Pink Camo!

It’s Father’s Day in the US today !  My dad is the best!  He’s what you’d call a Mr. Fix It.  It’s so comforting to know that if the crap hits the fan – my daddy will be able to fix it it for me!  He’s a woodworker and a real outdoorsman too.  He’s into camping, hunting and all the typical guy stuff.. so I thought it would be fitting to try some camouflage nails for today’s holiday!

I was googling images of camo for like ever… until I decided to just pick up a brush and go for it!  As my dad would say, ‘stop farting around and get to work’.  So that’s what I did and here’s what I came up with!  There’s no planning needed- just pick a few camo colors and start painting some splotches!  I started with a very light pink base color called Kiss the Bride by Orly.  Then I used a detail nail art brush to paint the splotches using China Glaze Dance Baby (medium pink), China Glaze Westside Warrior (dark army green) and Orly Faint of Heart (cream grey).  I also did a gradient accent nail using the same colors and some silver studs.  Lastly, a matte topcoat works well to transform it all into a smooth uniform design.  I love my MASH Matte topcoat!

Have you tried camo nails before?  If not, you might want to give it a go!

DIY Glequins… sorta!

I’ve seen so many cute nail designs online lately using glequins.  (A glequin is a big piece of glitter that’s kinda like a sequin.)  For some reason I haven’t purchased any yet!  I don’t have a lot of beauty supply stores near me so I’d hafta order them online.  Since that hasn’t happened yet- I decided to make my own!  You can too if you have a polish with kinda big glitter pieces in it!

All you do is simply dab some of your glitter polish onto your work surface (glossy paper works great for this technique).  No- I didn’t dab it on my kitteh’s face- this is a cut up piece of a kitty wall calendar (repurposed work surface post). Then grab a toothpick or dotting tool and fish out some of the big pieces of glitter.  It’s as easy as that!  Sure, you waste a few drops of polish… but now you have a bunch of glequins set aside for your cool nail art ideas!

Check out my glequin creation below!  For this design I painted my nails with 2 coats of China Glaze Westside Warrior which is a nice funky army green.  Then I painted two coats of glitter polish on top called Get Carried Away! by China Glaze (but I kept my ring finger plain in preparation of my glequins!)  Then I painted some clear polish on top of my green nail (to make a sticky surface) and I strategically placed my glequins on top using my dotting tool.  Quick, easy and fun! 

What a creative way to make good use of your glitter polishes!  Check out your glitter polish stash- you may have a bottle that would be perfect for DIY glequins!  (When Monkeys Fly by OPI comes to mind!)

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

I finally attempted my first water marble!  I’ve watched so many youtube videos on water marbling that I thought I might ace the technique on my first try.  Well, that was a good theory.  I did have some issues… mostly because of water temperature I think.  I used filtered water as everyone suggests, but my water may have been too cold because the polish didn’t spread out over the surface well.  Also, I found that not all polishes behave the same way in water.  I had to eliminate my white wet n wild polish because it was being a huge P.I.T.A. !  After 4 or 5 tries with different temps and polishes-  this is what I came up with.  Not too bad for a first timer I suppose.  I love all the Irish colors!  Oh, and if anyone has any marbling tips- please leave me a comment!

Hope everyone has a fantastic St. Patrick’s Day!  I will be cooking a turkey.  It’s not traditional at all, but I felt the need to cook this weekend and that’s what I had in the freezer !  My boyfriend is busy painting so I will occupy myself in the kitchen.  No St. Patty’s pub crawl for this girl!

Sally Hansen ♣ Golden-I

Sally Hansen ♣ Emerald City

China Glaze ♣ Westside Warrior

AVON ♣ Orange Creamsicle

Morning Burst

I’m calling this manicure Morning Burst because it was inspired by my Clean & Clear facial wash that I use every morning.  How corny is that lol?  Sometimes we find inspiration in the strangest places.  My orange and yellow pump bottle of Morning Burst has a cute dotted sunburst design on it and I wanted to simulate that.  I changed up the color combo a bit as you can see- I wanted an excuse to use a bunch of my favorite polishes all at once!

I enjoy dotting designs because they seem less intimidating than free-hand painting.  I’m always afraid that my free-hand work will come out like crap.  Keep in mind that I live with a man that could arguably be one of the most talented painters in the US today…  so I might have a slight inferiority complex or something.  I stuck to dotting tools for this design and I think it came out cute!  I will probably take it off before I head back to work tomorrow though.  It is a little crazy- and there’s just so many colors in here that I doubt I will find a coordinating outfit lol!  Here’s a list of the polishes I used …

GREEN ♥ China Glaze Westside Warrior

YELLOW ♥ Sally Hansen Yellow Kitty

PINK ♥ China Glaze Dance Baby

NAVY ♥ China Glaze First Mate