Skittle Stripes

Hello! Just a quick post today because since my nails are so short I haven’t had any inspiration and am struggling to find things to post. As soon as my nails get a bit longer posts should become a bit more regular, please just bear with me! 

 The pictures for this post aren’t very good quality because I took them on my phone to show my boyfriend, never intending to use them for my blog. I didn’t do any clean up so that’s why some nails look a bit scruffy. I think you get the idea though! 

 

 

 

 

I was just playing around with striping tape for the first time and this was the result. It is similar to this manicure that Chalkboard Nails did a while ago. I didn’t copy it on purpose but as I was doing it, I was thinking to myself ‘I’ve seen this before…’ and then I googled and that was where! 

 

 

 

 

 For the base colours I used Barry M – Pure Turquoise, Indigo; China Glaze – Papaya Punch; NYC – Greenwich Village and OPI – Who The Shrek Are You? The black was just a random one from Collection 2000. I really need a new opaque black creme!  Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

 

Thank you for reading!

Fantasy Fire Layering

Hello! These are the nails that I have been wearing for the last few days. I knew that I wanted something glittery and fun to wear on results day to cheer me up if things went wrong!

 

I used many many coats of polish to create this look but I think it was worth it. The pictures don’t quite capture how amazing it looked in real life! Barry M – Indigo was the base colour then I layered Essence – Confetti and Copper’ize Me over the top. Two coats of Max Factor Fantasy Fire added that gorgeous red/green shimmer and changed the colours of the glitter slightly. Then finally I added two coats of Sally Hansen Mega Shine.

 

 

 

I apologise that I haven’t blogged for a few days but I have been very busy and not really in the mood. I will try to blog more regularly now though! Thank you for reading.

Turquoise Metallic Gradient

Hello! Today I have some nails from a couple of weeks ago to show you. Nothing too complex, just a simple gradient with two colours.

I used Barry M – Pure Turquoise for the base then sponged on Revlon – Ocean Breeze to create a gradient. Simple but effective! I like how the gradient is quite subtle and the combination of textures. I will definitely try this again with other similar colours.

 

Thank you for reading! If you haven’t already please vote for me in Makeup Savvy’s Nail Challenge final. It finishes tomorrow so please don’t forget to vote! You can do here.

Pastel Penguins!

Hello! Today I have quite a fun manicure for you, pastel penguins! I recently went to London Zoo with my boyfriend and one of my favourite animals there were the penguins. I knew I wanted to do a nail design inspired by them. Although it was veeeery loosely inspired, here is a picture of the lovely penguins at London Zoo.

 

Polishes used: Collection 2000 – Black, Color Club – White, China Glaze – Papaya Punch, Barry M – Blueberry Ice Cream, Barry M – Peach Melba, NYC – Mint Macaroon and finally NYC – Lavender Cupcake.

 

 

 

I love how these turned out, they’re very cute and it was very easy to do. I've had several compliments on them already :D

 

 

Finally, I am in the final of Makeup Savvy’s 15 Day Nail Challenge! There is still time to vote so if you would like to vote for me (I am B!) you can do here. A huge thank you to everyone who has voted thus far! Thank you for reading!

Scalloped Nails/Ruffle Nails Experiment!

I have seen the Scalloped or Ruffle nail trend everywhere recently and I really wanted to try it out for myself. I didn’t sit down with a plan, and you can tell but this was just an experiment to see what I could do with it. This is the result!

I had some slight issues with polish from the end circles flooding into the cuticle which you can see as well keeping the circles the same size but practice makes perfect! I will definitely try again. Additionally my NYC topcoat bubbled a LOT so please excuse that! I will use a different top coat until I get chance to repurchase.

 

 

I think I perfect the ruffles at an angle like on the pinkie but the middle finger is nice too. On the ring finger I think the gap between the first colour and second colour is too big and the index finger… let’s not talk about that one! It is a total fail. I think I meant to add orange as the third colour again but clearly I forgot…

 

 

I used lots of polishes, so I will quickly list. If you want to know which colour is which specifically, please ask. Barry M – Indigo, Blueberry Ice Cream, Berry Ice Cream, Pure Turquoise; Orly – Oui; OPI – Who The Shrek Are You?; China Glaze – Papaya Punch; NYC – Uptown, Greenwich Village, Price Street; Color Club – White; Revlon – Ocean Breeze, No 7 – Purple Fantasy, Lilac Chill; Miss Sporty – Teal (?) and Pop Fiction.

 

 

Finally, do you prefer plain backgrounds to photos like this or the coloured or patterned paper that I used in pervious posts? Thank you for your feedback, reading and to anyone who voted for me to win Makeup Savvy’s Nail Challenge!

15 Day Nail Challenge – Day 15 Anything

Today is the final day of Makeup Savvy’s 15 Day Nail Challenge! I can’t quite believe how quickly it has gone. I have thoroughly enjoyed myself and it has been great to try out new things and see everyone else’s wonderful designs. A huge thank you to Fee for hosting this challenge!

Today, as the theme is anything I wanted to try something that I haven’t done before; the cling film manicure otherwise known as the saran wrap manicure! The method consists of scrunching up a bit of cling film, dipping it in polish then dabbing onto the nail. It is simple and the effect it gives is beautiful.

 

Sadly, my nails for today are a total fail. I used Barry M Silver Foil for my base colour then dabbed various duochrome colours onto the nail (W7 – Metallic Neptune, Essence – Where is the Party?, Catrice – Genius in the Bottle, Collection 2000 – Hello Sailor!). However, the result is more of a blurry mess than beautiful duochrome over silver… 

 

 

I think this may be because either I used too many colours or that I didn’t dab enough polish off the cling film before going onto the nail. Anyway, in a desperate attempt to rescue my nails I added a coat on Andrea Fulerton Gemstone Overcoat which you can see here:

 

 

I think that added a little more colour back to it but I was still not happy so I added a coat of matte topcoat. Really I should have started over again but I didn’t have time so this is what I was left with… A bit of a mess really but not a complete fail. I will definitely try the cling film method again!

 

Last but not least another huge thank you to Fee for being such a wonderful host and supporting us all with our nail art! Thank you, Fee!

15 Day Nail Challenge - Day 13 Film Inspired

I am sorry about not posting yesterday, I was extremely busy and forgot to prepare a post. I will be participating from now until the end of the challenge though! Today’s nails are inspired by the film Ice Age! I know that it is aimed at children but I really like it, especially Scrat!

The white icy tip is meant to represent the ice (of course!) and on the ring finger there is an acorn which needs no explanation! 

The base colour is Barry M – Blueberry Ice Cream then I painted Color Club – White onto the tips in lines to create the feel of cracked ice. Then I sponged a tiny bit of a very light grey onto the white to give some shadow then finally added some of Colour Club – Covered in Diamonds to the white to give the effect of ice crystals!

 

 

The acorn was made on a plastic food bag with several polishes mixed together to create the correct colours. It could do with being a tiny bit smaller but overall I am happy with the outcome! It is far from perfect but I think it is quite cute.

 

 

 

I made the mistake of doing these nails last night and then going to bed when they weren’t fully dry which meant that the polish at the tips crinkled a little bit but this isn’t very noticeable due to the flakes of glitter!

 

 

I am looking forward to tomorrow’s theme which is dots and sadly the penultimate day of the challenge :(

 

 Thank you for reading!

15 Day Nail Challenge – Day 8 Leopard

I loved my nails so much from yesterday that I didn’t want to take it off for today so instead of completely removing it, I simply added leopard print over the top with a Sharpie! I have never been very successful with leopard print but I absolutely love this! It is quite abstract and I love the way that everything blends together slightly.

I am sorry about the quality of some of the pictures, my camera had a massive smudge on the lens and I didn’t realise until I came to upload the pictures. Sadly my nails are no longer in a state to be photographed so these will have to do!

 

 

These nails look far better in real life but you still get the general idea from the pictures. Sadly my topcoat smudged the design a little bit but this isn’t as noticeable in real life either.

 

 

 

Thank you for reading!

15 Day Nail Challenge – Day 7 Neon

I don’t actually own any true neon polishes so instead I did a watercolour manicure with a couple of very bright almost neon colours. This is the first time I have tried to do this and I am quite pleased with the results.

 

I started off with a base of Color Club – White then on a plastic food bag I mixed a drop of each colour polish with some nail polish thinner (I tried with acetone first but it didn’t turn out as well) then dapped it onto my nail with a little nail art brush. The colours I used were Barry M – Indigo, Barry M – Pure Turquoise, OPI – Who The Shrek Are You?, China Glaze – Papaya Punch, Rimmel - Sunshine and finally Maybelline – Hot Salsa.

 

 

Thank you for reading!