Flame

I spent a long time trying to figure out how to use this plate, which was sent to me for review from the Born Pretty Store. Fire-colored gradient with black stamping? Gradient stamping? I tried doing yellow and orange and red…but they didn’t pop against black! So I had the brilliant idea of layering them over GOLD. Because that just sounded like fun.

I ended up using a gold glitter rather than a metallic, so the fire looks a little more granular. I think if I were to do this again, I’d try it with a metallic and see what happens! I do like this quite a bit though.

In the end, each nail got stamped 4 times: twice in gold with the two overlaid designs, once with a yellow-orange blotted mix, and finally with a purple-red mix. Surprisingly, this didn’t take that long! Mostly because the plate was so well-etched that transferring the designs was a piece of cake. Even the solid body of the bird on my thumb!

Colors
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ Gold: Sally Hansen – Go for Gold
~ Yellow: WOW – #301
~ Orange: ULTA – Sun of a Gun
~ Red: Pure Ice – Siren
~ Purple: Zoya – Margo
~ Dark purple: Zoya – Monica
~ Stamp: BP – X012 (Exoticism)

That’s it for today…awesome fire! I’ve honestly had my eyes on this stamp forever because I love flames but I HATE hand-painting them! And this stamp has SO MANY FLAMES. You can pick it up for yourself at the Born Pretty Store on sale for $1.99. Don’t forget to use my 15% off coded, LY5X31!

101 Dalmatians

Another Disney mani that I’ve been sitting on since 2016…July, actually. How sad is that? These are so cute though!

I wanted to do each collar a different color, but when I went back and looked, only the mom and dad dog (Perdita and Pongo) had really distinct collars that were not just the same as all the puppies!

The design itself was inspired by @banicured_. Puppies! And Disney! I’ve wanted a dog for a long time, and this makes it worse…only, I can’t imagine that I wouldn’t end up with dog hair ruining my manis!

Colors
~ White: Wet n’ Wild – French White Creme
~ Black: Wet n’ Wild – Black Creme
~ Yellow: WOW – #301
~ Red: Pure Ice – Siren
~ Blue: Zoya – Ling

I thought about writing “101” on my thumb, but honestly, this was surprisingly quick and easy and I didn’t want to ruin it with trying to make words! Or numbers. Either way.

Did any of you guys have a favorite puppy from 101 Dalmations? Hope you enjoyed!

Nemo and Dory

I painted these in May of 2016…so I should probably actually post them. I just wanted to wait until I had enough disney-themed manis to post them all in a week! Whoops.

This mani was inspired by Finding Nemo. Yes, these are super-stylized, yes I still think it’s cool!

I got the idea from Klo’s to me, although she used much brighter aqua for her underwater…I wish I had a similar blue but I just don’t! So mine is more of a teal-based blue. Either way, I loved her idea for the surf!

Colors
~ Light teal: Maybelline – Green with Envy
~ Teal: Zoya – Wednesday
~ Light blue: Zoya – Rocky
~ Blue: Zoya – Yummy
~ Dark blue: Zoya – Ling
~ Dory blue: Sinful Colors – Endless Blue
~ Yellow: WOW – #301
~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ Orange: Zoya – Thandie

That’s all for today! Any other Disney or Pixar movies I should work on painting (I mean, and hopefully posting less than a year after they were initially painted)?

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

Negative Space Flowers

These came out cute! Although, sadly, they were cuter in my head. I just wanted something colorful and spring-y! I do wish that I had a left a bit more space between the flowers on some of my nails, but oh well.

The art is inspired by @lifeisbetterpolished, who has apparently changed her ID to @withlovekarissa and I had to hunt around and make sure I wasn’t tagging someone who stole her photos!

Anyway. Flowers, and negative space. I don’t usually go for negative space designs, but putting this on a white background seemed too…jarring.

Colors:
~ Sheer nude: Formula X – Marvelous
~ Pink: Wet n’ Wild – Tickled Pink
~ Orange: Wet n’ Wild – Sunny Side Up
~ Yellow: WOW – #301
~ Green: Essie – The More The Merrier
~ Blue: Essie – Rock the Boat
~ Purple: Essie – Full Steam Ahead

It is amusing that 90% of the colors I used came from two pastel collections (Wet n’ Wild and Essie)! I should go back to buying collections that come out with rainbow colors with the same finish, it makes for the best nail art! Hope you enjoyed!

Grey Marble

A somewhat simple mani (made by smushing colors on with saran wrap), and then some striping tape! It ended up looking far more elegant than I intended it to 🙂

The base here is a pale grey creme called Dove, by Zoya. I’ve been in the market for a light grey for a while, since my last one ran out….around 2 years ago. Whoops. Dove covered perfectly in two thin coats, and reminded me why I love buying cremes from Zoya! This isn’t a shocking color, but it is pretty. Not that many brands have a grey creme in stock at all times, so I’m glad Zoya does!

The art itself was my (successful?) attempt to make my nails look like marbled granite. I know most people start with a white base (and if I ever do this again, I am likely to as well) when they try to create a white/grey/silver granite look but I wanted to see what it looked like all grey! And I needed to use Dove in a way that would look cool but be subtle enough for work.

I actually took a whole bunch of photos before adding the striping tape, because I wasn’t sure if I would like it. I really did though, so there are no photos here of the silver-less manicure!

Colors
~ White: Wet n’ Wild – French White Creme
~ Light grey: Zoya – Dove
~ Dark grey: WOW – #333
~ Black: Wet n’ Wild – Black Creme
~ Silver: A England – Excalibur

Hope you enjoyed! Stay tuned for another swatch on Wednesday.

Valentines Dotticure

I wasn’t sure if I was going to use this as my day-before-Valentine’s Day mani or not…because there are no hearts! But really, I didn’t paint any hearts this year, so have some pink and red and gold dots 😀

This mani was inspired by @badgirlnails…which really just seems to be a trend for me right now. I think I accidentally browsed her last approximately three years worth of manis and pinned them all to my to-try folder on pinterest. And they are all somewhat simple (like, 1-1.5 hours of work, rather than 3 hours of work) so when I don’t want to stamp I just keep turing to them! I would say whoops, but I honestly like her nail art a bunch so I don’t feel too bad about continually turned to it for inspiration.

Sadly, I haven’t actually edited the mani that includes the swatch of the base color I’ve used here, Cherish by Picture Polish. I’ll see if I can’t get posted next week or something! The nail art that went with it is a bit boring, but it is a pretty polish. So, stay tuned for that!

Colors
~ Nude: Picture Polish – Cherish
~ Hot pink: WOW – #371
~ Bright pink: Revlon – Bubbly
~ Light pink: Wet n’ Wild – Tickled Pink
~ White: Wet n’ Wild – French White Creme
~ Gold: OPI – All Sparkly and Gold

Regardless, happy almost Valentine’s Day! I hope you eat a lot of chocolates and your lives are filled with flowers. Personally, I love going to the grocery store the day AFTER Valentine’s and grabbing all the half-price chocolate :-D. There is one more pink mani coming on Wednesday (just because), and then on to less girly pastures!

I am a little curious myself…this is my first Valentine’s day since I got married. I don’t think my husband and I are doing anything we don’t usually do (small gifts, fancy dinner, and not-flowers), but will it feel different? I highly doubt it :-p. Hope you enjoyed the nail art!