~ Bright pink: Zoya – Kelsey
~ Neon green shimmer: JReine – Radioactive Nom Nom
~ Green: Sinful Colors – Exotic Green
~ Stamp: BM – Xl158

I do think this looked better on her slightly shorter nails, especially with the two nails being plain (I can never let myself do that…). Hope you enjoyed! Happy late February/almost spring!

Caduceus

I graduated neurology residency the week I wore these nails. I somewhat frequently do science-themed nails, but hardly ever do medicine-themed nails (what would I paint, stethoscopes? Reflex hammers? I did do EKGs that one time…) anyway. I figured the caduceus, which is a common icon used in the medical field, would be fitting. Hilariously, it is NOT the actual correct identification for a doctor! The caduceus (which is TWO snakes wrapped around a pole, sometimes with wings) is actually the symbol of Hermes. However, people got confused because the symbol they were looking for, which is the Rod of Asclepius (ONE snake wrapped around a pole without wings), looks really similar! Asclepius was the Greek god of healing rather than the god of messengers and thieves…so everyone using the caduceus (including me!) to indicate the medical field is doing it wrong. History lesson of the day!

Colors:
~ Purple matte: Zoya – Iris
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Red/green shimmer: Etherial – Rainforest
~ Gold: Zoya – Ziv
~ Stamp: Hit the Bottle – For the Love of Science

The base I started with (Iris) is matte on its own (and also the name of a Greek goddess, so we are sticking with that theme this week) so I decided to re-mattify the end result after I did some advanced stamping. I like it! Although it was also very pretty shiny. Hope you enjoyed….and get ready for the #31DC2022! I have been taking part in the 31 day challenge for many years now, and this one will not be any different. Any dates that fall on my (somewhat….) usual Monday/Wednesday/Friday for the month of September will depict that days theme in the 31 day challenge. Hopefully I can actually keep up given how bad I have been at posting recently!

Olives

I hate olives. They taste awful and salty, and they poison all food that they touch with their saltiness. They are more-or-less the only food that I not only will not eat, but also will not eat around (they spread their nasty flavor). Now, this is a problem since I married a Greek and he LOVES olives. Regardless, on our trip to Greece last month I learned the story about how Athena gave a gift of olive trees to the Greek people to have Athens named after her, beating out Poseidon’s gift of water (because he gave a salt water spring rather than a freshwater spring). In light of that, I figured I could stomach one olive-based manicure because Athena is a badass.

Colors:
~ Dark grey: Bordeau – #212
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Nude: L’oreal – Boho Babe
~ Light grey: Formula X – Delightful
~ Light green: Zoya – Tilda
~ Dark green: Zoya – Shawn
~ Stamp: Nicole Diary – L21

The other fun thing about this manicure is that it features Greek polish! I have made it a goal of mine to find and buy local polish whenever I travel internationally; nail polish is a fairly cheap hobby and I find it fun. Some of my favorite neons are from Israel. I had also read online about this magical store called Hondos Center that has, in addition to regular makeup things, HEAPS of nail polish. Drawers and drawers of nail polish. Many are from Italy and France, but I found a few Greek brands with the help of the women who worked there! Once they saw my nails and figured out what I was looking for, it was off to the nail polish races. I was in heaven. I ended up buying (only) 9 polishes on two trips to the same store (oops), a mix of neons, jewel tones, and this particular find: a very dark buttery grey creme. I have been searching for a nearly-black grey for months without success. This one was PERFECT. This is two thin coats of #212 by Bordeau. I would assume that it was french given the name, but the back states “papadopoulou ariadni” who I’m guessing is a very Greek designer. I have no idea, I can find no records of this brand online, but the polish applies beautiful, dries quickly, and holds up well. Hope you enjoyed! And if you live in some place (besides Australia, since many of my favorite brands are Aussie) let me know some awesome local polish brands!

Elaborate Eggs

Time for an easter themed manicure! I bought this stamping plate months ago and have been saving it for use in early spring…and despite that, I almost missed it! But here we have it, a very elaborate easter egg manicure. It took a full hour to hand-paint all the colors on the eggs, but I think it was worth it. The bunny is from a different plate, but it just isn’t easter without a bunny!

I also had the brilliant idea to make my base using a green glow in the dark polish, so that when it was dark out the eggs and rabbit would be outlined. It worked! And it looks pretty darn cool. The polish is Glowin’ of Eden by Serum No 5, and this is three gloopy coats. GITD polishes are always harder to use than regular polish, and honestly this was the easiest of the 4 that I have (mostly because I went with thin coats instead of just trying to do two thicker ones). It does glow, but the glow is not easily identifiable as green. Oh well!

Colors:
~ Green GITD: Serum No5: Glowin’ of Eden
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Pink: Zoya – Sandy
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Moment
~ Blue: Zoya – Yummy
~ Purple: Zoya – Malia
~ Stamps: Whats Up Nails – B017, BM – 302

Overall a very cute manicure (if I do say so myself) but a mediocre GITD polish. I have worn it again since, and, when charged directly by the sun, it is glow-y. But otherwise it is not that impressive. Then again, I compare all GITD polishes to Dayglow and nothing matches up to that insane brightness!

Hope you enjoyed anyway 🙂

Fan Flowers

There was no overall plan with this manicure, I just had a color pallet to use and went for it! I don’t know if I like the overall scheme over blue (rather than nude or light orange) but it is what it is! I love the yellow/orange/pink/purple pallet, but looking back at this I wish I had done it over a more neutral color. Maybe next time!

Colors:
~ Pastel blue: Zoya – Blue
~ Blue shimmer: Sinful Colors – Cinderella
~ Yellow: KBShimmer – Orange You Glad I Didn’t Say Banana?
~ Orange: Zoya – Thandie
~ Pink: Zoya – Morgan
~ Magenta: Zoya – Margo
~ Purple: Zoya – Danielle
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamp: Moyra – 45 I Fill You

I want to say it is getting close to spring (we are most of the way to March and its been in the 60s the past two days) but honestly it is supposed to snow and then freezing rain later this week (oh joy) so I can’t say that. I just like flowers? Anyway, hope you enjoyed!

Radioactive Collide

I saw this polish and I just HAD to have it. I have amassed quite a collection of neon green polishes in the last year, and this one adds nicely! Of course I couldn’t just walk around with neon green shimmer nails (that would have been too boring, hah!) so I added some matching peach stamping.

The base is two coats of Jreine’s Radioactive Nom Nom from Polish Pickup. It is a neon green with lots of pink/orange/gold shifting shimmer. I love the end result, but the brush head is a little too thick for my skinny nails, and the polish was a bit thick to work with! Still worth it. Also, the name is fantastic

Colors:
~ Green shimmer: Jreine – Radioactive Nom Nom
~ Peach: KBShimmer – Papaya Don’t Preach
~ Pink: Essie – Sunday Funday
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamp: Lina – Urbannailart collab

I figured if I had some pretty pink-orange shimmer I had to add some pink designs. I actually like the end result even if it looks super weird! I need to wear this nail polish again, even looking at its neon goodness brings me joy 🙂

Psychedelic Illusion

I had such high hopes for this, and they fell short. I need to repeat this again with more patience to blend the colors together! Sadly, the nail that looks the best is my POINTER not even the cool design on my ring finger! Next time, jelly polish. I wanted to make it look like a crazy illusionary neon loop, but all I ended up with was a mess.

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Neon yellow: Love&Beauty – Yellow
~ Pink: Zoya – Kelsey
~ Purple: L’oreal – Paparazzi Pleaser
~ Holo: China Glaze – Fairy Dust
~ Stamp: B Loves Plates – 03 Mind Blown

This is another design where I lost all the editing work I had done. Womp womp. So no editing of this nail art other than minimal color correction. Sorry guys.

Itinerant Traveler

I had been staring at this design on the stamping plate for SO LONG and I just had to use it. I had to. The biggest struggle was how to make the dragons stand out. The stamping plate has the dragons as part of the design, but I didn’t want them to be just black. So, I stamped over the black with multichrome (and then went back in and added more multichrome by hand because shifty dragons just make sense)!

I started with a bright green base. What you see here are two coats of OPI’s Did It On ‘Em. I hate the name, but the color is a beautiful pale grass green (a yellow-leaning bright pale green). I had been looking for a replacement for Essie The More The Merrier, and I think I have found it! Its a nice polish.

To make the base more grass-like, I dry-brushed on two more shades of green. When that was dry and top coated, I added my stamping decals, and then finished off with the multichrome dragons. I initially painted the blue sky directly on the nail after the stamp was finished, but I decided that was farrrrr to much effort and just turned it into part of the stamping decal after the first two nails 😀

Colors:
~ Pale green: OPI – Did It On ‘Em
~ Green: Zoya – Josie
~ Dark green: Zoya – Shawn
~ Blue: KBShimmer – I’d Rather be with Blue
~ Light grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Grey: WOW – #333
~ Dark grey: Zoya – Evvie
~ Pale grey with black flecks: Cirque – Hatch
~ Red: KBShimmer – Chai-huahua
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Brown: Zoya – Dea
~ Gold: Salon Perfect – Gold Leaf
~ Blue multichrome: ILNP – Birefringence
~ Stamp: Maniology – M035

Thats all for today, and fits the 31 day challenge of book, mostly because I love fantasy novels! I don’t have a specific one here, but there are so many who cares :-p. Hope you enjoyed!

Dark Orchids

It is rare that a manicure comes out exactly as expected. This one managed to and I could not be more pleased! I love orchids, and I figured if I can’t match the bright purple/white/yellow ones in my living room to the base of my nail color, then improvise!

Colors:
~ Pale grey/purple: ILNP – Long Walks
~ Dark purple: Sinful Colors – Muse
~ Purple glitter: Zoya – Rea
~ Pastel purple: Ethereal – Little Oysters
~ Yellow: Revlon – Electric
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamps: BP – L067

I was initially upset that I made the underside of the orchid a shimmery metallic purple, but in the sunlight and when it caught the light it looked stunning. The odd muted grey tones somehow all worked! Anyways, I hope you all enjoyed!

Sunflower Morning

Omg I love this manicure! Look at the detailed stamp! And those ladybugs! This is basically the perfect summer manicure and I am proud of myself. It helps that the stamped worked perfectly (that happens to rarely!) and that the base color somehow just complimented the whole thing. I feel as though I usually reach for a complicated holo/glitter background and it ends up detracting from the final design! But this totally worked. Score 1 to Eva!

Colors:
~ Pink holo: Femme Fatale – Mr Pinchy
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Light yellow: Maybelline – Citrus Collide
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Moment
~ Green: Zoya – Tilda
~ Dark brown: Zoya – Louise
~ Light brown: Zoya – Flynn
~ Red: Pure Ice – Siren
~ Stamp: Nicole Diary – L21

I wanted to post a link to the born pretty store plate because it worked so darn well…but they stopped carrying it! I guess the good ones sell out fast. Anyway, hope that you enjoyed this summer nail art, stay tuned for more this week!

Bugs in the Grass

I have been on a bit of a pink-on-green kick recently and I don’t know why. It isn’t really a good color combination unless its in Wicked! Anyway, this time around I painted some pink bugs on some grass and it wasn’t terrible? I have also found my new favorite grass stamp!

Colors:
~ Light green: OPI – Did it on ’em
~ Green: Zoya – Josie
~ Light pink: Born Pretty – Warm Tea Cherry Blossom
~ Bright pink: Born Pretty – Warm Tea Crimson Cheeks
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamps: Lina – Make Your Mark 02, Nicole Diary – L21 and 090, BM – XL47

The grass stamp is the firework-looking pattern from Make Your Mark 02! I don’t know why I have never through of using it before for this purpose but it works REALLY well. Thank you Lina :-D. Anyway, hope you enjoyed my pink bugs! They were fun to make.

Rainbow Glitter Curtain

These nails are the BEST so I just needed to finish off the week with them! Omg. I wanted to make a rainbow reveal manicure but I also didn’t want to spend literal hours hand-painting every line of this particular stamp…so I came up with a great idea! I started with a somewhat pastel rainbow gradient on my nails. Then I painted the stamping decals (rainbow swirl center, white on the outside, and holo glitter topcoat on the lines) and stamped it straight onto my nails. The end result is super cool looking, if I do say so myself! I love the smooth background rainbow gradient, the bright vibrancy of the colors in the central swirls, and the holo glitter 😀 That said, I apparently need another blue creme (I only have like 9 of them, obviously that isn’t enough) because I used a shimmer for the blue color and it barely came through at all in the gradient!

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Holo top coat: China Glaze – Fairy Dust
~ Pink: Revlon – Bubbly
~ Orange: Formula X – Incandescent
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Moment
~ Green: OPI – Did It On ‘Em
~ Teal: Zoya – Wednesday
~ Blue: KBShimmer – Id’ Rather Be with Blue
~ Periwinkle: Nails Inc – Regents Place
~ Purple: Zoya – Malia
~ Stamp: Moyra – 45 I Fill You

This ends out rainbow week! Hope you all enjoyed. And are prepared to see all three designs in my end-of-year roundup of favorite nail art posts :-p Happy friday!