Animal Mani

Happy Thanksgiving! Turkey Nails!

9:00:00 AM

Happy Wednesday all!!!  Hope you all are having a great day!  It's snowing here, which kind of makes me happy.

As many of you know, tomorrow is Thanksgiving, so I of course had to have a festive manicure to help celebrate!!  I decided to re-create last year's Turkey Nail Art since it's the most Thanksgiving-y thing I could think to do.  Last year, I tried to follow Adventures in Acetone's tutorial, but failed.  This year I decided to try again, and guess what, I failed again!  After trying three different turkey looks, I found this tutorial by Heather from Peace, Love, and Polish and liked that turkey the best.

I'm not 100% happy with my re-creation, but it's better than having no holiday nails.  I'm also not 100% happy with my photos.  My light box would NOT participate with me, so I opted for the white background which turned into a dingy gray with the lighting.  Maybe on Black Friday I'll go out and purchase another desk lamp.




Colors Used:
  • Gold Nails
    • Sally Hansen - Golden-I
    • China Glaze - Glitter Goblin
  • Turkeys
    • Sinful Colors - Nirvana, Snow Me White
    • Zoya - Arizona, Thandie, Darcy
    • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
Okay, they're kind of cute.  You would think that painting a turkey would be rather easy, but honestly it is one of the hardest designs I've done.  I just couldn't get the little guy to look just right or fit perfectly with all the dang feathers.  Maybe if my nails were longer?  I would say I'll try again next year, but honestly, I think I'm forever crossing turkeys off my list of nail art I must do!



To get my turkeys, I followed Heather's tutorial.  I first drew my turkey's body and filled it in with my nail art brush.  When it was dried I took my yellow polish and drew the random feathers around the little guy.  I did the same with the orange, then lastly the red.  I then added the details of the turkey's little face.

What do you think?  Liking these turkeys?  Having just as much difficulty with turkey nail art as I have?

 I hope all my followers who are celebrating Thanksgiving have a very blessed holiday with their families and friends.  I am so thankful for all of you who have supported me and my blogging adventures.  I know that sometimes I stink at responding to blog or Instagram comments, but I read every last one of them and they put the biggest smile on my face.  I never in a million years thought that this little hobby would turn into what The Little Canvas has become, and for that I am thankful.  Despite the frustrations and disasticures, this blog has truly been a blessing!  So again, thank you all for your support and kind words!!!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!!!!!!  Until next time, <3.

Holiday

PolishPals Thanksgiving Pumpkin Nail Art

9:00:00 AM

Happy Sunday Polished World!!!  How are you all today?  As long as I'm sitting in front of a heater today, I'll be great!  It got really chilly here this weekend and we just got our first little accumulation of snow.  I love the snow, just hate the cold.  If only there was a way to have snow in 75 degree weather.....

Today's nails were not planned at all.  I originally sat down to do a manicure for Catching Fire, but the odds were not in my favor and I had three disasticures.  I decided to abandon the Catching Fire theme and move into a Thanksgiving theme!

I remembered this adorable manicure by PolishPals that I wanted to create back in October, but got delayed with all my Halloween manicures.  I'm happy I delayed in re-creating Jenna's manicure because she created this little tutorial!

I am happy my Catching Fire manicure failed....let's take a look at my cute little pumpkins!




Colors Used:
  • Base
    • Zoya - Avery
  • Pumpkins
    • Maybelline - Sweet Clementine
    • Sinful Colors - Nirvana
    • Zoya - Josie
    • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
Cute, right?  I can't tell you how much I love these little pumpkins!!!  To me, they look like little cartoons.

To get the look, I followed the tutorial I linked above.  First, I started with my base coat of Avery.  Then I took my orange polish and created the pumpkins on my nails.  With my nail art brush, I added the brown stem, then started outlining my pumpkins with my black polish.  When the black was dried, I went through and added the green leaf and outlined that with more black.



After one day, my base shrunk and my little pumpkins were pulling back from the tips of my nails.  I tried to touch them up it didn't go so well.  Since I loved the pumpkins so much though, I decide to re-do them without a base color, and that's currently what I'm wearing.  I'll probably snap a shot of that version with my iPhone sometime this week and share it on Instagram as a comparison.  Personally, I'm liking both versions the same.

What do you think?  Liking the little pumpkins?

Until next time, <3.

kitchen sink mani

Pink and Gold Princess-y Star Manicure

9:00:00 AM

**Press Sample**

Good morning!!  Today's manicure is a pink and gold princess-y star manicure, aka something waaaay outside of my comfort one.  Once you see the photos, you'll see why since by now you know what colors I tend to gravitate towards.  I got my inspiration from this pin on Pinterest which sadly leads to a link where no credit was given to the original artist.  I'm not a huge fan of gold polish, but for some reason this manicure stuck out to me.  

The other night when I was looking through my nail art idea board, I decided to re-create it with my own Little Canvas twist.  Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Precision Lacquer - 18 Carat Cake
  • OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls
  • Funky Fingers - Queen Cupcake

 Princess-y, but gorgeous.

This was my first time using Precision Lacquer 18 Carat Cake, which is part of their Sprinkles Collection (Remember this manicure with Hazel and Gretal?).  I'm not going to lie, when I first received this collection, it was my least favorite of the six because of the color.  Yes, it was sparkly and gorgeous in the bottle, but it was gold and I just can't stand gold!  I'm kicking myself now for the delay in using it for so long because that sparkly gorgeousness from the bottle transferred directly onto the nail.  You know how some glitters are super sparkly in the bottle, then when you put them on the nail they just look unimpressive; well, 18 Carat Cake is most certainly not that type of glitter polish.  It reminded me of Zoya Solange, the gorgeous textured Pixe Dust polish.  People were even asking me if it was a textured polish because the sparkle gave it that look.  And boy, was it sparkly, I couldn't stop looking at my nails!  The fact that it was gold no longer was an issue!

18 Carat Cake worked great for nail art too.  To get the stars on my nails, I took my star hole punch and punched my painters tape.  I then taped my nail and painted some of the glitter polish onto a make up sponge and then dabbed it onto my nail.  It applied like a dream with the sponge and didn't leak under the tape or leave any bald spots in my stars.  It also worked great when I outlined my pink polish.

I decided to use Funky Fingers in Queen Cupcake for my pink over Sally Hansen Pink Blink because this polish is a much softer baby pink.  It also has a light gold shimmer in it which is impossible to photograph and hardly noticeable on the nail unless there is gold accenting it.  The pinkie finger was truly gorgeous in person.


What do you think?  Liking the subtle princess manicure on me?  Are there colors that you have but just don't use?

 I really ended up enjoying this manicure more than I thought I would.  I ended up touching up the tips a couple of times to extend the life of it.  I also received numerous compliments on it also, which always is a good sign.  I might have to go out of my comfort zone more often!

18 Carat Cake and the rest of the Sprinkles Collection can be purchased from Precision Lacquer's website for $5.95 individually or $30 for the whole set.

Until next time, <3.

**Precision Lacquer 18 Carat Cake was provided for Promotional Purposes.  I purchased the OPI and Funky Fingers.  All opinions expressed are my own.  Please see my disclosure policy**

Galaxy Mani

Galaxy Nail Art

9:00:00 AM

Good morning polished world!  I hope you all are having a great Monday.  Are great Monday's possible  Today I am bringing you a galaxy manicure straight from The Little Canvas vault.  I have so many new manicures to show you, but I have decided to hold off on editing them until I get through some of these old manicures that I was so proud of at the time.

I can't begin to explain how much I loved these galaxies!  I attempted galaxy nails last year but never posted them because I really wasn't pleased with the end result.  I might have to look for a photo of those to post on Instagram as part of throwback Thursday, plus it would be neat to compare.  One thing I do know is that this years attempt was much more sparkly and had more "depth" than the others.

Let's take a look.




Colors Used:

  • Base
    • Zoya - Storm
  • Galaxies
    • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
    • Ulta - Sun-Sational
    • Sinful Colors - Cream Pink
    • Color Club - Over the Moon
  • Stars
    • Sinful Colors - Snow Me White
    • INM - Northern Lights
Neat, right???

To get the look, I started off with a base coat of Zoya Storm, the worlds greatest sparkly black polish.  If you're going to do galaxy nails, this polish is a must have.  When my base was dry, with the corner of a make up sponge, I dabbed white where I wanted the galaxy to be.  With another corner of the sponge, I took yellow polish and dabbed it along the white polish.  Then, with Cream Pink and another corner of the make up sponge, I dabbed the pink randomly around the galaxy.  Finally, I took Over the Moon and sponged around the edge of the galaxy to blend the white into the black.  I then took INM Northern Lights and added a quick top coat to add sparkly and blend the galaxy together.

When Northern Lights was dried, with my small and large dotting tool, I added a bunch of random stars.  Once those were completely dried, I went through and added a plain shiny top coat.

What do you think?  Liking the galaxies?  Ever tried them yourself?

I'm so happy I decided to add the holo polish around the edges to blend the black into the galaxy.  It really completed the look.  Ahhh I should have taken a video of how sparkly they were.  Maybe I'll do them again eventually.

Until next time, <3.

Flowers

Zoya Pixie Roses

9:00:00 AM

Good morning!!!  Hope everyone is well today!!!  Today's post comes from the drafts folder of The Little Canvas.  Yes, I have plenty of new manicures to show you, but I couldn't go another day not sharing it.  The main reason being, it's a gorgeous manicure done using only Zoya Pixie Dust polishes.  You know, my favorite textured polishes in the whole wide world.

A while back, Casey showed me this manicure by Jess of @miss_prettynails on Instagram because she knows how much I love creating nail art designs with the textured polishes.  I pretty much tripped over myself to take whatever manicure I was wearing off to re-create this gorgeous look.  Seriously, roses + pixies, how could you go wrong?

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Zoya - Tomoko, Arabella, Chita
Gorgeous right?  I wish you could have seen how sparkly this manicure truly was!!  You can tell that it kind of made my camera go crazy and not be able to 100% focus on all the shots.  It kept catching the shimmer of the glitter in the polish each time I tried to snap the photo.

Have I mentioned that I love Tomoko?  Next to Stevie, I think it's my favorite Pixie Dust.  Tomoko is an AMAZING color with the perfect amount of glittery goodness.  It reminds me of champagne.  I used three coats in this manicure, but really could have gotten away with two.  Just as I have found with all of my other Pixie Dust polishes, Arabella and Chita were amazing for nail art!  For as fast as they dry on the nail, they don't dry too fast that you can't work with them to draw designs such as these roses.

To get the look, I started with my base coat of Tomoko.  When the base was dry, I use my nail art brush and Arabella to draw on the rose petals.  After that, I used Chita to add the outer green leaves.
What do you think?  Liking the Pixie Dusts?  Loving art done using them?

The Zoya Pixie Dusts that were used in this manicure are all from the Fall 2013 collection and can be purchased on Zoya's website!

Until next time, <3.

**The polishes used in this post were provided by Zoya for Promotional Purposes.  The opinions stated are my own.  Please see my disclosure policy**


Review

Shimmer Polish Review!

9:00:00 AM

Hello there!  How are you all on this fine day??  I'm doing well and am super excited to share with you my first ever swatch post!!!  At the end of September, Shimmer Polish contacted me asking to review some of her amazing glitter polishes.  I could NOT say no to this incredible opportunity.  

A few days later, 5 bottles of gorgeous, shimmery glitters arrived in the mail.  Sadly, while swatching, I had a horrible accident and broke one of the bottles.  Poor Jovie, it didn't stand a chance against the floor.  Such a pretty pink glitter also.  Sigh.  

Despite the tragedy, I'm able to bring you these four gorgeous glitters today!!!  Bear with my photos as this is my first ever swatching post and it was really capturing a polish versus capturing nail art.  Literally a whole new experience!

Bow Mani

Bow Manicure - Inspired by CaseyLane Loves Polish

9:00:00 AM


Hi polished world!  How are you on this fine Saturday morning?  I'm doing well, especially since I'm now able to share some of the manicures that I have been dying to share for so long now.  It's kind of bittersweet though since the manicures are awesome but the pictures aren't as great as I remember.  Maybe that's because my pictures are changing now that I'm in the lightbox and these are outdoor photos?  Who knows.  Just know I'm not 100% happy with the photos.

This manicure was inspired by one that my dear friend Casey from CaseyLane Loves Polish did before she started blogging.  I fell in love with the bow dotticure and HAD to copy.  The dots and bows went together so well with the amazing teal color.  I put it on a list of must do manicures then never got around to it.  After being out of ideas one night, I remembered this amazing manicure and decided it was the perfect time do try it!

Let's take a look.



Colors Used:
  • OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls
  • OPI - Can't Find My Czechbook
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
Adorable right?  The best part, the manicure looks extremely time consuming, but it really wasn't!!  To get the bows, I started off with a base coat of OPI - Cant Find My Czechbook, the most gorgeous dusty teal ever.  I'm so happy I purchased this polish despite having two colors which are practical dupes of it.  In my opinion, you can never have too many teal polishes.  When the base was dry, I create a large circle in the center of the nail with a dotting tool.  With a nail art brush, I drew the rest of the bow coming off the side of the circle.  After the bow was dried, I used my nail art brush and added the detail to the bow with black polish.

During the bow dry time, I dotted all my other nails using the random sizes of dotters.  Since I stink at the normal polka dot, and loved how Casey's nails looked, I did the many random sized dots all mixed together on the nail.

What do you think?  Liking the bows and dots?  Loving the color choice?

So happy I finally got to share this cute manicure with you all today!!!  Hope you have a great one!

Until next time, <3.

Tutorial

Fancy Schmancy Movember Tuxedo Men! + Tutorial

9:00:00 AM

Hey everyone!  How are you on this fine Wednesday?  It's supposed to be rather warm today and I have the day off, so I'm rather happy.  I'm going to use this day to put all the Christmas lights on the bushes that way I'm not out there in the 20 degree weather doing it.  Don't worry, I won't turn the lights on until after Thanksgiving.

Despite having a gazillion manicures to show you from before my Halloween manicure extravaganza, I've decided to share with you a cute little Movember manicure I still have on my nails!  I wasn't planning on posting these right away, but after sharing a sneak peek on Monday of these little guys during #madpropsmonday on Instagram, I thought I should put them up on the blog now!

I originally did these fancy schmancy Movember men on the neighbor's nails almost two years ago when I was just starting to paint nails.  She was dying to have mustaches and I had just seen a monocle man manicure so I gave her that option and she was in love.  To make them super fancy, I decided to do tuxedos as well.

Now that I have become a better nail artist, I decided this would be a good manicure to reattempt on my own nails for Movember.  Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • OPI - My Boyfriend Scales Walls
  • Color Club - Eternal Beauty, Over the Moon, Miss Bliss (Who wouldn't want holo bow ties?)
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl and Jet Black Instant Artist

Tutorial Time!

Mustache Men

  1. Start off with a base coat of white polish
  2. With a medium sized dotting tool and black polish, create two dots for the eyes, then below the eyes, two connecting dots for the "body" of the mustache
  3. With a nail art brush or even a smaller dotting tool, extend two little lines from the mustache dots.
  4. From the tip of the mustache, connect the line back down to the bottom of the dot.
  5. Create the monocle by drawing a circle around one of the eyes with a nail art brush.  With a dotting tool, or even the nail art brush, create little dots to represent the chain that the monocle is connected to.  You could technically draw a curvy line if you would like
  6. With the nail art brush, draw a diagonal line over the other eye and add the top part of the top hat.
Tuxedos
  1. Start off with a base coat of white polish.  If you're feeling daring, you can create colored shirts.
  2. With any color polish, create a bow tie with a medium sized dotting tool.  To do so, I started with one dot in the center, then added two dots on each side.  In the end, it kind of looked like a bone, but it works very well for a bow tie also.
  3. With the same dotting tool, draw two dots down the nail to resemble the buttons on the shirt.
  4. With a striper or nail art brush, Draw two diagonal lines at the tip of the nail.  You can also draw two lines going up the nail beside the bow tie and buttons to represent suspenders. 
  5. Fill in the tip of the nail with the black polish.
Don't forget to finish off with your favorite top coat!  I topped mine with some Out the Door which is pictured here in my fancy schmancy bottle shot.  Now that I'm back to using my light box for the winter, I might as well do some bottle shots, right?


Overall, I'm in love with this manicure.  I couldn't be happier with how it turned out.  A lot of people asked me if they were stickers, and to me that is such a huge compliment.  I feel a lot of the time that my art is rather messy, or not 100% perfect, so when someone thinks that they're brand nail wraps, it's flattering.

What do you think?  Liking the fancy schmancy men?  Think you'll do them on your nails?

Hopefully next post I will share some manicures I keep talking about.  Maybe some galaxies or a kitchen sink? hmmm, decisions decisions.

Until next time, <3.


Nail Artist of the Month

November Nail Artist of the Month - Lovely Muggle Nails

9:00:00 AM


Happy November or Movember hehe.  How are all you today??  I've been off the past week, not feeling well and kind of burned out.  I actually haven't had nail art on my nails since Halloween, and those nails were painted last Monday.  That's right, I haven't busted out a dotting tool or nail art brush in almost a week.  Maybe tomorrow I'll feel up to doing a crazy design, or at least a dot manicure.

Since it's the first post of the month though, I'm not the one who is bringing you nail art today!  That's right, it's time to introduce you to yet another Nail Artist of the Month!  I'm pleased to introduce Tiffani from Lovely Muggle Nails!  I found Tiffani's Instagram account after I posted a few months ago looking for a new Nail Artist to feature.  I started following her personal account after seeing some of the nails she posted, and I knew I just had to feature her!

Enough of my babbling, let's all meet Tiffani!
____________________________________

Hello! It was an honor to be asked by Alaina to be her nail artist of the month! She’s an absolutely amazing artist and I’m constantly inspired by her work. My name is Tiffani, I’m 25 and I live in the Land of Enchantment, New Mexico. I’ve been experimenting with nail art for about 3 years. I feel like it is such a great outlet for my creativity. I work in an office and it’s totally not my element. I would rather be outside with my dogs or in my small art room creating things. I love to water color, make hair pieces, crochet, sew, and of course paint nails! I’m always being inspired by so many things and also other artists.

A lot of my inspiration comes from the colors themselves. I love picking a palette and seeing where I go with it. After I’ve chosen the colors that I want to use in my manicure I will paint swatches on a piece of paper and play with ideas there. I use small brushes that I trim down to get the details in my manicures. I love working with super creamy opaque colors. 

I have natural nails and I change my nail shape often. I am a huge fan of every shape out there. Right now I have some shorties and I’m super enjoying them after having talons for so long. I feel like I can be less serious with short nails and can have more goofy nails. Hence the little man face on my pointer finger in this manicure. My favorite base coat is Nail Magic, it gives me awesome results, and for a top coat I switch between Sally Hansen’s line of fast drying top coats and Seche Vite.





I hope you like my manicure. My only goal was to use some fall colors. My thought process behind a lot of my manicures is pretty random. My little man was inspired by the art from mrcandiipants.

Thank you so much for this opportunity Alaina!

Blog- http://lovelymugglenails.tumblr.com/

Instagram (nails only) lovelymugglenails

Instagram (personal + nails) lovelymuggle

_____________________________

I love this manicure so much because it just shows how talented Tiffani is.  She did so much and showed off so many different techniques.  She really, truly made her nails into little canvases!  

I just noticed that her little guys on her pointer fingers have mustaches on them, which make this post perfectly fitting for Movember!  I don't think that Tiffani realized it, but it's so perfect!  I love that I just noticed that!

Please head on over to Tiffani's Instagram & Blog to follow her!  You won't be sorry at all.  

Thank you so much Tiffany for this awesome post!!!

Until next time, <3.