The peacock experiment

I wanted to do a peacock mani SO badly. I'd seen a lot of designs and I had all the colors so I decided to go for it. I knew I was not about to hand paint something that detailed on every single nail so I did it as an accent on my ring finger. I'm really happy with how it turned out and it's something I'd like to perfect later, but I think I need some different sized brushes. I was working with dotting tools and one brush. This might be something I'd like to try on somebody else so I have both hands to work with.

I needed something really bad ass for my Poison/Motley Crue concert mani. I knew it was going to be a black base and I'd just bought Sally Hansen Celeb City after having terrible experiences with silver foil polishes in the past but I'd seen a lot of other nail bloggers giving it great reviews, so I bit the bullet. It was actually pretty awesome! I went through my Konad and Bundlemonster plates and found these cute little kissy lip prints and fell in love. I'd also gotten a few other polishes with Celeb City so I decided to see how they stamped as well. Here's what I came up with :

In person? It was adorable and I got a lot of compliments, even by my husband who could care less about nail polish. Photographing? Didn't show up all that great. I'm a little disappointed by how badly it showed up because it was an adorable mani but I think it was just SO shiny that it wouldn't pick up with the flash and it wouldn't show up without the flash.

It's been awhile!

I went on a little bit of a hiatus for the past couple of weeks while I was house-sitting, at the Ohio State Fair (seeing my new boyfriend Blake Shelton, omg) and seeing Poison and Motley Crue (which was an AMAZING show) and doing some running around. I'm back now though and even though I wasn't posting, I didn't forget to take pictures of anything that I did on my nails so now there's going to be a post flood!

So I've been getting the hang of this Konad thing. One of my favorite stamps is the little bow so it shows up on a lot of my manis. I also got a pretty nice polish haul for the end of summer and wanted to play with as many of those as I could. This one features my new Essie polishes, Nice is Nice (a great creme lilac) and Mint Candy Apple (a minty creme)

Now, I'd been having a problem with my nails that I couldn't figure out for like a week, it was ridiculous. If I did a light colored polish (which had been mostly blues) I would get these dark blue streaks around the tips and I thought it was my top coats smearing when they dried or something. I tried different top coats, no top coat, but whatever I did, I still got these streaks. I was going crazy until I realized what it was. I had just gotten my hair done and the for some reason, the color was transferring to my hands, nails and all over my neck. My hair is a blue-black base color with thin highlights of bright blue. My neck was blue when I pulled my hair up, I had blue stains between my fingers, my brush bristles turned bright blue, but it wasn't transferring to my clothes or my pillow cases, so I guess it wasn't too bad but was it ever irritating. I rarely wear my hair up unless I haven't washed it in a day and eventually it stopped transferring... just in time for me to have to get it redone on Monday. So my new manis are going to be dark colors while I ride out the staining period.

Bonus! I did my toes with my Konad stamps as well! 

I also bought Essie's Matte About You so I wanted to test it out. I was obviously on a blue kick so I went with OPI Ogre the Top Blue and made it matte, added some zebra stripes and silver glitter accents.

Neon Leopard

I LOVE leopard print. My laptop is leopard, my garter at my wedding was pink and black leopard, my couch pillows are leopard, you get the point! I'm actually working on getting a quarter sleeve leopard print tattoo soon. I can't wait! I never tried leopard print nails before and thought it would be way too hard but I surprised myself! I practiced with a few pictures online, but I don't have any brown polishes so I decided to go for the neon leopard to match my computer. This was also my first successful use of white polish on anything that isn't a french manicure. Usually I have TERRIBLE luck with white. Either it's too thin, not the bright white shade that I'm looking for or it's so thick that it never dries and always gets smudged or scraped. I found another gem in the Sally Hansen collection (I'm starting to sense a trend here. I might be hooked on Sally Hansen next...) with the InstaDry Whirlwind White. It's the exact white that I want and the brush is awesome. It's a wide flat brush, as opposed to the more rounded shape that most polishes come with. I can usually get my whole nail done in one stroke. It's also a perfect base for neons or thin polishes that need a little bit extra behind them to make them really pop.

Here's my first leopard manicure. I originally did every other nail to avoid it being too loud, but I didn't like how it looked and went back to fill the rest in later. I also should probably add that most of my pictures are taken pre-clean up to get them while they're still fresh. Don't worry, I clean all that extra off!

What I used:
Sally Hansen InstaDry Whirlwind White
Stripe Rite Neons (Pink, green, yellow, orange and purple) and Black

Inspiration for this nail design and the how to came from The Polished Medic. I've been following her blog for awhile and LOVE the way she does her nails. I also love to see long, natural nails being done in more colors than just red and french-tipped :)

After doing my own mani, I decided to give my kitty her weekly mani as well. She wears Soft Claws to cover her front claws since I don't declaw my kitties and this week, we were matching once I put on her pink and blue caps. We had also just finished listening to some Lady Gaga so I felt compelled to snap a picture of my own little monster. Allow me to introduce, Peppers!

Peppers, put your paws up!

Stained Glass

 This was my first nail adventure that I thought to photograph. It's taken with my phone, so I apologize for the quality, but I didn't expect to be publishing them! I wanted a bright look that was more than just a solid color one day and just started experimenting with color. You don't have to do these exact colors (I thought of doing different blues or pastels, for instance) but try to keep them all the same finish so the end result flows nicely together.

What I used:

OPI That's Hot! Pink
OPI A Grape Fit
OPI The 'It' Color (by far, my favorite yellow)
Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Grass Slipper
OPI Dating A Royal
Stripe Rite Black

This is actually a lot easier than it looks and application doesn't have to be perfect because you're filling in where the colors meet with the black line. Simply paint shapes in each color on the nail, as carefully as you can (but once again, any goofs can be covered by the black polish) and outline the area where the colors meet in black or any thin stripe of an accent polish that you choose. I wish I'd taken pictures of the steps so I can show how easy this really is. Your end result will look like a stained glass window, but I like to think of it as a paint by number :) Get creative- you don't have to put the same pattern on every nail and the same colors don't have to always be touching. Have fun!