Rainbow Nails and my gradient technique!

Today’s nails were inspired by my inner child!  When I was a little girl (back in the 80’s) I just loved rainbows!  Rainbow stickers, rainbow spiral notebooks, rainbow earrings… pretty much anything that had a rainbow on it caught my attention.  Too bad it took me 30+ years to discover this rainbow gradient technique!  Well, this mani is dedicated to you, little Jacqui from the 80’s!  I know you would’ve loved these nails. 🙂

My first attempts at gradients were total fails- until I came up with this very effective way of using makeup sponges.  Here’s a pic of how I use my sponge for a gradient:

I start out with a standard cosmetic application wedge and use sharp scissors to cut it into 4 or 5 long skinny pieces.  I take one of the pieces, fold it in half, and dab it into a drop of nail polish on my work surface.  Then I sponge it onto my nail to create the gradient effect.  I think these folded over sponge strips work well since their surface is slightly curved, yet small-so you can dab, dab, dab away to get the paint just where you want it.  I use a different sliver of sponge for each color.  The small surface area of the sponge worked great to get the skinny lines of color for today’s rainbow gradient… but it also works well for a larger-scale gradient (like this leopard design where I only sponged on one color).  I think this technique is less messy and it’s fool-proof!!  I haven’t screwed up one gradient yet since I started doing it this way !

WHITE BASE ♥ one coat of Sally Hansen Teflon Tuff in French White Tip

RED ♥ Zoya Carmen

ORANGE ♥ AVON Orange Creamsicle

YELLOW ♥ AVON Inspire

AQUA ♥ Wet n wild I Need a Refresh-mint

PURPLE ♥ Nicole by OPI I’m a Belieber

This mani makes me happy on this beautiful friday!!

Do you love rainbows as much as me??

Bieber Border Manicure

It’s day 20 of the nail art challenge for April and the theme is border manicure!  When I think about border manis I think, “what two colors work well together?”…  and most times I think out loud.  So my man suggested purple and yellow.  Well, I have a two-pack of Nicole by OPI polishes with those exact two colors!  How perfect is that?

I can think of a lot of young girls that would love this manicure.  WHY? Because these Nicole by OPI shades are inspired by Justin Bieber!  I’m a Belieber is a nice basic purple cream (Bieber’s favorite color is purple) and the yellow is called My Favorite Gold.  I’ve swatched My Favorite Gold before- here’s the post.  It’s a beautiful and bright gold color, but it needs a lot of coats (and preferably some undies too)!!  Next time I try a border mani I will use more opaque colors.  I’m a little embarrassed to say how many coats I’m wearing here!  Even still, I love the final result and how the purple really stands out against the gold.  I think Justin Bieber would be proud! 😀

My Favorite Gold

I haven’t tried this Nicole by OPI shade yet- and I figured it would be a great glitzy color for the 3 day weekend!  I just found out yesterday that I have bronchitis, and now I’m surprisingly really happy!  I have been sick for ten days, so I’m glad to finally have a diagnosis and some meds.  This shiny gold polish is perfect for me today since it matches my good mood.

This shade is called My Favorite Gold and it’s part of the Justin Bieber collection.  This gold is super shiny, glam and is really an eye-catcher.  It’s one of those polishes that really glows!  If I dare venture out of the house today I can imagine getting a lot of compliments on it.  The formula was iffy- it did dry fast, but man- did it need a lot of coats?!  Shown in my pics is 5 coats… and I could almost go for a 6th!  If I turn my hand just right I can still see some visible nail line.  Next time I’ll have to use a white or yellow base coat underneath it.  I also decided to spice up this mani a little bit with some fimo flowers.  Has anyone used these before?  The flowers seem small at first glance, but once I apply them to the nail I realize how big they really are.  They take up way more space than I planned.  I wish they were a bit daintier…. but they’re still fun to use as an embellishment once in a while.

My Favorite Gold came in a two pack along with I’m a Belieber and I noticed a funny typo on the box.  There’s a couple words printed on the packaging- fashion, art and DYI.  DYI?  What’s that?  I think they meant to say DIY!  Hehehe… I love finding random typos.