Friday, January 31, 2014

Girly football nails

Hey guys! More Football nails weeee! I really wanted to do some involving pink as a different option! These are super easy and quick. Time for some Orly Love! I only have a few Orly's, but the few that I do have are spectactular.

shade

Can we pause for a moment to gawk at Miss Conduct?????

direct sun....WOWZA

Here's what I used.... The brown (Prince Charming) is definitely not my favorite brown, but its a nice changeup!

from L: Miss Conduct, silver striper, Prince Charming

Thursday, January 30, 2014

Denver Broncos Inspired Nails (chevrons)

More football nails today! These are my "Denver Broncos" nails, like I said in the past, I am unable to free hand logos and such so I like to create graphic representations of things! I really love how these came out, exactly as I had on paper. Besides the fact that they involve orange....ewwwwww.

shade



direct sun (yay)

Here's how I did them. For the chevron nails, I started with solid orange.  Once it was really dry (several hours) I used scotch tape strips cut with my pinking shears. I am finding that when using creme-on-creme-tape designs, scotch tape works best. I just don't get as clean of lines with painters tape.
For the orange-tipped blue nails, I painted a narrow strip of white at the tips, then orange. If you just put the orange straight on the blue, it gets swallowed.


tutorial




The colors I used are NOPI Fairy Fairy Quite Contrary and OPI I saw, You saw, We saw, Warsaw.


Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Paw prints nails

Hey guys! It's almost Super Bowl time! Here are some cute Pawprint nails using just dots (circles) in honor of the Puppy Bowl! Oh you know you guys love the Puppy Bowl :)

shade

direct sun

The lineup: I used textured polish because I thought it would make the pawprints stand out more!


from L: Purity, Chyna, Solange, Chita, Sunshine

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Traditional football nails

Hey guys!  Here's some traditional football nails for you! Can we just address how sad I am that there's only one football game left this year? SAD FACE.

I used Zoya Louise for the brown, it's pretty much the most perfect chocolately footbally brown I own.

shade

direct sun

Here's a quick tutorial: Start with solid brown nails. For the grassy nail, I used a base of a green texture (Chita) and then layered over green bar glitter (Rina) and I'm super happy with the way it came out! It really looks like turf!
Use a white striper to draw football laces on the brown nails. That's it!

tutorial

Here's the Line up:

from L: Louise, Chita, Rina, white striper

Monday, January 27, 2014

Picture Polish Kryptonite

Hey guys! Here's another one of my Picture Polishes. I'm trying to slowly work through them, like I'm trying to preserve the newness of them , or something, I don't know. I'm weird.

Look how beautiful!

shade

direct sun

Superman has always been my favorite superhero so there's no shortage of superman toys in my house! I had some fun posing with him for some prop tags on IG. :)


poor superman ;(


direct sun

Saturday, January 25, 2014

BMW nails plus tutorial!

Hey guys!  Here's a fun and easy tape tutorial for you! BMW nails!


shade

direct sun

Start with 3 black nails and 1 white nail. After your white  nail has dried for SEVERAL hours, cut your tape pieces. I usually use scotch tape for straight lines, but I thought I'd try painter's tape again. It doesn't matter what the pieces look like, they just need to have a right corner on them .

painter's tape strips

Tape the white nail so that the top right and the bottom left are covered (see pictorial below) and paint over with the blue. Remove the tape right away! I did find that I didn't get as clean of a line as I wanted, so I took a tiny brush dipped in polish and made the edges a little straighter.

Here's a quick little pictorial collage of the process!


 
And here's the lineup:
From L: SH Black out, OPI Alpine Snow, OPI Suzi Says Feng Shui, Seche vite

shade

direct sun

Friday, January 24, 2014

Favs of 2013: OPI Alcatraz Rocks and Keeping Suzi at Bay. (Ocean Nails)

Hey guys! I've been back and forth about posting a "favorites" of last year, so here's what I landed on. I created a mani with my 2 absolute favs from last year (and of ALL TIME at the moment).

In my head, this was going to look like sideways lines of sparkly texturey goodness. The plan was to use my fan brush for the first time, and draw horizontal "fan brush" lines with the texture. As I was doing it, it just was not looking like it was supposed to! It wound up looking more like it was sponged on. After totally hating it for several minutes, then apologizing to my bottle of Alcatraz and telling her I could NEVER hate her, I decided to take some pics anyway.

And then I fell in love.
shade

direct sun

To me, it looks like the ocean floor! I am a beach girl at heart and anything blue or ocean related goes straight to my core! *sigh*

Here's what I did. Start with a royal blue base.


OPI Keeping Suzi at Bay


I used my fan brush, but you could easily sponge this on and probably have the same effect. Some one try it and let me know! Dip the brush in and paint sideways.

fan brush

And then, just when I thought I couldn't love them more, I decided to add a layer of topcoat, just for kicks. LE SIGH!

with topcoat, shade

with topcoat, direct sun

I am stalking my stores like crazy for these to go on sale so I can get another bottle. Because I will be a sad sad lady when mine runs out!

 
 

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Grammys Nails plus bonus tutorial!

Hey guys! Here's another award show mani for you! I do love themes! I love award shows more for the red carpet special than the show itself!

Here's what I went with. The Grammys are much more edgy, with rock stars abound. I love how these came out!


shade
 

Here's what I started with. I actually used these as my "studs" nails for the #nailartjan Instagram challenge. Little double dipping never hurt anyone, right? ;)
Start with 3 white nails and one black. I used my beloved OPI I Snow You Love Me glitter and placed them with a small dotting tool.

OPI I Snow You Love Me

After they are reeeeeaaaallllyyyy dry, tape off for your gold. I taped at a diagonal, one at a time. Tape, paint, peel, repeat.

Then, because I'm too impatient to wait several more hours to tape again, I used a black striper to draw the next set of diagonal lines, and filled in with black polish.

tape tutorial

These would be great for NYE I think too, yes?


direct sun

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

St Louis Cardinals Baseball Nails plus Rock and Roll Half Marathon Medal!


Hey guys! Another updated medal post for ya! I ran the Rock and Roll St. Louis Half marathon last October, which SO HAPPENED to be in the middle of the World Series which SO HAPPENED the Cardinals were playing in the night before the game! Like, right down the street from my hotel! Cool, right. I decided to do baseball nails. I think my red stripes could have been a little thinner, but I'm pretty happy with the way they turned out! And they matched my medal :)

St. Louis Rock and Roll Half Marathon
 
 

OPI Jade is the new black

Cinderella Nails plus Disney Princess Half Marathon Nails!

Hi! Forgive the old pic, and it's the only one I have left! I painted my nails to match my Cinderella Costume. Light blue, with Essie Beyond Cozy on my ring finger and I drew a little slipper on my first finger out of Beyond Cozy. Early days of nail art indeed!

Disney Princess Half Marathon Medal

 

Chicago Flag Nails plus Rock and Roll Half Marathon Medal!

Hey guys! Just updating some old posts! These nails were for the Rock and Roll Half Marathon in Chicago, July 2013. I used OPI I Saw, You Saw, We Saw, Warsaw (longest name ever!) and a variety of others on my flag nail, including the star glitter that Fergie for Wet 'n Wild has out right now (Hollywood Walk of Fame) I grab for it a lot-multi colored star glitters YAYYY.

Pardon the poor picture quality.... early times, you  know.


Chicago Flag, indoor light

Chicago Flag, direct sun (on the L!)

I got a lot of attention over these at the expo!


Matching cookie-yum


Chicago Skyline


Rock and Roll Half Marathon Medal

Texas Flag Nails!

Howdy! I did these a while back for an Instagram challenge.

These involved several rounds of drying and tape, only because I'm terrible at free-hand lines and I wanted them to be perfect!

Excuse the picture quality, early days....


Texas Flag, outdoors, shade


Texas Flag, Outdoor, shade

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Christmas 2013: Aussie Goodies!

Hey yall!  Here's more of my new polishes! So glad I am stocked up because no more new ones are coming in for a loooooong time!
This is Picture Polish, an Australian brand that I have come to know and love over the past year. My husband, on his trip to Australia last month, made a special trip to the PP headquarters to pick these up for me. This was all I asked for for Christmas :)
I'm especially excited to try Revolution, which is a special base coat you use under glitter polish to make it easier to remove. Review coming!
 
These 4 are from my sister in law in Canberra. These are all glittery textures by the brand Face of Australia. I can't wait to try them!!!!
From L:Midnight Fireworks, Between the Flags, Ferris wheel, Masquerade
 

Saturday, January 18, 2014

Pink deco striped nails plus tutorial!


Hey guys! I have another tape tutorial for you. I would love to do these every week! I find it a super easy way to get cool geometric designs.

I started off with OPI Koala Berry. This is such a beautiful color! Its from the Australia collection waaaayyyy back, I have made it my mission to try to collect them all! If  I was a Barbie I'm pretty sure this is what my hands would look like.

OPI Koala Berry
After applying 2 coats of color and topcoat, start cutting your tape strips. Can you see how I try to line up the design on the scissors before cutting? I'm pretty particular  about that, but it's not a required step!


Here are the strips and the scissors I used.


Here's a simple pictorial collage tutorial for you...it's the same method as last time. Just be sure your nails are SUPER dry!


Here's the final result. I don't usually add topcoat to textures, but this time I did. It really changed the color of the Pixie Dust I think!