January Golden Oldie Thursday #4

It's the last Thursday in January and our theme today is dots!  I love dots!  I had a few suggestions from friends but when I was looking at things on Pinterest for inspiration, I kept going back to one by A Girl And Her Polish.  You can see it here.  She is amazing!

• China Glaze Sea Spray
• Milani White On The Spot
• Ulta Cream Of The Crop

I started with my trusty base coat and one coat of my undie: Milani White.  I used 2 coats of the White On The Spot and 3 coats of Cream Of The Crop.  I put one coat of Seche Vite on top to seal in those colors and to prepare for dotting.

I really randomly added dots...  I sealed it in with another coat of Seche Vite and called it a day.  Thanks to Katee for such inspiration!

January Tri-Polish Tuesday #4

It's the last Tuesday in January already!  I have loved this challenge so far!  I loved my colors for this one, that I kept them even though we didn't have to.

• OPI Animal-istic
• Pure Ice Twinkle
• Orly Melodious Utopia

I also did my very first stamp nail decal with this manicure.  I can't even tell you how proud of myself I am on how well this turned out!  Not too shabby for my first go!  It seems like I am not the only one who is giving it a try right now - it is hot in the community.  :)

I am in love with this red polish!  I started with a base coat and then painted each nail with 3 coats of the respective polish.  The white is Milani White and then there is the decal..

I used MoYou Princess 08, stamped with American Apparel Hassid, and then colored in the wings with both the red and orange colors.

What a great end to the January TPT!

January Golden Oldie Thursday #3

Yay, it's Thursday!  I love this challenge because it allows for so much freedom in what you can do.  I also like that I can do it in the middle of the week because I can keep it simple.  Today's theme is "blue" so I chose these colors:

• Revlon Dreamer
• Milani Bolting Blue
• Ulta Blues Cruise

I started with one coat of my white undie followed by 3 coats of Dreamer.  This beautiful light blue doesn't have the best application.  It was streaky and didn't level out well.  I will say that where my polish is stored is fairly cold and that may have something to do with it.  The Revlon brush is great though.  I used 2 coats of Blues Cruise on my pointer finger.  I then added 1 coat of Seche Vite and started stamping with Bolting Blue.  How well it stamped was surprising as it isn't a very opaque polish.  I used BM-H02, BM-319 & BM-H01 for this mani.

I love these colors for a winter look.  I haven't done anything with winter yet this year and boy is it WINTER here!

Take a look at the other brilliant looks for today's theme:

January Tri-Polish Tuesday #3

I can't even believe we are 3 weeks into 2014 already!  So, it is back to Tri-Polish Tuesdays...  I used the same polishes as last time, only a little differently.

• OPI Animal-istic
• Pure Ice Twinkle
• Orly Melodious Utopia

These colors are so great together that I wanted to do a gradient...I love gradients!

I started with my usual undie polish (Milani white) then added 2 coats of the Orly.  Once that was dry, I sponged on my gradient using all three polishes.

I added a layer of Seche Vite to seal it all in and added my stamp to my ring finger and thumb.  I used GA15 for this look and I used American Apparel Hassid.

One last layer of Seche Vite and it is finished!  This is so tropical and beautiful.  I am going to stick with these polishes for the last Tuesday too...I just love them together!

January Golden Oldie Thursday #2 (Inspired by a tutorial)

I was inspired by Kick Acetone for this look.  It seems as though I wasn't alone in this thought for the stripes theme!  LOL!  Thankfully, we all used different colors!

You can see the tutorial here for the reverse gradient stripes.

I used these gems from my untried stash:

1. American Apparel Office
2. Sinful Colors Envy
3. Sinful Colors Calypso

I started with 2 coats of Office, then sealed it in with a layer of Seche Vite.  I sponge applied my gradient with Calypso at the tips, Envy in the middle, and Office near the cuticle.

Once I was satisfied with the gradient (about 2 coats), I sealed that in with another layer of Seche Vite.  I will say that these colors made a beautiful gradient and I was really sad to cover it up but I was committed to the look.  

I applied the striping tape and then went for the reverse gradient with the darker color at the base of my nail and the lighter color at the tips.  What do you think of my middle nail? I mentioned in the last post that I chopped it off due to a major break.  It doesn't look as bad with some pretty nail art on it!

I removed the tape once the second gradient was applied.  Once dry, I put on a final coat of Seche Vite on top.  I really love how this turned out!  I can see why so many people have reproduced it - it is so neat!  I got so many compliments today at work which always makes me smile.  This is the first time I have tried this style and I haven't used green polishes like this - ever!

January Tri-Polish Tuesday #2 (Inspired by a tutorial)

It's Tuesday!  I am so behind in getting this post written.  My wonderful husband decided to try and find some game cheat on my computer and now it is full of spamware and adware that I have to try and remove.  Gotta love him!  Anyway, I chose new polishes for this look as the textured polishes I used last time were more of a "one-time" deal.  :)

• OPI Animal-istic
• Pure Ice Twinkle
• Orly Melodious Utopia

I started with one coat of my usual Milani White as an undie polish.  I then just started dabbing the colors on each nail randomly.  I used the Nimbus technique from The Nailasaurus for this one.  I have done this type before and I love the simplicity of it and that each nail looks different.  You can do so many different looks with this technique - it has quickly become one of my favorites!

Using a cotton swab, I just kept going until I was satisfied with the saturation.  This manicure reminds me of a notebook I once had in school - it is just light and fun.  Please pardon the nasty break on my middle nail!  I debated about cutting it before pictures but decided against it.  It is cut off now though.  :(

You can see the tutorial by clicking on her photo.

January Golden Oldie Thursday #1 (Inspired by a tutorial)

This is a new challenge for the year: Golden Oldie Thursday hosted by Debbie Crumpet over at Crumpet's Nail Tarts.  This is a really great idea.  Everyone who hoards polish must feel some guilt over not using them all the time!  I mean, polish has feelings too, you know!  LOL!  The first theme is "pink".  Now, this is another double duty mani for me as I am also participating in the Nail Challenge Collaborative's "inspired by a tutorial" theme.

My "inspiration" for this mani is a free hand ombre from SimpleNailArtDesigns on YouTube.  See the video here.  It is simple in theory, but more challenging than I thought going into it.

I used:

• Ulta Baby Doll
• Sinful Colors Starfish
• China Glaze Designer Satin

The Ulta application was a little streaky so I used 3 coats to get a good base color.  I then used a small nail art brush to roughly add 2 coats of Starfish. Once that was dry, I added 2 coats of Designer Satin to the tips.

I finished this off with a coat of Seche Vite.  Now, I don't keep track of when I purchase polish, so these are all "untried" polishes that needed some love.  I wish I had not gone as high with the dark pink shade because you can't see too much of the medium shade.  Lesson learned.  This mani was really fun to do because it is an awesome, more rough, way to do an ombre.  I am fond of gradients that are subtle and this is a great alternative to that.  I will do this again!

January Tri-Polish Tuesday #1 (Inspired by a tutorial)

This is another double duty post as it fits in perfectly into two challenges I am participating in this month.  1st is the Nail Challenge Collaborative's theme: Inspired by a Tutorial.  2nd is the Tri-Polish Tuesday Challenge hosted by Crumpet's Nail Tarts.  January's colors are: red, orange and yellow.

As did Katee from www.agirlandherpolish.com, I chose to do a cloud manicure.  I have never tried this before but have been wanting to try it for a long time.  I am please to report that it was very simple!  I followed Nailside's tutorial here.  She explains it very well!

I used these for this manicure:

• Milani Yellow Mark
• China Glaze Toe-Tally Textured
• Milani Tainted In Red

I started with a thin coat of my usual undie polish: Milani White followed by 2 coats of Yellow Mark.  Once that was dry, I started my first "cloud" with the Toe-Tally Textured.  Only 1 coat is required for the "clouds".  Then, the next cloud in Tainted In Red.  I did not add a top coat to this manicure to preserve the textured look.

These colors are totally obnoxious for winter but, on a side note, I chose them because my mom is vacationing in Hawaii right now and sent me a lovely sunset photo from her beach-side condo!  Isn't that nice?  While I am suffering through sub-zero temperatures, she is living it up in the beautiful tropics!  So, my nails are also inspired by an awesome sunset too!

Intro to 2014

Happy New Year!!  As I mentioned in my last post, I re-designed my blog background and header.  I hope you like it!

To start the year off, I wanted to do something of a little twist on the typical NY stamping mani.

My inspiration: the 2014 Pantone color Radiant Orchid

Now, when I pulled my colors for this manicure, I swear they looked really close to this swatch...now, I just don't think so.  I find this color to be very evasive!  I can't quite find an exact match in my swatches - keep in mind that I still need to swatch somewhere around 600 polishes.

Here is what I picked to use:

• Wet n Wild On A Trip
• Sinful Colors Fiji

I started with 2 coats of On A Trip followed by 1 thin coat of Fiji.  I topped it off with 1 coat of Seche Vite.  As I had started this rather late, I just did this part for the night...about 2-3 hours before I went to bed.  For some reason, my left hand wouldn't dry - it was tacky for a LONG time and my right hand was perfectly fine.  WEIRD!  Well, I had to get some sleep so I went to bed.  When I woke up in the morning I had found some awesome bed linen imprinting on my left hand.  Here is a comparison photo:

Do you see the patterns in there?  It was interesting, so I decided to keep it.  For New Years, I added the typical stamps from BM-H14 in all kinds of polishes.  Since I consider the actual stamping part a bit of a failure since you can't really make out the design, I didn't keep track of all of the polishes I tried.  Sorry!

Here is the finished product:

 Even if it isn't an exact match, the colors worked great together!

 Happy New Year everyone!