Animal Print

NailTrail Leopard

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  I'm feeling a tad better.  Still kind of beat up from this whole stomach bug.  Luckily I have a back log of manicures to post so I don't have to worry about editing photos or doing new manicures for the time being.  Maybe I'll start that all back up later today.

So I went through my back log of manicures and picked one that was simple, easy, and something I wouldn't end up writing a whole ton about.  It is a purple and black leopard manicure with is inspired by The Nail Trail.  She has some very cute animal print nails and gradient nails.  She's just a great nail artist, I don't think I've seen a design of hers that I didn't like.

Let's take a look.




Colors Used:
  • Sinful Colors - Mad About Hue
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
  • Orly - French White
Overall a fun design.  I really liked the Nail Trail's better though.  I think it's because she has longer nails than I do.  Or that her art is just better.  Regardless, I did love this design.  It was fun, simple, and quick.  Can't get much better than that in a manicure!



I really love Sinful Colors Mad About Hue.  I've owned it for awhile now and used it once or twice.  Looking back on this manicure, I really think I need to re-visit some of my Sinfuls and use them more.

What do you think?  Fan of the manicure?  Something you would do?

 Until next time, <3.

Twinsie Tuesday

Twinsie Tuesday: No Post Today...Sigh

9:00:00 AM



Hey all.  I'm sad to say that I don't have a Twinsie Tuesday post ready for you all this week.  Sunday I ended up sick with the stomach bug.  Yesterday morning I woke up still not feeling too well and ended up staying home from work.  I had a plan that I was going to paint my nails during the day but I couldn't muster up the strength or energy to do so.

Therefore, I have to skip this week.  Our theme was vampy and I had such a cute nail art idea planned.  Maybe I'll do them later this week and share.

Make sure to check out the other Twinsie's vampy manicures!


Amanda at Amandalandish
Amanda at Fashion Footing
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Bridget at A Painted Nail
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Claire at Kerruticles
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Savannah at Addicted to Polish
Tiffany at Polished To Precision

See you all soon! <3

Dot Mani

An Orly Dry Brush Manicure

9:00:00 AM


Happy Sunday polished world!  Hope you all have had a fabulous weekend!  I'm quite exhausted and am planning on using today to catch up on some sleep and rest.  Oh, and I wanted to go hit up the Sally Beauty OPI Buy Two Get One Free sale.  And maybe stop and buy some boots.  Okay, I won't be resting today.

That doesn't mean though that I don't have time for a blog post!  I'm sharing with you today a dry brush manicure that I was inspired to do after seeing a similar one by @nails_and_wax on Instagram.  Her's was done with a dark green polish, which I attempted to use but it just didn't look good on my hands.  It was actually a good thing the dark green didn't work for me because when I removed it after a whole 10 minutes of it being on, it had already stained my nails.  I could only imagine the damage it would have caused if I wore it for three days.

So I substituted the dark green for one of my favorite polishes, Orly Gumdrop.  Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - Gumdrop
  • Orly - French Tip White
  • Orly - Liquid Vinyl
I think I'm obsessed with Orly lately.  That and China Glaze.  I swear those are the only two companies I have been using for the past few weeks.  I need to dig deep into my Melmer and re-visit all my OPI's, Sinfuls, and Sally Hansens.  So many pretties being neglected.  But how could you not neglect them when Orly makes gorgeous polishes like Gumdrop?!  And the world's most perfect white and black polishes?  I just love them.  Yes, Orly is a little more expensive, but I think it's worth it because the bottles are a little larger, they never dry up, and the caps are awesome with that squishy grip.



This manicure is super simple and eye catching.  That's what makes it so great.  You don't have to spend a ton of time on manicure to have some fun nail art!  Literally, I think this manicure took me a half hour to do on both hands.

What do you think?  Like this design?  Have you tried the dry brush technique?

 Well I am off to enjoy my semi relaxing and semi busy Sunday!  Until next time, <3.

China Glaze

Floral Manicure Re-Creation!

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  It's Friday which means it's almost time for the weekend!  I am kind of upset though because Saturday I have to be up bright and early which means that I am missing out on my sleep in day.  It's okay though, it's for a good cause which I will talk about in another post coming up!

Today I am sharing a manicure which is a re-creation of a neon pink floral design I did earlier this year.  It was one of my favorite floral manicures ever.  I've been dying to do them again, but I didn't want to do two exact designs so close together!  So now that a few months have lapsed, it was time!

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • China Glaze - That's Shore Bright
  • OPI - This Crown Needs a Gown
  • OPI - In True Stefani Fashion
  • China Glaze - The Grass is Lime Greener
  • Orly - French White
I didn't think it was possible, but I love this manicure more than the first time I did these flowers!  I should make a tutorial for how I did these flowers.  I started off by using black acrylic paint to create an "outline".  When that was dry, I colored in the white space like it was a coloring book.  I then went through with my black to even out any lines that got wonky when filling in the colors.



I'm so happy that I discovered this coloring book technique for nail art.  It makes things so much easier.  If you recall, I discovered it last year when I re-created a snowman manicure by Simply Rins.  She had an awesome tutorial for this difficult looking snowman which ended up being the easiest thing possible because of this technique!  I really should make a tutorial because I don't think I'm explaining it in a way that anyone will understand!

What do you think?  Like this color combo?  Fan of the floral?

See you soon.  Until next time, <3.

China Glaze

Twinsie Tuesday: Inspired by a Hobby

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  It's Tuesday which means it is time for another Twinsie Tuesday!  Today we are sharing manicures inspired by our hobby other than nail polish.  Now it is no secret that nail polish is a huge part of my life and my main hobby, so thinking of something other than nail polish started to become quite the challenge.

Then, it hit me...crochet!  A month or so ago some of the residents at work showed me how to do a little chain when we were playing with yarn and I now am hooked.  So much so that I decided that I'm going to make myself an afghan.  If you follow me on Instagram, you have seen my little project's progress!

This weekend actually I posted that I added the green onto the purple portion of my afghan.  I'm so proud of myself that I've taught myself how to do most of this!  It's exciting.

So for today's design, I decided to do a weave design using two colors which are similar to my afghan.

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Sinful Colors - Chalk it Up
  • China Glaze - Lotus Begin
  • Orly Instant Artist - Black
Cute, right?  I started off with a base coat of white polish, and then sponged the purple and green on.  When that was dry, I used my Orly Instant Artist and drew on the painted/weave design on the top.  To me, the weave kind of looked like a braided crochet look...maybe?



I think it looks like crochet...kind of.  Make sure to head on over to my Instagram to see my little project and it's progress!  I'm sharing photos every week or so!  

What do you think?  Do you crochet?

Make sure to check out the other Twinsie's posts!


Savannah at Addicted to Polish
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Claire at Kerruticles
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Bridget at A Painted Nail
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Amanda at Fashion Footing
Amanda at Amandalandish

Until next time, <3.

Bug Mani

Monarch Nail Art :)

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing on this fine Saturday?  I meant to get a post up yesterday but it completely slipped my mind.  I'm kicking myself too because I have so many posts I need to share.  I have to get back into the blogging groove.  I feel like I've been saying that for 8 months now and keep failing at it.

Today I am sharing a manicure I did in mid-August.  See, I told you that I have a back log of manicures.  Anyways, in August we had a monarch butterfly release at work.  This year we got a new butterfly garden which attracts monarchs and is supposed to give them a safe place to reproduce since they are almost close to becoming endangered.  I love butterflies so when we got the garden I was rather excited.  It attracts so many neat looking butterflies, but the monarchs have to be my favorite.

Let's take a look at my manicure!




Colors Used:
  • FingerPaints - Paper Mache
  • FingerPaints - Tie Dye Tangerine
  • FingerPaints - Yellow Out Man
I love how these turned out!  I never wear orange or yellow polishes so I always forget how much I love how these colors look.  Tie Dye Tangerine and Yellow Out Man are a part of the FingerPaints Tie Dye Revolution collection that came out earlier in the summer.  It was a collection which consisted of five bright cream polishes and re-introduction of their awesome white polish.  I absolutely loved the colors in this collection because they were perfect colors which any nail artist could use.



For this manicure, I started off with a base coat of Paper Mache.  Once it was dried, I used Tie Dye Tangerine and Yellow Out Man and created a gradient.  These polishes are PERFECT for gradients!  They are so opaque that I literally only had to dab the sponge a few times.  Typically I have to paint the sponge twice and do two rounds of dabbing.  This time, only once!  Total plus!

What do you think?  Fan of this look?  Should I do more orange and yellow manicures??

I highly recommend getting over to your Sally Beauty and picking up these polishes if they still have them!  Two of the stores I went to last week still had a display!!

Until next time, <3.

China Glaze

Twinsie Tuesday: Inspired by Your BFF

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world and Happy Tuesday!  That's right, Tuesday, which means it is time for yet another Twinsie Tuesday!  This week we are sharing manicures inspired by our BFFs.  I decided to be inspired by my polished BFF Amanda from Fashion Footing.

Amanda and I both have a love for everything floral.  She is a lover of daisies so I decided to do some fun daisy nail art.  I re-created this design by @mvargas_nails on Instagram.  It worked out perfectly because that fun bright green teal is also something Amanda likes.

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - White
  • China Glaze - Too Yacht to Handle
  • FingerPaints - Sterling Sculpture
  • Acrylic
I really love how these nails turned out.  I was so sad when they finally chipped and I had to take them off.  They were so simple, yet different and fun.  The middle nail really gave me a run for my money.  I think I had to take it off three times before I got it looking how I wanted it to.  The first time I put too much of the Too Yacht to Handle so there was no room for the white space.  The second time, the line going down the middle was wonky and well you can't have that.  And the third time I messed up a flower.  Fourth time was a charm in this case.



I loved doing the daisies in black.  Something different that I honestly never would have thought to do.  They really were eye catching.

What do you think?  Like this manicure?  

Don't forget to check out the other Twinsies!  We have some new lovelies posting with us this week!


Amanda at Amandalandish
Amanda at Fashion Footing
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Bridget at A Painted Nail
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Savannah at Addicted to Polish
Until next time, <3.

Dot Mani

Gradient Dot

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  I'm still feeling a tad under the weather.  And it doesn't help that the weather is completely different than what it was at the beginning of the week.  Seriously, it was 90 and humid, and now it's 60, cold, damp, and raining.  I wouldn't have minded the temperature change if it came slowly, not all at once.  Oh well, it's going to be hot again next week.

Today I am sharing one of my end of the summer manicures.  I was in the mood for a gradient and some polka dots so I decided to combine the two.  What I ended up with was a fun, crazy, bright manicure that I fell in love with.

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - White, Purple Crush, Be Daring, and Skinny Dip
  • INM - Northern Lights
Adorable, right?  Part of me wishes that I didn't reverse the gradient on the middle and ring finger and kept it going in the same direction as all the other nails.  I do like the mish mosh of it, but I think it might have been less busy if I kept it all going in one direction.



I've been obsessed with my Orly neons lately.  They make some of the greatest bright polishes.  For this gradient, I only had to dab the sponge on the white nail a few times before having complete coverage.  Only one nail I had to go back through and dab to get it as opaque as the others.  They're just such brilliantly beautiful polishes.

What do you think?  Do you think I should have kept the gradient the same on all the nails?  Or maybe laid it out differently?

Until next time, <3.

Bestie Twin Nails

Bestie Twin Nails with Fashion Footing: Round 16

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  I'm trying to get over this upper respiratory infection.  You know I'm sick when I have no want to paint my nails and have kept the same manicure on for more than 3 days.  Thankfully it has barely chipped since I did it this weekend!  This manicure that has barely chipped is what I am showing you all today!

Amanda from Fashion Footing and I are back for another round of Bestie Twin Nails!  As you may or may not know, September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.  I was on Facebook the other day and one of my friends shared a video from Baby Mason's page.  This page is ran by Baby Mason's mother where she shares the story of her son Mason who passed away from AML Leukemia.  I watched the video of this mother holding up flash cards describing her son's story.  It truly touched my heart.

As I watched the video, I was texting Amanda.  I think at the same time the two of us decided we should both paint our nails gold to join in and raise awareness.  It pains me to see children fighting such awful diseases such as cancer.  I could never imagine going through what this woman did, and what millions of other mothers do.  I'm sure with the power of the Lord I would be able to get through it.  I'm 100% positive that people like Baby Mason's mom are able to share her and her son's story with such strength because of the Lord being by their side.

So, gold nails.  I don't use gold polish much so I went to Pinterest and started searching for ideas.  Amanda and I decided to re-create this manicure by nails_by_erin on Instagram.

Let's take a look!




Colors Used:
  • Orly - White
  • China Glaze - Lotus Begin, UV Meant to Be, DJ Blue My Mind
  • OPI - Love Angel Music Baby
  • FingerPaints - Wrapped in Ribbon
  • Salon Perfect - Champagne Toast
  • Twinkled T - Chevron
I really love how these turned out.  I'm kind of happy that I got sick so I had to keep them on for a little longer than I usually do.  I'm even happier that they aren't chipping.  Which usually anything with glitter polish chips right away!

I'm loving Salon Perfect Champagne Toast.  A few months ago, my top drawer of my Melmer came crashing down, and when that happened I lost my favorite bottle of INM Northern Lights in Gold.  I  had received that polish in a PR Sample and there's no way for me to really replace it because I cannot for the life of me find it in any store.  I received Champagne Toast last year as part of a giveaway prize and am so happy I did.  It's pretty much identical to my lost  INM.  Although it doesn't dry as fast and smells kind of like Fairy Dust by China Glaze, I'll deal with it because it's gorgeous.  And glittery, and just perfect.



Lookie at me using nail vinyls!!  I finally caved a few weeks ago and purchased some Twinkled T nail vinyls.  For my nautical manicure a week ago, I used the striped ones and wasn't overly thrilled by them.  Mainly because my polish was goopy and it didn't work....that's a whole different blog post though.  I was a little nervous to use the chevrons.  I removed them off the paper and they were a little sticky.  Amber from Nails Like Lace told me that before she uses hers she applies it to the back of her hand first.  I did that and didn't have a problem with them peeling off my base or anything.

Over the top of the vinyls, I added a quick coat of Love Angel Music Baby, let that dry for a second, then some of the Wrapped in Ribbon.  I then used some tweezers and removed the vinyls and had perfect chevrons!!

What do you think?  Fan of this manicure?  Something you would try?  Do you like nail vinyls??

So I hope that this post has raised some awareness about Childhood Cancer.  There are many charities out there which could use all of our help.  Baby Mason's page links to this St. Baldrick's Foundation Fight With Baby Mason which is collecting donations.  You could also donate to St. Jude's Hospital.

Until next time, <3.

China Glaze

Twinsie Tuesday: Ocean Inspired

9:00:00 AM


Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today??  I'm sorry that I have been MIA on the blogger front since last week.  I have so many posts to show you, and really wanted to get one up this past weekend, but I kind of got the upper respiratory illness going around work.  I thought I was going to shake it, and then I went to laser tag which was filled with fog and I think that just made matters worse.  It was fun as heck though so it was totally worth it....maybe.  We will see how long this lasts before I can make a true decision.

Today is Tuesday which means it is time for yet another Twinsie Tuesday!  This week we are sharing manicures which are inspired by the ocean.  I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, so I started searching Pinterest and found a bunch of different things that I really wasn't feeling.  Too many beach gradients and with September being here, I didn't want to have a beach on my nails.

Then it hit me....mermaid scales!  Or fish scales.  Whatever you want to call them.  I keep seeing vinyls of this design everywhere.  Now I don't have the vinyls so I decided to free hand.  Let's take a look at my ocean inspired design.




Colors Used:
  • Floss Gloss - Dime Piece
  • Orly - Skinny Dip
  • China Glaze - Too Yacht To Handle, That's Shore Bright, UV Meant to Be, Highlight of My Summer
  • Sally Hansen - DiscoBall
  • White Acrylic
So, fun story about this manicure.  I totally ended up with nail polish in my eye while I was creating it.  How you ask?  Well, my bottle of Floss Gloss Dime Piece is a little on the thick side.  While I was trying to get some of the excess off the brush around the bottle top, the brush flicked and the polish went straight into my eye.  Yes, glittery nail polish was in my eye and caked on my eyelashes.  It burned sooooooooooooooooooooooo badly!  I flushed it out with some water and it's alllll better now.  Thank goodness.  I seriously felt like such an idiot for getting polish in my eye.  Leave it to me though.



To get my mermaid scale nail, I started off with a base of white polish.  I then sponged on the different China Glaze polishes and topped it with Disco Ball.  I then went through with a toothpick and white acrylic polish and drew on the scales.  Honestly they were really easy to do!  I thought I was going to have a problem or have to re-do them numerous times but I didn't!  First time and had perfect results!  No need for me to buy the vinyls!

What do you think?  Fan of this look?  Ever get polish in your eye?

Don't forget to check out the other Twinsie's posts!


Amanda at Amandalandish
Amanda at Fashion Footing
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Bridget at A Painted Nail
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Jessica at Blue Velvet Lacquer
Lakeisha at Refined and Polished
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Savannah at Addicted to Polish
Tiffany at Polished To Precision

Until next time, <3.

Nail Artist of the Month

September Nail Artist of the Month: Emspire

9:00:00 AM

Good morning polished world!  How are you all doing today?  It's Friday and the beginning of a three day weekend, so you know I am the happiest person in the whole wide world right now.  I cannot wait to sleep in on Monday.  Although it will throw my whole week off, but it will be worth it.

Since it's one of the first posts of September, that means it is time for me to introduce you all to another talented nail artist.  I am pleased to introduce you all to Emma from Emspire on Instagram!  Em is beyond talented and it is a shock to me that she doesn't have more followers!

Time to hand the blog over to Emma!

___________________________________________

Hi Little Canvas readers,

My name is Emma from California and the gal behind @emspire. Like many of you I also have a nail polish, nail art addiction. My obsession started back in 2010 when I first discovered nail stamping (I wasn't very good at it but I thought I was the ish lol). I continued to polish my nails through out the years but it wasn't until about a year ago that I decided to share my nail creations on Instagram. 

Ok so that's a little background on how and when I got started but it's now time to move onto my mani... I was having a hard time trying to decide what to do. Aside from free hand nail art I live for a good glitter gradient so that's exactly what I went with. Something simple and cute that anyone can recreate.



I started off by applying two coats of a creamy darker colored polish. Then I sponged on some of these hexagons on my tips. & finally topping everything off with my favorite top coat.

*Picking a darker polish will help the bright hexagons stand out.

I used: 
Sally Hansen- Dark Knight
KBShimmer- Sweet Wave
Seche Vite top coat

Here's a closer look... 

I want to thank everyone that took the time to read my post but a very special thank you to Alaina for choosing me as her Artist of the Month.

xoxo
-Em
_________________________________________

I love this manicure so much.  The blue, the fun bright glitters, the perfect gradient!  Ahhh I love it all!!!  I wish I could do a glitter gradient like this.  Every single time I have tried, my nails look like blobbed messes.

Make sure to follow Em on Instagram!  Thank you again for this awesome post!!

Until next time <3.

Nail Vinyls

Twinsie Tuesday: Inspired by a Flag - Nautical

9:00:00 AM


Hey all!  How are you all doing on this fine Tuesday?  I'm am pleased to say that this Tuesday the Twinsies are back and posting!  In the month of August we took a little break to re-group and enjoy the rest of the summer.  I"m not going to lie, this post creeped up on me and I kind of wasn't ready for the break to be over.  Plus it's a super busy week at work and I most likely would have skipped today if it weren't for the group.

Regardless, I'm happy to be back.  Today we are sharing manicures inspired by flags.  Since I keep my manicures on for a few days, I didn't want to have an American flag themed manicure because I would have had to explain myself over and over again.  So I found inspiration elsewhere.  I looked up the New York State flag and in the middle of the flag there are little boats.  Which got me thinking of something nautical.  So I went searching for nautical themed flags and found dozens upon dozens of blue striped flags, ones with anchors, and ones with gold.

And I ended up with a nautical themed manicure.  Let's take a look!  I was inspired by kadnails for the look.




Colors Used:
  • Sinful Colors - Rain Storm
  • OPI - Love, Angel, Music, Baby
  • Sally Hansen - Goldi-Flecks
  • Orly - French White
New to The Little Canvas collection are Twinkled T Nail Vinyls.  I used the stripe ones for my accent nail.  I need to get used to them...that's why my lines aren't perfectly straight.  Plus my bottle of Rain Storm (love this color) was a tad thick so nothing was really going well.  Once I get used to them, I'm sure I'll be able to get straight lines and not all weird uneven looking things like I did.



Overall, I like the manicure.  It's not my favorite...honestly I think nautical nails look better on other people.  Plus my nails were rather long this weekend when I did the manicure and I feel that made them weird too.

What do you think?  Fan of the look?

Don't forget to check out the other Twinsie's posts!


Amanda at Amandalandish
Amanda at Fashion Footing
Amber at Nails Like Lace
Bridget at A Painted Nail
Chelsea at Nailed Blog
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les
Savannah at Addicted to Polish

Until next time, <3.