The Music Man(icure)

Good day! Today I would like to share another nail design featuring a Born Pretty Store stamping plate :)

#31DC2014 - Day 22 - Inspired by a SONG

Yo man, let's get outta here. Word to yo motha.

Oh, hi! Today is day 22 of the 31-Day Challenge--nails inspired by a song! I actually got my days mixed up, and had my movie nails ready to go tonight when I realised my mistake. Fortunately, I already knew what I wanted to do for my music nails, and was able to complete the mani fairly quickly! The downside to this is that it's late and I didn't get any sunlight pics. I might add one tomorrow (update--I did!), but for now, all I have is flash photos. You may have already guessed the song I chose...

Indoors with flash. If I had time to redo the blue nails and add another coat, I would. I didn't know I'd have such awful nail line showing--without flash it's not visible at all--and why does it look so dark? o_o

A polish named after a song I happen to always keep on my iPod? Of course I had to use it :D  And this is a song that never gets old, I swear. I always have to sing along when I hear it, and I jammed out to it while painting these. I even have this t-shirt. It is absolutely my guilty pleasure and I make no apologies xD

For all nails except the middle finger, I used two coats of China Glaze Blue Years Eve, and atop that, the signature polish for this look--a glitter topper by Confetti called Ice Ice Baby! It's got the most lovely electric blue glitters ever. These photos don't do it justice at all. You can get a better idea of it in different lighting here and here.

For the feature nail... okay, kids, gather 'round. Once upon a time, in order to buy music, one had to purchase little plastic cartridges called cassette tapes. A little later, this changed to plastic discs called CDs. Cassettes and CD's came in little protective clear plastic cases, which featured album artwork. And the album artwork for Vanilla Ice's single Ice Ice Baby looked like this:

So I used Revlon Colorstay #120 Red Carpet (just one coat!) as a base, and then with black and yellow-mixed-with-green acrylic paints, I freehanded the design. Lastly, a nice layer of Seche Vite to seal them all in and make 'em super shiny!

Best photo, except for it being upside down.

Still no sunlight here, but you can see the way the glitter looks in natural light, aka most of the time. Icy!

So there's my "inspired by a song" mani! I hate that I had to rush it, but I hope you liked it anyway. Come back later for an update to this post (edit: done! see above!), and a little later for the next prompt! xoxo

Spider-Man Nails -- The Lacquer Legion Does Fandom!

G'day, boys and girls! It's time for another Lacquer Legion themed collaboration! This month, we celebrate the things in life we geek out for! TV shows, movies, sports teams, celebrities, comic books, you name it! Whatever you pay to go see, whatever you get excited about, whatever you have posters and T-shirts and collectible tributes to--put it on your nails!

I actually had to think a bit for this. I don't really watch TV, and I've already done manis celebrating my favourite sports teams, movie, book... what to do? Oh, comic books! My two favourites are Iron Man and the Amazing Spider-Man. As you cleverly ascertained from the title of this post, I went with the latter :D

Blue Fuzzy Hearts + Metallic Doodles

Hi-dee ho, neighbour!

Happy Sunday, for most of you! It's nearly Monday here now, but either way, it's about 11 hours before the Super Bowl. And in rather unusual fashion for me, today's manicure has nothing to do with it. (But, go Broncos, put that big-mouth Sherman in his place >.> )

*ahem* right. Nails! It's February, and thus I will kick off Valentiney designs--or just other cute or soft romantic-type looks that can be worn any time! Today's falls more in the "cute whimsical" sort of category.

Let's start with the materials I used! A few days ago, I went to a discount cosmestic store I found in a local shopping centre, and found this cute "velvet nails" kit from BYS, with polish and matching flocking powder. As soon as I saw it, I suddenly wanted to do blue fuzzy hearts with it on a yellow background. And then I started thinking about what I could do around that, and remembered I had some gel pens, one of which matched this colour perfectly:

See? A match made in heaven.

I started with a base of Confetti Margarita Senorita, a nice lemony-yellow creme. I never noticed this before, but it dries SO shiny on its own. Here is a shot of it pre-decoration: 2 coats and no topcoat!

I just noticed the ring fingernail looks darker. It's just an angle thing.

Once that was completely dry, I used the blue polish from the Velvet kit and a small brush to paint hearts on all my nails. I then used the metallic blue gel pen to doodle around the hearts--dots, shapes, zig-zags, whatever. I got a photograph right after this step:

because...

I swear I don't go into these posts intending to incorporate a meme. They just happen.

And sure enough, I got a little bit of smearing, but not too much. I applied the first layer of topcoat (KBShimmer Clearly On Top) very quickly and lightly--you float the polish onto the nail without the brush actually touching the surface--and managed to keep the doodles mostly intact. A second more careful layer smoothed everything out, and I let that dry completely.

Finally, I added a layer of a slow-drying clear polish over just the hearts, and dipped them into the flocking powder. I did not anticipate this, but the powder was sort of clumped together at first. Next time I'll open it ahead of time and "stir" the fluffy bits before I try to whack my nail into it. Instead of smooth fuzz, I ended up with little fluffballs in some areas. However, I managed to get them all done, and once that dried and I brushed away the extra fuzz...

fuzzy hearts!

How cute is that? :D

I'm not sure how long these will stay fuzzy, but after washing my hands several times + cooking dinner and getting oil and such on them, they are still fairly soft. I'm totally petting my nails every five minutes. That's not weird... right? ;)

I am glad I finally got to try out the velvet nail thing. I know it's soooooo several trends ago, but whatevs. It's fun and cute and I dig it. Plus I am still loving how closely the gel pen I already had matches the stuff in the set! Couldn't have been more perfect.

Thanks for coming by! See you next time xoxo

Alphabet Challenge: I is for... I Don't Give Icicles in Rotterdam

Weird title is weird.

Good day! Wow, it's been a week since I posted. I have a good excuse this time, though: my car was hit! While I was sitting inside playing Xbox and minding my own business, even. :o  (Also a special visitor in town, and some international folks coming in for meetings and dinners at work... busy week!) So the last few days have been a whirlwind of work appointments and sorting out the car. But my dear KITT will be fine soon :D It's not too bad, just some damage to the rear bumper and one of the tail lights >.<

Anyway, you've waited this long, on to the nails! In keeping with the Alphabet Challenge, today's letter was I:

Icy?

There's sort of a funny story with the polishes I used for this one. I found the silver (China Glaze Icicle) and the light shimmery blue (OPI I Don't Give A Rotterdam!) first. I wanted to do a marble and stamp design like this, but needed a third colour. The darker blue went well with the others, but is a mini that came in a set and didn't have a name on the bottle. I decided this would be called OPI I Don't Know, and it would work for this challenge. Hilarious, right? :P

But then I did some thinking, remembered when I got it and which set it was in, and looked up the name. And wouldn't you know? It's called Into The Night (OPI Spider-Man Collection)! Happy coincidence that was!

Anyway, I marbled with those three colours on my small, middle, and index fingers. On my ring and thumb I painted two coats of Into The Night and then stamped the heart image from Red Angel plate #110 using Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Silver Sweep. Yeah, it doesn't start with I, but it stamps more clearly than Icicle does. :P

The glitter is Confetti Ice Ice Baby. It's a gorgeous glitter that looks white-iridescent but flashes electric-blue, dark blue, even purpley-pink at times! I love it. And the name cracks me up xD

Finally, topped with NYC In A New York Minute. See, even my topcoat starts with I!

I rather like how this marble came out.

One showing off the thumb as well. The polishes are colour-accurate. My skin is not >.<

I really enjoyed how the colours and the marble all contributed to a frosty, icy look. Goes well with the polish names.

See you next time with a really special post for the letter J! xoxo

Yellow & Teal Spring Flowers

Hooray! It's *finally* starting to actually feel like spring around here. Been rainy and grey for too long, but today was sunshiney and lovely! I like to think that, similar to a rain dance, this bright manicure I did last night summoned the sun. Behold:

I love yellow and teal/turquoise together :D Indoors with flash.

Isn't it just... happy? :D

Base colour is by the brand Confetti, and is called Margarita Señorita. Three thin coats of that was opaque enough to be a nice sunshiney background! I then used a dotting tool dipped into China Glaze Turned-Up Turquoise (Neon), the bottle pictured in the above shot, to create the flowers and random dots. The centres were made with the same dotter and a random white polish--I think it was Petites #417 French White. Doesn't really matter; they're all the same. Layer of Orly Sec N' Dry topcoat and I was good to go!

I saw a cute swimsuit at the beach last week in yellow and teal and it made me want to do a manicure with those colours.

Outdoors in this lovely sunlight.

This really was such a simple design to execute--it's just a bunch of dots!--but the result can be so pretty. Give it a try sometime with your favourite shades! xoxo

Teal Swirly Nails

Hiya me lovelies! I'm back with some nails that ended up more wintery and appropriate than I expected. I quite like them!

Subtle stamping, always great :)

Base colour is Sinful Colors Mint Apple, which is the perfect cyan I needed in my Pac-Man design for one of the ghosts... lol! I bought it after that, when I realised I didn't have anything like it, and THAT WAS UNACCEPTABLE. (own ALL the polishes!)

I then stamped the swirls from Mash plate #40 and Zoya Zuza. Zuza is a lovely metallic teal shade that stamped well and went perfectly with Mint Apple. Next, I added a coat of a fun new polish I got recently by Confetti, called Ice Ice Baby. It's a clear base with lots of iridescent, teal, and electric blue sparkles. They catch the light and reflect SUPER bright blue! Plus, I love the name :D

Finally, I added a coat of Hard Candy Matte-ly In Love matte topcoat over the index and middle fingers, just to see how it looked. It brought out the glitter in a different way as well as making the metallic stamping look nice.

Tip wear, oh god. IGNORE.

As I said, it seems all wintery and nice with the pretty blue glitter and fanciful swirls.

Hope you're all having a great week :) See you next time! xoxo

Challenge Day #28: Inspired by a FLAG (and, whoops!)

So, oops!

In case anybody noticed, I sort of missed a day. I looked at the list wrong, and skipped the artwork day, #27! Yikes. I will do that one next time, and then get back on track. Only a few more challenge prompts left!

Since the start of this challenge, I've had all kinds of ideas for this prompt--maybe do all ten fingers with a different flag of countries I've been to, or do some really cool detailed flag over all nails making one big image when putting them together... But then I was laying in bed the other day not feeling so great, and staring at my nightstand, where I happen to have a flag I got the first time I ever went to a "foreign" (to me) country. And, being as obsessed with nail art as I am, as soon as my eyes gazed at the Brazilian flag sideways:

behold: a bandeira do Brasil.

..it immediately occurred to me that the top bit looked like a chevron french tip + a half moon, and that I was going to have to paint that shizz ASAP! So... I did.

Cut my nails, too, a bit shorter than I intended. D: But. Yay flags!

As you can see, I went with the basic colour scheme, but a bit brighter! Started with my pretty yellow polish, Confetti #008 Margarita Senorita, that I have mentioned before. I then freehanded the green chevron tips with Sinful Colors #198 Irish Green. It's a quite sheer polish--I had to use at least 3 coats even over the yellow base, so my tips are kind of thick. It's really pretty though! I then used a detail brush to paint on the blue half-moons with Pure Ice's Celestial, and then the white details with Orly Pointe Blanche. Sealed it in with a new topcoat I found, also by Orly, called Sec 'N Dry. So far I'm pretty impressed! It's another multi-layer, quick-dry topcoat. The formula is nice, the brush is good quality, and as you can see, it's quite shiny! Smeared my dots a bit, though. Maybe I didn't wait long enough for them to dry, however, so I won't count this topcoat out yet.

With the inspiration flag.

And another, because I liked this pic.

Hope you enjoyed these! Next time I'll get the artwork nails up, and then get back on schedule! Untli then, take care, and enjoy the rest of your week xoxo

Challenge Day #16: TRIBAL

Aloha! Just a quick one today! Challenge #16 is tribal print, and I had a tough time coming up with something for it. I'm quite familiar with the typical "tribal-print" manicures (Google image search will show you loads of lovely designs, if you're so inclined), but I just don't like them and didn't want to wear one. I started trying to think outside the box. My mother's side of the family is significantly Cherokee Native American, so I thought maybe I'd do something related to that, but... no joy. Lots of good information, but just wasn't feeling inspired. Tribal-tattoo style? I have several stamping plates with images that look like those, but then I decided I didn't want my nails to look like the biceps of a douchebag frat boy that made a bad decision, even if it is only for a day.

I went back to my first idea, the Native American one, and just browsed random pictures. A common (generic) theme is campfires, teepees/wigwams, and feathered headdresses. The idea I ended up with is simple, and far from what people expect from "tribal", but strangely, I like it:

If the stamping had been straight on the ring finger, it'd be even better! But never mind that. FIRE. :D

I wanted to try the two-colour stamping, and then the other image reminded me of three things that I see in the photos a lot: mountains, campsites, and feathers. But I'm getting ahead of myself! The yellow base is a new one (omg, something besides Mellow Yellow? nowai) I found at CVS recently. The brand is Confetti, and this shade is #008 Margarita Senorita. I was impressed with the quality! It's a lighter yellow, more banana or lemon-esque, and was opaque in two coats. It's good to have another high-quality yellow polish in my collection! I then used the flame image from Mash plate #48, and painted the two colours directly onto the image, just one stripe above the other--the red is Revlon Colorstay: #120 Red Carpet, and the orange is Orly's Melt Your Popsicle. I was SUPER pleased with how that came out and will totally do that on its own sometime!

Last, I used the polish you see in the bottle shot above, OPI's Suzi Loves Cowboys to stamp on the row-of-triangle-thingys from Mash plate #28. It's a nice brown--I don't often wear plain brown creme polish, but I bought it to use in nail art, and it came in handy here! A quick coat of Cult Nails Wicked Fast sealed it all in, and I was good to go.

The brown is much richer normally, but in a thin stamping-coat, it matched my nice taupe-ish sheets pretty well, eh?

This may not be a typical "tribal" design, but I like the earthy colour pallette and the imagery it evokes when I look at these. It works for me. And luckily, this is my blog ;)

Th-th-th-that's all, folks! See you next time for challenge day 17, and my ridiculous glitter nails! xoxo