Nail design of the week

It's been sometime since I wanted to try one of those nail polishes that leave your nails rough and  bumpy, and not shiny and sleek as they usually do.  I stumbled upon an O.P.I. stand and they had some of the nail polishes from the Liquid Sand  line, and I bought one.

These are the tools I used:

Mussvital nail hardener as base coat 

Wharf! Wharf! Wharf! nail polish by O.P.I. (one coat)

Naio coconut cuticle oil for the cuticles when everything is finished and dry

I absolutely love them!  My mother says that it looks like the manicure has been ruined, but I like it precisely for that.  A perfectly done nail is beautiful, but the moment it has an imperfection then the hard work is lost.  

It's been some days since I made them, and they are still perfect, apart from the obvious wear on the tips, since you cannot use a top coat with these polishes.  But I have had them scratched, hit, bumped, and the polish does not look any less great than the first day.  I also like to touch them and find that they have texture.  I would love a dark grey or black polish of this line - it would look like asphalt!

Nail design of the week

Remember some time ago I mentioned I purchased a stamping plate with dragons?  Well, on Monday I used it for the first time, and the results were fabulous:

Excuse the chipped nail!  I couldn't get pictures the day I made them

These are the tools I used:

Unglax nail hardener as base coat 

Black Orchid nail polish by Sally Hansen

Messy Mansion stamping plate #MM05

Konad plastic scraper

Konad small stamper

Icy Princess nail polish by essence for stamping

Seche Vite top coat
Naio coconut cuticle oil for the cuticles when everything is finished and dry

The designs are BIG, which is great for my nails, and as you can see, the stamping is very clear and precise.  The one in the pinky does not look good, but that was my fault.  The pinky of the right hand looks awesome.  Fot the thumbs I used the crown and the axes.  The axes look great, but I could not get a really good stamping with the crown.  But overall I am happy with the results.  I think this is the best stamping work I have made since I started.

I hope I can use the backgrounds with other nail designs as accent nail.  They will undoubtedly cover the entire bed of any of my nails, they are so big.

Here is a little vid I made of the Messy Mansion plate.  Enjoy!

Nail design of the week

So, as I mentioned, I wanted to try a sailor-inspired manicure tutorial before Summer was over.  I saw this great manicure at Radi D's blogspot:

Picture from Radi D's blogspot

I wanted to try something similar, but I omitted the anchor and life saver stickers, and made my own version of it:

These are the tools I used:

Unglax nail hardener as base coat

Essie Blanc nail polish
Blue nail art tape
Twizzers
Scissors
Seche Vite top coat

Naio coconut cuticle oil for the cuticles when everything is finished and dry

I do like this design very much, but I had some troubles with the tape.  Although I made sure the tape was well sticked to my nails, I ended up with the ends lifting, even after applying the top coat.  I am guessing part of it is my fault because I touched the stripes too much, but also I noticed that the rubbing/friction of my nails against my fingers may have been contributed to the lifting.

I hope I can do soon another manicure featuring nail art tape.  Maybe a design that does not involve the tape going to the sides, to avoid this problem...

Nail Design of the Week

It was some time since I wanted to do this beautiful Indian inspired nail tutorial by IndigoNova1:

After doing it, these are the results:

And these are the tools I used:

Unglax nail hardener as base coat
Colorama Turquoise Seas (#107)

Folk Art 660 Metallic Pure Gold

00 artist brush

Dotting tools

Konad Clear Top Coat 

Blue rhinestone

Seche Vite top coat
Naio coconut cuticle oil for the cuticles when everything is finished and dry

My nails are considerably shorter than the ones in the video so I had to do a smaller design - smaller teardrop, less dots, no green rhinestone.  It came out better in my left hand (of course) than in my right hand.  Since it is so complicated (at least for me) I only did it as an accent nail in my middle fingers.

I absolutely love it!  This design is simple enough to not be overkill, but at the same time it is dainty and delicate.

Since Summer is ending, I do not know how many times more I will be painting my nails blue.  I just adore when they are in sync with my tail! 

Nail design of the week

Pearls!  I am in love with pearls lately - which is odd, because the pearl is a jewel that has never appealed much to me.  My favorites have always been dark stones like onyx and garnet.  Must be the Summer, and the mermaids...

So, this week's manicure is inspired by mermaids and pearls:

These are the tools I used:
Unglax nail hardener as base coat
Margaret Astor Fashion Studio Lilly of the Valley (#244)

Tweezers

White half pearls in sizes 1.5, 2 and 3 mm
Konad clear top coat
Seche Vite top coat
Naio coconut cuticle oil for the cuticles when everything is finished and dry

I love how well they turned out!  They remind me a bit of my mermaid tail color.  It is a nice alternative to the mermaid scale pattern; after I saw this beautiful mermaid top I figured maybe mermaids like to wear pearls in their nails (oh how I covet a top like that!).  I have lately thought of how would a mermaid have her nails; the best I have imagined is that they are somehow scales matching the color of their tails (lol!).  So maybe some pearls on them is not a far fetched thought...

I have even put some pearls on my toes:

But not color.  I hate painting my toe nails, because my eyesight is not very good, and it's troublesome for me to see if they are OK or not.  Just the base coat, the 3 mm pearls and the top coat to protect them.

I saw this mermaid scale tutorial yesterday and maybe I will try with the pearls next time I do the Mash scale stamping.  What do you think?

Showing some new things

Even though I made my own H2O crystal necklaces, I found one on eBay with a beautiful bead that I could not resist to buy.  Here are some pics of it:

Isn't it amazing the difference that it makes to photograph a necklace on a dummy, instead of on a table?  I had totally forgot that I had that dummy, and since I had it out I took pictures too of Elena's locket, the H2O locket and The Illusionist locket.

I have had this necklace for some time, but I forgot to put up the pics.  

But today, I got the Messy Mansion stamping plate:

It's amazing!  The details are incredible, and the central stampings are big enough to cover all my nail surfaces, including my wide thumbs!  I cannot wait to try it!

A new stamping plate for my collection

Just a few days ago I purchased a nail stamping plate from Messy Mansion:

Picture from the Messy Mansion store

It is great, isn't it?  This is the first plate that I have found that is not what I call "girly", i.e. no butterflies, flowers, kittens, smileys or hearts.  Instead, dragons, knights, axes and castles, along with a crest and a background.  So awesome!!

Messy Mansion also has a website for you to peruse full of nail art goodies.  

I will let you know when the plate arrives, and how well it performs.  I am dying to try it out!

Nail design of the week

I'm afraid this week I revisited the mermaid nail tutorial created by elleandish.  It is so lovely I just can't get enough of it!

This time I followed all the instructions provided, and my nails look like this:

It looks so much better with a softer two-color combination!  I say two-color because, despite the fact that I wanted to use three, one of the blues was barely visible, so I just omitted it.  These are the tools I used:

Unglax nail hardener as base coat 

Fashion Studio by Margaret Astor nail polishes #242 (Aqua Leaf) and #070 (Blue Taffeta)

Mash plate #39

Konad plastic scraper

Konad small stamper

Makeup sponge

Lina Bocardi 45'' Flash Nail Polish #12 for stamping

Quick Dry Top Gloss by Margaret Astor
Naio coconut cuticle oil for the cuticles when everything is finished and dry

It cannot really be seen in the pic but the design smeared again.  I need to get me a Seche Vite top coat, which I hear is fabulous for this kind of stuff.  

This design really gets people's attention.  I will probably end up using it for most of the Summer.  My inner mermaid is so happy with it!

I also painted my toe nails with Come along with me nail polish by H&.  I don't know why, I am liking very much blue colors this season.

Nail design of the week

This week I had planning on doing a new Konad stamping design, but I have been watching a lot of nail videos featuring French manicures, so I got envious and did a simple French manicure on my nails:

Left hand - the nail on my middle finger broke (ouch!)

Right hand

I am very happy how it turned out.  I think it looks way, way better than my previous Franch manicure.  I was tempted to do a lace stamping on them, just as elleandish did here (very similar to my own!), but I finally decided against it - maybe some other time.

These are the tools I used:

Unglax nail hardener as base coat 

French manicure French Ivory (#433) nail polish by Rimmel *
Nail Tip Whitener by Rimmel
Quick Dry Top Gloss by Margaret Astor

* I just realized that the number of the polish on Amazon is different than my own.  Maybe the numbers change from country to country catalogues?  I don't know...

I used the "rolling motion" technique - moving my finger while keeping the brush steady.  It worked very well for me.  I could not touch up any mistakes, because the nail tip whitener is quite viscous, and the touch ups were very visible (I had to redo one of my thumbs because of that).  Maybe it would be good as a nail polish for stamping?  I am not going to find out though, I will keep it for my French tips.

Here is the French manicure tutorial that helped me with the rolling motion technique:

Let's see how next week's design goes!

Nail design of the week

I already talked about the lovely mermaid inspired nail tutorial from YouTube user elleandish.  I tried it yesterday, but I toned down the difficulty:

As you can see, it's in no way perfect; the stamped design smeared in some places after applying the top coat; I think I used too much of top coat, I'll try with less quantity next time.  These are the tools I used:

Unglax nail hardener as base coat 

Come along with me nail polish by H&M

Mash plate #39

Konad plastic scraper

Konad small stamper

Black Mash Nail art polish for stamping

Konad Clear Top Coat

I used one coat of the blue polish, and then stamped the design on the nails with the black stamping nail polish.  I have a problem with this design; some of my nails are too wide for it, so both my thumbs are not completely covered in scales.  Also, it wouldn't work if my nails are a bit longer than they are right now, so for me it is best to use when having short nails.  I loved the black stamping polish and how well it transferred to my nails.  Better quality and better to work with than the Konad, I think.  I am not sure if it is the polish or the plate, I will have to check on that.

After comparing the result with the tutorial, I think I need to use another shade of blue for the stamping.  The black seems to me very "in your face", if you get my meaning, to simulate fish scales.  However, I am thinking the big contrast would be great to use with other colors, such as red or green, for a "dragon scale" manicure - perfect for Daenerys Targaryen fans!  It would look also fantastic with a grey base, for a "finger armour" effect.  Very strinking for LARP events, or Medieval faires.  I will probably do both in the future, just to see how they look.

Looking forward to next week's design!

A new hobby: Nail Art!

It is impossible to not peruse YouTube nail art videos and not get amazed at the nail design you can find there.  How creative are some people!

I began researching how to do nail art without having to be an artist with a mini brush (which I am definitely not!), and found out about nail stamping.  My interest for mermaids got me to this video, which I absolutely loved:

So obviously the first thing I did was to search for that stamping plate at the Mash Nails website.  When I found it and saw it was available I searched for tutorials on nail stamping (I highly recommend this one), and after I learnt a thing or two I placed my orders both at Mash and Konad.

Being unable to wait for them to arrive, I decided to try some simple nail design to keep me busy.  I visited a drugstore and bought a new set of nail files and 6 nail polishes from the new Margaret Astor collection, Fashion Studio.  I had at home some nail rhinestones - a long time ago I visited a local dollar store and they had some miniature glass bottles filled with them.  I bought the bottles to use in my miniature making and forgot about the rhinestones.  I never thought I would give them some use, and it was lucky I did not throw them out!

So, I chose one of the blue shades (#256, Electric Ocean).  I love this particular shade.  It reminds me of the skin color of Mistique, from the X-Men movies. You need two coats of this one.  Then I took the blue rhinestones and placed them on the side of my nails; 3 of them, in order big, small, big.  Then I applied the top coat.  How do you like the result?

Left hand

Right hand

If you notice, the pinky of the left hand looks a bit crowded, so in the right hand I put the rhinestones small, big, small, to give the nail a better look.  I like how they turned out.  I was so happy I forgot to clean my cuticles after finishing, but the natural light was fading and I wanted to take the pics.  Excuse the mess!

After having finished, it ocurred to me that maybe red rhinestones would have been better for contrast (as Mistique's hair is red), but I had in mind the mermaid-y look when I was working.  

I can't wait for the orders to arrive and start practicing the stamping!