Day 7: Black and White Nails

I've seen tuxedo nails all over the internet lately and have been dying to try them, so when I saw "black and white" on the 31 day challenge I saw my chance and took it. I'm quite pleased with the results.

The white is by Tivoli's Color Shock (very thin and streaky, I wouldn't recommend it) and the black is Kiss Nail Art Paint. I used the small brush from the Nail Art Paint to make the sides of the jacket and a small dotting tool to make the bow ties and buttons. 

Taking a picture of this manicure was a nightmare! First I forgot that my camera was on the night setting so every single picture was blurry. When I finally solved that problem, I had a lot of issues with lighting. As you can see, my topcoat is very glossy so I was having a lot of issues with the light reflecting off the nails. Eventually I gave up and just used the best of the worst. I think I went through at least thirty pictures to get this one. Not the best, but better than nothing.

Day 6: Violet Nails

The instant that cutepolish did the video for this manicure, I had 3 different people send it to me and say that I should do it. So, seeing as I didn't have much inspiration for violet nails, I figured this would be a good time to give it a try. I present to you converse nails!

The purple I used is from a Monster High nail polish set I got from Claire's. These polishes are some of my favourite that I own. The colours are vibrant, the polish goes on really even and it dries very fast. Plus, they seem to chip a lot less than my LA Colors polishes, even though they were cheaper. I'm a little sad because I'll probably never be able to find them again. Such is life.

You may also have noticed that I've switched back to the oval nail shape. I only had the square nail shape for about a month, but even though I liked the look I had too many issues with the corners breaking and I think they made my nails look even shorter than they are. So, I'm back to the oval shape. Just in time too, I think this design looks much better on more rounded nails.

Day 5: Blue Nails

Once again, I entered this challenge with a very clear idea of what I was going to do, and ended it with a completely different design. I intended to try and do a wave manicure I have seen on several different manicure blogs, but it turns out I don't have quite the right colours to make it look good. Funny enough, I remember when I got my 48 nail polishes and I thought it was way more than I would ever use. Now I'm constantly finding colours I could use in my collection. Go figure. But I do like the final result of what I came up with.

The base colour is "Ocean Mist" and the design is in "Twilight", both by LA colours. To do this, I used the BM19 image plate. This look is really subtle, from a distance it just looks like a silvery blue. It's a different look for me, but I like it a lot.

I'm getting so impatient with this challenge, I wish I could do designs more than once a week. Maybe this summer, when my schedule clears up, I'll start doing at least two a week. Fingers crossed!

Day 4: Green Nails

These are the first nails I will be posting that I'm not super proud of. I tried to turn a half-moon manicure into kiwis. They look okay, but they certainly didn't turn out as well as I thought I would.

The light green is "Palm Tree" and the dark green is "Voodoo", both by LA colours. I wish I had a more yellow-green to use as the light green, and then used "Palm Tree" as the dark green. I also wish I had made the white parts slightly smaller, and the edges fuzzier. Plus, a larger proportion of light green would look better. Overall, they look fine from a distance but they don't look much like kiwis. 

I usually try to make my designs last a week, but part of me wants to take them off and either move on to the next day or just throw on some glitter until I have time for the next design. That seems a bit silly. Especially because they don't look terrible, they just don't look the way I intended them to look. They're already chipping a bit though, so maybe I'll have an excuse to take them off early.

Day 3: Yellow nails

The next day in the challenge is supposed to be yellow nails. I decided a while ago that I was going to do the Despicable Me minions. Unfortunately, they were not working. So, I did a google search for yellow manicures, and I happened upon crime scene nails. I love the idea, and I'm really happy with the look!

My apologies for the poor photo quality, my camera and I don't seem to be getting along at the moment. The yellow is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri's Lightening, the white is Kiss Nail Art Paint, and the black is from a multi-pack I got from Claire's. I'm pretty sure there's supposed to be a lot more yellow in this design, but there's SOME yellow so it counts, right?

On another note, I just bought my first ukulele! I've been thinking of buying one for years, and I found one for really cheap that's perfect for me to learn on! The downside is that you use your fingernail to strum, so my nailpolish may suffer significantly. The upside is I HAVE A UKULELE! So I think it's a reasonable sacrifice to make.

Day 2: Orange Nails

I have been excited about doing these nails for weeks now! Originally I was going to do orange slices, but when I thought about this one I liked it so much better. Without further ado, I present to you...Lorax nails.

The orange is LA Color's "Perfect Sunset" and Sally Hansen Intsa-Dri's "Lightening". I chose to make the thumb nail resemble the poster for the Lorax movie, but I wanted the trees on my ring finger to have a more Dr Seuss feel so I outlined them in black. I'm glad I did, the orange I used is a little thin so the trees didn't really stand out with just the orange on its own.

I feel like I should type more, but it's been a long week and I'm tired. Besides, most of you probably just read this for the pictures. I'll be back next week with yellow nails!

Day 1: Red nails! But first....

Also known as I was busy last week and didn't have time to post, so today I'm posting my last design as well as my current one!

Last week I had a few important things going on that required more demure nails. I decided on a french manicure, but I thought just doing a normal one would be too boring. So, I added a flower based on a design I saw on Evening Lavender, though I didn't do quite as well as she did. I still like the results, though!

The base coat is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri's "Beige Blast", and the design uses Kiss Nail Art Paint in White and LA Colours' "Sea Siren". I really liked this design, it was subtle but had just a little bit of flair to it. On another note, I love the lighting in this picture! Too bad it was taken at a hotel that I won't be back to any time soon. I need to experiment around my house and see if I can get the same kind of quality here.

I was really happy with my nails last week too, they had finally reached what I felt was the perfect length. Just long enough to look pretty, but not so long that they got in the way. Of course, as soon as I decided that I broke two nails and had to cut the rest off to match. Sigh.

However, I don't really care because I'm finally starting the 31 day challenge! The first day is red nails, but as I don't like to just do a solid colour I decided to spruce it up a bit.

The red is LA Colors' "Cayenne Pepper", which happens to be one of my favourite polishes. I also used the BM19 stamp with Konad Special Polish in White, and divided the colours with a line of Sephora by OPI's "Queen of Everything". Unfortunately the white stamp shows through the red even after two layers, so if I did this design again I would want to stamp red over white polish rather than the other way around. I don't own red polish that's good for stamping though, so this will have to do. On the bright side, the white shows through a lot more in this picture than it does in real life.

I like this design, but I already can't wait to move onto the next one. I've planned out about two-thirds of the designs for the challenge already! For those of you who haven't seen the 31-day challenge before, here's the list of what I have to do: