Glitter for #NAILLINKUP

Just in the nick of time!  Here’s my GLITTER themed manicure for the February N.A.I.L. Linkup.

I re-sized my pics in a different program and they look a little blurry.  Buuuut I’m happy to say that I was able to take these photos outside in natural light this time!  Some of our snow has melted and I’m venturing outside again.  I emphasize the word SOME when speaking about the snow melting.  There’s still a lot on the ground! Oh, and we’re supposed to get another snowstorm on sunday nite.  Sweeeeet.  Cuz it hasn’t snowed in like what?  At least 5 days now ?

• I’m wearing one coat of Sally Hansen Hard as Nails as my basecoat.
• I used one coat of Seche Chic as my nude transparent base color.
• I applied blue painters tape to section off my tips.
• Painted my tips a dark brown shimmery color from the Kardashian Cabana Collection called Sunrise.
• Then I applied three coats of my sparse glitter topper from wet n wild called Stick it to the Man.
• One coat of seche vite topcoat to smooth it all out.
• Then I realized it needed something to pull it all together so I added blue dots of Nicole by Opi Pros & Confidence.  Much better!

The last time I wore this brown Kardashian color I was disappointed.  The brush was all weird and defective and application was difficult.  I wrote to the Kardashians and Kim promptly mailed me a new one!  Ok, I didn’t write to THE Kardashians… I wrote to their company.  And the ACTUAL Kim didn’t mail me a new product, instead some girl in their customer care department named Kim did.  But still… it was pretty cool, and I appreciate their good customer service.  Here’s the other time I wore this brown: Feathers for Oct NAILLINKUP

February N.A.I.L. is almost over but tomorrow we’ll announce the March themes.  Can’t wait!  And here are all the awesome nail art entries from February.  Talk soon…

Red :

Valentines Day :

Gradient :

Glitter :

easy bobby pin nails

This post is for all you girls out there that think you could never do your own cute nail art.  It’s easier than you think!  For this fun dot manicure all you need is a few nail polishes, and a bobby pin or two!

♥ Start with a base coat.  I like to use a nail strengthener like Sally Hansen Maximum Growth or OPI Nail Envy.

♥ Then paint all your nails in a solid color.  I like to use the darkest color for this.  It creates a cool 3-d effect later when you add lighter dots over top.  I used a nice medium blue cream as my base color.

♥ Pick a color for your dots and dab a few drops of it onto your work surface (a piece of paper or magazine would work).  Then unbend a bobby pin so it’s sort of straightened out, and then dip the tip of it into your drops of polish.  You’ll use this as your handy dandy dotting tool!

♥ I find it easiest to start by making the middle row of dots first (yellow in my case).  Then I work on building up rows above and below it in complementary colors.  My patterns come out more uniform that way.   You can wipe off your bobby pin in between color changes, or just use a new one if you have a zillion of them.

♥ I like to wait a good ten minutes of dry-time before applying topcoat.  You wouldn’t want to smear your fresh dots!  My favorite topcoat is Seche Vite.  If you’ve never tried it, you need to because it makes your manicure dry in just a few minutes.  It will change your life.. and I really mean it!!

What other household items can you use to make nail art?  I’ve used toothpicks before, but I’m sure there’s a bunch of other cool ideas that I’ve never even thought of!  I’d like to hear what crafty stuff you’ve found around your house!

OMD Rather Awesome Challenge: Day 2 Blue- Dotted Blue Frenchie

Welcome to day 2 of the Oh Mon Dieu! It’s the Rather Awesome 31 Day Challenge Giveaway!!  The theme of day 2 is BLUE. 😀

First off I’d like to sincerely thank everyone for all the birthday wishes yesterday!  I had such a great day and all your warm comments really helped make the day feel special for me.  So thank you!  Nail bloggers are some of the sweetest and most encouraging people I’ve ever met!  You all are great… thank you for being a part of my life!

 Now that all the mushiness is out of the way 😀 let’s get to my blue design!  I started with one thick coat of a baby blue cream called Take Me To Your Chateau by Color Club.  When that was dry I taped off my tips using painters tape and I applied some dark blue using AVON Forget-Me-Not Blue.  I slowly removed the tape and was pretty impressed with my light and dark blue french mani!  But why stop there?  I then embellished the design with a dotting tool to create more interest.  I really like the monochromatic effect of the two blues in this frenchie- it’s pretty simple but also fun and retro.  I hope you like it. 😀

 I’m geared up to see the other blue manis now!  I really get a kick out of checking the inlinkz for updates!  You can view them here:

 2. Blue :