Colorful Leopard Print

I'm back! If you want to know why I was gone, see this post. Its too much to summarize again. Oh my goodness, I missed you guys so much! To all of those who stuck with me during my absence, thank you! To those who left, I hope you come back soon. And to those who are new, welcome!

So many of the upcoming posts are old-ish manicures. However, this one is brand new. I hit the blogs for inspiration and ended up wanting to recreate this gorgeous leopard print by Chalkboard Nails. For mine, I used Zoya Pippa, Essence Let's Get Lost, and Sally Hansen Black Out. Leopard print is an easy design, even for the nail art challenged. I love it!

I'm trying out a new watermark technique. Let me know what you think.

Halloween Water Marble

I hope you are enjoying your Friday! I have another part of the This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge to share with you. Today is water marbling. This was my first time doing an actual water marble. I've done one marble before and scooped it out with a piece of plastic, but this is the first time my fingers have actually been dunked. It was fun, frustrating, and messy.

Not the best, but not the worst. And please excuse the mess. The clean up was difficult. I taped off the skin around my nails, but the polish still got on me. I used Pure Ice Super Star! as my base. For the marble, Beauty UK Black, Sally Hansen Die-Hard Fan, and NYC Times Square Tangerine.

Butterfly Tattoo

I hope you are enjoying your Friday! I have attempted to use regular temporary tattoos as part of a manicure twice. The first time was a bit of mess. I tried cutting down a large tattoo to fit across all of my fingers. I had trouble lining it up well. It just did not work. I'm happy to say that the second attempt went much better. I used a smaller design and only did an accent finger.

I cut a blue butterfly temporary tattoo in half, one piece for each ring fingernail. I applied it exactly as you would to skin. Press the paper on, tattoo side down. Wet with water and hold for several seconds. It transferred very well. Top coat did not smudge or drag it at all. Removal was also very easy.

I love the look of it. Little bits of sparkle show through the blue. A temporary tattoo makes for a very easy design. Quick and simple.

Sally Hansen Diamond

I hope you are enjoying your Thursday! Today I have a very pretty holographic polish to show you. I have a few silver holos, but this one is different than the rest I own.

Sally Hansen Diamond is part of the Nail Prisms line. It is a gorgeous light silver scattered holo. The application was great. No pulling or bald spots like some experience with holos. It took three thin coats to be completely opaque. The sparkle from this is unbelievable. What appears as slight blurriness on my nails is really just the all the colors and sparkle trying to be captured on camera.

Blue Milk Mushrooms

Its Stamping Sunday! I have not done this challenge in a long time. Which makes me sad. So I'm making an effort to start again. This week's theme is 'Poisonous and Toxic." It took me a long time to decide on a design. Spiders, snakes, and bats are all venomous not poisonous (if they are deadly at all). I finally found something poisonous that I had a stamp for. YAY!

Lactarius indigo, also known as the blue milk mushroom, ranges from light blue to dark blue. They can be poisonous. They are very pretty if you see pictures.

To create those lovely fungi on my accent nail, I started with two coats of Pure Ice Wild Thing. Then I sponged on Ulta The Jungle Look and Sinful Colors Black on Black. Finally I added my blue mushroom with BM-302 and Sally Hansen Pacific Blue. The rest of my nails are two coats of Pacific Blue.

BM stamping plates are part of a 25 piece set (the 2012 one) that retails for $22 on Bundle Monster or their Amazon store. Pure Ice retails for $2 at Walmart and Bari Cosmetics. Ulta Nail Lacquer retails for $6 at Ulta. Sinful Colors retail for $2 at Walgreens (online/in store) and Target (in store). They're also available for $2.50 at Cherry Culture. Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear retails for $2-3 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta.

Whimsical Mellow Yellow

I hope you are enjoying your Wednesday! Today, I have a pretty Spring combination to show you.

Someone on PAA mentioned layering Revlon Whimsical over Sally Hansen Mellow Yellow. I had to try it. I love it! This is two coats of each. Though Mellow Yellow rarely wants to dry on me, so this manicure did not last long. I will do this layering combination again with Zoya Pippa next time. 

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear retails for $2-3 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta. Revlon retails for $4-5 at Walgreens, Riteaid, Ulta, CVS, Target, and Walmart.

For the Love of Train

Its Stamping Sunday! Yes, it is that time of the week again. :) The theme is Inspired by Music. It could be our favorite artist, album, artist/band, et cetera. I chose to do a song by Train. Given I have a limited amount of stamp images, I listened to my favorite Train songs to see which one I could do.

Not perfect considering my limited collection, but it was fun to do. I was inspired by Save Me San Francisco by Train. I based each nail on a different piece of the lyrics as the story goes along. Index: "We took the highway to the One, up the coast to catch some sun." I did a base coat of Cosmetic Arts Sky High with Sinful Colors Snow Me White clouds. Then I stamped a sun with Konad Yellow and plate BM01. Middle: "I drove into Seattle rain, fell in love then missed the train." I did the same base as my index finger, then stamped on the Seattle Space Needle with Sally Hansen Night Flight and plate BM15. Ring: "If I could wish upon a star." I did a base coat of Sinful Colors Black on Black with Midnight Blue sponged on and a layer of China Glaze Fairy Dust. Next I stamped on stars with Wet n Wild Silvivor and plate BM21. At the time, I had misplaced the plate with a single star, so I used my full nail design and just stamped one of the stars. Finally, Pinky: "But there's a wide-eyed girl back there, and she means everything... everything." I used  Look by Bipa Metallic Matt as my base before I stamped on Love with Love My Nails New Love and plate BM09.

Wet n Wild retail for $1-2 at CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, Ulta, and many other stores, all of which are listed on their website. Cosmetic Arts retail for $2 at Ross (I'm unsure where else they are sold, if anywhere else). Sinful Colors retail for $2 at Walgreens (online/in store) and Target (in store). They're also available for $2.50 at Cherry Culture. Konad Special Polish (for stamping) retails for $6.80 on their website. Sally Hansen Insta-Dri retails for $3-5 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta. China Glaze retails for $5-10 a bottle at Sally Beauty Supply, Ulta, and various other stores/sites. Love My Nails retail for $1 at Bari Cosmetics.


If you want to listen to the song that inspired my nails, click the song title you see above. Or click here if you would rather see lyrics. :)

Happy Easter

I hope you are enjoying your Sunday! And your Easter if you celebrate it! I have a cute Easter manicure to show you today.

I was inspired by several different manicures that I found on Pinterest. All of them can be found on my Polish Likes and Inspiration board on Pinterest. I used Sinful Colors Unicorn, Snow Me White, Black on Black, San Francisco, Sally Hansen Lacey Lilac, Wet n Wild Tickled Pink, Lavender Creme, Pure Ice Wild Thing, Cosmetic Arts Sky High, and Dahlia Orange.

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear retails for $2-3 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta. Sinful Colors retail for $2 at Walgreens (online/in store) and Target (in store). They're also available for $2.50 at Cherry Culture. Wet n Wild retail for $1-2 at CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, Ulta, and many other stores, all of which are listed on their website. Pure Ice retails for $2 at Walmart and Bari Cosmetics. Cosmetic Arts retail for $2 at Ross (I'm unsure where else they are sold, if anywhere else). Dahlia retails for $4 at various sites online.

Cheshire Cat

I hope you are enjoying your Tuesday! I have what I hope is a cute design to show you today. It did not turn out exactly as I wanted.

The Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland. I did all of my fingers except for my middle with a water/dry marble technique. I followed this tutorial on More Nail Polish. Except instead of using a thick piece of plastic, I placed wax paper in the water. When my marble was ready, I cut a hole in the paper and pulled it out. The water drained and the marble landed on the wax paper. The marble itself came out very well, but the transferring to my fingers was a little difficult. Practice makes perfect though.

For the marble, I used L.A. Colors Nuclear Energy and Sally Hansen Lacey Lilac. I painted on a base coat of Nuclear Energy then added the marble. The Cheshire Cat smile is a base coat of Sinful Colors Black on Black then Snow Me White and Ulta Sun-sational.

L.A. Colors retail for around $1 and can be found at most Dollar stores.  Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear retails for $2-3 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta. Ulta Nail Lacquer retails for $6 at Ulta. Sinful Colors retail for $2 at Walgreens (online/in store) and Target (in store). They're also available for $2.50 at Cherry Culture. 

Spring Flowers

Its Stamping Sunday! This week's theme is Large Flowers. I tried for something very Spring like.

I used two coats of Cosmetic Arts Sky High, a light blue creme, as my base. Then I used stamping plates BM06 (one flower) and BM09 (two flowers). Both designs have similar flowers. I filled in the green first before the purple then stamped the two colored design on. For the green, I used Ulta The Jungle Look and for the purple, I used Sally Hansen Raspberry Race. Both cremes stamped very well.

Cosmetic Arts retail for $2 at Ross (I'm unsure where else they are sold, if anywhere else). Sally Hansen Insta-Dri retails for $3-5 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta. Ulta Nail Lacquer retails for $6 at Ulta.

Girly Girl Nail Art Challenge Day 4 - Inspired by the Runway

I hope everyone is enjoying their Thursday! I have another design for the Girly Girl Nail Challenge for you today.

This challenge lasts a month and includes eight different days of nail art. Instead of trying to keep up with a new nail design each day, we have two each week. Day Four is Inspired by the Runway: What is your favorite trend this season? Show us your stylish mani!

I do not really follow trends, especially the runway. I generally buy and wear what I find pretty or flattering. So I searched through pictures of the runway trends for Spring 2012. I actually love the patterns. I almost did color blocking in bold shades of blue and orange, which seems popular this year. But I went instead with pastels inspired by the above design by Luca Luca.

I used two coats of Essence You Belong to Me then waited for it to dry. Once dry, I taped off one finger at a time and painted on a coat of Sally Hansen Mint Sorbet. I immediately peeled the tape off. Easy color blocking. My nails kind of remind me of mismatched plastic Easter eggs.

Essence Colour & Go retail for $1 at Ulta, H-E-B, and Fred Meyer. Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear retails for $2-3 at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Target, and Ulta.

Please check out the other lovely bloggers participating in this challenge. :)

Amanda of Nox Nails
Amanda of Berry Polished
Ashley of Smashley Sparkles

Bethany of  A Plethora of Nails
ChiChi of I'm just me...ChiChi
CR of Color Me Silly

Danielle of Polish. Glitter. Rock & Roll
Elly of Polishable

Emily of TheLacquerologist

Eugenia of Talon-ted

Jess of LuvMyLacquer

Jodi of CaptivatingClaws

Johanna of Neues vom Kellerkind

Kate of This Charming Kate

Kelly of Devilish Polish

Lindsey of Neverland Nail Blog
Lizzy of The Do It Yourself Lady

Olivia of Unprofessional Nails
Robin, Erin, and Anna of Polished Cousins

Sarah of See Sarah Swatch

Stephanie of A Little Polish
Tressa of O' Natur Nail

Cupcake Nails

I hope everyone is enjoying their Monday! This week's Monday Nail Art Challenge on Polish-aholics Anonymous is Water Marble/Happy Birthday. As a joke, Krissi (admin on PAA) threw in the option to vote for her birthday as a theme. She's awesome and we love her, so water marble and her birthday pretty much tied. The one time I attempted a water marble, it was a brown mess, so I decided birthday was a better choice.

I followed a tutorial from CutePolish with a little tweaking. For most of my nails and the base of my cupcake, I used Wet n Wild Tickled Pink as a base and Lavender Creme for the stripes as well as for the candy heart. The icing is Sinful Colors Snow Me White. The sprinkles are Sally Hansen Lacey Lilac, Cosmetic Arts Sky High, Sinful Colors Unicorn, and Wet n Wild Tickled Pink. 

I definitely need more practice. Doesn't help that my hands shake a little due to a hereditary trait. Its not noticeable unless I'm doing certain things. Like painting tiny details or taking camera pictures without a flash.

Sinful Colors retail for $2 at Walgreens (online/in store) and Target (in store). They're also available for $2.50 at Cherry Culture. Wet n Wild retail for $1-2 at CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, Ulta, and many other stores, all of which are listed on their website. Sally Hansen retail for $2-3 (the Xtreme Wear) at Walgreens, Walmart, Riteaid, Ulta, etc. Last but not least, Cosmetic Arts retail for $2 at Ross (I'm unsure where else they are sold, if anywhere else).

Shattered Hearts

I hope everyone is enjoying their Monday! This week's Monday Nail Art Challenge on PAA is "Love Me, Love Me Not" or Valentine's Day/Anti Valentine's Day. I've done a few cute Valentine's manis, so I thought Anti Valentine's Day was in order.

In the top two pictures, you get to see rightie make an appearance. Since I'm right handed, I generally take pictures of my left hand. However, I liked the heart on my right hand better, so I had to get a picture.

On my index fingers, I used two coats of Sinful Colors Snow Me White then layered Sally Hansen Cherry Smash using a heart stencil I cut out. I wanted little shattered hearts. On the rest of my fingers, I used two coats of Wet n Wild Red Tape then China Glaze Lightning Bolt.