International Nail Art Day And My 100th Blog Post!!!!

HELLOOOOOOO! I hope everyone's Saturday is going awesome! As many of you know, today is International Nail Art Day or INAD! I thought it was pretty flippin' awesome that this day just happened to coincide with my 100th blog post so I did something extra special!

 

For this mani, I painted a base of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear - White on and then stamped over that with Konad black pearl and Mash plate 47. I just got my Konad polish and I'm not sure how I lived without it! It makes such beautiful, clean lines and stamps like a dream! After stamping the image onto my nails, I then went in with acrylic paint for all of the lovely color you see!

The lighting in the next two pics is a little weird but I think they really show off the design so I included them anyway!

 

What do you guys think? Was this worthy of a 100th post ceremony? Thank you so much to all of you that have put up with me this long - I hope you stay tuned in because (hopefully) I'm just going to keep getting better!

Purple Cartoon Nails

Happy Wednesday!! Am I the only one that when I see the word Wednesday, pronounces it "WED-ness-day"? I can't be the ONLY one!  

Today's mani is really fun and this post is super pic-heavy because I couldn't choose between them and I don't have to...it's my blog and I'll do what I want! ;)

 

The base is two coats of Color Club - Wild At Heart and I framed it with a England - Camelot and the little white bits are acrylic paint!

 

These first pics are in full-on sunlight because how could I not show you the holographic yummy-ness? It's awesome, right? Feel free to drool away.

 



 

 

Next up are the pics I took in my light box - it's still pretty, just not as sparkly!

 

 

 

You had to know this was coming - I had to do it! I added the Lancôme matte top coat and it looks so cool this way! If you haven't done cartoon nails yet, you really should try it, it's so fun and looks wicked-cool!

 

 

Stained Glass Nails

Let me just say I have been having the worst luck with my nails and hands! I had finally gotten my nails all grown out and pretty and then I broke one turning on the faucet!!! Who does that? Then I woke up one morning to find that I had chewed the heck out of my cuticles while I was sleeping! So my hands may be a little ugly ( I had to retouch the really icky parts of my cuticles - trust me, you would thank me if you saw the before shots!)

 

The base here is aEngland Camelot. Then I used striping tape and applied a coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in White On. Then I used neon acrylic paints to make it purdy! I followed the awesome YouTube tutorial by HannahRoxNails that you can find HERE! I still need more practice and they aren't perfect but I liked them a lot!

 

 

Whaddya think?

My First Cloud Mani

Happy FRIIIIIIDAYYYYYYYYY! Am I excited? Just a little!

 

I finally decided to try a cloud mani. While I'm not 100% satisfied with the outcome, I think it was fairly good for my first try and I'll definitely want to give it another go! Next time I will give the bottom two colors more room to show and not do such a large section of the third! I did this using the polish brushes but I've also seen it done with a dotting tool as well.

 

The polishes here are Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear - Bubblegum, aEngland - Avalon and China Glaze - For Audrey. This is actually the first time for me to use For Audrey. I hear people rave about it and it's being used in nail art everywhere but I'm just not a blue person I guess! I also have issues matching/contrasting colors so I'm not even sure if these look good together, lol! Don't tell me if it's complete crap, I don't want to know! XD

 

 

My nails were also so short here that I was pretty limited with what I could do. I hate it when my nails aren't at least to the tips of my fingers, but at least they grow quickly!

Holographic Paint Splatter Nails

It's Friiiiiiiiiiiiiday!!! I didn't know if it would ever come! I'm so excited because my husband has the next 9 days off of work! Ask me how I feel at the end of the 9 days... lol!

 

So, a couple of nights ago, I was searching for nailspiration and asked on twitter if anyone had any ideas. My friend Wes from Polish Me Manly said, "holos." That wasn't enough detail for me so he suggested holo splatter nails. Holo? Splatter? Why yes Wes, that's a fabulous idea!! I was a little nervous as I had never done splatter nails with polish before and usually use acrylic paints. But I dove right in and went for it! I didn't have a straw to splatter with so I put a few drops of polish thinner in each puddle of polish and used a paint brush to splatter on the polish and I think it turned out pretty sweet!

 

This polishes I used are a base of THE black, a England - Camelot. Then I splattered on with Color Club in Wild At Heart, Cloud Nine and Harp On It.

 

This first pic was taken in my light box. I took somewhere around 30 pics in my lightbox but was unable to capture the holo goodness as you can see...

 

So then I dragged my camera outside and yeaaaaah buddy, isn't she gorgeous??

 

As good as it turned out, I have some even better ideas for next time! I hope you all have a fabulous weekend! Mwah!

 

Whimsical Undies!!

I know what you're thinking and get your mind out of the gutter! A couple of weeks ago I finally decided to try out my bottle of Revlon Whimsical. So I slapped a coat on my naked nails...and then another...and another! By the third coat it still wasn't opaque and I wasn't a happy camper! I had seen some really pretty swatches of this polish and I wanted mine to look like that too! So I asked my Instagram ladies what was going on - did I get a bad batch? I was quickly informed that I needed to put something under this polish. I know that some of you are thinking, "duh Lindsey!" Well, I really don't ever use undies unless I'm doing nail art like a watermarble or something. Usually when I use a glitter polish, I prefer to use enough coats to make it mostly opaque.

So once I had accepted the fact that I needed some undies, I asked for suggestions and there were quite a few readily given! So I decided to try them all and share them with you! Each of these swatches is shown on it's own and then with 2 coats of Revlon Whimsical on top.

The first five polishes I tried are as follows from thumb to pinky: a England - Camelot, Wet 'n Wild -Megalast On A Trip, China Glaze - Lemon Fizz, Essie - Butler Please, OPI - If You Moust You Moust.

Next up in thumb to pinkie order is Catrice - Am I Blue Or Green?, MUA - Frozen Yoghurt, Essie - Go Overboard, China Glaze - For Audrey and GOSH - Silver.

And the third set is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear - White On, Sinful Colors - Cinderella, Wet 'n Wild - Tickled Pink, Wet 'n Wild - Lexington Yellow and China Glaze - First Mate.

What do you think? Any you love, hate? I kinda like them all!

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!

 

Giraffe?

ALRIGHT!!! Who took my week? 'Cause it's Wednesday and I don't remember Monday or Tuesday! Ugh, actually, work is crazy and I have two kids with eye and ear infections - yuck!!!

I was totally debating on whether or not I should post this mani because I'm not a huge fan of it but I decided that after taking the time to do it, I was going to show you my hard work! The base is two coats of Catrice - Twist of Lemon which I made matte with Lancome Magique topcoat. Then I stamped it with a England Camelot and Bundle Monster plate 313. I really love that Bundle Monster is making the positive and negative images for some of their designs, it makes it so much easier to do a complete mani without having to thing too hard and I like that!

These came out looking a little like a giraffe print which I didn't intend when I started but, then again, my nails don't usually end up the way I intended!

Black, Purple and Yellow Gradient Nails

T.G.I.F!!!! I can't tell you how happy I am that it's finally Friday! This week has been super busy at work and I am really ready for a break, how about you? I wish I had something exciting, or even interesting to talk about but I can hear work calling me and it's not going to shut up until I take care of it! With that said, I hope, in the near future to begin posting more interesting reading for you as opposed to just listing the polishes used and poppin' in a few pictures! I also really want to do video tutorials! They take a lot of preparation though and one of those prep steps involves cleaning my room and I am totally dreading that!

 

I keep seeing these gorgeous gradients all over IG and they make me drool so I decided to do one of my own! It turned out pretty good, I like the color combo, I just hate that my white undies are showing! In hindsight, I could have used the yellow underneath but I hadn't picked out my gradient colors at that point! The white undies is OPI Alpine Snow and the gradient colors are Avon Sunshine, China Glaze Gothic Lolita and a England Camelot. Then I slapped a coat of LA Colors Sassy Sparkle on top. I really wished I had taken pics before I put the glitter on it because I liked it better without it. I really need to get CG Fairy Dust or INM Northern Lights so that I can have a TINY bit of sparkle without overwhelming the design!

 

Sorry it wasn't an enthralling read but at least you got what was important, right? Love you all - mwah!

Black and White Sugarspun Nails

Happy Tuesday! Where did Monday go?? I feel like I totally missed it this week but I'm not going to complain at all! I decided to try the sugarspun technique and I think it turned out fairly well. I wish I had more time to chitchat but as I'm typing this, the baby is yelling at me!

 

I used one coat of the amazing a England Camelot for the base and Wet 'n Wild Megalast Break The Ice for the "icing"! They kind of look yummy, right? Don't worry, I didn't lick my nails...much.

 

 

 

 

Waterspotted Nails

Happy Humpday - thank goodness! I'm late so I'll just list the polishes and leave you to it! This is the waterspotted design created by Cute Polish and I had to give it a try. My experience was that it was best to use room temp, filtered water and I actually used plain rubbing alcohol in a little spray bottle! Also, I first tried this with Wet 'n Wild Black Creme and it would not spread out in the water so I switched to aEngland Camelot (which almost made me cry!) and it was easy peasy from there!

 

Polishes Used:

Finger Paints (unlabeled hot pink)

China Glaze Papaya Punch

Barry M Indigo ( this polish is amaaaaazing!)

Catrice Twist Of Lemon

aEngland Camelot (the ULTIMATE black polish!)

 

Purple Birthday Mani!

Happy Friday!! Sorry, once again for being MIA! I have had sick kids all week and my poor little baby has the flu so I've spent 4 days holding and snuggling her! I'm holding her as I'm typing this so it's going to be short and sweet!

 

This was my bday mani and I wore it for 4 days with barely any tip wear! I've never had a mani last over 24 hours before so I'm amazed!

 

All of these polishes were gifts I received recently and they all worked so beautifully together! The base is MUA Frozen Yoghurt then a England (sooooooo excited about this one!) Avalon and finally Color Club Harp On It which is my first holo ever!!



 

 

I'm really loving how this turned out and all of the polishes were so gorgeous! :) I hope to be back to blogging more as soon as my kiddos feel better!