Abstract Stripes and Dots Nails

Good morning everyone, how are you all doing this fine Tuesday? I'm COLD!! When I went to take the kids to school this morning it was 12 degrees - brrrrrr! I had a pretty quiet weekend but I kind of like it that way. I haven't painted my nails in about 4 days so I'm really hoping to have time to do that very soon because I'm starting to jones for a nail polish fix!

 

I had absolutely no idea what I was going to do when I started this mani. I just grabbed some polish, a striper and a dotting tool and this is what came out of that! The base is two coats of Wet 'n Wild Megalast - Wet Cement. I really love this color!! It's mostly a brown but it has a touch of gray in it and it's a truly lovely neutral. Then for the stripes and dots I used Wet 'n Wild Megalast - On A Trip, NYC In A New York Color Minute - Lexington Yellow, China Glaze - For Audrey and OPI - If You Moust You Moust.

 

I really love how this turned out - what do you think? My husband even commented that he liked that and he usually couldn't care less - score!

 

Purple Polkadot Nails

Helloski! How is everyone's Thursday so far? My week has been a bit of ups and downs but I'm still here and that's what counts, right?

 

I've got something simple for you today! I painted a base of 2 coats of Barry M - Berry Ice Cream and then slapped on some striping tape in a diagonal line across all 5 nails. This was a LOT harder than I thought it would be! You can see that in some places the strip of dots is thinner on some fingers but I think it turned out fairly well! The dots were made using the following colors, China Glaze - Gothic Lolita, a England - Avalon, Avon Nailwear Pro + - Decadence and NYC Long Wearing - French Tip White. I got this idea from a pin I saw on Pinterest but, unfortunately, the pin was not linked back to the source and there was no watermark. What do you think of this? I kinda think anything with dots is good!

 

 

 

Also, PLEASE help me make fabulous YouTube video tutorials by answering a couple of questions and giving me your opinions HERE! I appreciate you all so much!

 

Random Hearts Mani

It's Friday, it's Friday, oh yeah, oh yeah it's Friday! Can you tell that I'm excited about it being Friday? It's been a pretty good week though, I can't complain! How have all of you been doing?

I am so proud of these nails today, they turned out so much better than I thought they would! I never have time to do freehand art so this was really a treat! I've been seeing so many cute heart manicures going around and I was getting a little jealous! Of course, all those little pictorals that show you how "easy" it is to make a perfect heart are full of bunk! I made the two little dots and then used a brush to try to drag the polish down to a point to make the perfect heart and what I ended up with was not very heart-like! So I figured out my own best method. When I first did the hearts I wasn't too impressed with them but once I added the white highlights they really came to life! I also like the randomness of them. I really have an issue with randomness. I see all those awesome dotticures where the dots are randomly placed and they are so cute but every time I try to recreate it, it turns out a hot mess! I'm pretty sure that "random" is a skill all it's own and certainly one that I haven't mastered.

The polishes used here are a base of 2 coats of China Glaze Hang Ten Toes. This is such an awesome pink, I'm really loving it! Then the hearts are made using Catrice - Twist of Lemon, Barry M - Indigo, China Glaze - I'm With The Lifegaurd and the highlights are done with NYC Long Wear - French Tip White.

Grey Gradient

Told you I'd be back soon! You didn't believe me, did you? Shame on you for not believing in me when I've been so reliable in the past!! XD

 

I got a bunch of gorgeous greys in some nail mail from my amazing friend Roisin over at

Cuti-CLUE-les so I had to do something with them and I started off with a grey ombre on my nails but it wasn't quite enough so I decided to make it a gradient! I'll list the polishes as I had them in the ombre so the color I list will be the one you see closest to the cuticle. Starting with the thumb is NYC - Bowery Black, China Glaze - Concrete Catwalk, Catrice - ASHley and Sing: Hey, Dirty-Lilah! and finally Gosh Silver which is a beautiful smooth silver polish!

 

Then I just had to add a bit of silver tape to the tips and I like it! Sorry about the tips, my Seche Vite desperately needed to be restored and it shrunk on me - Boooooo!

 

I hope to soon start making some video tutorials on some of this stuff because I love making tutorials for some reason! Much love and see you soon!

Oh yeah, one more thing! Does anyone else go back and forth on how to spell gray/grey? I usually spell it gray, but I noticed that most people use the grey spelling and I hate when people thing I spelled something wrong! I wish that whoever makes these kinds of decisions would just decide that one of them is right and one of them is wrong because it drives me nuts that there are two acceptable spellings for it! How do you spell it?

Holo Watermarble!

 Hey lovely people!! Ugh, I'm sorry I've been such a lame blogger! With work being crazy and the baby still sick, life has been super insane around here! With that said, I have a super-delicious mani to share with you today! When I put on Color Club Harp On It, the holo goodness was so awesome, I knew that I wanted to do something amazing with it. So what's a girl to do? WATERMARBLE!!! From thumb to pinkie, the colors used are: Bettina Glamour Flame, Bettina Art Deco Yellow, NYC In A Minute High Line Green, Barry M Indigo and Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Acceler-Grape!

It took me forever to get the polishes to play nicely with the clear coat (which was INM Out The Door) and spread properly but I'm pretty happy with the finished product. What do you guys think? I hope to see you soon!

 

 

 

 

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!

 

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!

My Pathetic Nail Polish Stash

Okay - I used to own about 10-12 bottles of nail polish, not one of them costing over $5 a bottle.Then I made the mistake of trying some China Glaze and then some Essie and THEN I tried Illamasqua - I am in so much trouble! I don't have a very big stash right now but I thought I would take some "before" photos so that we can see how my baby is growing. If I could afford it, I would own 300 bottles by now but we'll have to start slowly and work our way there. So here are some pics - I started out having them sorted by color but then I would find one that should have been in the last group 2 photos ago and I got lazy so you get what you get and you don't get upset!

Cover Girl Cabernet, Maybelline Red Comet (those two are so old!) Sephora by OPI Be-Claus I Said So, Sally Hansen Red Velvet, Sephora by OPI New Year's Red-Solution, Sally Hansen Shining

 N.Y.C (label came off, sorry!) Venique Lost In Bermuda, Sephora by OPI Just a Little Dangerous, Sally Hansen Royal Romance, Wet n Wild Wild Card, Wet n Wild Eggplant Frost, Wet n Wild On a Trip, Sally Hansen No Hard Feelings, Wet n Wild Buffy The Violet Slayer, Illmasqua Prosperity



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Avon Suede Soft Violet, Pure Ice (my daughter peeled this sticker off!), Nicole by OPI Gone Wishin', Nicole by OPI Rainbow In The S-Kylie, Sephora by OPI G-listen To Your Heart, Wet n Wild Fergie Hollywood Walk of Fame, Wet n Wild Party of Five Glitters, NYC Big City Dazzle

Wet n Wild Sparked, Sally Hansen Strobe Light, Sephora by OPI Beam Me Up Hottie!, Sephora by OPI Traffic-Stopper Copper, NicHaole by OPI Have A Heart

Avon Decadence, Wet n Wild Through The Grapevine, Wet n Wild Hannah Pinktana, China Glaze Traffic Jam, NYC (another one my daughter got to!), Wet n Wild How I Met Your Magenta, Sinful Colors Pinky Glitter, Maybelline On Fire, Sally Hansen Pretty Petunia, China Glaze Exceptionally Gifted

Sally Hansen Blushing Bride, Maybelline Color Show Fuschia Fever, Avon Feisty, NYC MoMa, Wet n Wild Lavender Pearlescent, Venique Heel D'Orsay

Sinful Colors What's Your Name, Sally Hansen Lapis Amethyst, NYC Water Street Blue, Pure Ice French Kiss, Wet n Wild Saved By The Blue, NYC  Pier 17, Wet n Wild Caribbean Frost

China Glaze Custom Kicks, Sephora by OPI Tempted By Teal, Sephora by OPI Who Let The Dorks Out?, Wet n Wild I Need a Refresh-Mint

Sally Hansen Save the Date, Sally Hansen Lavender Pearl, Sally Hansen Turquoise Opal, Sally Hansen Celeb City, Wet n Wild Silvivor, NYC French White Tip, NYC Bowery Black, Sally Hansen Black Heart, Maybelline (no label!), Wet n Wild The Gold & the Beautiful

NYC Park Avenue, Essie Merino Cool, Sally Hansen Cafe Au Lait, NYC Canal Street, Wet n Wild Sunny Side Up, NYC Lexington Yellow, Sally Hansen Limestone

Well, there she blows! All 73 bottles! I know pathetic, right? Well, I'll be changing that soon, muahahaha! Also, while I wish that every bottle I own could be Essie or OPI and the other nice polishes, my bank account can't handle that kind of stress so I will continue to be an equal opportunity polisher. Besides, a lot of the cheap stuff is really decent for the price!

If you see anything that you would like swatched, please aske me! Sorry for the inconsistency in the pics, I was trying to get the very last of the fading light for true color photos so I chose the pics that translated the colors best. Also, I'm still being out-classed by my Canon Rebel T3i - this thing is a beast and I need to learn to use it!
 

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