Glitter for 2013

So, here we are, less than 30 minutes from the new year. Why not post some pictures of my celebratory manicure? I couldn't decide what I wanted to do with my nails for New Year's Eve. I eventually decided on glitter. I figured shimmery nails with glitter tips would be good and festive.

I started with three coats of OPI Lucerne-tainly Look Marvelous. For the tips I used some loose silver hex glitter. For my left hand, I was inspired by my favorite nail art blog, The Nailasaurus.

Mine don't look nearly as awesome as her nails do. I'm still happy with them, though. Nice and sparkly! :)

Happy New Year, everyone! I hope 2013 brings happiness and love for you all!

Harry Doctor Potter Who

I had been asking my sister if I could do her nails ever since we got to Tennessee. She's not necessarily the girliest girl out there so she wasn't all that keen on having her nails painted. I offered to paint some designs on her bare nails and she agreed. I asked if she wanted Harry Potter themed nails. (She has always been a die hard HP fan. I've only recently started watching the films.) She said she wanted one hand to be Harry Potter and the other to be Doctor Who. (The Doctor is our newest obsession.)

We started with the Potter hand. It took us a while to decide on what to do. We wanted something simple so we settled on this...

The Harry Potter logo on the thumb and the first initial of each of the four houses; Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Slytherin, and Hufflepuff. The colors I used are (from thumb to pinky) Wet n Wild Black Creme, Sally Hansen Rapid Red, Sally Hansen Co-Bolt Blue, OPI Here Today...Aragon Tomorrow, and Black Creme again. Then, we topped it all off with a coat of NYC Matte Me Crazy. She was very happy with it. I love it, too. 

On to the other hand...

I heart heart this hand! (Doctor Who fans will get it.) I used all of the same colors on this hand except for the OPI. For the Union Jack, I painted the nail with the Co-Bolt Blue, then used white acrylic paint and when that dried, painted on the red stripes using Rapid red. Again, we finished with Matte Me Crazy.

We are both so happy with the way these turned out. Yay!!!

My mommy's manicure!

When we decided to come to Tennessee to see my family, I already had in mind to do my sister's and my mom's nails. My sister and I were sitting in the kitchen planning out her manicure and I ended up doing mom's. She wanted to try a tape manicure for the first time. She chose the base colors. They were all Wet n Wild fastdry. Then we taped off half of each nail at a diagonal and painted the second layer.

The colors are Buffy the Violet Slayer (left thumb and right pinky), How I Met Your Magenta (left index), FuchsiaRama (left middle and right ring), The Wonder Yellows (right index and left pinky), 9.0.2.1.Orange (right ring), Sage in the City (left middle), and Teal or No Teal (right thumb, unpictured). The white is OPI Alpine Snow. This was something different for my mom and she really likes the way they look. I do, too. Plus, it was really fun doing my mom's nails. 

Tomorrow, I'll post my sister's nails. *SPOILER* They will be Doctor Who and Harry Potter themed. :D

Cling wrap!

Christmas is over so it was time to get rid of the red and green nails. For this manicure I wanted to try a technique that I hadn't used before. I settled on cling wrap marbling. It's an extremely easy technique with a really unique result. 

I went to Forever 21 today and thought about getting a Love & Beauty nail polish. I left with four. Ha ha. I used one for the base color.

This is Love & Beauty Light Blue. It's a bit on the sheer side so this is three coats. Pretty. :)
Then, to top it off with the second color. OPI Alpine Snow.

A few dabs with a wad of cling wrap and viola! Marble! I love the way this looks. Hubby loves it, too. That means it's a keeper. :)

Christmas and feathers!

As much as I loved my last manicure, by this morning I was already bored with it. That may have had something to do with the fact that I bought a new polish today. Color Club Ho Ho Holly. Hubbs helped me pick this one out. There were several that I wanted but we went with the green. Let me just tell you, this color is GORGEOUS! It's a wonderful cool green with heavy green/blue shimmer. The formula is lovely and the application was very smooth. If all of Color Club's polishes are this nice, I want more for sure. Oh, and another thing. Ho Ho Holly is scented! Crazy, right? I didn't realize until after it dried but it smells a bit like pine.

Anyway, I decided to do a simpler manicure but still using Christmas colors. Naturally, I went with green and red.

Of course, the green is the Ho Ho Holly. The red is OPI Danke-Shiny Red. For an accent, I did a feather nail on the ring finger. I think it turned out really nice.

Christmas Time

I was going to do a Christmas themed manicure a few days ago but we were planning on visiting my family in Tennessee and we hadn't packed at all. So, I decided to just do them while I was here. 

I had this super ambitious idea for my Christmas manicure. I was all, "I'm going to do a different design on every single nail!!!" Then, I remembered that I have ten nails. That's a lot of work. So, I scaled it down a bit. Five designs.

I am so happy with the way they turned out. It was a lot of work and took a little while to do but it was well worth it. The only nail I am not too happy with is the middle finger. I was going for a candy cane stripe look but it didn't turn out that way. My mother says that she likes them, though, so I left it. Over all, I like my Christmas nails. Now, I just have to figure out what I'm doing for a New Year manicure. Hmm...

Water Marbling Play

Before I take off a manicure, sometimes I like to practice different nail art techniques on them. Yesterday, I was working on my water marbling. Those who have tried it know, water marbling can be a pain. It is so easy to screw up, it's messy, and it's unbelievably time consuming. I have yet to master the water marbling technique but I'm getting better.

So today, I did a full-on water marble manicure. I thought I'd go with a Christmas color scheme. I started with a base color.

I used Essie Imported Champagne. It's fairly sheer so I had to use three coats for decent opacity. I love this color. Then, on to the tedious task of water marbling.

The colors I marbled with are the Imported Champagne, Essie Wicked, and OPI Here Today...Aragon Tomorrow. This is my left hand...

...and this is my left thumb. 

Don't mind my middle finger nail there. I may have aimed poorly. I love the thumb nail. It looks like a twisty type of french manicure.

  This is my right hand...

...and this is my right thumb. I love the way this entire hand turned out. I smudged the ring finger a bit but it still looks great. 

I love this manicure. Worth the time and patience it took. I might keep this one for a bit. :)