Brush stroke feather technique

Once again I have found inspiration from this site Pshiiit, the site is in french but the universal language of art in undeniable, the 'force' is truly strong with this one! Using a flat brush you can mimic the look of the very popular feather nail art you see all over the place, & the best part...no birds are harmed in the creation of this art.

I used Zoya Neely as my base, China Glaze QT to make the pink feather brush strokes & white paint for the dots.

indoor light

edited with a film in picassa

IRONMAN 3

"I've got 2 tickets to IRONMAN, took off work to stand in line..." Yup, we're going to stand in line @ 2pm today, so excited & of course I have my nails ready:

Inspiration

Mini Cadbury Eggs

I saw a post on 10BlankCanvasas & loved it, she featured her take on mini Cadbury Eggs. I was planning on doing the exact same effect but found myself terribly short on time, so I chose a faster route & cheated a little with some large glitter polish over my pastels. Although it's definitely shinier than Cadbury Eggs actually are, the result was still quite lovely & I'm glad I can share just how simple it is to recreate something that looks both professional & authentic.

I used various polishes for my nails & alternated: China Glaze Lemon Fizz, Zoya Blu, OPI Rumple's Wiggin', Zoya Neely & China Glaze Something Sweet. The glitter polish I used to top it off is from Sinful Colors Jewelry Heist, it's different size glitter in it, I just swiped one thin coat so the glitter looked spread out. Thankfully they turned out just how I wanted & resulted in many compliments. 

Nail Art Contest by Kelsie

This is my entry for Kelsie's nail art contest she's hosting in honor of her 1 year blogiversary, yay!

As per her rules, I picked a picture from her pinterest board called Nail Inspiration. Here's the one I picked:

I used OPI My Boyfriend scales Walls & China Glaze QT, then used acrylic paints for the detail. 

Here is my interpretation:

Cirque du Soleil

Just a quick little post with a layered swatch of a couple Cirque du Soleil polishes I picked up from China Glaze the other day, Bend over Backwards & Get Carried Away!

This was the most true to color picture I could get

China Glaze Tranzitions

Wow, I've been seeing a lot of new fun polish inventions coming up for the new year. First off, I have for you, (insert drum-roll here) the new China Glaze Tranzitions. Goes on one color & changes when you add the top coat. I quickly ran to sally's & picked out a couple to try out! What you do is apply your base color & wait for it to dry about 10min, then apply a clear top coat either all over the nail or in a design like french/diagonal/stripe or some dots etc., sit back & watch the magic...the color will change as the top coat dries leaving a really cool look.

My picks: Metallic Metamorphosis & Shape Shifter. I decided to put both on at once, so I swiped one on the left side & one on the right side, waited for it to dry a bit & then painted the top half of my nails with a clear top coat. Here is what resulted:

Cool textures I want to try this year: 

• Velvet manicure
• OPI Liquid Sand
• Zoya PixieDust

What are you looking forward to trying out this year?

I've been in a Vintage mood lately...

....so I've created a couple of designs over the last week that tie in with my mood.

For the first design I got the idea from Katrinasnailblog it's a little different, but similar enough that I must give her idea credit here. I used China Glaze Something Sweet & E.L.F. Desert Haze for my base colors & then used pink, white, red & green acrylic paint for the polka-dots & roses:

I put a 60's vintage film on it just to play up the vintage vibe.

The second design was inspired by copythatcopycat & is meant to look like an old vintage necklace & pendant. I used Zoya Pandora for my base & black, white & gold acrylic paints for my design:

Summer Fun Challenge, Day 2: Summer Lovin'

For day 2 of the Summer Fun Challenge, we are to show off our "lovey dovey" design, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I had seen this super cute valentines design by Copythatcopycat, it's so adorable. Nothing says summer like yellow & nothing could be more lovey dovey than a couple of sweet kissy birds!

For the base color I used my favorite yellow cream from China Glaze called Lemon Fizz. I then used various blue & pink acrylic paints to make my lovey dovey birdies.

Summer Fun Challenge, Day 2 "Summer Lovin' ", my Lovey Dovey bird design:

Girly-Girl Challenge, Day 1:Think Pink

I grew up a tomboy & would not be caught dead in pink. Not until I reached my 20's did I actually even attempt to incorporate pink into my closet. Now I can't imagine not having pink in my closet, in my polish collection, makeup, etc.

Day 1 of the Girly-Girl challenge, created by NeverlandNailBlog, is to wear your favorite pink polish & nail art. So I combined my favorite pink holographic with another fav. pale pink & my love for flowers to create this design.

For my "Think Pink" design I used a light pink creme polish from China Glaze called Something Sweet for all my nails except my ring fingers & topped it with a clear glitter from Sally Hansen called  Disco Ball for a little girly sparkle. On my ring fingers I used China Glaze QT which is a beautiful holographic polish that took me forever to find because it's discontinued. I then used acrylic paint to make some dainty little flowers & here is the final result:

The "outline" trend, with special guest appearance:

I don't know if ya'll have seen this new trend, I saw it on the runway & thought it was kinda interesting & a little odd looking too, it's called outline or border nail art & I figured I may as well give it a try...can't hurt & if I hate it I'll just take it off. I chose more subtle colors than I saw on the runway because I wanted to ease into the trend so I chose a light mint color from China Glaze called Re-Fresh Mint & a pretty gold color from OPI called Glitzerland.

I think it turned out really pretty & I took a whole bunch of pictures trying to get all angles with different flowers & my pretty gold & teal snake ring that matched. Then my Cinco de Maio babies, Marco & Maria, decided they were not going to miss a photo shoot & joined in the fun.