My new years nails- magnetic snakeskin

Happy New Year!!!  Here are my new years eve nails for the N.A.I.L. linkup! I went with a mix-match snake skin manicure.  I used two different magnetic polishes in this design and I also hid ‘2014’ in there as well. 🙂

GREEN NAILS- My green nails were painted with Sinfully Magnetic Snakeskin nail polish in a green shade called Force Field.  I applied one coat and let it dry.  Then I applied the second coat and then immediately held the included magnet over top.  The magnet reacted with the polish and created such an amazing criss-cross snakeskin effect (see my other post about Force Field here). This is probably my absolute favorite magnetic polish & magnet of all time!  I also applied some pearl-toned studs to these nails for a feminine sexy touch.

BLACK NAILS- These nails were painted with China Glaze Liquid Leather.  Then I stamped MoYou Pro 05 snakeskin design over half of these nails using a silver magnetic Orly polish called Paint on Electron.  I’m so glad that the silver stamped so well!  The puny Orly magnet that came with the polish really sucks…so I’m happy to find another use for Paint on Electron which didn’t even require a magnet.  *Another thing to note about stamping with magnetic polish- it didn’t smudge at all when I applied topcoat!

Oh and about the hidden ‘2014’-  I placed my studs strategically to represent the year 2014– I put 20 studs on my right hand and 14 studs on my left.  🙂  I also patterned my nails differently on each hand just for effect. 

Do you think magnetic nail polish has a fun ‘party feel’ ?  I love it and I think it’s just perfect for the holidays. Plus, I did magnetic nails last new yrs eve… so I’m sorta keeping up with traditions by doing another one tonite.  These nails are also just in time to say goodbye to the SNAKE.  Au revoir 2013, year of the snake!  Bonjour 2014, year of the horse! 

While we’re on the topic, I’d like to show you a pic of my new horse calendar for 2014.  I got it as a Christmas present from my uncle!  Isn’t it purty?

I look forward to a new year!  See you in 2014!

View the other N.A.I.L. entries here:

N.A.I.L. December Theme 1 – Snowflakes

N.A.I.L. December Theme 2 – Shopping

N.A.I.L. December Theme 3 – Winter Solstice

N.A.I.L. December Theme 4 – Festive French Manis

N.A.I.L. December Theme 5 – New Year

My new pointy nails!

My Craftynail blog turned one year old yesterday.  So I wanted to do something new and crazy, like a blogiversary makeover. 🙂  I decided to change my nail shape!  I’m dying to show you my new pointy claws…

Beforehand my nails were squoval, but now they’re so different!  Would you call these almond shaped?  I’m not sure the exact term… but I think I’ll call them pointy.  To shape them like this I used a sturdy glass file- I made sure to use one that had a tough grit in hopes of making the filing go faster.  I know you’re not supposed to ‘saw’ your nail back and forth- they say you should only go in one direction when filing.  But honestly, I didn’t want to be here all night…so I used the sawing technique.  I know, bad girl!  But even still, it took a good 50 minutes or so to file them down!  They came out looking shorter than I expected….but I like the cute pointy shape!  It feels very appropriate for halloween too.  I also like not having any ‘corners’ on my nails to bump into things or bend.  The corners are always the first place my polish chips too.  So I’m really enjoying the new feel of my pointy nails.  It’s easier to use the pads of my fingers to get things done and my nails aren’t getting in the way as much.

In these pics I’m wearing Orly Naughty, a cool-weather oxblood sorta color. I also used some nature props to show you what fall is like here in NY right now.  It’s extremely sunny out, the old giant maples in front of my house are gold and burnt orange, leaves are falling all around me and there’s pumpkins and apple cider donuts at every farmstand.  Ahhh it’s so nice today.  I wish today would last all week and maybe we could skip the whole work and weekday thing!

I was thinking of doing a ‘year in review’ post to summarize what happened with Craftynail this past year.  Maybe show you which of my nails designs were my faves, which of my articles is the most popular or gets the most hits, etc…  Let me know if you would be interested in reading something like that!  Oh and lemme know what you think of my pointy nails.  Unless of course you don’t like them, then I don’t wanna know at all.  hahaha!  See ya!

Nail Art Ideas Linkup- Astrology Theme

I’m excited for Nail Art ideas Linkup.  First off, I’ve got a fun cancer astrology manicure for the last week of september.  And second, we’ve got some great themes coming up for October so stay tuned for those!

I’m pretty into astrology, you?  My sign is cancer and I really identify with it.  I feel like many of my traits and cancerous.  Wait, that doesn’t sound so good, but you know what I mean.  Cancer is a water sign and is closely associated with the moon.  Good colors for cancers are sea green and silver so that’s what I went with for today’s NAIL manicure.  Cancer is also associated with opals, pearls and moonstones… so I incorporated some pearl-like studs in my mani too.

I’m wearing two coats of Orly Jealous, Much?  My middle finger has pearl studs and silver sponging.  My ring finger has a hand-painted brown cancer symbol and some silver sponging as well.  But I really like how my thumb, pointer and pinky fingers came out.  I dabbed on some white square-shaped glitter called OPI Lights of Emerald City.  Then I sponged some teal Sinful Colors glitter over top which hid the squares a bit and it gives a really neat layered appearance.  The Sinful Colors glitter is called Nail Junkie and I was super impressed with how glimmery it was!  I got it back in July for my birthday (from my mommy!) but I haven’t tried it til now.  It reminds me of mermaids- I’ll have to reach for it again soon!

I’d love to see more astrology manis for NAIL.  You have til Sept 29 to submit one.  Here are the links!

Day 21 of OMD Challenge- Green Ombre Leaves

Day 21 of the nail art challenge is STAMPING!  I love stamping- I first started stamping a little over two years ago when I bought a Konad Starter Kit a the Excalibur Hotel in Las Vegas.  There was a vendor there selling all kinds of konad stuff and she would demo it for anyone who walked by with fingernails.  I was already thinking of buying some konad online (even before my Vegas trip)  so when I saw her booth I was like, ‘OK, lady- show me what you got!’  The starter kit had some really puny small designs like tiny flowers and stuff and I really wanted some full-nail designs- so the lady kept trying to get me to combine my order with some stranger standing next to me so I’d get free items or something.  Uh, no thank you.  Just gimme my starter kit and I’m outta here!  I think the kit was about $40 and when I got home I realized I could’ve bought the individual items way cheaper online- but oh well!  After that I kept buying individual Konad plates on amazon for $7 a pop… which got kinda pricey!  Plus, as my nails got longer I needed plates with larger designs.  I did some research and found out about Cheeky Plates.  Cheeky is said to have some of the biggest designs on the market.  So I purchased this awesome Summer Collection Bundle with 20 plates in it!  It was $20 on amazon which basically means each plate is one US dollar- so I was sold!  Plus, the designs come in this cool storage box which is very handy!  Check it out:

Enough yammering about my stamping history- let’s see my design for day 21!

I started by painting my nails in OMBRE using mostly green Orlys.  I used these 5 colors:

Alpine Snow by OPI (thumb)

Jealous Much? by Orly (pointer)

Gumdrop by Orly (middle)

Green with Envy by Orly (ring)

Lucky Duck by Orly (pinkie)

Then I stamped on top with Konad special polish and Cheeky plate 33 (CH33).  Then I topped it off with some MASH Matte Top Coat.

21. Stamping :

What brand stamping plates do you use? 

Peacock Nail Art

I recently picked up some more Orly colors from their old Birds of a Feather Collection.  I loved this collection from 2011… but more importantly, I felt the need to hoard a few more of these old Orly bottles.  Have you seen the design of their new bottles?  They look so weird and different to me that I want to get my hands on as many of the oldies as possible! For posterity or something! 

One of my faves from the Birds of a Feather collection is the blue base I’m wearing here called Sweet Peacock.  Isn’t it gorgeous?  It’s the most electric aqua blue foil that I’ve ever seen!  I’m so glad I added it to my stash!

It seemed fitting to pair this polish with a peacock design. I did 2 coats of Sweet Peacock as my base color. Then I applied some chevron nail guide stickers and painted my tips with another Birds of a Feather Orly called Lucky Duck.  The rest of the gold, black, blue and purple accents were done with a dotting tool.  It was actually pretty simple! Here’s the colors I used:

blue ♥ Sweet Peacock by Orly

green ♥ Lucky Duck by Orly

gold ♥ Because You’re Worth It by L’Oreal

purple ♥ Eggplant Frost by wet n wild

black ♥ Black Lace Cream by NYC

These peacock nails are fun to wear!  I just love colors inspired by nature!  Do you own any of these polishes from the Birds of a Feather collection?

A Lovely Award and Some Lovely Nail Spam!

Just a quick post to thank a few bloggers for recently nominated me for the One Lovely Blog Award!  I read each and every one of their lovely blogs!  Here’s a special shout out to these ladies for nominating me:

Eeeek! Nail Polish!

Short & Sweet in Texas

Ooh La La Nails

buy ALL  the colors!

The Nail Boss

Nail Art for Dummies

DailySofia

Award Rules:

1. Thank the person who nominated you
2. Add the ”One Lovely Blog Award” image to your post
3. Share 7 things about you
4. Pass the award on to seven nominees
5. Inform your nominees by posting a comment on their blogs

Here’s who I nominate:

Maiden Aunt

everysensory

Polish Me, Please!

PROMAKEUPME

Pocket Money Polishes

In The Gray Areas

Here’s my 7 random facts:

1. I played field hockey and basketball in high school.  Field hockey I can live without, but sometimes I miss playing basketball all the time.
2. I’m seriously thinking about getting one of those fitness gadgets that you wear 24hrs.  Like maybe FitBit, Nike Fuelband or the Jawbone UP.  Did you know some of them monitor your sleep and have an alarm that won’t wake you up til you reach the correct sleep cycle?  I need all the help I can get when it comes to waking up in the AM!
3. I have become addicted to seltzer lately.  Water, tea and seltzer are my faves.
4. I have the weirdest dreams and remember most of them in the morning.
5. My favorite nail polish brand is Orly.  But they recently changed the design of their bottle and cap?  This is upsetting to me.
6. If I ever have a son he will probably be very tall and blond and I wanna name him THOR… but I bet my friends and family won’t let me 😦
7. My name is Jacqueline but the shortened version is JACQUI.  Everyone spells it like the more common version: JACKIE.  My name is misspelled so often I don’t even notice it anymore!

Here’s some random pics of my nails… a lil spam is always nice!

Orly Gumdrop… a nice cream turquoise.  I used this as the base for my AriZona Green Tea Nails ↓

OPI Elephantastic Pink… a beautiful vibrant pink.  I used this color for my crazy underside mani ↓

Nautical nails using my new Cheeky stamping plates (CH36 and CH38)↓

Thanks for reading… and thanks for thinking my blog is lovely!!  Muah!

Silver Feather Fowl Play

Day 17 of Julie’s April nail art challenge is dedicated to 3D nail art!  I love that this nail art challenge makes me try new things. I don’t have a lot of nail embellishments in my stash so my best bet was to think outside the box!  I have a lot of jewelry findings and beads so surely I’d be able to find something to decorate my nails with.  When sifting through my beads I came cross these lovely silver-plated feather charms from Fire Mountain Gems.  I used to love these things!  I don’t make myself a lot jewelry- usually I give it to family and friends…but I made myself these aqua chandelier earrings with the silver feathers and they turned out to be my absolute faves!  I wore them all the time!  Until I lost them 😦   Here’s a pic of them on the left.  I really should make myself another pair… but first, lemme put these feathers on my nails!  I cut them with my wire cutting tool and secured them to my painted nails with a clear top coat.  They looked really awesome, but I kept scratching myself with them!  So I didn’t get to wear them too long lol.

If you are wondering about my purple base color… it’s called Fowl Play by Orly and it’s part of their Birds of a Feather Collection from 2011 maybe.  It has a dark purple jelly base with a thick suspension type formula… and it’s got all kinds of crazy shimmer, micro glitter and small flakies.  Lotsa colors in here!  I like deep complex colors like this.  In fact, the whole Birds of a feather Collection is beautiful- check out Orly’s promo shot for the collection.  Don’t you love this bright metallic peacock blue polish that the model is wearing?  I know this collection is old news… but this blue is so pretty!  And so is my purple Fowl Play- I hope you like it too!