Snowy Nails

Dear Nail Diary,

This was supposed to be a Mani Monday but I'm a bit behind.  To make up I'll give you a double feature!

I'll start with my Mom's as I did hers first.  It's based on the design of the Glossybox I received last December.  To recreate it I started off with two coats of Collection 2000 - Buried Treasure over a base coat, as it was the closest shade I owned to the box which is a sort of warm/rose gold colour.

I then sponged China Glaze - White on White onto the tips of her index, middle and little fingers.  On those same fingers I haphazardly dabbed China Glaze - Chillin' With My Snowmies in a kind of snowfall gradient.  I still had to place some of them to keep the biggest glitters away from the bottom of the nail.

On her thumb and ring fingers I simply sponged Nails Inc - Champagne Graffiti to the desired amount, as I still wanted a tiny bit of the rose gold to come through.


My nail design has been influenced by several nail art designs I've been looking at on Pinterest - where you can also find me.
I started with two coats of Ciatè - Morning Dew and added a coat of Seche Vite.  Once it was fully dry I added snowflake vinyls, which are part of Twinkled T's Holiday Vinyl Bundle.  I however got them as part of their Limited Edition Holiday Bundle.  Anyway, I painted over the vinyls with China Glaze - I'd Melt For You and a little of Ciatè - Looking Glass.  I then added a matte topcoat to let the iridescence of the Morning Dew "shine" through in a different way.

For my ring finger, I painted two coats of China Glaze - White on White and then a coat of Butter London - Frilly Knickers and finally a matte top coat.  Once that was fully dry I sponged on Barry M - Silver around the tip and up the side of my nail and then poured on some fine silver glitter and brushed off the excess. On top of this I also dabbed light glitter coats of Essie - A Cut Above and London Girl - 42 and added a thick coat of Seche Vite, careful not to get any on the matte part of my nail.

Unbelievably I've chipped this already, so hopefully later this week I'll be posting a new mani.

>:x

Mani Monday: Candy Cane Lane

Dear Nail Diary,

As promised here is the first of my Holoday Nails, before I do my Mom's and potentially ruin them.  Also if you want to get technical there isn't actually any holo in this design, only iridescence and sparklies.  I was desperate to try my new candy cane stripe vinyls - now they are holo! I started off with a base of Barry M - Lady.  It's a textured polish, but a couple coats of SV sorted that out.  I then applied the vinyls and painted on Nails Inc - St James.  I was just going to leave it there but there seemed to be something missing...

More sparkle!  So I glued on some square rhinestones and added another coat of SV.  However it still wasn't enough...

So lastly I stamped a filigree style design on the tips of my nails using China Glaze - I'd Melt For You and added a final couple of coats of SV.  It's been a couple of days and I'm impressed I haven't lost any rhinestones yet as I've usually lost at least one an hour after I've done my nails.

I'll be back when I've done my Mom's nails as I forgot to take a photo of the design I last did for her.

=:x

George and the Dragon

Dear Nail Diary,

I apologise if the nail art is looking a little worse for wear in these photos, I've been meaning to take pictures for a few days, but I've been too ill to take them.  Yesterday however, one chipped completely off the nail on my other hand so I thought I'd better get a photo while I still can.

I love the two green holo polishes from A England - Saint George and Dragon and I wanted to build a design around them.  I started off with this Dragon Scale Triple Gradient tutorial from Simply Nailogical:-

It was the first time I've tried a scaled gradient and while it ccame out okay, it seemed pretty basic just on it's own, so I decided to add some elements.  Using a dragon vinyl from Twinkled T's Mythical Creatures collection, I painted it using Nails Inc's red/orange duochrome glitter polish - New Burlington Place.  On my next three fingers I stamped a fiery looking tribal stamp with an orangey/gold shimmer polish from Avon that I've had for ages.  I also painted a light coat of China Glaze's Golden Enchantment on top of the flames.  Duochrome dragons breathe golden holo fire, don't you know? ;)

Wouldn't you know my camera died just before I could take this last photo, so I had to take it with my tablet.  My thumb is what my duochrome dragon is protecting - its treasure room.  I did a quick glitter gradient using OPI/Gwen Stefani - Don't Speak and a thin layer of the golden holo on top.

Next time I'll have photos of the first of my Holoday nails!

=:x

Furry Fail

Dear Nail Diary,

I forgot I hadn't posted this.  I recently bought some nail vinyls from Twinkled T (among other things) and was desperate to try this idea I'd had to honour my cat who died a couple of months ago.  Cristine from Simply Nailogical has these cat cyclone vinyls and I wanted to see how they'd look combined with the flocking powder I got from Bundle Monster.  I imagined a really cool texture effect between the A England polish I'd chosen and the furriness of the powder, however the end result wasn't as impressive.

I think it would have been better if I'd used nail glue or top coat instead of clear polish to adhere the flocking powder.  Also it was obvious right away that I needed a more striking colour of powder if it wasn't going to create the effect I wanted.

I changed to a purple, however that just seemed to emphasize how badly the powder wasn't sticking.  The last time I used the flocking powder it worked really well, but I think that was because I was applying to my entire nail.  I tried a vinyl with a gold holo glitter just to make sure it wasn't my lack of skills with vinyls that was failing me - as you can see, that wasn't the case.

It worked slightly better on my right hand which I did second, so maybe I just need to practice this technique a bit more?

=:x

Back From the Dead

Dear Nail Diary,

Hallelujah, I'm back into nail art again.  I've been in a bit of a slump lately, plus I've been immersed in a jewellery collection I'm currently making/designing and I just haven't been in the mood to have pretty nails.  After skulking around the internet I discovered Simply Nailogical on YouTube and fell in love with her style.  BTW, I am a confirmed Holosexual - check out her videos to find out what that means!  Anyway, I've been so blown away by how far nail art has come in the time I've been away, that I couldn't resist any longer.

So here's what I've been wearing the past week on my nails, while I wait for some new nail art goodies to come from 'Merca...

I'm loving how much more intricate and cool vinyls have become, so before I get the ones I've just ordered from Twinkled T, I made do with some cheap Christmas border stickers I had lying around.  I picked up two random colours from my stash: China Glaze - Define Good and Nails Inc - Lanesborough Place.

I'm really pleased with how it came out, considering being nail vinyls are not these stickers' intended purpose.  The Seche Vite topcoat kind of dragged the design a bit, but other than that it would be a pretty cool look for Christmas I suppose.

=:x