Phone Case Inspired Mani

I recently changed my phone case and thought that the pattern on my old one would make for an interesting nail design.

I think I'm also finding my own style and the type of manicures I like to do most. The last few manicures I did in the last 31 day challenge were around water colour type of effects or abstract art designs. These are what I enjoy most and think look great on my nails.

So here was my next challenge and I managed to dig out quite a few of my untrieds in order to create this look.

I started off with my favorite off-white polish 'My Boyfriend Scales Walls' from OPI as my base. I used an ultra fine long thin nail brush to start the design. I started with black to create the lined diamond shapes you can see above, making them using a variety of long and different shaped lines.

Then I used that same long tipped brush to paint on the other colours around the outside of the black shapes. I started with the orange, then moved on to the pink, purple and finished with the light blue, dark blue and anywhere I thought needed darkening up I went over with the black. Here's the finished result.

Super tricky to get a good pic of this and to capture the colours. Here's a good old close up so you can see the design and get a better idea of how it was created.

Very, very happy with this design and will be looking out for more inspiration from everyday things.

I also had a little splurg a little while ago and here is one of the goodies I horded. Essie's 'Dive Bar' this was a stop gap between my Nail Art attempts.

This was two coats and Top Coat, the first coat was rather patchy but second coat went on like a dream. This polish is a very dark teal with a colour shift to purple, my favorite colours. What are yours?

Day 11 & 12's Challenge - Reversed Polarities?

After getting Day 8's theme a little bit wrong I had to check up on Day 11's title of 'Reversed Polarities'. Luckily for me someone else on Instagram asked The Crumpet to clarify and was given the word Negative. So.... I had a go at a reverse gradient striping tape manicure that I saw Colette from My Simple Little Pleasures do on YouTube. This woman knows how to water marble, her designs are awesome.

Here is Colette's tutorial for this manicure.

I used three polishes to create my look, White (Sinful Colors - Snow Me White) a pale purple (Sinful Colors - Sweet Tooth) and a Navy Blue (Sally Hanson Complete Salon Manicure - Blue Rose). I painted my nails in the pale purple and created a gradient using a makeup sponge painted with the colours to dab on to my nails. Once done I topped with a quick drying top coat and placed three lines of striping ribbon on my nails. Then I used the same technique to create a gradient in the opposite direction over the tape. 

Very happy with the outcome apart from the messy edges around my cuticles.

Next up was a manicure inspired by a film. The last challenge I did included this theme too, I did 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'. This time I used little imagination and went with Hunger Games using China Glaze's 'Electrify' from their Hunger Games collection.

I've only used this polish once before and wasn't keen. This time I layered it over Revlons 'Autumn Spice' a lovely dark shimmery brown and I rather like it!

2015 Nail Challenge

So start as you mean to go on, especially as I neglected my Blog in December. Let's start the New Year off with a Nail Art Challenge!

I follow some amazing ladies on Facebook doing some pretty funky nail designs. One of these ladies called Debbie, otherwise known as 'The Crumpet' has devised the following 2015 Nail Art Challenge.  I love the picture she has of herself, when she was little at the top of her Blog, I have never seen a face so CHEEKY!

First up, I started my Challenge how I ended lasted years by following a tutorial by another of my favourite Bloggers 'The Nailasaurus'. This 'Nimbus Tutorial' is a technique I've wanted to try for a while. I not only followed her tutorial but also her colour scheme, not the exact polishes, but ones that were the closest colour match.

The technique here is to paint a light coloured base coat, I used a very light pastel purple from Sinful Colours in 'Mauve'. Then pick three to four complimentary colours, I used three. Starting with the lightest first, pop a splodge on a palette or bit of plastic/foil and water it down with some acetone until it's watered down but still retains some colour. A bit like painting with water colours.

You can test it on some paper first before applying to your nails, take a cotton bud, dip it in the watered down polish and randomly apply to each nail.

Then do the same with the other two colours. To tie in the whole design The Nailasaurus recommends to use your base colour as the final colour to water down and apply to your nails. You can repeat the whole process with the colours until you get the finish you want.

Polishes I used are, Salon Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in 'Bewitched' GOSH in 'Altered Blue' and Barry M in 'Prickly Pear'. I may have used GOSH in 'Berry Me' too. I can't remember if it was too similar to the Salon Hansen polish.

Day 2 is 'Tape Mani'! I scoured the intertubes for inspiration and wanted to try something different and challenge. I found this on Google from the Sois Polish, check out the lines on their manicure.

Mine was a combination of striping tape and having a go at hand drawing the lines, which didn't work. I love the design and colours, just a bit more practise and more time I think I could tidy up the edges. Polishes users were Sinful Colors 'Snow Me White' as the base, 2true 'Nicole' and Barry M 'Prickly Pear'. 

Big Break after 31 Day Challenge and now a November No Buy!

After the 31 Day Challenge I took a break from nail painting BUT NOT polish buying. The last manicure I did on the challenge was using the cling film (saran wrap) technique and I loved it so much I kept it on as long as I could. The next manicure I did, I tried the same technique only with different colours and it didn't work as well, but still for those of you who appreciate nail art on close inspection would have appreciated it.

Since then I have done a Halloween Manicure...

Using 'Boo-gie Down' from China Glazes Halloween collection from last year and for the orange Sinful Colors 'Cloud 9' in a conscious effort to use some untrieds.

A bit of a mini haul from Poundland and eBay etc... produced this manicure...

Look at that Sinful Colors, this is called 'Pearl Harbour' it looks like something from the deep, those little creatures that live at the bottom of the ocean that have crazy filaments that make them light up.

A small splurge after watching PackAPunchPolish's review of some recent China Glaze collections and a trip to Sallys to pick up Acetone, made this two manicures possible.

This is China Glaze in 'Choo choo chose you' from their 'All Aboard' Fall Collection for 2014. This picture doesn't do the colour shifts on this polish justice, it moves from purple, to gold, to burgundy to brown, gorgeous!

Then this also happened in Sallys...

This is OPI 'Comet in the Sky' glitter topper, just go and look at it in person, to lovely to resist! The last purchase was from Rainbow Connection whilst I was purchasing a top up on my HK Girl quick dry top coat. This is my first and no doubt last Picture Polish purchase.

This is 'Fool's Gold'. I did try to follow ohmygoshpolish tutorial on making these look like turquoise stones but I didn't have much success. Never mind the polish is beautiful without any embellishments. 

Now I have joined forces with other nail addicts and agreed to a November No Buy and I'm keeping a tally on my Untrieds which must be reduced and taken down to less that half of my total collection.

31 Day Challenge - Animal Print and Flowers

Well after being chuffed with my last two manicures for the challenge, I really struggled with Day 13, Animal Print. 

I wanted to do something different, and when looking through my Bundle Monster stamping plates for inspiration I came across a plate that had an Octopus on it, and some rather spectacular tentacles.

I thought, this will be a great idea! I knew what base colour I wanted to use for the sea and the glitter topper I wanted to pair it with... the trouble came with the polish to use for stamping with. I was going to aim for a deep red for the octopus, and maybe something in a metallic finish. Unfortunately all polishes in this arena either didn't show up on this base colour or just didn't stamp well. So this is what I ended up with...

Stamping with the same Barry M Foil Effect polish I used for my metallic manicure on Day 7. You can just about make out the tentacles on my thumb and on the middle finger. Trust me this was the best picture I could get, the images were just not up to scratch. 

I love this deep duo-chrome polish though. It's from Sally Hansen's lustre shine line in 'Scarab'. Perfect for mermaid or peacock nails. Just ruined by my stamping efforts.

Day 14 however proved more fruitful! The challenge was flowers and I saw this post on Pinterest and I thought this is what I'll do! 

Anyway, needless to say mine, didn't quite come out as planned but overall happy with the effect.

I used Barry M's Gelly Shine in 'Blue Grape' and Sinful Colors 'Snow me White' for the accent nail. Both great polishes, particularly impressed with the white from Sinful. I created the flowers using a dotting tool and the two polishes.

More Gradients with Splatter Topper

I picked up Color Shows 'White Splatter' from their Street Artist collection sometime ago and been wanting to wear it ever since, but been distracted by other bottles!

So finally got round to doing a whole mani with the polish and not just an accent nail. 

I googled it first to decide what colour I wanted to layer it over, it looked good over black, maybe a purple, lots of grey and teal colours too. So not being able to decide I thought I'd layer it over at least three in a gradient type of way.

I used, for the grey; Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in 'Dorien Grey'. For the teal; Sinful Colors 'Savage' and for the purple China Glaze 'What a Pansy' from their latest City Flourish Summer 2014 collection. (One of three I picked up on a recent and secret trip to Sallys)

I used the sponge method to layer and overall happy with the end result, although the teal colour did over power the grey and purple due to pigment and formula being much stronger than the other two polishes. Just going to show that Sinful Color polishes being the cheapest of the three are a top notch brand, and I wish they were more available over here, along with their Sinful Shine range.

Teal Ombre Manicure

After my trip to the States and reflecting on the polishes I bought, there are two clear colours that I lean to. Blue and Purple. So in the last week I've started swatching my polishes and grouping them into colour types to review where I have duplicates and also identify polishes that I can use for an ombre manicure.

The above seems to work really well, although the lighter shades are very subtly different. For this look I used:

Thumb - Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in Fairy Teal

Index finger - Sinful Color in Savage (This dry's matt so will need topcoat)

Middle Finger - OPI in Can't Find My Czechbook

Ring Finger - Vivo in Someday

Little Finger - Essie is Where's My Chaffeur

I'm pretty sure I can also do a similar manicure in purples too. Overall I'm happy with the effect, even though the last three nails are very similar at first glance. What I'll try next time too is using the same polish only with white added as per this post I came accross on Pinterest.

  

USA Haul

So a couple of weeks ago I went to the states for the first time, and I was excited to see what polish I could pick up over there, and at a better price in the UK.

I was limited somewhat as we didn't have a car and were reliant on public transport to get around. So I was unable to visit Target or those kind of places that tend to be on retail parks.

However we spent sometime in New York and Boston, and I was able to visit a CVS, a DUANEreade pharmacy and most importantly when in New York a Sephora! 

So then, not too much excitement on the nail front. I acquire three new polishes on my first shop at Walgreens. Two Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicures polishes (above) in 'Mermaid's Tale' and 'Black and Blue'. You can get these at home, but slightly cheaper in the States and I've had my eye on 'Mermaid's Tale' for a while.

The third was a Sally Hansen Lustre Shine Polish in the colour 'Scrab' (pictures on swatches here on the left). Gorgeous Duo Chrome that shifts from Blue to Green, great for a Mermaid manicure topped with 'Mermaid's Tale'.

My next polish purchases were from Sephora and I picked up a Deborah Lippman polish from the new 80's Summer Collection called 'Video Killed the Radio Star'. An amazing bright blue polish (below). Formula fantastic and wore really well, although I didn't base coat it as I had none with me at the time, and it stained some of my nails pretty bad.

I topped it with my other purchase Nails Inc ' Floral Street Mews' on the accent nail. I've not had a great experience with Nails Inc polishes before, but this one is a glitter with light pink and white glitter and blue and white flowers. Also swatched above on the right swatch at the front.

The last four polishes I bought were from DUANEreade and were, OPI's ' Yoga-Ta Get This Blue' (Right back in the swatch picture). In the bottle looks like a duo chrome that shifts from blue to purple but this doesn't translate on to the nail unfortunately. 

Next Sally Hansen's 'Save The Date' which is a dark plum/purple metallic with very fine shimmer (Left back in the swatch picture). 

A Milani polish, which I have never seen over here in the UK, called 'Sugar High' (Left front in the swatch picture). It has gold, peach, lime green and blue glitters. It looks like sprinkles for a cake.

The last polish I bought was Sinful Color's 'Mint Apple' a cool Blue/Green polish with a slight shimmer. Perfect from Spring/Summer and I used this for the manicure below topped with a blue/green glitter from Technic.

So all in all, 9 polishes purchases and I'd say nothing really out of the ordinary and apart from some of the Sally Hansen and the Milani nothing that you can't really get over here. 

However I did spurge on some make up at Sephora, I'll do a separate post on these. My nail varnish addiction seems to be now expanding to make up in general. I also found out that Sephora ship to the UK too for not too much money, this is bad, very bad...

Mini Haul and Revlon Chroma Chameleon Mani

So I mentioned previously that I bought 16 polishes in one day, and here they are in all their glory. Starting off with the three Revlon chroma chameleon polishes. The above mani was with the 'Colbalt' colour and has a slight shift from blue to purple in the bottle, however on the nail it just looks metallic blue. I topped my accent nail off with OPI's 'Polka.com' but was a bit of a rushed mani as you can see and I've taken the polish off.

The other two polishes I bought were 'Topaz' and 'Gold'. The picture above captures the colours really well in the bottles, unfortunately the effect doesn't translate on to the nail quite as much.

The next four polishes are Sally Hansen, the two on the left are from the Xtreme Wear range and are 'Kiwi Bikini' and 'Pinch of Punch'. The two on the right are from the Sugar Coat range and are both matt textured polishes, the black is call 'Lick-O-Rich and the yellow is 'Sweetie'. I've not worn any of these, but I think I'll give the yellow an outing in the Spring/Summer.

All these polishes so far were a £1 each Pound Land including the seven Sinful Color's below. Only the brown in these polishes claims to be a Matt polish however most of the colours when swatched seem to be too. Not a problem for me as I top coat everything anyway.

The Fuchsia colour at the front of each picture is called 'Dream On' and is gorgeous bright fuchsia colour, I've not captured it well on these pictures as it's much much brighter.

Left picture shows from left to right, 'Ruby Ruby', 'Timbleberry' (A lovely coral colour), 'I Miss You' (A blue, silver, and purple glitter is a purple base) and 'Dream On'.

Right picture from left to right 'Dream On', 'Savage', 'Nirvana' (The matt brown polish) and 'Cool Gray' which I used in my second geometric manicure.

Swatch above shows from left to right, 'Nirvava', 'Timbleberry', 'Dream On', 'I Miss You' and 'Savage'. The colours again aren't true to the polishes themselves and I'm starting to lose the light now, but you can see these have a matt finish.

The last two polishes I bought were GOSH in 'Berry Me' a gorgeous burgundy/purple polish and Color Show 'Nearly Black' which is a matt textured polish from their Crystallize range. (Swatch on the right). It has purple, teal and gold micro glitter in a dark brown base. Interestingly enough I thought this polish was the same as a matt glitter polish I bought from GOSH called 'Frosted Plum'. I swatched them both when doing this blog post to compare. Turns out the GOSH polish is an exact dupe of Barry M's 'Countess' from their latest textured range. I cannot tell the difference!

So that was my 16 polishes in one day adventure. Most at a bargain price, keep checking out your local Pound Shops they seem to get new polishes in all the time and both of the Sally Hansen polishes I have never seen before. The Color Show was buy one Maybelline product and get another half price at Superdrug so that cost me £2 and the only polish I paid full whack for was the GOSH. But I really wanted a polish in exactly this colour. 

All in all a successful shopping trip and I endeavour to wear them all within the next couple of months, so far I've worn 4 so not bad. I have some work to do...

Geometric Nails - Part 2

I have a confession to make. 

When shopping the other week.

 I bought 16 polishes in one day! 

However... 14 of these were from Pound Land and included the above Sinful Colors polish in 'Cool Gray'.

Pound Land have a great selection of Sinful Colors, the Boots near me who were carrying the brand seem to have discontinued them and no longer do. I bought several Sinful Colors, 3 of the Revlon Chameleon polishes, 2 Sally Hansen Sugar Coats (a textured polish) and 2 Sally Hansen Extreme Wear polishes which I've never seen anywhere in the UK before.

So work night out in Manchester and I chose the above manicure, could have spent a little more time on these as the blue was a little messy. I used scotch tape to create the triangles and Sally Hansen's Complete Salon Manicure in 'Blue Rose'. Might be why the blue is so messy, the brushes on these polishes are like shovels.

Other news, started to see people talking about the new OPI Sheer Tints polishes, these are coloured top coats that you can layer over each other and other polishes. Temped to buy the minis set to try them out which you can get at Amazon. However I came across the post on Pinterest on how to make your own Sheers Tints Polishes. 

Mermaid Manicure

Lazy mid-week manicure, I brought this GOSH 'Ocean' polish down to try and stamp with at the weekend but hadn't used it. So uninspired by my last manicure I needed a change and not having used this polish ever I thought that'll do!

Lovely shimmer and shift effect from a teal blue to a green and if that wasn't enough I thought a dash of sparkle would improve the look. So I topped with Sinful Colors 'Kissy' which is a perfect match for this polish. 'Kissy' is a blue\green jelly with gold micro glitter that shimmers and shifts this polish from blue to blue-y green and green. A perfect combination for the GOSH base polish.

I was going to use NYC's 'Green Day' Smoky Top Coat to finish off the look, but I applied it to my accent nail first and decided it was too dark and needed a different colour to compliment and define it better.

 Again 'Green Day' is another polish which I had not tried. I'd had my eye on it for sometime but never bought. NYC polishes are something like £1.99 from Superdrug and I picked up this and 'Rock Muse' another smoky top coat for £1.99 all together as it was BOGOF!!! 'Green Day' is a sheer black base nail polish with medium green circle glitters and gold and silver micro glitter. You may be able to get it opaque in 3 coats, but it's a Top Coat as it say on the bottle, so lets see what I can pair it with next. Any suggestions?