Day 2 - Orange Nails

Alrighty ladies. I could have sworn that this color was going to be the death of me because I couldn't think of anything good for two days!

Then I did them last night and...I like them. Alot.

Right about now is the time when the leaves start changing to the reds and orange and it all has such a beautiful orange hue to them so naturally, this was my inspiration! I so love fall and this was a good mani for me to do.

I used Sally Hansen's "250 Lightening", SH's "Orange Impulse" and Revlon's "730 Valentine" for the base gradient. Then I used plain ol' black acrylic paint to draw the leaves on. Seche Vite to top it off with.

Sorry about the yellow tint on my hands, the polish seemed very attached to me...

Like I said, it took forever to figure out what to do, but this is def one I like!

Good - 1

Meh - 1

Alli

Day 1 - Red Nails

First day of the 31DC2014. Colors. Red Nails.

Hmm…

First off…It’s been like a long time since my last freehand mani. And I had coffee that day.That being said, I was a little disappointed with how this one turned out. I could have redone it but I felt that it would just been cheating almost and good to post it as motivation to do better.  

The base coat is Revlon’s “730 Valentine” which I have swatched before here.

For the gold lines and the glittery color, I used Nailene’s Artist Expressions Warm. In this kit is a clear, glittery polish that’s almost holographic, a gold stripper brush and a small tube of loose gold glitter. I got this years ago from my grandparents and this is the first time I’ve really used it.

This isn't the correct color..

But I used the stripper first and then filled in with two coats of the shimmer color making the red underneath look like it’s a totally different color. I liked the effect and I’ll definitely have to use it again.

Day 1 Complete! Good – 0, Meh – 1.

V-Day Mani Two Days Late. Heehee!

Happy Two Days After Valentine’s Day, Chicas!

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve done my nails so I’m really glad that I got to do these! I did some for WinterJam and apparently, they looked like Dino poop. And I also deleted the pics when I thought I had more somewhere else….Which I didn’t. -__- Gar…

But anyways, I had a lull in my studies and I saw this mani from cutepolish on Youtube (here) and knew that that was the mani for this week! So cute, so easy. I bit time consuming when figuring out how I would do it, but so worth it.

Since I didn’t really have any peachy color as what she did, I painted my nails a solid gold, Pure Ice’s Jaguar, and I covered my entire nail instead of doing just the French mani style. Two coats isn’t quite enough for that color to be completely opaque, but with the spots on it, it’s totally fine. 

 

Once I got all the base color finished, I made the hearts on the ring and thumb nail on both hands. After that, I used Essie’s Study Case for my brown spots. I was a bit worried that it was too similar to the gold color, but when it was outlined with the black it wasn’t too bad. Then you obviously outline the spots and part of the hearts. That’s really the most time consuming part of this mani. 

A word to the wise…Don’t do the outlining when you’ve had a cup of coffee that day. Heehee! Did that once and it looked terrible…lol!

Anyways, hope you all had a great V-Day with your special someone! :D

Maze Mani On Ugly Toes..

Ok, peoples. I know I’ve been a total slacker this past month. I’m sorry. I started college(yea me!!) and I just haven’t had the time to actually write a post but I’ll be writing a few tonight and saving them for a few days from now.  Here’s o one I did a week or so ago.

So I really didn’t like the white that I had because it was all gloppy and thick(which I fixed yesterday) so I decided to use acrylic paint. For the entire thing. And I found out why you don’t use acrylics for the entire mani, which I will explain later. 

I had been on YouTube watching nail videos(shocker) and I stumbled across this one and I thought “Oh, that would be really cool if you showed a path!” So that’s what I did. Started with a white base and did the maze part with acrylics. I printed off a maze from my computer to help me with actually doing a maze and it was harder than I thought. I’ve never been one to do mazes so it was weird…

So it worked out just fine using all acrylics at the beginning until they started flaking…

You know how the acrylics are kinda chalky in texture after it dries? My guess is that’s why it flaked, cuz it wasn’t one whole layer. And because it was chalky, whenever you’d move your toes and the nail bed would flex, instead of flexing with it, it would just crack underneath it. So that’s what happened. 

Definitely a good learning experience, but one I’ll only do once.  :) What are some nail blunders you’ve made?

Pure Ice Jaguar - Vintage Lace

Morni…Afternoon!

For the mani today, I saw on Pinterest(shocker) this tutorial for how to do sort of a lacey type mani with a cloud mani. And for some odd reason, I can’t find it on Pinterest, but I found it again on Lacqueerisa’s blog and I guess it was originally Nailside’s. Both AMAZING bloggers! Super simple, incredibly cute. 

So, a few weeks ago, I had won a really cute polish via the County Fair Nail Art Contest, Pure Ice Jaguar, and I had been wanting to use it for *something* for a while to see how it works. So I used that for my base. A little streaky, but it’s really quite cute. It was somewhat opaque after two coats, but the bottom of the nails was to be covered anyways, so it would have taken at least three coats to be completely opaque. But, it dries nicely, so that’s a plus. 

So anyways…:) I decided to use two contrasting colors.  And gold and blue seem to be good ones. So I used that(PI) and China Glaze’s For Audrey using the vintage lace tutorial. I did a terrible job on my right had and a decent job on my left hand. :)

So what do y’all think?

In Christ,

Alli

County Fair Nail Art Contest!

**Warning: This post has LOTS of pictures. 

Hello, my lovely readers!! I have exciting news! I won my first ever nail art contest!! It was part of our county fair and it was for amateurs so I thought it would be a great idea for me to do it. I figured that even if I didn’t win, that it would be a good experience and that I’d meet some people that were passionate about nails. And I got both! There were only two other people competing however.  The older one, Jana, was so nice and she was really good! She had only been doing nails for a month and I thought they were great!

                                                                              Here I’m getting ready…

                                                  Me being obsessive about where my polishes are…Heehee!

                                                                                    My cheer squad! 

                                                Starting the mani with my bangs in my face. Like always. :P

So concentrated. Earlier today, I had done the mani and I had had a stiff cup of coffee and was all jittery and it turned out great. So I figured that if I could do it all jacked up on coffee, that I’d be able to do it without jitters. Well….I was shaking the entire time. Literally. So it was good that I had a practice run beforehand. ^^

                                                                  Jana’s and mine finished product.

                                                                                           People…

                                         So happy that it’s done! It was a bit terrifying but SOOOO exciting!

                                                             All three contestants and the two judges.

                                                                 Me grinning out of shear joy. Nbd…..XD

                                                                                       And Jana and I.

So are you ready to see what I did?!?! Tada!

I did a gradient with blue and green for my base, used an brown and light brown for the tree, and just various colors for everything else. If anyone want an entire list, just comment and I’ll get it. I’m bushed right now and I don’t want to go see what they are all called. ^^  Lazy me…I will say that I used Sally Hansen, China Glaze, Pure Ice, some Revlon, Elf, Essie, Sinful Colors, aaaaannnnnndddddd......I think that's it. :D

                                   And I got this stellar ribbon! Bragging rights are actually really nice. Lol 

My prize was this really pretty goldish color by Pure Ice, Jaguar, and a gift certificate to the sponsoring salon for a manicure. 

Anyways, it was a blast and I’m ready for round two! I’ll have to think of some other things to do for next year and hopefully, I’ll be better than I am now. Oh, and I have several more new ideas of what I should do with my nails! Any suggestions are very welcome. :) Hope y’all had as good of a day as I did!

In Christ,

Allison

Sally Hansen Insta-Dry Orange Impulse

Afternoon!

Today’s mani I just wanted to try doing whatever I could think of with just a couple colors. So I chose orange, grey, and white. I was quite pleased with the outcome, but there were definitely things I’d do differently.

I used Sally Hansen’s Insta-Dry Orange Impulse, Pure Ice’s Kiss Me Here, and Pure Ice’s Superstar. And then for the thumb(which is down low), I used matching colors of acrylic paint. I’m really digging the acrylics right now. XD For the middle finger, I used the white base and then stamped twice with RA plate 119 in both the grey and the orange and that was one of my favs of this mani. 

I really enjoyed doing this and I’m going to be doing it again. Perhaps in the next post.  :)  Have a great day!

In Christ,

Allison

Jamaica Me Crazy!

So last week, I went to my friends house and did her nails and I don’t mean to brag, but I think I did  a  pretty good job on some of them! And she gave me a birthday gift! Errr….Birthday giftssssss. ^^

Pure Ice - Jamaica Me Crazy, Pure Ice – Cheatin, Revlon – 730 Valentine, and Revlon – 915 Crème Brûlée. Along with a Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen, in black. It’s really neat, but its not very good for a very detailed image. Or maybe that’s just my lack of talent. Heehee! It was so funny, cuz she said that she got most of them based on the names. Love her! The Jamaica Me Crazy is more of a deep fuchsia, with a nice purplely shimmer to it. So ready to try it out! She also got me…..

This amazing box! I actually have no idea what to call it, so box it is! And it’s so cute! It gave me A LOT of room and I have a place for most of my little accessories now! I love it.

So now that we saw those, on to her nails!!

On the thumb here, I did the most retarded butterfly wing. :P For the index, I did a white base and I stamped with Red Angel Plate 103, doing a multy color experiment with purple, orange and green. On the middle finger, we did sort of a retro type thing with a blue, what is supposed to be a bright pink and a nice purple.  I used my new magnetic polish for herring finger and it turned out pretty cool! Last, but not least, I used a Pure Ice Free Spirit as my base and just did some black and white polka dots. I love that color green. Next!

For the thumb, I did a cute little chick inside an egg. And now is where I’m realizing how sloppy of a job I did. :P Oh, well…I did a navy blue base(PI French Kiss?) and then I did the PI Free Spirit half way up and did opposite dots on either side. Laura, aka, friend who “volunteered” her hands for me, said that she thought it would have looked better with different colors and I think I agree with her. ^^  I think I used my new Revlon color for the base and I used my “Artist Expression” kit thingy…lol Ring finger time!! This is one of my favorite designs so far! I saw it on julep blog here  and fell in love! It was the most fun to do out of all of them. :) And on the pinky, we did China Glaze For Audrey with a blue glitter by Finger Paints. Laugh My Art Off, I do believe. 

Well, that’s all I have for nails today. :) I hope to have another post soon.  Let me know what y’all think, if there’s anyone there. :)

In Christ,

Allison

Hungry for the Hunger Games?

Yea! I have FINALLY posted this one! I know it's WAY late to be posting about the HG, but oh well. :) 

And as you all know, I love doing nails. And whenever I get the chance to do someone’s nails, I pounce. I was talking to a friend at church, last Sunday, and she mentioned that she was going to the midnight premiere of The Hunger Games, which was last Thursday. And somehow, it came to the point of me offering to do Hunger Games nails for her! And so she came over and we did them!

I haven’t actually read the books, but they sound really interesting and I’m hoping to read them in the next year or so. So on the thumb, we just did HG with a layering of three colors cuz I don’t have a gold color yet. The index finger represents Peeta in the book and he’s the son of a baker. The middle finger is for Katniss, who is from the mining district(so I heard) and she has a costume that explodes in flames so that’s that nail.

On the ring finger, we have the circly design from on the book. And like I said, I haven’t read the books and I haven’t seen a real copy, but we have the internet. ^^ The pinky, was for the district 12, and I guess it's where Katniss and Gale would hunt together. 

So there they are! It was very interesting doing a theme nail for once and i'm looking forward to doing it again. :) Thanks again to Katie for letting me do your nails!

St. Patty's Day Is Comin' Up!

Is everybody ready for St. Patrick’s Day?! I know I am! The corned beef and cabbage is already calling my name…And with any leftovers(ha!), we’ll make Reuben’s for my birthday diner. ^^ Yumminess in my tummy!

 On to the mani’s!

So last night I did my nails with China Glaze base of “Tree Hugger” and I used three other colors of stipper brushes, white, light green and dark green. Oh, and I always use a base coat to protect my nails. Sally Hansen Green Tree and Bamboo Strengthener.  And I use Orly’s Polishield 3-in-1 Top Coat. I have noticed that it gets bubbles in the actual coat and I don’t really like that. Any suggestions?

And today, I used base coat, China Glaze base color of “For Audrey”, the rainbow is of several acrylic colors that my mom had from couple years ago and they are still good! Then for the other toes, I just used the acrylics that 

 correlated with the rainbow, plus two.

For the “gold”, I layered three things. Sally Hansen Insta-Dry “Lightening” first, then Sinful Colors “Let’s Meet“ for some extra sparkle and then last but not least, Art-Deco Stipper Pen Gold.

I really liked using the acrylics and I will definitely be working with them again. :D I also was using some thin paint brushes that I had bought from Micheal's, Simply Simmons, and they are really good.

So there’s my St. Patty’s Day stuff!  If there’s anything y’all want to see, tell me and I’ll see what I can do!

In Christ,

Alli

Demo hands!

Hola! I have a feeling that I’m very quickly becoming addicted to blogging. ^^ But that’s ok. It’ll give me some good practice with my writing skills.

So, in the past three days, I have obtained nine polishes. Er….Six polishes and three strippers(strip-ers). Augh! I feel so dyslexic right now! I can't tell if i'm writing the right word!  *^^*  Strip as in a straight line. :P

 Both of these are L.A. Color-Color Craze and the first one, the glittery one, is NP447 Jewel Tone and the beige is NO403 Mega Watt. Jewel Tone is a clear coat with glitter, great for playing up a plain color and the beige is quite shear so you’d need at least three coats to have a good color. I also bought a white, gold and silver strip-ers.

 When I normally do my nails, I do what I call “demo nails” which is a different design on each nail and that’s what I did last night! I used just about all my new colors and I used a lot of ideas from other people. So here’s my disclaimer: None of the following designs are mine unless I actually say they are mine. If I don’t know who did that certain design and you(reader) do, please message me so that I can give credit where it belongs. :) I will try to write where I got each idea however. Most of these today I have found on Project:Nails. Link below…

http://projectnails.tumblr.com/

On to my nails!

Since there are so many, I’m not going to describe them all. If there’s a particular one you’d like to know how I did, then message me. The middle finger is the only one that I can actually fine who did it and I copy that one from “LOVE4NAILS” on YouTube. Here’s the link.

http://youtu.be/V2KnXt6kvDg

I happen to be very proud of the fact that there’s not a stamp on any of them. Aka, all free-handed. :D I have to say that the ring fingernail on this hand could have done without the inside diamond. :P It looked fine with just the first two.

Anyways, that’s all I have for today!

In Christ,

Alli