Fun and Random

31 Day Challenge - Day 7 - Rainbow Nails - Converse Nail Art!

11:00:00 AM

Day 7 of the 31 Inspired Days of Nail Art  Challenge...and that means, it's rainbow day!!!!  I am almost 100% positive that I am the only one who did not do the typical rainbow manicure for this challenge day.  Reason being, rainbow manicures are a pain in the booty.  I did one rainbow manicure back for St. Patrick's Day and it took way too long and I vowed to never free hand a rainbow again.

I was going to do a rainbow gradient, but my nails weren't long enough to fit a whole rainbow onto a sponge then onto the nail.  Then, I was going to rainbow skittles, but I figured that would be boring.  This was the manicure where I really wish I owned a stamper set because rainbow skittles + stamps = awesomeness.

So free hand nail art it was.  The two ideas I decided upon were stained glass or Converse sneakers.  When I took to Twitter, of course I had a tie, which resulted in me just closing my eyes and picking a manicure.  The winner, skittle converse!  Not your typical rainbow, but hey, it's full of color, so why not!?  I'd like to thank the amazing Ryan from Naild in the South for helping me pick out my colors and selecting what finger to put what color on.

Let's take a look at my not-so-typical rainbow manicure!







Colors Used:

  • China Glaze - I'm With the Lifeguard
  • China Glaze - Hang Ten Toes
  • China Glaze - Splish, Splash
  • China Glaze - Sun Kissed
  • Funky Fingers - Riot!
  • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
  • Sinful Colors - Black on Black
I attempted these nails last year before I was a blogger.  The only picture I have to show of them is going to be posted below this, and I was very hesitant in doing so.  I photographed them with my crudtastic webcam and posted them to Facebook for all my friends to see.  Of course, they were a hit despite how awful they were.  Looking back on them now, I can't believe I posted them, but it's really amazing to see how far I have come!  These original ones were done all with tooth picks.  As you can see I also wasn't one to clean my edges either. 


Ahhhh look at my nubs!!! Such small nails I had, but I was able to fit on the lil sneakers!  Remembering that night and painting my current ones on was seriously night and day.  Oh, how I love my new nail art brushes!  Seriously, the nails were SOOOO much easier to do with the paint brushes instead of using tooth picks.

To begin, I painted on my base colors.  From there, with one of my paint brushes, I painted on the white toes of the Converse.  Then, with my dotting tool, I added 6 dots to represent the lace holes with Snow Me White.  When that was dried, with my smallest paint brush, I added the laces.  Finally, with Black on Black, I painted on the black lines on the toes, and then with my only tooth pick of the night, added black dots to the lace holes.

Seriously, if you want to do nail art and are accustomed to using tooth picks like I was, you need to run out to the store now and purchase some paint brushes.  I just went to Michaels and grabbed some that reminded me of stripers.  They have made my life SO much easier!

Have you ever done Converse nails?  If so, I must see!!!!!  Do you like my take on the rainbow day?  Do you think I should have stuck to your typical rainbow manicure?

As a reminder, here is the 31 Day Challenge...do not forget to check out the other lovely ladies participating!!!!


See you all on Day 8! <3


Foodie Mani

31 Day Challenge - Day 6 - Violet Nails - Grape Nail Art

6:00:00 PM

Well hello there!  Today is Day 6 of the 31 Inspired Days of Nail Art Challenge.  Day 6's theme is centered around the color "violet" which for me was great since purple is by far my favorite color.  You wouldn't know this by looking at my polish stash since purple seems to be heavily lacking.  How many lavenders and dark purples could someone really own though?  Wait, what am I saying...you can own millions. lol


My stash isn't horrible though, I do have about 7 purple polishes.  I was debating on using all of them and doing some form of gradient or tape manicure, but I was bored by the idea.  I wanted nail art...something fancy, something hardcore, which I haven't really sat down and done in a while.  So I got to thinking...what is purple?  Answer....GRAPES!

I knew immediately what I wanted to do.  I quickly Googled the world "Grape Vines," found a picture for inspiration, and got to work.  Here's the finished product....







Colors Used:
  • Base
    • Revlon - Charming
  • Grapes
    • Sinful Colors - Fig
    • Sinful Colors - Amethyst 
  • Vines
    • Revlon - Sassy
    • Sinful Colors - HD Nails
    • Sinful Colors - Nirvana
The image that I found on Google was (which had no author and was a dead website when I clicked to source it)

I liked how this picture showed the vines and how it truly "wraps" around the main branch of the plant.  When I started painting, I outlined with my brush the brown branch.  This extended on all the nails in a curvy way since this, and other pictures of grapes I found were not perfectly straight.  From there, with my thinnest paint brush and Revlon Sassy, I painted on the vine circling the branch with a few leaves off of each one.  I then painted some lil curly vines or random lines to fill in the blank spaces.  With the same brush, I added some detail with HD Nails.

For the grapes, I attempted to do my marbling dotting technique.  This is where you drip more than one color onto a paper plate, then with the dotting tool you dab it into both polishes.  The colors stick to the tool and make a marble effect on the nail.  I did this with Amethyst and Fig in attempt to get that uneven grape color.  Didn't work out exactly how I wanted it, but they came out pretty dang cool looking regardless.

What do you think?  Have you done grape nail art before?

 Don't forget to check out the other lovely ladies in the challenge!






  • Nicole from Polish Me, Please!
  • Ave from Polish Pixelle,
  • Jessica from Once Upon a Polish, 
  • Cynthia from Of Life and Lacquer



    • See you all on Day 7 - RAINBOW DAY! <3

    Gradient Mani

    31 Day Challenge - Day 5 - Blue Nails!

    6:00:00 PM

    Day 5 of the 31 Days of Inspired Nail Art Challenge!  That means it's Blue Nails day!!!! woot woot!  The day I am so excited for since I am a sucker for a blue polish and own so many!!  I don't know what it is about blue, but I love it.  Funny considering my favorite color is purple.  Hmmm....

    Anyways, I had so many ideas for this manicure day, that was until I saw an amazing tutorial on the blog Nailed It which I had to recreate!  I was in love the moment I saw it.  Blues...gradients....ahhhhh gorgeousness!  This manicure is called Bleeding Blue.

    Let's see if I butchered it or not....(My light blue didn't show up well in the pictures *sad face*)







    Colors Used:
    • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
    • Revlon - Dreamer
    • Sinful Colors - Midnight Blue
    • NYC Matte Me Crazy Top Coat
    Love it!  So pretty and eye catching, and I cannot wait to try this with other colors.  I followed each step of the tutorial.  With one of my handy, dandy, new nail art paint brushes, I messily painted on my sky blue polish, Dreamer.  When that was dried, I did the same thing with my dark blue, Midnight Blue.  When it was dried, I decided to put on my new matte top coat.  Reason being, I thought it would look awesome, which it did.  I don't think I would have liked it as much if the polish were shiny.

    My advice if you do this design is to make sure you wrap your tips!!!!  I didn't put enough polish at the tips of my nails, and literally not even 24 hours later, my tips were worn off and all you could see was the white polish.  It was easy enough though to touch up.  I added a bit more matte top coat and it looked like a fresh manicure.

    What do you think?  Is this something you would do with other colors?  Matte or shiny?

    As a reminder, this is the challenge!  Don't forget to check out the other lovely ladies posts!


    Dot Mani

    31 Day Challenge - Day 4 - Green Nails!

    6:00:00 PM

    It is Day 4 of the 31 Days of Inspired Nail Art Challenge!  That means, it's time for some green nails!!! Exciting, right?  Well, not really...green isn't my "it' color.  I'm a blue person, and many of my polishes are blue based.  So, you can guess that I'm rather excited for Day 5 :).

    Originally, I was going to do some super cute frogs.  I was beyond excited.  Painted on a base of sky blue (yes I know it wasn't blue day, but the froggies would have made up for the green) and I had the little heads drawn on.  Then I added the details, and well, they didn't look like frogs.  Ribbit, ribbit, disasticure.

    So, I grabbed my bottle of my favorite green polish and recreated a retro dot design I did before I started blogging.  One I forgot about until one of my followers on Twitter (@DubiGil) tweeted me a picture of her retro dot design.  All I have to show for my original design is a horrible blurry cell phone picture, which I have added at the bottom of this post!

    Let's take a look!






    Colors Used:

    • Sinful Colors - Mint Apple
    • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
    • Sinful Colors - Black on Black
    Love, love, love, LOVE this manicure!  It's so simple, easy, and eye catching.  I also loveeeee the base color, Mint Apple.  It is by far one of my favorite Sinful Color polishes, and well actually probably my favorite polish among my whole stash.  It is a gorgeous darker mint shimmer that has full coverage with two coats.  For this manicure, I used three coats because I really wanted the color to pop.  To get the design, I striped on my lines, then with the dotting tool added the dots.  It really is a simple manicure that does not take much time at all!

    Here is my awful picture of my original attempt....I know, I know blurry!  I can't believe I posted this to my personal facebook way back when!


    Ahhh look at my lil nubs!  I thought my nails were currently nubbed, but these are so much shorter!  I'm happy I'm finally growing them out a tad!  Have to say, looking at that old picture, I did pretty dang well considering I wasn't blogging yet and was never using base or top coats! hahaha.  Oh, how I have come a long way!

    What do you think?  Something you would try to do?  What's your favorite color polish that you would use as a base if you were to do this manicure?  Thank you @DubiGil for reminding me of this awesome design!!!  This is why I love when you guys tweet me your designs!  I love seeing them!!!!!  

    As a reminder, this is the 31 Days of Inspired Nail Art Challenge!  Do not forget to check out the other lovely ladies posts!





    See you all on Day 5! <3

    Fun and Random

    31 Day Challenge - Day 3 - Yellow Nails - Emoticons!

    6:00:00 PM

    Hello again Polished World!  I hope everyone is doing fantabulous!!  Today I bring you day 3 of the 31 Days of Inspired Nail Art Challenge.  Are you enjoying seeing mine, as well as the other ladies, posts as much as I am?  Day 3's theme is "yellow" which I'm really not too fond of.  I rarely paint my nails a plain base of yellow due to the fact it ALWAYS stains my nails in the end.

    I had a bit of trouble coming up with an idea for this day as well.  I went out and purchased a lighter yellow polish (Sinful Colors Unicorn) and was planning on doing some form of a variegated lemon looking nail art.  After coming up with no plausible way of doing so, I began asking everyone else what I should do.  To be honest, at this point I can only remember what one little boy told me, and that was "lions! Lions are yellow!"  While he was right, I feel I couldn't have dedicated enough yellow to the idea to keep it in line with the yellow theme....so instead, I opted for Emoticons!!!!

    Here's how they came out.  The first four pictures are of my left hand, then we get to see my right hand which I painted totally different faces on.  Last but not least, thanks to the help of my lovely father, we have the picture of both my hands together!








    Colors Used:
    As
    • Base:
      • Julep - Daisy
      • Sinful Colors - Let's Meet
    • Emoticon Faces
      • Sinful Colors - Black on Black
      • Sinful Colors - Sugar Sugar
      • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
      • Sally Hansen - Blue Me Away
    Look at all them cute little faces!!!

    To being, I painted on two coats of Julep Daisy.  I received this polish for free from Julep awhile back, and I am happy I didn't pay for it because to me, it is the most awful yellow color ever.  It dries so mustardy on the nail...blech.  To make the color not so awful, I painted on two coats of Sinful Colors Let's Meet.  This brightened up the color and added a nice little shimmer, which made my nails bearable.

    With a toothpick, I began drawing all different emoticon faces.  I first Googled Emoticons and copied the little guys that must  be on an iPhone or some form of smart phone.  I still have a basic phone and use the simple :) when I want to show I'm happy.  The thumb on my right hand I copied from a manicure I found which now for the life of me I can't find again....hate when that happens.  To whoever did it, thank you, I love you, it was so cute and my favorite nail.  To get the blushing cheeks on my angry and super happy nails, I sponged on some Sinful Colors Sugar Sugar with a make up sponge.

    The little boy who told me to do lions was in love with these nails.  He sat and pointed at each one in pure excitement going "That one's happy...aww look he's angry!"  It was beyond adorable.  I received many compliments too from customers at work.  I'm so blessed to have jobs which allow me to paint my nails this crazy and wear them to work!

    So, what do you think?  Something you would attempt??  Any faces I missed??  I know I missed the :P face but for the life of me I could not get the tongue looking right.  Oh well.

    As a reminder, this is the challenge!!! Don't forget to check out the other lovely ladies posts as well!


    See you all on Day 4! <3

    Bug Mani

    31 Day Challenge - Day 2 - Orange Nails

    6:00:00 PM

    Hello there!  Today I bring you Day 2 of the 31 Days of Inspired Nail Art Challenge!  Day 2 is centered around the color Orange.  This one was difficult for me.  I really couldn't think of anything that was orange other than, well, oranges.  I found a super cute idea, but I didn't have the right colors and was too lazy to actually attempt them.  I really did not want to have a disasticure.

    Then I remembered a guest post that the amazing Ryan from Naild in the South (formally Dream a Little Dream of Polish).  She did cute butterfly wing nails, which she was inspired to do after seeing a manicure on pinterest.  Ever since I saw her post, I wanted to attempt them but the right opportunity never arose.  This challenge day was my moment....I was finally going to do monarch wings!!!!!

    Let's take a look....






    Colors Used:

    • Base
      • Zoya - Lianne
    • Details
      • Sinful Colors - Black on Black
      • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
    To begin, I put on three coats of Zoya Lianne, a really pretty orange shimmer polish which I got for FREE at the beginning of the year through a Zoya promotion along with Zoya Avery.  Oh how I love a deal.  When that was dry, with my super long striper brush, I painted the individual arches and lines coming down from the arches.  With a tooth pick, I drew on the lower arches connecting the lower lines, and then filled in the tip with the polish brush itself.  Finally, with my dotting tool, I added the white dots.

    I have to agree with Ryan on this, these nails were a pain in the booty!!!!  I thought she was joking when she posted that if you were a neurosurgeon to go for it.  Boy, oh boy, did they take a steady hand!  I'm thinking it was partially due to my striper which is sooooooo long.  It was a brush I had from a nail art polish which dried up a long time ago.  I threw out the polish but kept the brush and have been using it for awhile.  It has always bugged me how long it was, and I never thought of cutting it down.  Megan (@PaintinRainbows) gave me the brilliant idea of going to Michaels and purchasing regular paint brushes and cutting them down to size.  I took her advice and purchased 7 different brushes and I cannot wait to use them!  Hopefully it will make designs like this one easier!

    What do you think?  Have you done the monarch/butterfly wing manicure?  Did you think it was difficult?  Tweet Me your designs! I want to see!   


    As a reminder this is the challenge!  Do not forget to check out the other lovely ladies posts for today!!!



    Until Day 3, have a good one! <3

    Flowers

    31 Day Challenge - Day 1 - Red Nails

    6:00:00 PM

    Hello Polished People and welcome to my first post of the 31 Day Challenge!!!

    For today's post, I didn't want to do a red based nail, instead I wanted to do a form of nail art which included red.  A while back, I had seen a pin on Pinterest which showed a white based nail with pretty pale red roses.  I LOVE floral nail art, especially roses, so I knew I had to do it.

    Grabbed my bottle of red, and started painting.  Here is my red creation...






    Colors Used:

    • Basee
      • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
    • Roses
      • Sinful Colors - Sugar, Sugar
      • Revlon - Sassy
      • Sinful Colors - HD Nails
      • Sinful Colors - Black on Black
    Ahhh these nails are so pretty!  I'm in love with them!!!  I will be doing them again.  When I sat down to do the manicure, I was unsure as to which red I was going to use.  My choices were Sugar, Sugar, a shimmer red, and Red Carpet Red by Ulta which is a jelly red.  After talking it out with a few people, we all decided on the shimmer, and oh how happy I am that I used the shimmer.

    To do these nails, I started with a dotting tool and drew on the roses.  I did not do perfect circles because roses are not perfectly round.  With a toothpick, I then drew on the leaves with Sassy and added the shimmer detail with HD Nails.  Once everything was dry, I added the black detailing with a toothpick to make the petals.  Originally, I did not have a black outline around the green leaves, and it was not nice looking.  Once I added the black though, they popped.

    I don't know if it was the shimmer polish or what, but the roses seemed to jump off the flat cream white base.  I can't even find the words to properly describe how amazing they looked in real life.  If you have the colors, or something similar, you all MUST try!  Really, I swear, they are not that difficult!  Just a bit time consuming, but in the end, so worth it!

    What is your favorite floral manicure??

    As a reminder, this is the 31 Day Challenge!  Do not forget to check out the other lovely ladies participating along with me!



    31 Day Challenge!

    9:00:00 AM

    Well Happy Sunday everyone!!!!  Hope you all have had a great weekend!

    Tomorrow I, along with Nicole from Polish Me, Please!, Ave from Polish Pixelle, Jessica from Once Upon a Polish, and Cynthia from Of Life and Lacquer, will be kicking off our own personal 31 Day Nail Art Challenge.  Ever since I started blogging, I wanted to do this challenge, especially since my blog is centered around nail art.  A few weeks ago I had tweeted my interest in doing so, to which Miss Nicole responded immediately that she wanted in.  After a bit of planning, and gathering of a few more lovely ladies, we are ready to go!

    Below is how our challenge is laid out.  This is different than other 31 Day Challenges that are out on the blogosphere right now.  We used the original list, then went through and substituted out some days and created our own.  For example, we're doing some saran, tape, and jelly sammiches which aren't in the others!  There are a few more things we added in as well!!!  Thank you Ave for making our graphic!


    We will start posting on September 10th, and then post every three days at 6pm EST.  It would be beyond impossible for me to post a manicure a day for this, even if I pre-swatched for a month in a half.  With work and school, nails kind of fall by the wayside.  The other girls so kindly have agreed to that scheduling and I'm so excited. I want this challenge to be fun and not a stressor for anyone!  So hopefully the every three day thing will be good for everyone!  Who knows, maybe we will end up with some hard core nail art since we have extra time ;).  Also, we will be taking a week off before Halloween so we can post some Halloween manicures.  :D

    I cannot wait to start and I hope the other girls are as excited as I am!!!!  Cannot wait to see others interpretations of the themes and to challenge myself along the way!!!  Hope you all enjoy and see you tomorrow with Day 1!!!

    <3

    Dot Mani

    Pink Dotted Tip Manicure

    6:52:00 PM

    Well good evening!!!!  Tonight I bring you one of those manicures, well, that I'm not quite sure how to name.  It's pink, and it has some dotted tips....so pink dotted tips, I guess.  I hate when my posts are boringly titled, I mean if I saw something called "Pink Dotted Tips" I would probably just turn away and not read.  Maybe the pictures will drag in the readers or by the time I'm done writing this post I will come up with a better name.  Most likely, I will remain content with the name, as it is the only way to explain them.

    Anyways, this is a manicure which I feel any pink lover would enjoy.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, minus my ring finger, which you will see why and I will explain after.  This manicure was copied after one I saw on Pinterest (Surprise, surprise) which was a Hello Kitty Manicure.  Since I did not have any Hello Kitty stickers or stamps, I opted to not skip that part.  I wanted to link the Pinterest pin to this post, but of course when I went back to my nail idea board and clicked on it, it came back with a "No Pin Found."  Bummer, because it was super cute with Hello Kitty, and the other girl's ring finger wasn't messed up.






    Colors Used:
    • Base
      • Ulta - Flamingo
    • Tips
      • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
      • Sinful Colors - Black on Black
      • Ulta - Flamingo
    Easy peasy.  I started by painting on a base coat of the pink polish.  I have explained before how I have a love for Ulta Flamingo.  Seriously, it is the prettiest pink polish ever, and applies like a dream.  While this manicure could have been done with tape, I was running short on time so I decided to just free hand swipe the white tips with the Snow Me White brush.  Once that was dried, I took my striper, dipped it in an old bottle of Black on Black and divided the white from the pink.  With my dotting tool, I added the pink and black dots.  Smeared on some Out the Door, and went to sleep.

    Loved the color combination with this manicure.  It reminded me of a comic almost, you know like the BAM cartoony things in the weird talky bubbles?  You all probably think I'm crazy.

    Ring finger, why did I hate it you ask?  Well, look at it!  It is so uneven compared to the rest of the nails!  My striper kind of striped it not so smoothly and it was not as thick, then the white wasn't really at the same angle as the other nails.  Not to mention, when I first painted this nail, I slipped during the dotting (okay I sneezed) and I ended up with this huge black dot which I couldn't cover over with white polish.  Therefore, that was my second attempt at that one nail.  Usually when that happens,  it doesn't turn out how I want it.

     What do you think?  Love the color combo?  Hate it?  Do you see what I mean about those bubble BAM cartoon things or am I crazy?  Would you only attempt this with tape?  Have a better name for it?

    Well, I wrote this whole post and I have not come up with a unique name, so it shall forever remain "Pink Dotted Tips".  Excuse me as I add the word "manicure" into the title so it doesn't sound so awful.

    <3