Spring Color Swatches

I'm trying to make a comeback here, life has been very busy with many changes & getting around to blogging has fallen on the back burner. I haven't even been painting my nails much, it's been odd & a little sad, but when you have big projects on the line such as remodeling a home to sell, moving into a rental, taking real estate agent classes & tying things up to quit your current job, nail painting doesn't seem quite as important.

Anyhow, with spring already here & so many gorgeous spring colors dancing around in my head, I had to take time to paint.

Inspiration

I guess with the home remodel I have paint swatches on my brain & I wanted my nails to look like I was trying to pick the right color to go with, so I swiped some random "test swatches".

31DC2013 Day 5: Blue

31DC2013 Day 5: Blue pattern

I found this blue pattern on pinterenst so I thought I'd give it a go. It's pretty awesome that the lines are very obviously free-handed as it takes the pressure off being perfect!

Inspiration (I do not own this picture, found on Pinterest)

White to blue fade

After a few failed attempts at a manicure I could be proud of I finally settled on this simple sponge fade manicure. I used OPI my boyfriend scales walls, which has become my favorite white because it's not quite white & has just a smidgen of gray to it which I find romantic. I then sponged on some OPI Catch me in your Net, and there you have it, simple & lovely...finally!

Where in the World Challenge: Hungary

#11, Hungary: I was struggling with this a bit, I don't know much about Hungary so I really had to rely on Google searches &/or looking at what the other ladies had come up with. Mandy, from Chameleon Stampede had found out that a Hungarian physicist is responsible for the HOLOGRAPHIC method, and here I quote from Wikipedia: "The Hungarian-British physicist Dennis Gabor (Hungarian name: Gábor Dénes),^[1][2] was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1971 'for his invention and development of the holographic method' "

Well, any excuse to use holographic polishes, I'm all over that! I just did a holo post a few days ago, but y'all gotta let me get away with another one so soon, pretty please?  So I grabbed a couple of my favorite holo's, Nubar Reclaim & Butter London Fishwife, and went to work. This is also my very first tape Mani  so it's exciting for me. I just recently bought some of that nail tape that I've seen a lot of other bloggers use, I found it to be a little tedious & time consuming. But since I've mainly been a freehand nail artist I wanted to at least try it out. It's not really up my ally but I'll give it a few more goes with some other color combos, so we'll see! Maybe I'll try using some regular tape & see how I like that, cause the nail tape was slightly difficult to control & tends to curl up a little making it hard to place.

Anyways, back to the Mani, I put Fishwife on as my base & Reclaim on top, it resulted in a very pretty & subtle tape Mani:

Holographic x3

I spent about 3 hours Sunday sketching one of my tattoo concepts; I'm hoping to eventually have enough money to do a 1/2 sleeve & have been devising my design for a few years trying to get it just right. It's a big decision & it's gotta be right. Anyhow, by the time I was done with that I guess all my creative juices had been used up because I tried several nail art designs for my weekly change up ( I usually change my design every Sunday) but was unhappy with all of them. Finally I just figured I'd wear a solid color that made me happy until inspiration struck me again. So I put on one of my holo polishes, China Glaze QT, & as I was putting it on I was inspired to combine a couple of my other holo's to make a simple accent nail. Here are a few pictures of the resulting holographic heaven :-) The other 2 polishes are Nubar Reclaim & Butter London Fishwife.

Stamping Contest

I have a quick little post, I found a contest on one of the blogs I follow called Creative Nail Design by Sue & decided to give it a go. I hardly ever stamp, but I really do need the practice, & the first prize was the kicker...Butter London, oh my!) But it's a lovely idea & so I grabbed all my stamp plates & stared at them for a while, finally I chose one that I think is super cute & just went with it.

For my polish color I chose Orly Royal Navy, if you haven't gotten this polish it is simply the most gorgeous blue ever, I mean really...EVER! I then used the little buttons on Konad stamping plate M16 & my white Konad polish to stamp with. I added an angled french tip with white polish & accentuated with little black stitch lines using black polish & a thin art brush.

Here is my result & entry to the Stamping Contest: (please forgive the sorry state of my cuticles, I had a big clean up day & didn't wear gloves. Tsk, tsk, I know!)

This pic was taken outside, no sun today.

Here's a pic of the polish before the design, indoor soft lighting shows off the pretty  teal shimmer

LDTTWC, day 6: They don't make'em like they used to...

Yay, I'm so excited for this day of the Time Warp Challenge that Lindsey created, cause we get to look back on happy childhood memories & the simple joy of playing silly games that kept us entertained for hours. Imagine not having tv, computers, video games or even a bicycle growing up? Well, such was the life of my family of 7 girls growing up in Brasil during the 80's & 90's. If we weren't outside climbing trees, at the beach, or playing soccer, we were indoors playing a variety of indoor games such as; Lego, scrabble, snakes & ladders, pictionary & other board games. But I had to narrow it down & ended up picking 2 favorites to design for you today; Pickup Sticks & Jacks. Can you imagine getting kids nowadays to play pickup sticks, they would look at you like you were crazy, lol!

For the pickup sticks I used various colors as my base in white, blue, green & yellow, any colors would do. I then used acrylic paints in the same colors for my two accent nails. 

For Jacks I used Elf Innocent as my base & then used acrylic paints for the Jacks & ball.

LDTTWC, Day 5: "We can do it!"

For day 5 of the Time Warp Challenge, created by Lindsey, I have chosen Florence Nightingale as my influential woman. I remember watching a movie about her when I was a kid & having to write an essay. It made quite an impression on me & hers was the first name that popped into my head when thinking about who I should pick for today's challenge. 

I used a dark blue for my base, then with acrylic paints I painted her demure dress collar on all my nails except my ring finger. On my ring finger I painted a lamp since she was known as the "Lady with the Lamp".

Inspiration

Result

LDTTWC day 4: Lights, camera, action!

I think I was the most excited about this day, day #4 of the Time Warp Challenge created by Lindsey, cause we get to do a design based on a nostalgic movie, song or literature. Most everybody knows I am a huge movie buff, I love everything from old B&W films to SyFy & Comicbook, romance & chick flicks to action & comedy. I have done several mani's that were movie based; Avengers, Batman, Serenity & one of my all time favorites Little Women. There are just too many fabulous movies to choose from, I almost picked "The Scarlet Pimpernel" for my movie choice or I was going to go with "Secret Garden" for literature, both extremely dear to my heart for various reasons. But I already knew what I wanted to do before even thinking of it...TITANIC! I know by doing this Mani I am risking going up against some other girls in this challenge who will think of this as well, but I really had no choice. I simply love the story, the way it's told, the era, the actors, everything about it just touches me in the most beautiful way & I had to give my interpretation.

Inspiration #1

Inspiration #2

I drew my inspiration from the ship & the lovely blue sapphire necklace, "heart of the ocean", worn by Rose in one of the most intimate & romantic scenes ever filmed. I used Wet n Wild Blue Moon for the three fingers with no art on them. I did a lovely nude, also from Wet n Wild called Private Viewing, which I thought was perfect for Rose's flawless skin & the "private viewing" Jack was having, hmmm. I then used various acrylic paints to do my designs. Here are a few pictures:

I wanted to zoom in really good so you can see the detail, sorry if it looks a little crappy.

This one got a romantic soft tone to it.

Where in the World Challenge: Australia

I've gone & picked up another challenge. I know it seems a bit silly to do more than one challenge, I'm currently in the beginning of the Time Warp Challenge, in addition I have been very busy lately with 2 jobs, a house, hubby & animals to care for. But this second challenge is very low key & can be spaced out extremely well giving us about 2 months for each individual Country listed.


The Challenge was created by LifeinColor & SuperficiallyColorful. Here's the Banner:

Here are the rules, I've copied & pasted from Superficially Colorful's site:

1. The challenge will start on September 10.
2. You may join us at any time along, but you must keep the original order of countries and without skipping. This is why it is called "A challenge", to differ it from a random one country mani idea.
3. There is NO time frame for each post, as long as it is in order. If you don't have time this week - you may work on your mani next week. No problem. As long as the order is kept.
4. What should your mani look like? You decide. The country is your inspiration. How you represent it - it's up to you. It can be as simple as the polish name (e.g. OPI "Russian Navy" to Represent Russia), the country's flag mani, using a country's colors or even make a complicated artwork to represent a country. Your choice!
5. The list of countries will be set once the challenge takes off. If you would like to add to the list - please let either Me or Gosiaknow, before September 8.
6. Every country will have an inLinkz code so that everyone who participate can have a thumbnail link to their blog post, in every participant's post. If you play along - please email Me or Gosia so we can give you the code to put in your blog post.
   
   Please note: if you add your link to the display but you don't put the code in your blog post to show all other participants, your link will be deleted without warning.

Today is Australia & I have picked the Sydney Opera House as my inspiration. I used Sally Hansen insta-Dri Blue Away as my base to imitate the clear blue sky that I always associate with Australia. I then used some acrylic paints to do my tips in the curved shape of the famous opera house.

The inspiration

The result

Geek Nail Challenge #3: Games/Gaming

Play play play, games & gaming day of the Geek Nail Challenge created by Girlonashoestring. I have to be honest, I am not a huge gamer. My parents really couldn't afford video game apparatuses for my sisters & I growing up as a missionary kid in Brasil, so I really didn't form any sort of addiction or skills growing up. I have since done much better, now in my 30's, but I'm still terribly slow & uncoordinated. I love watching my hubby play, he's really good & it feels just like watching a really action packed movie when he gets on a roll. I do like quite a few games & one that I actually enjoy playing is Stargate: the Old Republic. My Hubby & I actually got to test it @ Comic Con 2011 before it even came out & I loved it especially cause it's on a PC because I suck at xBox controllers. Our friend got it for him for Christmas 2011 & I've gotten to play it a little & it's been fun!


I got my inspiration from the logo's for the Empire & Republic: