Failed Quartz

I was trying to make a pseudo-marble manicure (since everyone else seems to e making marble nails) and I wanted something pretty and subtle…so I went with a light grey and pale pink. And then I added another shade of pink. And a blush. And then it was too pink and the grey looked blue so I added white. And then some rose gold glitter…and the whole thing just took a life of its own!

Colors:
~ Grey: Formula X – Delightful
~ Pink: Zoya – Jordan
~ Nude: CND – Cashmere Wrap
~ Blush: KBShimmer – Caught on Tape
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Rose gold: ILNP – Juliette

In the end although I do think these nails look cool, they look nothing like I intended. I will have to re-try the marble theme at some point! And maybe they will actually end up marble-like by the time I am done :-p. Hope you enjoyed!

Elegant Grey Floral

Apparently I have a thing for thinking that grey with silver or white is elegant? I don’t know. I do think these are pretty despite the boring color palette! I actually was surprised to find these in my things I have painted folder, I forgot I ever made them! Oops 😀

Colors:
~ Grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Shimmer white: Revlon – Calla Lily
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Orange silver glitter: ILNP – Fired Up
~ Stamp: MoYou – Porcelain 01

I am really glad I started adding tiny bits of glitter in certain nail designs. I don’t remember who I saw using that idea on IG recently, but it has gotten me back into the habit (especially since I really cannot wear 3D pieces like rhinestones to the hospital at the current moment) and i love it! Anyway, hope you all enjoyed!

Shimmer Flowers

This ended up being oddly delicate? I didn’t mean it to be but its actually rather pretty! Between the pastel grey-green base, the thin black lines, and the scattered gold glitter, I’ll take it!

This mani (by which I mean this base polish) exists because a coworker tipped me off that a local St Louis tchotchke (turns out I’ve never had to spell tchotchke before!) store was selling old Formula X polishes for $1 each. These used to be something like $12 each at Sephora (and I think I bought 4 of them when they were on some kind of sale) and this random odds and ends store had HUNDREDS of these polishes in boxes! So, of course, I pawed through them and ended up buying 12 polishes. For $12. Now, one was a top coat and one was a base coat (I had to test them…) but still. I am so happy!

Anyway. I doubt this polish is really available to purchase anywhere but I am going to review it regardless because it is new to me. This is two thin coats of Quantum by Forumula X. It is a pretty, subtle, pale grey-green and I quite like it! It is a bit more neutral than I usually reach for, but I don’t own anything quite like it and it was easy to wear and to match to things. I have already worn it again and I only bought the polish 3 months ago.

Colors:
~ Grey-green: Factor X – Quantum
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Gold glitter: Salon Perfect – Gold Leaf
~ Gold shimmer: Sephora by OPI – I Found a Pot of Gold
~ Stamp: Lina – Urbannailart

Hope you enjoyed this delicate art! I promise we are coming to the end of flower power posts. I just figured I would dump all my flower manicures online while it was still spring time! 😀

Tall Grey Trellis

Subtle but fun! With dots, of course. This one looked rather cool when I was wearing it, but really is subtle enough that photos do not do it justice. The grey stood out from the holographic background better IRL :-p

Colors
~ Grey-blue holo: ILNP – Timeless Vow
~ Grey: Zoya – Evvie
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamp: MoYou – Steampunk 06

Hope you enjoyed, and happy Friday! Stay inside. Next week I will bring you more colors to brighten up the indoor time!

Neutral Marble Flowers

I wanted to water marble, but I also needed something subtle for the hospital! This is what I ended up with. If I am being honest I don’t love it, but it is certainly subtle and work-appropriate, and has watermarbling!

Colors:
~ Nude glitter: Sayuri – Anthos
~ Nude: Zoya – Chantal
~ Pink: Zoya – Jordan
~ Grey: Zoya – Dove
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Stamp: BP – L067

The oddest thing about working from home while being a doctor is how staffing is working at the moment. To try and keep the minimum people getting sick at once we are truly working in shifts: so I am working from home 3/4 days and only going into the hospital on day 4. This is a deeply weird time and I don’t know how I feel about it. St Louis is preparing for the storm of COVID patients, although we aren’t there quite yet. Stay tuned! And hope you maybe somewhat enjoyed these odd nails :-p

Neutral Vibrations

I don’t know why exactly, but for some reason this manicure makes me think of the ripples of sound waves. Vibrational nails! Of course, these are also super neutral for the hospital, but I like them more than I thought I would! Each finger has a minimum of three stamps, which is a lot even for me :-p

Colors:
~ Nude: CND – Cashmere Wrap
~ Blush: Zoya – Rue
~ Grey: Zoya – Dove
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Stamps: Born Pretty – L005

Even though these are neutral-toned, and I have had a LOT of neural toned negative feelings after my Valentines nude-and-lace boring montage, I still don’t mind these! If you have to go neutral, at least make it interesting 😀 Hope you enjoyed!

Elegant Silver Grey Overlay

This one might not have many colors, but it makes up for that with elegance! There are few monochromatic manicures that I actually enjoy wearing, but this was one of them. The stamp is lovely, and silver-on-grey works (at least sometimes).

Colors:
~ Grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Silver: A England – Excalibur
~ Stamp: BP – L049

I feel like I seldom wear things that qualify as classy in anyway, but these nails made me feel fancy! They might not be as much fun as my usual style, but sometimes a girl just needs class over pizzaz :-p

A full 5 days into wearing the manicure I added some rabbits because I have a friend that loves them. I was impressed by how good the mani looked…but also, bunnies! So please enjoy the classing down of the silver grey-ness too 😀

Holographic Grey Splashes

Wintry and appropriate! Next week I start posting lace-themed things for Valentine’s day (no hearts this year) so I figured I should sneak in at least one final winter manicure.

What is cool about this mani is that I actually both polished with a holo AND stamped with a similar scattered holo. Usually I would stamp with a creme polish but I wanted to see what would happen! The end result it kinda trippy, it almost looks like I top coated with some type of linear-ish holographic? Go figure!

Colors:
~ Grey holo: Emily de Molly – Crystal Crown
~ Dark grey holo: Darling Diva – Black Diamond
~ Stamp: MoYou – Fairytale 02

Of course my friend had a birthday, and she has (and loves) guinea pigs, so I had to add them on just for her! The background was just subtle enough that it worked. My nails had grown out 4-5 days at that point which is why I have so much free cuticle space (gross) but they were too cute not to post! So enjoy the bonus extra guinea pig photograph 🙂

Dark Indian Corn

I made two styles of indian corn, this is the darker version! You saw the lighter version a week ago. I started with a yellow base and dry-brushed on a lighter shade of yellow. Then I stamped with white, and vaguely colored in some corn bits with grey and red. Then I stamped again in brown. Sadly my brown stamp was not nearly as opaque as I would have liked!

Colors:
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Momen
~ Light yellow: Maybelline – Citrus Collide
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Red: OPI – Vision of Love
~ Grey: WOW – #333
~ Brown: Zoya – Flynn
~ Dark brown: Zoya – Dea
~ Stamp: Moyra – 32 Nature

The husk is hand-painted, but it doesn’t make up for the fact that neither the white nor the brown were dark enough to work. Maybe if I had actually colored in the corn kernels on the stamper this would have worked better, but as it stands it just looks messy. Oh well, other corn for the win! What are your thoughts?

Light Indian Corn

I made two styles of indian corn and this is the lighter one! The other one will likely be posted in the next two weeks. This one was made using a light brown base, over which I stamped the corn image in white. When that was dry, I then smushed a bunch of colors (yellow, light yellow, red, and grey) onto the stamping plate and stamped over the white with the colors. The end result is less identifiably corn, but still cool! However, it looked too pastel, so I used a yellow jelly polish over the top to deepen the colors.

Colors:
~ Yellow: OPI – Never a Dulles Momen
~ Light yellow: Maybelline – Citrus Collide
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Red: OPI – Vision of Love
~ Grey: WOW – #333
~ Brown: Zoya – Flynn
~ Dark brown: Zoya – Dea
~ Pale nude: Sephora X – Marvelous
~ Yellow jelly: Esmalta da Kelly – Yellow Soap Bubble
~ Stamp: Moyra – 32 Nature

Of course, one cannot just have kernels, so I added some hand-painted husks. Overall this was quite fun to make and wear, and I enjoyed comparing the two manicures! You guys will have to let me know (after you see the other one) which one you prefer! Hope you enjoyed 🙂

Shining Leaves

It’s fall! The 31 Day Challenge has ended, so it is certainly October. More than that, the weather in St Louis just went from the 90s (it was TERRIBLE) to daily highs in the 70s! Hurray!

In honor of the newfound cold and frosty world (ok, there has not yet even been close to a frost, but still, not sweating in tank tops because it is chilly out makes me very happy), I am going to finally start posting Fall manicures! Beginning with this one. Basically, I just double stamped silver, then a smooth of red and orange polishes. Voila!

Colors:
~ Grey flakie: Polished for Days – Grey Opal
~ Dark red: OPI – Visions of Love
~ Red: OPI – All I Want for Christmas (is OPI)
~ Dark orange: Essie – Playing Koi
~ Orange: ULTA – Sun of a Gun
~ Silver: Nails Inc – South Kensington
~ Stamp: BP – 19

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! And I hope this weather lasts, because it is the only time of the year that anyone will voluntarily find me outside!

Japanese Ink

I love this mani. I absolutely adore it. I feel like I am saying this a lot, but I think it might be one of my very favorites of 2019. It was time consuming (a weird mix of advanced stamping and freehand) but totally worth it! I also looked up about 15 ink paintings to get a sense of composition and color before I started :-p

Also, is there anything more fitting for “artwork” than this? I feel as though I have a lot of Japanese art around my house, but nothing quite this scroll-like!

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Light grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Grey: WOW – # 333
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Red: Zoya – Sooki
~ Pink: Zoya – Jordan
~ Stamps: MoYou – Porcelain 01, Born Pretty – Chinese L003, UC – Lovely Leaves 2

Anyway. I hope you all enjoyed! I do not have a post ready for Monday yet because I honestly just did not have enough time to ready a tutorial this year. I will likely do a “honor nails you love” a day early. Sorry!

Murky Geometry

Sometimes you have a polish that you like. It is quite pretty and you know you really want to use it…but it is such an awkward color that you never know what to pair it with! That is my primary problem with this polish. So, obviously, I am stuck reaching for black, white, gold or silver. This time, I went with gold.

I don’t know why I went with a geometric set of designs except that it had been a while since I last used this stamping plate! The combo came out rather nicely, although it was hard to see the design in sunlight due to the reflectiveness of the gold polish! :-p

Colors:
~ Purple-grey: Quixotic Polish – It Rubbed Off From Friction
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamps: Moyra – 54 Matrix

That’s it for today! This was a pretty straight forward and simple week. I am in the process of deciding how much I can contribute to the 31 Day Challenge this year…we shall see! I have a hunch its going to be a “on days I usually post just try to post something theme-appropriate” like last year.

Flowers Trailing Dots

This was a brushstroke marble, and it only kind of worked. I used different wet polishes gently brushed over each other to make a sideways pattern, and then transferred it with a stamper. The pattern looked cool on my mat, but when it transferred it got blurry! This was a class example of an over-engineered design. I wish I had just stamped without adding glitter. Oops!

Colors:
~ Light purple: Zoya – Abby
~ Purple: L’oreal – Royalty Reinvented
~ Teal: Zoya – Wednesday
~ Neon teal: Emily de Molly – Glee Ridden
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Grey glitter: Emily de Molly – Shadow on the Moon
~ Stamp: Whats Up Nails – B005

Of course, the sun also did not want to cooperate with me during the days I wore this manicure, so unfortunately all you get are indoor photos! I swear the flowers were glittery…they were just leo smushed. To make up for this poor showing, on friday you get neon rainbows! Ok? Ok.

Sea Storm

My birthday is the end of this week! It is also the first day of my end-of-intern-year-break. It is going to be amazing to actually be doing my speciality after the end of this month. Regardless, I decided to celebrate by posting a week of some of my more favorite recent manicures! Starting with this one.

In addition to looking like fancy lightening, this mani showcases a fantastic base color! What you see here are three thin coats of Narrow Sea by Illyrian from lat years March PPP. Yes, I wore these almost a year a go and never posted them. I was saving them for something special, because omg I love this color. I honestly could have gotten away with two coats of the polish, but I wanted more shimmer! My only complaint, and it is a tiny one, is that the polish is a bit thicker than I expected, but leveled well regardless.

To get the nail art I dabbed on some white and covered it with a dark grey-green and grey-purple to make the clouds and surf, and freehanded some lightning strikes! I wanted them to glow, so I added some shimmery polish. I am so happy with how this came out!

Colors:
~ Dark teal shimmer: Illyrian – Narrow Sea
~ White: LA Girl – White On
~ Dark grey-green: Zoya – Evvie
~ Dark grey-purple: Sinful Colors – Muse
~ Holo shimmer: ILNP – Rosewater

That’s it for today. Stay tuned for more of my favorite manis on Wednesday and Friday. Hope you enjoyed!

Pagoda and Maple

I love this mani. The leaves are upside-down from where they should be (oops) but it still looks awesome. Also, I finally did a stamp transfer to make a mirror image! That has NEVER worked for me before!

The base polish here is a new-to-me beauty called Darling, Red Isn’t Your Color by Cadillaquer. It is an off-white jelly base filled with tiny red glitters and small and medium black glitters. It is subtle and amazing and I love it. I am always looking for more off-white crellies and this is a success! This is three thin coats.

I then stamped in black, colored the leaves in pale grey and the roof in two different shades of red (you can’t really see the gradient but it made me happy), and voila! Next time I do this (cause lets be honest, this combination of designs is happening again) I will make sure the maple leaves point DOWN not UP. Oops!

Colors:
~ White crelly: Cadillacquer – Darling, Red Isn’t Your Color
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Red: OPI – All I Want for Christmas (is OPI)
~ Dark red: OPI – Visions of Love
~ Stamps: MoYou – Porcelain 01

That’s it for today! Happy Friday. It is currently only in the low 80s in St Louis…I hope this cooler weather holds until I have a few days off next week!!

Elegant Array

I love this stamp. I love love love this stamp. I didn’t even notice it when I bought the plate originally, but it is amazing! It also helps that the base color is elegant, but mostly the stamp is amazing.

Usually when I finish stamping I decide that the design just isn’t enough…that I need something else. Since it is me, this something else is usually dots. I did not even touch this design!

Colors:
~ Grey: Zoya – Yuna
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamp: MoYou – Porcelain 01

That’s about it. I am neck-deep in online estate sales right now trying to buy house furniture! Hope you enjoyed 🙂

Ionian Arches

This was simple but a lot of fun to wear! I figured that pairing a magnetic polish (and magnetizing it sideways) with a weird 1920’s style stamp would look awesome. Voila! Of course, it also gave me an excuse to play with a cool new-to-me stamping plate from MoYou’s steampunk collection.

Colors:
~ Grey magnetic: Nails Inc – Trafalgar Square
~ Rose gold: Essie – Penny Talk|
~ Stamp: MoYou – Steampunk 06

Hope you enjoyed! I know there are only two photos, but when there is no sunlight AND my nails are tiny I don’t tend to take as many pictures!

(just FYI: I am moving these next two weeks, and there is a chance that I don’t get around to editing nail art and posting. I will be back! But if the blog is post-less for the next twoish weeks it is because I am moving and did not appropriately edit nail art in advance!)

Purple Bulls Eye

I mean, if you can call something off centered and purposeful off-stamped a bulls eye :-p

I wish I had captured more of the silver under lighting! I was so proud of myself for yet another successful double stamp. I think I only had to completely restart one of the nails once! Success.

 Colors:
~ Grey glitter: KBShimmer – Sandy
~ Purple: Zoya – Danielle
~ Silver: A England – Excalibur Renaissance
~ Stamp: B. Loves Plates – B03 Mind Blown

Not super exciting, but I liked it! Hope you enjoyed. I am on vacation next week (!!!!) so I should have some posts set up while I am away, but I won’t be responding to messages!

Pink Along the Circle

I have no idea. I just started playing with things and ended up here? I wanted grey, red, and pink, and somehow wound up turning to this pattern.

I started with a light grey base and layered one coat of a glitter polish overtop, to give it some flakies. I then stamped, and dotted the rest of the pattern. The only really fun part of this design is that I mixed red and white and just swirled them together, so the dot color is variegated.

Colors:
~ Light grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Grey glitter: Polished for Days – Grey Opal
~ Dark red: OPI – Visions of Love
~ White: LA Girl – White On
~ Red: Pure Ice – Siren
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamp: BM – S101

That’s it for today! A bit of an odd design with a bit of an odd collection of colors, but overall not terrible :-p.