Plaid nails! for #NAILLINKUP

Did you know that today (Jan 25) is an unofficial holiday??  Happy Opposite Day everyone!  You can read more about the holiday here on this Daily Grid article.  Our monthly nail challenge called NAIL ART IDEAS LINKUP has the perfect theme to commemorate this funky holiday!  Ready to see my nails for our ‘OPPOSITE DAY’ theme??

I’ve never done PLAID nails before so I thought this is the perfect time to tackle them!  In fact, when I did Short & Sweet’s 30 day nail challenge last year I did my nails EVERY day except one of the days: PLAID DAY!  It seemed hard at the time, I was drawing a blank, and I decided to skip it.  Well, it still urks me that I never did the plaid prompt!  I’m ending all that madness today!

In true Opposite-Day-spirit, I also used a color that I rarely wear: RED.  Here’s how I did this plaid mani:

♥ I did two coats of Zoya Seraphina (silver) as a base color.

♥ Then I hand-painted 4 red stripes on each nail using a mini bottle of sephora by OPI called Sample Sale.  Because it’s a ‘mini’ the brush is really tiny so it was perfect for making the red stripes! Minis are very handy for nail art!

♥ Then I used an L.A. Colors black striper to paint a skinny black line in the middle of each red stripe.

♥  Lastly, I used my Essence tip painter (which is kinda like a striper) to paint 6 white stripes in between the red.

♥  Of course, I used my trusty seche vite topcoat to finish it off.

This mani took a while, but it wasn’t too challenging.  Just time-consuming.  To do both hands I had to hand-paint 140 stripes for goodness sakes!!  I’d also like to mention that I used Seize the Nails purple plaid nails as a reference while I was doing my nail art.  Bella’s purple nails are gorgeous and almost make me wanna try this look one more time with prettier colors just like hers:  PURPLE PLAID NAILS

That’s all for today!  View the other ‘opposite’ designs right here:

20 – 26 January – Opposite Day :

visions boards and red nail polish

Let’s talk about VISION BOARDS, or Dream Boards as they are often called.  These boards are supposed to help you harness the power of the ‘law of attraction’ and basically if you think positive thoughts, then they will come true.   Have you ever tried this?  Well, I did.  I even read the book The Secret about five years ago so I could learn more about the law of attraction before I started my very own vision board.  Eventually I put together a board and I’ve had it for more than 5 years now.  I’ve updated and revised it a few times already since then.  Well, this past weekend I realized that a couple of years have gone by without me tweaking my board.  So I decided to re-vamp it and I wound up removing 6 things from it.  I was thinking of adding more things to it now, but is it even worth it??  Out of the 6 things I removed from my board, only one thing came true!  The others things are outdated, never happened, won’t ever happen, etc.  I look at the board everyday too… it’s right next to my bed.  WTH?

I like to stay positive and open-minded, but I really don’t think these boards work.  If you are planning to use one to attract a hot man, win the lottery, or build your dreamhouse…think again.  But if you want to use it to motivate yourself to achieve a few little things, then it could be helpful, especially if those things are within your control.  I accomplished a few things that I put on there over the years, but they really weren’t biggies.  I’m still not fitting into my old jeans, growing an herb garden, wearing sexy cowboy boots, going to bed by midnight, or waking up by 7am…. so whatevs!

While we’re talking about wishes and dreams… I want to mention red nail polish.  I never wear it.  I realized that in my year of blogging I have never posted a red manicure.  Ever!  (I should put red polish on my vision board!)  I gravitate towards blues, greens, and generally funky and bright colors.  But why no red?  For starters, I dress very casual, and I think maybe I perceive that polished red nails would clash with my outfits?  Yoga pants and fancy red nails don’t really jive well together, ya know?  I also think red makes my skin look pale.  BUT… I vow to get over it!  I solemnly swear to hereby wear more red nail polish.  Which means I need to buy more, right?  So I recently added some reds to my stash and the first one I tested out was a creme Essence Colour & Go polish called Fame Fatal.  Shown here is one coat of SH Maximum Growth, two coats of Fame Fatal and one coat of seche vite.

I didn’t really like it too much while I was wearing it….but now that I look at the pics- I like this red on me!  You may notice that my hand looks different too.  Yup, that’s my right hand.  Cute, huh?  My poor left hand that I usually photograph experienced a break so I’m showing you my other hand instead.  These pointy nails are a little tricky.  I’ve actually broken two tips in the last few days so I had to shorten my pointies.  Now they look like little shark teeth.  haha!  I’m wondering how long I can keep these pointies going?  If the tips keep cracking off I might have to go back to a more squoval shape.  Boooo.  😦 Cuz I really am having fun with them.

Do you wear a lot of red?

#31DC2013- Violet Nails

Day 6 of Chalkboard’s 31 day nail challenge is VIOLET and I came up with a bold purple petunia design using my new Essence colour & go polishes! The lighter base color (3 coats) is called Essence Oh My Glitter! and it’s such a pretty, pretty purple, I just love it!  It’s one of those purple shades that’s dusty, but also bright at the same time.  (does that make sense ?)

Moving on to the petunia motif…  I started by free-handing the petals with a detail brush and cheap black nail polish.   I almost always use this NYC brand of polish called Black Lace Creme for my black nail art.  This stuff was $0.98!  Also, it’s nice and smooth and it doesn’t get too goopy on my brush.  It’s just a great cheapo polish to have on hand!  Then I filled in the black outlines with Essence Break Through, a deep magenta-tinted purple.  The flowers came out big and bold but luckily they don’t outshine my gorgeous base color!  I like that my eye keeps catching the pink and purple micro-glitter that’s in there.  Here’s a close-up of Oh My Glitter! so you can see ….

Want to see more purple manicures?  Here’s the inlinkz for 31DC2013 violet theme…