Neon Rainbow Webs

My birthday is tomorrow! Which means that this is the official RAINBOW WEEK! I have had a tradition for the past few years of painting my nails with crazy awesome rainbows on my birthday, because rainbows are just the best. This week will show three of my rainbow nails in honor of my birthday 🙂 including my birthday nails that I actually wore last year (because heaven forbid I actually edit nails in time to post them within a week of painting them).

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Pink: Revlon – Bubbly
~ Orange: Zoya – Thandie
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Moment
~ Green: Zoya – Tilda
~ Blue: Zoya – Yummy
~ Purple: Zoya – Malia
~ Gold: Zoya – Ziv
~ Gold holo: FUN Lacquer – Million Dollar Dream
~ Stamp: Nicole Diary – 156

Today’s manicure was approached with the thought: what would Claire Estelle do? She has stopped posting, but back in the day she had the BEST rainbow neons, glitters, and random bits of color. I browsed her IG for a bit (not that I don’t already have most of her posts favorited, because again, rainbows) and settled on this idea! It took some effort but wow was it ever glittery! I started with a pinwheel stamping rainbow (basically going clockwise around from pink through to purple) and gradiented a different orientation of that same pinwheel on each nail. The end result was a somewhat random looking array of rainbow colors. I then added the black stamp, the gold through the line at the middle (both a simple glittery gold and then a chunky gold holo on top), and finally some black dots with gold centers. Voila! Hope you enjoyed…and stay tuned for more rainbows!!!

Purple and Gold Fail

I don’t want to look at this, and I almost don’t want to post it. I wanted to show off a new gold polish (but not put it on every nail because it is a pain to remove) and I failed. Dramatically. I needed to stop loooong before I did stop with adding random gold lines. Even my color choices were questionable. Yuck.

Colors:
~ Yellow holo: Formula X – Light me up Edison
~ Purple: Zoya – Margo
~ Dark purple: Zoya – Lael

The only good nail here, my ring finger which I left alone, has two coats of Light me up Edison by Formula X, which is a shockingly glittery yellow holo polish. It is one of those polishes made entirely of tiny glitters (in this case, yellow holographic) which makes it very painful to remove but also stunningly beautiful. I bought it because I own GOLD holo glitters, but no real YELLOW holo glitters. I have no idea when I will want to go through the pain of removing it again, but it is beautiful! I will need to find some art to pair it with that comes together better. Or at all.

Queen Charlotte Regal Garb

This was another manicure designed after some of the outrageously beautiful dresses in season 1 of the show Bridgerton. This one is modeled after the epic red and blue gown worn by the actress playing Queen Charlotte. I tried to capture the shiftiness of the blue using a multichrome but it only somewhat worked. Regardless, I like the end result! The inspiration is dramatic!

Much like Monday’s post, I decided to post this now since season 2 was just released, and I will be starting to watch it this week because I am behind. I hope the gowns are just as beautiful! And of course, the queens hairstyles just as magnificent.

BRIDGERTON GOLDA ROSHEUVEL as QUEEN CHARLOTTE in episode 108 of BRIDGERTON Cr. LIAM DANIEL/NETFLIX © 2020

Colors:
~ Red metallic: OPI – Cute Little Vixen
~ Blue multichrome: ILNP – Birefringence
~ Gold: Salon Perfect – Gold Leaf
~ Silver: Revlon – Metallic
~ Stamp: BC – 06

The whole design for this manicure is freehand, other than the background gold embroidery pattern on the red section; I hand-added the flowers in silver though! Unfortunately, although the very fine gold pattern is true to what gold embroidery looks like, you almost cannot make it out against the metallic burgundy of the base. Oh well, it was still fun to wear! Hope you enjoyed 🙂

Square Waves

I love this polish. I love it. Dark blurple base, flecks of pink metallic shimmer, and TINY IRIDESCENT SQUARES. I own 600 polishes and NONE of the others have iridescent squares. I die. So pretty. Why was this a limited edition?! Anyway, I didn’t want to cover up the polish all that much so I added some wave-like stamps and called it a day.

The base color is LE 302 by Emily de Molly. This polish is no longer available but if you have it and haven’t tried it PUT IT ON. It covers beautifully in two thin coats, does not drag, you get great glitter coverage, and its stunning. It is a bit of a pain to remove, but easier than most glitters (harder than cremes of course).

Colors:
~ Purple with glitter: Emily de Molly – LE 302
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamps: L078

This is a simple one but I really loved wearing it! And editing this nail art just bumped this to the top of my wear-again list 😀 Hope you enjoyed!

Perpetual Sky

This ended up pretty cool looking, and was quite fun to do! It was inspired by @nailsandtowel, but honestly also by one of the pixar SparkShorts. If you’ve seen if you’ll know what I am talking about, if not go watch Day & Night, and enjoy it! It is decidedly cute, and I had just shown it to my husband for the first time when I remembered saving this design on IG, and went back and painted it 🙂

Colors:
~ Light blue: Essie – Rock the Boat
~ Dark blue: A England – Tristam
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Moment
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White

Cute and accomplished! I really can’t ask more from nail art. Even if I didn’t actually do any art on two of the fingers, hah! Hope you enjoyed!

Flowers in the Ether

I have no idea what this manicure even is, but I think I like it? I started with a dark purple creme base. I then made a stamping gradient of a weird splotchy pattern using purple and pink holographic polishes, with pink towards my cuticle (I also forgot that the pink polish bleeds a whole bunch, oops). I decided that wasn’t interesting enough, so I added a gold floral + minimalist geometric stamp over the top? It works. Sort of.

Colors:
~ Dark purple: Zoya – Monica
~ Purple holo: A England – Crown of Thistles
~ Pink holo: Cupcake Polish – Berry Good Looking
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamps: BP Texture – L002, BP Flower Tango – L002

It is always fun coming up with designs that mix two disparate stamping plates that by all right should NOT go together. But the colors worked, so be it! Hope you enjoyed 🙂

Melting Clocks

This nail art is what would occur if Salivador Dali had a nightmare. I tried for this melting clock manicure…and I ended up with an awful disaster. I was not looking at my inspiration picture closely enough, and spent too long trying to determine how she made her marble background (I still have no idea and I REALLY want to know, they are so perfect! Share your secrets!). The end result is comedically horrible.

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Neon green: KBShimmer – Lime All Right
~ Teal: Zoya – Cecilia
~ Teal gliter: LA Girl – Teal Dimension
~ Gold glitter: Ethereal – Rainforest

If anyone knows how this artist (or any others like her) create such smooth beautiful marble nails, let me know! Clearly my attempts at recreation are cringe-worthy. Maybe next time.

Abstract Leaves

Today is just a really simple stamping design with some shimmer, but it is fast and the effect is pretty! This was supposed to go up on Friday, but I was distracted by a new board game that needed to be played. Sorry!

The base today is a new-to-me (but quite old) dark green creme polish by Zoya. As is typical of Zoya cremes, Hunter went on buttery smooth and covered perfectly in two coats. I had been in the market for a dark dusty green to work in a gradient or ombre with Shawn, and I think I found it! I really do love Zoya creme polishes, they just go on so nicely and the pigmentation is perfect.

Colors:
~ Green: Zoya – Hunter
~ Gold shimmer: Emily de Molly – Goddess of Rays
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Stamps: Lina – @urbannailart collab

For all that this was a very easy manicure, I like how the gold shimmer looks with the dark green, and how well the white stamp continues to stand out. No complaints from me! Hope you enjoyed 🙂

Grey Shimmer Fronds

Really simple but quite elegant in the end! All I did was color some white stamps in with a rainbow shimmer polish, and put it over a grey/gold shimmer base. The whole manicure took less than an hour, and really embodies dark cold days! The shimmer of the see-through polish picked up mostly green and orange tones from the grey base. In retrospect, the design looks a bit like the one I posted on Monday although they were painted months apart, maybe that is why I felt compelled to post them in the same week.

Colors:
~ Grey shimmer: Zoya – Yuna
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Rainbow shimmer: Different Dimension – Intergalactic Dolphin
~ Dark gold: ILNP – Sparks May Fly
~ Stamps: BPX – Floral L018

I need to use Yuna more, it is a pretty polish! And shimmery flakie-ish. I have a lot of grey polish, and I have slightly gotten out of the habit of wearing them! They are pretty, for all that they are not bright colors. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!

Golden Heart

This is needlessly complicated but almost cool? I wish I had used a less-glittery background pink. The idea was to encase a gold heart on my accent nail with a swirling cage. That worked, and I went an added swirls and occasional gold glitter to my other nails to work with it…but you almost can’t see the whole thing on top of the pink base! Oops.

Colors:
~ Pink holo: Milani – Digital
~ Pink glitter: Zoya – Mae
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Gold glitter: KBShimmer – Toast-ess with the Mostest
~ Stamps: BP – 185, Floral BP – X43

If I am being honest, I think this is the first time I have used Mae outside of swatching, and I use Toast-ess so rarely the polish has completely dried up and I am left picking out clotted glitter bits. Oh well! I suppose Valentine’s day is a good a day as any to open and play with some neglected polishes, right?

Turquoise Triangles

This came out better than expected. Somehow the colors all ended up working together, and the designs meshed well! I feel like that rarely happens when I do such dramatic accent nails. I thought There be Mermaids! would go really well with Rainforest, and I was right! However, I did not put any type of a base (nude or otherwise) down under Rainforest, so the free edge of my nail was very apparent. I will remember for next time!

Colors:
~ Turquoise: Powder Perfect – There be Mermaids!
~ Gold shimmer: Ethereal – Rainforest
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamps: BM – XL205

Overall I am actually pretty happy with how this came out, the stamping all looks intentional and the colors are excellent. I need to pair bronze with teal more often, jewelry-makers (…jewelers…) are clearly on to something with this combo! Hope you enjoyed.

Galactic Waves

I am not saying I purchased this stamping plate JUST for this stamp, but I also wouldn’t be lying if I said this was the one that caught my eye the most. I decided to use it at first with the glitteriest base I could find, and add gold, and add more dots…you get the idea. It looks almost musical. I love it!

Colors:
~ Pink/blue shimmer chrome: Polished for Days – Fireflies
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Gold: Salon Perfect – Gold Leaf
~ Stamp: Whats Up Nails – B039

Despite being a very simple manicure, this is one of my recent favorites. I need to use it again with a different color palette. The next week is going to be mostly stamping manicures as I clean out some of my older nail art. :-p

Glowing Pastel Lights

This one was FUN. I got a set of glow-in-the-dark polishes from Serum N5 and could not wait to start playing with them! I decided to see how they all compared to each other by making pastel christmas lights that actually glowed in the dark. I ended up using a pink jelly over the white one to make it pink, but the yellow, blue, and green are their original colors. Also not going to lie: they glowed nicely but NOTHING can compare to the neon bright happiness that is Dayglow. The others, although pretty, seemed weak in comparison, and I could hardly tell their glow colors apart. A bit disappointing but still fun!

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Cream gold glitter: Dear Rus – Sparkle Milk 21
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Yellow GITD: Serum No5 – Dayglow
~ Green GITD: Serum No5 – Glowin’ of Eden
~ Blue GITD: Serum No5 – Blue Blazes
~ White GITD: Serum No5 – Pure Glow Getter
~ Pink jelly: Zoya – Paloma

I am torn between wanting to buy more glow in the dark polishes, and wanting to just use the ones that I have more often, although they are a bit hard to use as base colors because they are just thick enough to be difficult! Next year I will have to do full-nail christmas lights I think.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed and happy almost-Christmas! I have officially run out of seasonally appropriate manicures that I have previously saved up, so the next round of nail art is likely to be what I am currently wearing gasp or at least have worn in this calendar year.

Geometric Christmas Sweater

I have a secret: this design is from an easter plate, and was supposed to be for an easter egg. I have repurposed it and it tickles me. I added some dark gold glitter dots and stripes for a bit more interest, but otherwise this is just a moderately complicated stamp! I do wish there were more Hanukkah stamps though. Or even things I could PRETEND were Hanukkah stamps. Hooray for another year of hand-painted candles.

Colors:
~ Grey: Formula X – Marvelous
~ Red: OPI – All I Want for Christmas (is OPI)
~ Green: Zoya – Shawn
~ Gold: ILNP – Sparks May Fly
~ Stamp: Whats Up Nails – B017

I have finished editing the rest of the designs for this week, and honestly, I feel like I need to up my Christmas game again. The ones I have painted this year will be posted next year, and at least I have a santa in the mix! I suppose this is what happens when I off-post by a full year. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!

Minimalist Christmas

This design is a trick! I started with a glow in the dark almost-white base, and stamped over it with a white polish, a single snowflake on each nail that can only be seen in the dark (or at least that was the intent. Hidden snowflake!). I then stamped a geometric pattern in black and highlighted little bits of the black with gold. That was intended to be the finished product, but it looked boring, so I went in with red and green glitter as well and made it more festive.

The base is two coats of the white glow-in-the-dark polish Pure Glow Getter by Serum No 5. The polish, like most GITD polishes, goes on thick and slightly gritty, and is likely not appropriate for beginner nail artists (sadly). That said, it has a reasonable level of glow (especially when charged by the sun, indoor light was less effective as usual), and the design that I put over it, including the secret snowflake, really popped!

These nails kept surprising me when I was falling asleep 🙂 I can’t decide if I would want to do a fully hidden design again, or if that took away a bit from the fun since no one but me (and my husband I suppose) knew that the snowflakes were there.

Colors:
~ White GITD: Serum No5 – Pure Glow Getter
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Gold: Salon Perfect – Gold Leaf
~ Red: Emily de Molly – LE 28
~ Green: Zoya – Ivanka
~ Stamp: Nicole Diary – 120

In retrospect looking at the polishes I used with this manicure, I hope Zoya regrets making a bright sparkly green and naming it Ivanka, but who knows. It is a pretty color regardless! Hope you enjoyed!

Pastel Teal Marble

This is a mix of freehand and water decal, because it has been a very long time since I played with water decals! And they are fast. I started with a teal holographic base, then added my water decal marble pattern, and then the teal line and dots. The end looks somewhat sealed together which is cool, although I wish I hadn’t done the double line and dots on my accent nail! It just looks silly.

This is three thin coats (I could have probably gotten away with two thick coats honestly) of Athena by Formula X. For a polish that I got for $1 this is incredible. I love the metallic-like shimmer and the holo glitter depth, it reminds me of some of my ILNP polishes. It is a pale green-leaning teal.

Colors:
~ Teal holo: Formula X – Athena
~ Teal: Formula X – Quantum
~ Brown: Zoya – Dea
~ Gold: Sally Hansen – Liquid Gold

I guess I have been quite into mint/teal these past few weeks! Ooops. Last time this year I was posting endless purple. I suppose I go through periods when all of my nail art is one main color based on what mood I’m in? Who knows. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! Water decals make for fun easy nail art 🙂

Orange Marsh Sunset

I wanted to make a beautiful sunset water scene using this stamping plate, and I succeeded in all but one aspect: I used the wrong colors. The whole thing is so darn brown instead of a bright orange! I figured I would start with the darkest orange and gradient on some lighter colors, and well it worked in theory, the brown undertones of the darkest orange out-shown the yellow and red of the brighter orange polishes! The end result is rather dreary looking. Next time, brighter colors!

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Pastel orange: Zoya – Cole
~ Orange: ULTA – Sun of a Gun
~ Dark orange: Essie – Playing Koi
~ Gold: Sephora – I Found a Pot of Gold!
~ Stamps: Moyra – 106 Picturesque

Looking at this manicure now just makes me happy that I got this stamping plate, and reminds me that I need to use it more in the next few weeks. It makes beautiful scenes. Hope you enjoyed! And sorry, I am out of any and all fall-themed nail art, so you guys get non-themed random designs for a bit!

American Turquoise

I don’t know why but this pattern seemed quasi native american to me? So I felt the need to use a more traditional teal/gold/white palette. I actually really like how it came out, and the gold highlights actually help instead of detract (I usually feel like my little bonus silver or gold designs actually hurt the overall art)!

Colors:
~ Teal: Zoya – Wednesday
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamps: Whats Up Nails – B039, EdM – 03

I feel that it is also fitting to inform all of you that I actually wore copper and turquoise today, so these nails (although they are not currently on my fingers) would have matched my jewelry choices for the day quite nicely! Hope you enjoyed :-p

Loose Mint Swirl

I did a test: which looks better, a loose swirl polish transfer (where you just blob the polish onto a mat, scoop it up with a brush, and release it onto the nail) or a cell-creating swirl that needs to dry on the mat/stamper before use. The cell version takes much longer, and it turns out that the loose swirl was the unanimous winner! I was surprised.

Colors:
~ Pastel teal: Zoya – Tiana
~ Neon teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ Teal: Salon Perfect – Escape to Neverland
~ Dark teal: OPI – Stay Off the Lawn!!
~ Gold glitter: Emily de Molly – Chasing Gold

I need to remember this loose swirl technique when I don’t have time. The whole design took maybe 15 minutes, and the cleanup after (due to the thickness of the polish around my cuticles) took another 15. Thats it. Not half bad! Anyway, sorry for the skipped posts last week, I am very stressed trying to meet some deadlines at the moment! Hopefully I manage to post more than once this week. Oops!

Orange Fog

This was intended to be the spooky backdrop to some creepy eyes, but I liked the background section so much that I didn’t want to risk messing it up by adding eyes! So we ended up with this, a Halloween-colored foggy creepy forest. It was also, notably, my first ever successful radial gradient 😀

Colors:
~ Light orange: KBShimmer – Orange You Glad I Didn’t Say Banana?
~ Orange: ULTA – Sun of a Gun
~ Brown: Zoya – Louise
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Silver: A England – Excalibur (renaissance)
~ Stamp: BM – XL472

Maybe I will try this again this year (these are from last year) but with purple! Or green. Creepy green forest fog. Hope you enjoyed!