V-Day Pedi

****Warning:Feet Ahead!******

I can't believe I'm showing you my feet. I hate them. I have a freakishly long second toe, that I can use to pick things up with (I even flicked a lighter and lit someone's cigarette with my feet once...it was a while ago haha). Showing my feet also means showing you a few of my tattoos. So, surprises all around.

I used this tutorial from Copy That, Copy Cat as a starting point for this pedi. I just discovered this blog, and am really loving it, especially the tutorials.

Also for some reason I have no idea how the hell to take pictures of my feet. 

What I used:
Color: Wet n' Wild-Red Red
Tips:Sinful Colors-Black on Black
        China Glaze-Silver Lining

Challenge #6 (aka #1)-Half Moon

Today you guys get to see the mani I'm actually wearing!... like right now, at this very moment. Are you all excited?! I know I am!.. </unnecessary sarcasm>

Ok I'm going to be honest, I suck at doing half moon manis. I guess they're cute if done right, so maybe I just need practice. Also decided to break out the Crackle polishes today! Underneath all those cracks are my horrible failed first attempt at magnetic polish, something else I'm going to have to practice with. hah

 I thought this was ok, but decided to get really fancy and break out the matte top coat too!

 I mattified everything except for the half moon, glittery part because, of course, I wanted to keep the bling!

What I used:
Base Coat: China Glaze Magnetix Attraction
Crackle: China Glaze Crackle Cracked Concrete and Fault Line
Glitter Half Moon: Color Club Magic Attraction
Matte: China Glaze Matte Magic

Venturing into Gels and Acrylics!

Truth be told, I wrote this up months ago, so you can see my level of procrastination. hah

Oh hey guys!! I'm back(ish). Life's been crazy, and I've been quite uninspired in all artistic aspects of my life, including nails. Also my nails have been breaking like crazy and are nubs, hence why I decided to try the whole acrylic tips thing. From what I've read the soak off gels, are the least damaging to the nails as well. Hopefully when they grow out a little I can ditch the tips and just stick with some gel, so these babies don't keep breaking on me.

Here's the results of  my first attempt at venturing into soak gels with acrylic tips. I think it came out decent, but I have a long way to go!

• Acrylic tips
• IBD Dehydrate 
• IBD Clear gel
• IBD Builder gel
• ECO Soak Off Gel Color in Bare Foot Pink (2 coats I believe)
• Clear gel mixed with some AC Moore glitter, trying to make it as flat as possible
• Another thin coat of Clear 
• For the leopard spots just a no name Hot Topic polish and some black stripping polish 
• Topped it all off with a coat of the IBD UV Top Coat. I found you can use regular polish on top of the gels, with the UV Top Coat, and it lasts pretty much as long as the nails last, with maybe just a little cracking of the polish. 

My thoughts:
Truth be told these were a little thick, but after a few days I got used to them. The glitter on in the tips is a little messy.

I used the IBD Soak Off Gel System, (bought it here, http://www.8ty8beauty.com/uv-gels/uv-gels.htm, as I've said before, I love these guys!) for these. It's a great starter kit for gels!

One last nautical themed nail..

I really had to get in a nautical nail post before the end of the Summer! I love the whole nautical theme, partly because it meshes so well with rockabilly/pinup style, which I have somewhat of an obsession with. I don't necessarily dress like it...I mean I would say my style meshes multiple genres.. I wear bows in my hair, have piercings, funky colored hair, vary from wearing cute little dresses to jeans, t-shirts and Converse. Sooo.. yeah. hah

I digress, back to nails again.

Ignore the huge chunk out of my middle finger..

The anchor could be a little less messy.. meh...

*I'll add the polish names a little later, just wanted to get this post up*

Fail-ish attempt at a half moon.

Ok so seeing as how I have been procrastinating my life lately, I have some manis I did months ago that I just never uploaded. So for now I'm going to try to catch up on some of those.
Lets not even lie though, it's cause I'm lazy really. hah They are on my computer already and already partly edited.

I liked the idea I had with this one, but it's somewhat of a fail in execution. I think I may try a half moon mani again soon, but using these circle stickers I got from Staples (also months ago... do you see a trend here hah).
Ohhh and I think I was going for some sort of watermelon theme here..

I painted a base of Finger Paints Art You Wondering?, when it dried I put the circle sticker on, and covered the whole thing with China Glaze Electric Pineapple. Then touched up the half moon with a pink stripping polish.

Pink (Tiger) Wednesday, and a Gelish Question.

Rawr!

heh

 I loves me some tiger (..or is it zebra?? ehh... let's just call it animal print)! 

Did a gradient with Finger Paints Outta Sight Orange and added Sinful Colors Creme Pink to the tips really messily and on an angle, it was pretty haphazard really, but I wanted it like that so it would look more like a gradient. Then topped it all with WnW Kaleidoscope, which IMHO blends the gradient and makes it a look smoother.

Still loving the new Bundle Monster plates, and I cannot wait till Fall so I can use the awesome Halloween ones! And by Fall I mean September. hah Needless to say I LOVE Halloween! I love Fall in general, but Halloween... yeah it's my favorite holiday.

I used Sinful Colors Black on Black with BM 2?? (this plate is currently MIA, and I may cry) *Edit:Just found it, along with about 20 other plates!!! This just made my day! Finally cleaning pays off!*

So my Gelish question is this.. I'm thinking I may buy this starter kit from Sally's seeing as how I would love to have my manis last 21(ish) days rather than 2 tops. The UV lamps they have there look pretty shit. I mean battery operated, really?! Anyone have any advice on where to find a decently prices UV lamp, or even on the Gelish system in general?? 

Thank you guys in advance for any help, you're all awesome! :)

So many nails, so little time. *Warning-Hella images*

Seeing as how I haven't posted in so long, I figured I'd make it for lost time with this massive post. Some of these nails I just did for fun, and one wheel I actually used for a party that I painted nails at. Are you ready for this? Take a deep breath!.....

And, go!

Complete with a lovely view of my couch and cell phone.

First up, we have some designs I hand painted, using nail polish and various nail art brushes and paint brushes.

1: Orly Ancient Jade
Flowers- Random white polish, Centers-OPI DS Passion
2: China Glaze Something Sweet
Tips-WnW Lavender Creme
3: WnW Lavender Creme
Tips-CG Electric Pineapple
Seeds/Highlights-Black & White Striping Polish
4: ????
Tips- Milani Fresh Teal; Random glitter polish

Leopard explosion!! <3333!

All done with the Konad M57, and Sinful Colors Black on Black (unless otherwise stated)
5: Orly Luxe
6: Finger Paints Don't Make a Scene, Stamp-???
7: Milani Freh Teal; Spots-Milani Cyberspace
8: WnW Lavender Creme; Spots- OPI DS Passion
9: Color Club The Lime Starts Here, Spots-Color Club Ultra-Astral
10: Estee Lauder Cool Lilac, Spots- Color Club Fashion Addict

NUDES!!! 
hehe
Color- Mabelline Express Finish Blushing Bride
Dare I say my favorite sheer nude?!
11: Random White Polish, Random holo gold glitter (that is MIA right now)
12: Stamp-Konad Special Polish in white
Konad M26
Pink Rhinestones

Some more hand-painted designs I did, I think I got the design from the Wah Nails site, which is great for inspiration!
Both done with a black polish and paint brushes.
13: Color Club You Got a Soul
14: Color Club I always Get my Man-darian

I <3 the shit out of neons, I really need to get more in before the Summer is over!

Both using Finger Paints Don't Make a Scene as a base. 

15: Used a pink feather I got from ACMoore, attached with a layer of T/C, trimmed the excess, and then did two layers of T/C on top. I love this but it's oh so very un-vegan of me.. I already could hear the crap I would get from my friends if I wore this.. I'll probably do it anyway. ha

16: Outlined heart with pink/purple striping polish, filled in heart with T/C and sprinkled glitter. Topped with two coats of T/c of course.

Attempt at sandwiching, all with a layer of color, topped with WnW Party of Five Glitters, then topped with the color again.

17: Oke Doke Hot Tomato

18: Fingers Paints lost the the name ha

19: NYC Luxury Lime Creme

20: City Color No Name pink jelly

21: City Color No Name

Experiments in Mattifying and Glitters

22:Milani Fresh Teal; Topped with WnW Party of Five Glitters; Matted with Esssie Matte About You

23: The Above without Matte

24: Wnw Ebony Hates Chris; Topped with Pure Ice Busted; Matted with Essie Matte About you

25: The above without matte

26: WnW Ebony Hates Chris; Topped with Pure Ice Spit Fire and Pure Ice Cheatin

The black base with Busted on top is so freakin' pretty, you can somewhat see the duo chrome effect here. When it's matted, it takes on a whole other look.

All using WnW Ebondy Hates Chris as a base
27: Topped with Pure Ice Spit Fire and Pure Ice Cheatin; Matted with Essie Matte About You
28: Topped with Pure Ice Spit Fire
29: Topped with Cheatin
30: Topped with WnW Party of Five Glitters
31: Topped with WnW Party of Five Glitters; Matted with Essie Matte About You

I LOVED all of these SOOO much! But then again I have a serious addiction to black polish and glitter in genral, so combine the two, and it's game over! I thought 27 looked especially awesome when matted, it reminds me of an gallaxy you'd see on the Hubbell telescope. I'm definitely going to be painting at least one of these on my nails ASAP.

Well that's it everyone, and boy was that rough.. my hands are seriously cramping from typing so much right now. hah Hope you all enjoyed it! 

Finally a post!

Sorry guys, been very MIA lately. I don't even know why either. I haven't really had much to do, just feeling very uninspired but here's a mani I did the other day.

Color:
China Glaze-For Audrey
Color Club-Covered In Diamonds
Tips:
China Glaze-Four Leaf Clover (I think)
T/C:
Essie-Matte about you

Super Crazy Glitter Explosion! aka Glitter Gradient

I've been getting a little bored of Konading lately (*gasp* I know. .. heh), and been trying to try my hand (heh.. no pun intended) at some experimental nail art. I did spent two years as a Fine Art major, so I should be able to put those skills to good use now. While at ACmoore last weekend, I was browsing seeing what random craft supplies I could use for my nails when I I came across these babies:

I saw the work "Holographic" and got way too giddy in the middle of the craft store isle, I'm sure people were looking as me strangely. As always you can't see in pictures quite how pretty these are, but they do have a nice rainbow holo effect to them. 

Ignore the foundation powder all over my dresser..
Didn't notice it till I got it into Photoshop :x

Today's post is a guest appearance from...my mom's nails.hah My mom was desperate for a new mani so I decided to do her nails, I have been wanting to try doing a gradient nail for a while so I pretty much winged it with the glitter...

For these nails I basically just put a few drops of topcoat on a piece of paper from a notepad, sprinkled some glitter in it and mixed it around with one of the little sponge cubes. Then I scrapped it off with one edge of the sponge, and sponge it onto the nails, focusing more on the tips.

One thing I did notice about using the glitter was I needed two coats of topcoat, and even with that it was still a little gritty. 

You can semi see the holo here

And here's a little look at my "setup". heh. 

I also got a bunch of other glitters, and I'm thinking I may try to franken with them. Anyone out there frankened? Any tips?

What I used:
Color- Sinful Colors Mint Apple

Finally Spring Mani!

My second go at a Spring themed mani, and I think I got it right this time! yay! I really enjoyed this one, and hated taking it off. Maybe that was because it's pretty different from what I usually do. All of these polishes are part of the insane haul from this month.. maybe one day I'll do a post of it... If I'm not feeling totally ashamed :-/   My bank account hates me! 

My Konading was a little weak on this one... the polish kept drying on the stamp.

Yay! Nothing says Spring like pink glitter! :) 

Detail of my thumb with a purple rhinestone.
My cuticles on my thumbs are so disgraceful, due to a horrible nervous habit of picking my thumbs.. ew.

I think I'm going to enter this into the "ThatsSOFresh" Spring nail art contest.. just for fun since I have yet to enter any nail art contests. Check it out, and enter it too! http://thatssofresh.blogspot.com/2011/03/bring-spring-in-with-wowsocool-contest.html

What I used:
Sinful Colors Innocent (2 coats)
Tips-Sinful Colors Call You Later
Accent Nail/Index Finger- Wet 'n Wild Sparked
Stamp-Sally Hansen Insta-Dry Purple Chrome
Plate-BM04
T/C-Seche Vite

NoTD: So Called Spring

So seeing as how Sunday was the first day of Spring, I set out to do a "Spring" mani... but somehow I got lost along the way and by the end I realized I made a Winter mani instead. hah In the end it almost worked out, because today is not at all spring like. It's cold, and gross out, it was even snowing this morning.


Anyway... I really love this color combo especially For Audrey with the flakey glitter Color Club Covered in Diamonds (which is one of the many polishes from this weekends nonsensically huge haul). I'll have to keep this one in the back of my head of next winter! Oh and I get to show you my horrible "freehand frenching" hah.

Soo pretty! Minus my blobby white tips! hah.. one day I'll get it right without the scotch tape!

I found the formula on the "Covered in Diamonds" very thick, but not unusable. Just slightly annoying because the flakes wanted to stay on the brush rather than stick to my nails.

Booo! Horrible cleanup job!

 I also needed two layers of the Seche Vite, in order to just smooth it out because there were so many flakes sticking out everywhere. You can somewhat see one of the flakes still sticking out in the photo below. 

Here you can semi see my blobby tips, and also a flake of the glitter sticking out.

 

As you all can see my nails are mighty short. I'm trying to grow them out but they keep breaking when they get to a certain length., and they are always peeling, which I'm assuming makes them even more brittle. :(  

I had been using Gelous for the past month or so, but it didn't seem to be helping. I just started using OPI's Nail Envy:Sensitive & Peeling formula, I'm hoping that helps. 

Anyone have any luck with this, or any suggestions for me on what to try? 

Base: OPI's Nail Envy
Colors: China Glaze For Audrey
              Color Club Covered in Diamonds
Tips: China Glaze Snow
TC: Seche Vite