Upcoming Nail Challenge!

Are you on a nail-painting frenzy lately??   If so, then you should join in on this 30 day journey with me! And if you’re not on a nail-painting frenzy… well, do you wanna be?

Julie from Short And Sweet In Texas organized this fun nail challenge that takes course over the 30 days in April ’13.  Participants will try to paint their nails for each of the 30 days of the challenge and then post a link to them online.  What if you’re not sure if you can manage to do a new mani for each and every day?  No worries!  Just do what you can.. it’s meant to be fun!!

Please read more about it and feel free to start your first nail design with us on April 1st! All you need to do is paint your nails and post about them … then submit your post to the Inlinkz link that Julie setup on this page.  Here ya go:  April 30 Day Challenge Starts Monday!

Embellished Nail Polish Easter Egg

I love painting easter eggs with nail polish- it’s my new fave spring project!  If you’d like to see my first attempt here’s the link to my other egg.  My first egg was decorated with just nail polish.  But today’s egg has a few other embellishments- fimo clay flowers and beads on top!

I took a few days to complete this egg because I’d paint a section… then wait for it to dry.  Then paint another section and wait for that to dry.  I set the egg on a soda cap while it was drying.  I also added some orange fimo clay nail art flowers and stuck them on with some clear nail polish.

Since I drained my egg before I painted it… it had a nice little whole on top which was perfect to slide a eyepin into (an eyepin is the metal stick that jewelery-makers use to slide beads onto when making drop earrings).  I simply placed two silver beads onto the eyepin and then slid the pin into the whole on the top of my egg.  I secured it with glue so they wouldn’t slip out.  I really like the beaded accent on top- it adds a nice touch and almost makes it look victorian.

I hope you get a chance to do some spring crafts too!  I can’t believe Easter is tomorrow!

In recent news, I have set my blog up on the Bloglovin site!  So if you use Bloglovin to view your favorite blogs- then you can add Craftynail to your list of followed blogs by clicking this link-  Follow my blog on Bloglovin!

If you have not yet setup a Bloglovin account then you can read about it here – I think it’s a great way to view all your favorite sites in one spot!

Super Shiny Smooth Berry Swatch

I have a beautiful AVON Nailwear Pro polish for you today called Smooth Berry.  I spotted it in the avon catalog and ordered it on a whim.  What a nice surprise when my order came in…. Smooth Berry turned out to be a jelly!  Well, I suppose it could technically be called a crelly… but still, it has that nice glassy translucent effect that I love. 

I used 3 coats of Smooth Berry to get it nice and opaque.  I’m not too keen on how this dark maroon shade goes with my skin tone though.  I think it makes me look like I have pale skin and long vampire fingers!  But this polish has something that I absolutely love….  SHINE!  It’s super duper glossy and shiny!  It didn’t need a topcoat at all, but I did apply some seche vite just so it would dry fast.  Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I wore a polish this shiny!  I have been wearing it for two and half days now and even though I have a bit of tip wear- it looks just as fresh n shiny as when I first applied it!

Do you have an AVON lady in your life?  If not, their website can link you up with one!  Or if you’re not into the personal service part of avon… then you can always order online too.  Last week they had free shipping on orders over $10… so check back to see what deals they have coming up.  I have toyed with the idea of becoming an avon rep myself… It could be kinda fun!  I could hand-model all the products to get better sales numbers lol.  I’m a little afraid to invest a lot of my time if I’m not sure of the monetary payoff though. So for now I will flip through the brochures and email my orders to my avon lady!  How easy is that?  I just ordered 5 different spring polishes for $3.49 each!  Can’t wait til she drops it off on April 4th!

Copycat: Evanora’s Nails from Oz

2 copycat posts in a row?  I’m really on a roll!  So, I finally went to see that movie Oz the Great and Powerful.  All the hype from the OPI Oz Collection really piqued my interest and I was hoping to see some awesome nails in the movie.  Well, I totally loved it- but suprisingly, there was not much nails to look at.  There were only a few main female characters and Rachel Weisz’ character Evanora was the only one with a real mani!  So today I’m copycatting her!  I found the image of Rachel Weisz here at this source.

The one thing I noticed about her look was the very drab base color.  It was a dull murky grey, but still very sheer.  I think it’s closest dupe would probably be a coat of OPI My Pointe Exactly.  Since I don’t have a sheer polish like that I had to mix one up myself!  I really wish I had a paint palette or something to mix paint on… in the past I have used soda bottle caps.  But since I have none left I used a plastic spoon… which worked fine.  I mixed a sheer topcoat, a grey polish, and an off-white polish and stirred it up with a toothpick.  Then I used an old artist’s paintbrush to paint one coat of this concoction on each of my nails.  The result was pretty good- my basecoat was dismal and eerie.

For the black accents I decided to not use tape since that would make the shape too triangular.  Evanora’s black strips aren’t too exact so I decided to free-hand them.  I used NYC Nail Enamel in Black Lace and a nail art brush.  Then for the dark green/gold sparkly outline I had to mix up another franken in a spoon.  Hmmm maybe I need to buy more polish lol?  I mixed up some China Glaze Smoke and Ashes and Julie G My Private Palace.  I striped that on with a nail art brush along the rim of my black triangle.  I didn’t want to make the sparkle too evident, because honestly, I could barely see the glitter in the movie.  Then I topped it off with a nice thick coat of Seche Vite to give it a smooth and even surface.  Lastly, I buffed all my finished nails with the medium side of a nail buffing square just to tone down the glossiness a bit.

Now I have long and pointy wicked witch claws! Come here my dear… would you like an apple?  Buahahahahahaaaaaa!

While googling for Evanora images I found this simple tutorial by cutepolish.  If you’re tempted to try this creepy look check out here video here.

Copycat: Adele’s Silver Louboutins

I love when celebrities show off their cool nails!  Like Katy Perry, Rhianna, Fergie and of course Adele!  I just love Adele’s Louboutin Nails from last year’s Grammys.  We’ve seen a lot of the black and red Louboutin nails… so I really like how she mixed it up by pairing the red with a glittery silver polish instead.  I will probably never own a pair of Louboutins- so why not try the nails out for a spin? Sure, I’m a year behind…but that won’t stop me.

I found this Adele pic from a seventeen magazine article. You can click on the photo to read the full article.  Seventeen reports that Adele’s nail stylist used Ciaté Paint Pots in “Jewel” and “Mistress” to create this mani.  My stash is not that expansive and I don’t even own one single solitary bottle of Ciaté polish.  So to copycat her look I had to get creative.  Not including top and base coats, I used 6 different polishes for this mani!  I did the red first, and used a few different mini bottles of polish to get the shade right (I loved using the teeny mini brushes for painting the underneath).   I also put some seche vite on top of the red since I wanted to make sure it dried properly.  Then I painted the top of my nails next.  To simulate Ciaté Jewel I did two thin coats of a light purple called Revlon Charming, then a coat of silver holographic polish to make it glow.  Then I topped it off with two different holographic glitters and some seche vite.  I think I have 7 layers of polish on the top of my nails and 5 layers on the underneath!  No one said being beautiful was easy.

I hope the underside of my nails don’t stain too bad.  I used some creamy white Orly Ridge Filler before I painted on the red to help prevent staining.  There was somewhat of a mess with the red, but that was expected.  I used some ‘manicure swabs’ for cleanup which worked pretty well.  Manicure swabs are handy for intricate cleanup because they’re essentially pointed cotton swabs.  So glad I found them at Harmon – they’re perfect for paint jobs like this one.

I’m really enjoying having this mani on!  I think it’s cool to glance down and see my nails painted from every which way!  What do you think of this look?  If you’d like to see my other Louboutin manicure- here’s the link!

What shape should your nails be??

I was doing a little research on nail shapes and came across this great article on the Nicole by OPI website!  Check out their chart that explains which nail shape looks best for your fingers and nail bed size.  I didn’t even realize there was a science to it until now!  (You can click either of the above images to read the article from the Nicole by OPI website.)

I would love to have square-shaped nails.  Square is my fave!  But I can’t seem to keep mine square…especially when they are long.  They naturally round a bit on their own (or break!).  The diagram says I should have square nails too- but I think mine might actually be squoval.  Oh well, close enough I suppose!

What shape nails should you have according to the chart?

Butterfly Wings

I had a lot of free time last night and sat down with my box of very old polishes that I never use.  I rummaged through them and tried out all my spring-iest colors.  The AVON Retro Rose floored me!  In the bottle it looked matronly, but once applied it morphed into this stunning peachy pink with gold shimmer!  I sponged on some Sinful Colors Lagoon which is a sheer orange shimmer.  This polish must be very old- check out the retro bottle in my bottom pic!  The peach and orange looked great together and then it hit me- MONARCH WINGS!  Yes!  Time for me to try out butterfly nails!

Butterfly wing nails have been one of my favorite looks ever since I got interested in nail art.  They’re breathtaking and have been on my to-do list for a while.  I’m so glad I finally tackled this project last nite.  I guess I just needed the perfect base color to inspire me!

I used some black wet n wild polish and a sephora nail art brush to freehand the black wing outline.  The design was very forgiving… I didn’t even have to wipe it off and start all over again –  you girls know what I’m talking about, right?  Here’s the list of polishes and tools that I used….

I love it.  It will break my heart to have to take it off once it starts chipping!  And in case you are wondering… yes, that IS snow in the background of my pics.  We got another bad storm last night in NY.  Will it ever be spring?  Probably not.