Monday, November 26, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #11 - Fireworks/Bonfire Night

Helllloooooo Monday! I've got a good feeling about this week, how about you? My husbands birthday was yesterday and for a few weeks he is 9 years older than me - tee-hee! Then my oldest daughter's bday is on Wednesday and she is going to be 6! Then my bday is Dec 11th and then Christmas, whew! It's a crazy time for us with all of that and Thanksgiving as well. Neither my husband nor I get birthday or Christmas presents this year as we got ourselves iPhones and that was not cheap! :)
 
This was kind of a crazy mani and I used a ton of different polishes as well as my new nail art brushes I ordered from ebay - yay! It took a month to receive them from China but they finally got here safe and sound as well as some glequins, yay! Okay, without further ado, here is the mani! I'll list the polishes after the pics because there's so many! :)
Fireworks mani

Fireworks mani
Here's the list!! Lancome Noir, Revlon Royal, OPI Alpine Snow, Bettina Art Deco Yellow and Glamour Flame. LA Colors Sassy Sparkle and a teal glitter (no label). Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Pronto Purple, Pure Ice French Kiss, Sinful Colors Dream On, Nicole by OPI A Million Sparkles, and Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Celeb City. 8 of those were in my untrieds so yay for that! :)  See you all on Wednesday!


Sunday, November 25, 2012

I'm Guest Posting for The Little Canvas!!

Hey all! If you don't know my friend Alaina over at The Little Canvas then you're missing out! She is not only an awesome person but also a fantastic nail artist! She does some seriously fierce freehand that makes me jealous of her mad skills! Here are a few of my favorites from her recent manis! I could go on and on but more importantly, please go check out my guest post on her blog! :)
 
 

The Little Canvas Owl Mani

Friday, November 23, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #10 - Mythical Creatures

 Happy Friday lovelies! I hope all of my American friends had a lovely Thanksgiving! I ate too much as usual so it was good!

I was pretty excited about this challenge and knew exactly what I was going to do for this one and I even had a sweet prop to pose with! I got this dagger years ago because I have a fascination with Asian decor and dragons. I really hope you guys love this as much as I do because this is one of my favorites!

Dragon Scales Mani
 
Dragon Scales Mani
 
Dragon Scales Mani
The polishes I used was OPI Alpine Snow for the base and then I sponged on a gradient of 3 different Revlons - Golden, Bonsai and Rain Forest. I then stamped over that with Wet 'n Wild Black Creme and Mash plate 48. I don't usually go with these types of colors but I thought they were much more "dragon-like" than my usual pinks and purples!
 
Please be sure to check out the other challengers! :)



Wednesday, November 21, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #9 - Disney

  I have to admit that I totally lived up to The Lazy 15 on this one! When I saw Disney coming up on the list I shuddered a little. Not because I don't like Disney but because this just isn't an area where my skills lie. You're going to see some sweet freehand from some of the other challengers but from me you get dotting tool Mickey Mouse heads!
 
The cool snowglobe is from my honeymoon. My husband and I spent our honeymoon in Disneyland and I couldn't live without this adorable snowglobe! I don't recommend using a snow globe as a photo prop because I had to get into some really funky hand and wrist positions so that the water bubble wasn't right in front of Mickey and Minnie's faces!
Mickey Mouse Disney Mani
The polishes were OPI Alpine Snow and Bettina Flame. This was my first time using Bettina and it has an amazing fomula! It's totally different than any other polishes I've used. It's not the most opaque but it is incredibly pigmented and very smooth! 
Mickey Mouse Disney Mani




Monday, November 19, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #8 - Dessert

I heart desert so much, especially if it involves chocolate! My first instinct on this mani was Oooh cupcakes! Then I decided that would be a little bit too quiet for me, especially since I've done them recently. So I decided to go with a treat "skittle" and this is what happened!

Sweet Treats Mani

 Sweet Treats ManiSweet Treats Mani

Sweet Treats Mani
I think it turned out pretty cute! The popsicle on my thumb needs a little dimension but I'm loving the rest! The only polish I used was a base of 2 coats of OPI Alpine Snow and the rest is acrylic craft paints!

Don't forget to check out the other challengers!!


Wednesday, November 14, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #6 - Favorite Color

Oy - I really have to stop leaving these challenge manis for the night before they need to be posted! I really wish I would have had more time to play with this one because I love the colors but I'm not 100% jazzed about how the patterns all turned out - oh well, life and challenges go on!
 
Today's challenge was favorite color. My two favorite colors are really kind of at odds with each other. Most people either prefer pinks and purples or browns and greens. I like pink and brown! Not only are they fabulous together but I happen to really love them separately. I have far more pink polish than any other but I truly love a good brown - I'm just a lot pickier about them!
 
The base coat for this water marble is OPI Alpine Snow. I'm really torn about using white as a base. For a lot of marbles it's a must but I think I could and should have use a pink as the base on this one. The reason I have issue with white is because whenever it comes time to clean up, there is always the tiniest line of white around the edges that is nearly impossible to get rid of and it drives me nuts!
 
I used three polishes to marble with and they are China Glaze Strawberry Fields, Sally Hansen Fuschia Bling Bling and Julep Olivia. I know some of you are thinking, "she water marbled with Julep? What a waste!!!" Not to worry! Someone shared with me the awesome tip of using a shot glass to marble in and it was a fantastic idea! Each finger only took two drops of each polish as opposed to the usual 3 or even 4! Some people dip multiple fingers at once but I really like to try for a different design on each finger.
Pink & Brown Water Marble
I really love the way the thumb and pinkie (pinky? I never know how to spell that!) turned out. I think the middle finger would have been my fave if I had more time to play with the swirl design.

Pink & Brown Water Marble
 
Make sure to check out everyone else's favorite color mani! :)




Monday, November 12, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #5 - Galaxy Nails

Okay, so I have to admit that this challenge had me worried! I have never done a galaxy mani before and it looks so complicated! But with a good video tutorial and some patience, I don't mind how it turned out at all! I will admit, however that this was my second try. The first time I tried to be too "perfect" with my design and you just can't do that with this one. You have to let go and trust that it will turn out right in the end because as I was doing this I didn't think it looked very good. I pushed through anyway and when I was done and stepped back from the process, I was actually surprised that it really looked like a galaxy!
 
Have you tried out this mani yet? You really should, it's fun and you'll be surprised at the cool results you'll end up with!

Galaxy Nails1

Galaxy Nails
 
The polishes used were as follows:
 
Maybelline Color Show - Blue Freeze
NYC Long Wearing - French White Tip ( I actually preferred this to my OPI Alpine Snow for this mani because it wasn't as opaque and you don't want big, obvious globs of white on this mani!)
Sally Hansen Hard As Nails - Hard Lemonade
Sally Hansen Diamond Strength - Fuschia Bling Bling
Wet 'n Wild Wild Shine - Tickled Pink (I mixed this and Fuschia Bling Bling together to get the perfect pink!)
NYC In A New York Minute - Water Street Blue
L.A. Colors - Sassy Sparkle
 
Now go forth, check out the other challenge entries and try out this mani for yourself!




Friday, November 9, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #4 - Water Marble

This was easily one of my favorite challenges on the list, I really love water marbles! I'm not an expert by any means, I think this is only the third one I've done but I think they are so fun! For this one I wanted to try to do something that I've never done before and I started by painting each nail a different color of glitter and then I marbled over the top with black and clear polish.
 
I do NOT recommend this if you're just starting out marbling as it was quite frustrating! I had to try out about 6 different top coats before I found one that worked well in the water and didn't dry too fast but I managed it! I actually had to dip my index finger twice because the first time there was only a tiny bit of the black on the nail.
Glitter Water Marble


Glitter Water Marble
 
Glitter Water Marble
I think it turned out pretty sweet, don't you?
 
The polishes I used were:
Sally Hansen Hard As Nails - Black Heart
Wet 'n Wild Wild Shine - Clear Nail Protector
Finger Paints - Purple Palette
Finger Paints - Laugh My Art Off
China Glaze - Glistening Snow
Sephora by OPI - G-listen To Your Heart
Orly - Royal Navy
 
I was pretty proud that I used 4 untrieds on this mani, woo-hoo! Please be sure to check out the other wonderful artist in the Lazy 15 and have a fabulous weekend!!!
 




Wednesday, November 7, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #3 - DOTS!!

 I can almost hear Nicole (aka Dot) cheering in the background on this one! I really wish I would have had a little more time to work on this one but work has been crazy so I didn't have too much time to think about it. I started with a base of OPI Alpine Snow and then did the dots in China Glaze Concrete Catwalk and an accent finger and a cute little heart in Finger Paints Pink Perspective Neon. I just had to add the little silver heart, I think he's cute, don't you?
Polka Dot Mani

Polka Dot Mani
 
Polka Dot Mani
Please be sure to check out all the other challenge participants, they're all pretty freakin' fabulous!
 




Monday, November 5, 2012

The Lazy 15 Mani #2 - Gradient

Goooooood Monday beautiful readers! I originally had a subtle purple gradient in the works but it was NOT working and looked like I had just globbed one really ugly color of polish on my nails. So for attempt #2 I decided to throw subtlety out the window and taste the rainbow! I started off with a base coat of OPI Alpine snow so that my colors would really pop! Then I applied three colors directly to a small piece of makeup sponge. I used China Glaze Adventure Red-y and Man Hunt and then Sally Hansen Lightening.
 
I love how bright and cheery it turned out, what do you think? 

Rainbow gradient mani
 
Rainbow gradient mani

Rainbow gradient mani
 
Rainbow gradient mani
Then, of course, I had to see what it would look like with some sparkle on it! This is just one coat of LA Colors Sassy Sparkle - talk about a glitter bomb, I love it!
Rainbow gradient mani

Rainbow gradient mani
Please be sure to check out the other challengers!!
 



Friday, November 2, 2012

The Lazy 15 Challenge Mani #1 - Tape Mani

So I've seen a lot of argyle manis around and I'd had success with a tape mani once before so an argyle should be a piece of cake right? Wrong! It was much harder than I anticipated and I had to redo 4 out of 5 fingers on this hand - ugh! But it's done now and I really like it!! I used OPI Alpine Snow for the white and If You Moust You Moust for the pink. The other two were China Glaze For Audrey and Gothic Lolita (LOVE this!)

Argyle tape mani
 I'm so excited for the rest of the manis on this challenge and to see what my friends have come up with!! We're only one mani in so feel free to join us!!!!
Argyle tape mani
 
Argyle tape mani



*****EDIT!! For the others taking part in this challenge, here is the code to put in your post to display the other blogs taking part! Just copy it and paste it at the very end of your HTML code!!

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