Inktober - Muddy

If I dragged my nails through the mud, I would hope they would look as good as my nails do for Inktober day 23, "muddy." I somehow don't think they'd be this pretty, and they would certainly be harder to clean!

The splashes of mud were really simple to create. First, I did two coats of Don't Burst My Bubble (OPI) to hide imperfections on my natural nail. Then, with Gina (Zoya), I dragged a small dotting tool around my nail. Sometimes it dragged through the base coat, but that gave it a nice authentic look of mud drying.

Try this with red polish for creepy bloody Halloween nails!

Camo Nails for Shayna

My good friend Shayna is visiting her sister this week as she finishes up Basic Training. 

To celebrate, I did some camouflage nails for her and a fake set for her sister. We chose a tan theme, instead of army green. 

I used 4 OPI colors for this. The base is Did You Ear About Van Gogh?  The brown spots are A-Taupe the Space Needle and they're outlined with Get in the Expresso Lane. The lightest spots are My Vampire is Buff. 

These were super fun to do and I love them!

BigDaddyBeauty Polish Samples

When I first started ordering nail polishes online, I was hesitant about the products I'd get and their quality. Then my sister recommended checking out BigDaddyBeauty.com. There, I purchased my first set of nail colors.

Currently, they have a bunch of gel colors, China Glaze, and every color striper from It's So Easy. I decided to a China Glaze color called Mahogany Magic with a pink striper they sent me for a simple design that reminds me of cupcakes for some reason.

You can get China Glaze colors from the latest collections including Tranzitions and the Cirque Du Soleil collections, and the polishes won't cost you as much as you'd find in your typical beauty store. China Glaze actually runs at about $3.50 a bottle, and the It's So Easy nail art stripers are $3.

The stripers give a lot of coverage. They're quite opaque, and a little chalky to be extra opaque, so getting good detail is easy. It does dry quite strong though, in the sense that it's tough to clean up mistakes, even with as light a color as I used.

If you've been dying to get your hands on a China Glaze color but can't muster up the money it costs to buy them in stores, check out BigDaddyBeauty.com. I'll be sure to add this to my Where to Shop page so you can access it later when you're out shopping for polishes!

These products were sent to me by BigDaddyBeauty.com. The reviews are based entirely on my experience with the products and were in no way influenced by anyone.

The End of a Delicious Era

As a tribute to one of the tastiest brands that fostered many breakfasts and breaks in high school, I present, my Hostess nails.

If you haven't heard, or you're not from a country where Hostess brand snackums are sold, you can read more about Hostess and how it's closing here. They made some of the US's favorite snacks, including Twinkies and their Cup Cakes.

I used Get in the Expresso Lane (OPI) and Purity (Zoya).

Rest in peace Hostess. You will be missed.

Image Source

Happy Plants

You've seen a few ColourLover-inspired designs here before. If you're new, or don't recall, ColourLovers is a fantastic site to browse color palettes and patterns. It's my go-to for inspiration.

Every Tuesday, an email to members is distributed, which they call Happy Huesday. They feature six or so popular patterns in the emails.

Yesterday, I liked one so much I decided to make it into a manicure.

Here's the manicure:

 And here's the pattern it was based on:

Image source: http://www.colourlovers.com/pattern/2958888/happy_plants

It's pretty obvious which part of the pattern is being shown on the manicure, but if I hadn't told you, would you think they were tiny mustaches?

Here are the colors I used: Ancient Jade (ORLY), Load (Illamasqua), Get in the Expresso Lane (OPI), Pull Over (Sinful Colors), and Front Row Flasher (Sation).

Where's Fall?!

Ok, Winter. That was a little rude. I know I said I wasn't excited for Fall, but I wasn't against warming up to it. Now suddenly it's snowing in Boulder?!

Image source: http://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/1107yr/first_snow_in_boulder_colorado/

I take it all back! I'm excited for Fall! See?! Excited! FALL MANICURE!

Come back Fall...

Colors: A-Taupe the Space Needle (OPI), Recessionista (Essie) and Solar Power (China Glaze).

The Glitter So Nice, I'll Show You Twice

Yesterday's speedy little manicure left some unanswered questions, so I wanted to show the glitter I used today as well. I was not upset about having to put the glitter on again because I LOVE it. Love it. Please please indie brands out there, give us more tiny glitter-chunky glitter variations.

This is Crow from Polished Perfection. What else is there to say about it besides how fantastic it is? You get some gold pieces with holographic reflection and the matte black tiny glitters. It adds something beautiful to any manicure, but I liked yesterday's color, Decades of Dysfunction, more than today's A-Taupe the Space Needle (OPI).

Nugget's V-Gap

Have you met Nugget? She's pretty great. She's just over a year old, full of life, and I think she may have an extra pair or two of vocal chords. She'll remind you if you've forgotten about dinner, and will do just about anything to get to food. She's a tiny thing, weighing in at 7.4 lbs., but I guarentee you, you've never met a cat like her. I love her.

When I got my order of Avon polishes from my friend Tammy this morning, I was surprised.

I swear I didn't choose these shades intentionally, but how good do they all look with one another? I wanted to use the brown polishes tonight, and after looking at them, I noticed that they looked like Nugget! So I give you, my Nugget V-Gap!

I used four colors for this guy. I started with Beige Blast (Sally Hansen Insta-Dri), Nomadic Nude (Color Club), Vintage Boutique (Avon), and Forbidden Fudge (Avon). It's all freehand, and I used the brushes that came in the bottles. I absolutely adore this, and so does Nugget.

Minty Cookie Nails

Are you dieting? Are sweets tempting you to no end? Do you find yourself standing in the sweets aisle at the grocery store just to absorb the joy the sweets once brought you? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then this manicure is for you.

These tempting talons feature Mint Chocolate Chip from F4 Polish. If that ice cream colored mint pastel doesn't get your stomach growling, then feast your eyes on Sand Tropez (Essie) and Nomadic Nude (Color Club), decadently topped with lovely chips of Get in the Expresso Lane (OPI). Are you drooling yet?

Please wear responsibly. Nail biting is highly likely under such delicious nail art circumstances.

Boho Birdie

Quick reminder to vote for my submission one last time! Today's the last day.

Today's manicure drove me nuts. I should've left the gradient alone. Personally, I think the stamp ruined it. But it also may have been a case of the it-looked-better-in-real-lifesies. I hate it when I catch those.

The gradient was created with two Color Club colors: New Bohemian and Earthy Angel. Turns out, Earthy Angel is not a good color for my skin tone. Probably will just stick that one in the pile with other accents-only polishes.

I sponged to get the gradient effect, then stamped the feather from the Bundle Monster BM-15 plate with Konad Special Brown polish.

Damn...it looked so much better in my head. As soon as these pictures were done being taken, I cleaned it all off.

Sunflowers in the Sun

My nails are still not the right length and my cuticles are still dry and wounded in some spots. However, I couldn't bear bare nails any longer. Fed up, I posted on Facebook this morning, calling upon my fans for what design to create. The respondent asked for flowers or blossoms of some sort, and since it has been absolutely gorgeous and sunny all day, I decided to do sunflowers. I'm pretty pleased with the results too.

The base for this is Suzi Says Feng Shui (OPI). The petals were done primarily with Design Yellow (Color Madric), but then I added a tiny bit of Me First, a neon yellow from Sinful Colors. The seeds were dotted on using another OPI, Get in the Expresso Lane.

Take On Dots

The love affair I'm having with dotting tools is hot and heavy, but they've got some fierce competition now.

Color Club polishes are scooting their way into my easy heart. I used one tonight as the base of my manicure, Rebel Spirit. This deeply dark brown is super pigmented and only takes two coats to reach its pure magic. I was sort of shocked to be honest since most of my Color Clubs came from Ross for a whopping $7.99.

I was truly tickled when it came time to clean up my clumsy right hand. Dark colors are absolutely dreadful to clean up, and usually require a few coats of cleanup before your skin looks clean. This dark brown, stuck on my cuticle area, came right off once I started cleaning up. So if you haven't already picked up some of the darker colors from Color Club, give them a shot.

Like I said already though, I have a serious love affair going with dotting tools, as expressed here.

In addition to Rebel Spirit, I used Unicorn (Sinful Colors), Sugar High (China Glaze), and Pelican Gray (China Glaze).

UPDATE 2/26/12

This manicure got great praise from you guys! I made a tutorial so you can recreate it yourself. The color combinations are endless!