Cruella deVille

This is actually the first of the “newer” Disney manis that I did! I found the previous two (memo and dalmatians) in my unposted folder and decided to use them as the jumping to point to EVEN MORE DISNEY.

I actually think I ended up doing paired manis for almost everything at this point (heroine + sidekick and then one for the villain). I am not shy to say that most of my villain manis came out better than my heroine manis 😀

Obviously, this is the companion post to Wednesday’s 101 dalmations! This was inspired by Cruella deVille. You don’t get to see my thumb because it was an idea that did NO pan out properly. The rest of the mani was inspired by Hot Pink Zebra Polish!

Colors:
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Red: Covergirl – Forever Festive
~ Beige – Zoya – Charlotte
~ Pale pink: OPI – Be There in a Prosecco

The question becomes: do I want to post ALL THE DISNEY MANIS in a row? Or do a disney week per month? I don’t know! I guess we shall see next week :-D. Any requests? Specific movies you guys want to see? Painting disney is fun!

Vines Through the Swamp

Don’t ask me about the title. I thought that as lovely as the base is, it looks like a swamp. And then I got stuck into thinking about Shrek and now “I’m a Believer” is stuck in my head on repeat.

Anyway. This is one of the A England polishes that I picked up a few months ago during the color4nails sale (because I couldn’t resist) and it is LOVELY. Now, at least part of that is because I simply love this type of murky green-brown, but a lot of it has to do with the polish itself! (Actually, I have a post that I’m working on that compares the three green-brown polishes I own. Yes, I own three of them. Because this color is magnificent).

Shown here is two thin coats of Fotheringhay Castle by A England. I almost could have gotten away with one! Adina’s version of this particular color is a deep murky green-gold with scattered fine holo shimmer. The holo is less noticeable than most other A England holos, but the finish is stunning and you can certainly see the shimmer! I’m quite happy with this 😀

Colors:
~ Green: A England – Fotheringhay Castle
~ Gold shimmer: Sally Hansen – Go for Gold
~ Gold metallic: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Light pink: ULTA – Babydoll
~ Pink: Essie – Eternal Optimist

I ended up triple stamping with two Bundle Monster plates: once with a gold shimmer that ended up very faint because the plate was not etched well, once with gold metallic swirls, and then over that using black polish and the same swirls. It came out pretty well for all that stamping madness!

Hope you enjoyed!

Bright Patterns

This was intended to be easter eggs (it went with my explicitely-easter-themed other hand for an easter mani) but i’m posting it separately just because (well, mostly cause they didn’t match that well)!

More or less, this is what happens when I play with stamps. Ta-da! I don’t even know what I ended up thinking about this, but it was entertaining to put together. I hadn’t done gradient stamping in a while.

I am also not going to go hunting for the list of stamps that I used, sorry! I don’t know that it matters (but if you REALLY want to know I can find them).

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Purple: Nails Inc – Regents Place
~ Teal: L’oreal – Not a Cloud in Sight
~ Pink: Revlon – Bubbly

In other news, I am really glad I bought Regents Place all those months ago…I wasn’t sure I would ever want a periwinkle purple-blue, and I’ve probably used it 5+ times (which is more than I’ve used almost anything that wasn’t black/white/silver/gold). Go figure!

Geometric Expression

I bought a bunch of OPI polishes recently…and this was one of my unplanned buys. They were having a buy-two-get-one-free sale so of course I had to leave with 6 polishes rather than the 4 I really wanted! Well, there were 6 but two of them were not in stock 😦

I have been in the hunt for a nude/pale-pink/grey and I thought this might be it! Until I swatched it on a nail stick and realized that it is a PERFECT DUPE for a (much cheaper) polish that I already own! Grrrrrr…I don’t usually buy perfect dupes. I feel rather dumb right now.

Regardless, this is three thin coats of Be There in a Prosecco by OPI. Despite taking 3 coats, it goes on better than my OTHER light pink nude creme polish (which takes 4 and even then has leveling problems). The polish is a very pale pink creme. I’ll do a comparison to the dupe sometime soon! As soon as I get over my disappointment.

Colors
~ Nude: OPI – Be There in a Prosecco
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Black: Wet n’ Wild – Black Creme
~ Gold: ILNP – Clockwork
~ Purple: Zoya – Rue
~ Stamps: BP – L054, 77

The one benefit of this is that I made something cool and geometric! Honestly, I just wanted to color in some geometric stamps, and this made it possible without standing out too much in the hospital.

Unfortunately some of the stamping decals bubbled a bit, so the top coat looks uneven. Oops! Hope you enjoyed anyway!

Spring Stripes and Buds

Unsurprisingly, I painted these back at the beginning of spring, when it was still exciting to put flowers on my nails. Oh well! They are still cute, and came out oddly colorful 🙂

These came about because I just wanted something fun a floral! I was going to use striping tape to make the lines, but the base took 4 coats (which reminds me of why I NEVER USE this polish, ugh) so I couldn’t use striping tape because my nails never dried. So, freehanded stripes! Pain in the butt…but not half bad. More of the story is that I have almost mastered straight lines? I think only one of these is my right hand, but I actually managed all these lines on BOTH hands.

The only reason I find that amusing is that I recently discovered I switch off hands when doing a physical exam in the hospital…which the rest of my team was super impressed by! I’ve always been somewhat ambidextrous, but I think its only gotten stronger since I started painting my nails way back at the beginning of my PhD!

Colors:
~ White jelly: Revlon – Cala Lilly
~ Light pink: Wet n’ Wild – Tickled Pink
~ Pink: Revlon – Bubbly
~ Green: Zoya – Tilda
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Stamp: BC – 06

Ok, that went very off topic. Suffice to say, these ended up colorful, cute, and a bit strange! And Cala Lilly is a terrible polish that I should get rid of before I try to use it again and spend 2 hours waiting for my base color to dry.

Moroccan Faded Pink

Another simple pink mani for clinic! Luckily, this time around I am allowed to have a bit of a longer free edge to my nails, and I am willing to be a TINY bit more daring and do some darker colors.

The inspiration for this came from a pinterest pin. Unfortunately, when I was putting the gradient together I didn’t have the image in front of me, and I assumed it was more pink and less white! So, I ended up doing the stamp in white since most of my nail was pink instead of the inverse. Knowing how much longer I’m going to need to wear pink nails, I imagine I will likely try the correct order of this mani (with maybe a slightly different color palette) at some point.

I almost decided not to matte the final product, but I am glad I did! It looks pretty awesome, even if it is pink. It’s also been a while since I’ve done gradients, so I am pleasantly surprised at how well this one turned out!

Colors:
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Light pink: Zoya – Rue
~ Pink: Essie – Eternal Optimist
~ Stamp: BM – XL205

Hope you enjoyed! And if I’m lucky I might get to do even more colors on a fairly regular basis after this 🙂

Neon Chevrons

I saw these on pinterest (with a nifty tutorial) months ago, and have been waiting for the perfect time to attempt them myself. Ta-da!

The design (and color choices) are lifted directly from Sassy Shelly. I’ve seen other people attempt similar things with results that I find mediocre…what struck me about these was the color combo and color order, so I tried to emulate that! I then went ahead and added a 3D glittery bit…because.

Of course, I don’t own any of the colors that she used (nor do I own any Cirque polishes, sadly, as they are expensive), so I made do with what I had. The end result was pretty good! Her white stamping polish is much better than mine, and her peachy-ornage is darker (mine is a pastel neon). I also STILL somehow don’t own just a plane holo topper. I need to get on that. So I used a coarser one which doesn’t look quite as good. I also don’t own wavy stencils, only chevron ones, so my nails have sharp points. Otherwise, I think its a pretty decent replica!

Colors
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Green: Essie – The More the Merrier
~ Blue: Zoya – Rocky
~ Purple: L’oreal – Paparazzi Pleaser
~ Pink: WOW – #371
~ Orange: Maybelline – Bleached in Peach
~ Holo: KBShimmer – I Only Have Ice for You

I basically just followed Shelly’s tutorial! It took a while mostly just to let the base colors dry, but was quite simple. This also reminds me that I should make more stamping decals! If I make them thin and use them the same day, they actually bend to my nail shape :-p