Travel Storage

For a while i've been trying to figure out how to easily and painlessly transport my nail supplies. I like to do other people's nails when we're just hanging around some place. Before i would stuff as many bottle of polish as i could into a tiny make up bag, squeezed in my dotting tools and sponges, and a few cotton balls. Now, i can bring any thing i want. And i am excited. Behold, my Caboodle.

To thee left you will see side one of my magnificent Caboodle. I love that word, Caboodle, it makes me smile. In thee top compartment you will see my nail pens. These fit fantastic and i now feel the need to buy more. Below that i keep, for now, just my simple make up sponges for gradients and the like. On the last level, my cotton balls and q-tips. I have not yet found a small solution for transporting acetone quite yet, so for now the cotton balls are useless.

Opposite side! Oddly enough this looks like it's the same side. This picture is obviously upside down. That does not void the fact that in the top shelf fits perfectly my nail files and matching manicure kit. Below, ready and waiting are my cuticle cream and hand salve. Did the shiny catch your eyes? I bet you already saw the rhinestone wheels and nail stickers sitting in the bottom section. What nail diva doesn't like shiny. 

Moving to the middle my polishes sleep soundly while i show off my nail art tools. Here you will see my dirty paint brushes and dotting tool strapped in tight by individual elastic spaces. There is another elastic wonder like this on the other side. I need to fill it with finer paint brushes. You can also set items in that black space you see when the case if open.

  In the depths of the middle of my Caboodle. The polish. One thing that disappointed me through all my excitement is how shallow the middle is. Unfortunately, it is not deep enough to hold anything taller then Essie. What you see now are various Color Club polishes from Ross sets. Those fit, which is great because i usually take these sets when doing nails due to the wide variety of colors and finishes.

Dorothy, who put those on your nails?

I do hope all you lovelies had a wonderful Christmas, and are looking into a bright and shiny New Year. Today i have for you a little experiment i tried the other night. I got these odd glitter things off eBay in hopes to use them to franken, but the bled horribly and sunk right to the bottom even in pure suspension base. So here i am, sticking things to my nails.

For this mani i used....

China Glaze "Dorothy Who?"

Color Club "Lumi-Icecnt"

Crushed Shell white glitter

I used two coats to China Glaze "Dorothy Who?"

Bright blue jelly base packed with similarly colored glitter, "Dorothy Who" has caught me by the heart and my spot spot for blue. 

I used "Lumin-Iceent," a light blue silver from Color Club's "Foiled" collection to stamp on a full nail filigree design. These two color together meld to a point of visual confusion. One second it's there and another its not.

Lastly i dipped the tip of my fingers into my white crushed shell "glitters" I used a heavy top coat over it and it remained....bumpy. However, by "bumpy" i mean painfully stabbing and scratching me, and constantly catching on things. I didn't have this on for long.

Androgynie and Shine of the Times

This year i've had my eyes almost fall out of the sockets at the sight of some of the new releases. Nail polish is defiantly about more then creme and glitter. Here are two of my latest favorites comboed together. On the left Orly's "Androgynie" a black jelly with multi colored, multi faceted glitter. On the right over "Androgynie" is Essie's "Shine of the Times," a multi chrome flakie top coat.

Here, with my messy cuticles and half assed clean up is Orly's "Androgynie." This was recently released in the 2011 "Holiday Soiree" collection. The collection also features a few dark cremes and multi colored shimmer polishes. This particular polish is a black jelly that finishes with a fantastic sheen. The mulit-faceted glitter reflects in various colors such as blue, gold, and turquoise. It defiantly is a unique glitter. But this gets even better...

SHINE OF THE TIMES. I could not pry my eyes away from my nails.Green and gold and yellow and orange holy crap are you drooling yet?! And look! You can see the glitter from Androgynie coming through. Ahhhhhhhhh. I can't get over this.

Christmas Lights Feat: Orly's "Luxe"

Merry Christmas every one! As you've already seen from my penguin and candy cane manis, i've been in the holiday spirit...on my nails at least. But in reality, i'm not really spending my days in anticipation of Christmas morning, i'm far more excited for the New Year. There have been press releases left and right for fabulous new collections coming out. Many making there debut right in time for my Friday the Thirteenth birthday in January. What are you excited for?

For this mani i had to use a wide variety of polishes.

Orly "Luxe" 

Color Club "Gingerbread"

Finger Paints "Where Art Renoir?"

Color Club "Chelsea Girl"

Color Club "Twiggie"

Essence "Glamourous"

                   Color Club "Wham! Pow!"

And a few tools: Small paint brush, Small and medium dotting tools.

I started out with two coats of Orly "Luxe"

Luxe is a polish i picked up out of no where just because it said "New" on it and was incredibly shiny. I never had the perfect excuse to use this metallic gold polish, which was a shame because its silver shimmer and flawless formula makes it picture perfect for nearly any occasion. Gold can always be worn as a tacky accent or for class and sass. Since it's more of a white gold rather then a yellow Luxe is the ideal shade for some extra glam.

Over "Luxe" i used one coat of Color Club's "Gingerbread." This glitter comes from the 2011 Color Club "Beyond the Mistletoe" collection. With tiny gold and and holo glitter this polish livened up Luxe of just enough so that it wasn't going to be too much to put Christmas lights over. I didn't want my base to be to busy, but i wanted it to sparkle.

With a small paint brush and Finger Paints "Where Art Renoir?" i carefully created my light wires. This isn't as difficult as it looks. I placed a small drop of polish on a non-porous surface and got small amounts onto my brush. Starting from the edge of my nail at any point i slowly made curved lines that eventually looped near the middle. The secret to this is taking your time and not trying to rush. Rushing will result in thin lines and sloppy wires.

From here i used a medium and small dotting tool to work on my lights. To make the lights i used my non-porous surface to blob some polish. With my medium dotting tool i made a fat dot near the wire. Before my fat dot dried i used my smaller dotting too to drag out the tip of my light in the direction of my pleasing.

After using Color Club "Chelsea Girl" and "Twiggie" i used Essence "Glamorous" to add red lights. I could have stopped here but i wanted one more color. You can really use any color you please for the lights, but your life will be so much easier if you choose polish of a thick consistency and opaque in finish. Thick polish will cut down on frustration when making your lights.

I finished with my bright orange "Wham! Pow!" by Color Club. If you were wondering "Wham! Pow!", "Chelsea Girl", and "Twiggie" are all apart of the same Color Club collection called "Poptastic."

I used the orange to fill in any empty spots along my wire. I tried to keep my lights all on one side of the wire to avoid cluttering up my nail and making the image to confusing to take in at first glance.

I finished with  a top coat

Candy Canes Feat: Orly's "Ruby Passion"

Of course, with all the holiday manicures being posted every where i look, i could no longer maintain my bah-humbug attitude and decided to jump on the band wagon with candy cane nails. And once again, i took it to far with the attempted fierce and some what spoiled my sweet treat with more glitter then necessary. It was still fitting for the occasion, as on the night i did this mani, i was on my way out to a punk rock Christmas show. Every year for the past three years my dad has taken myself and the family to The Vandal's "Christmas Formal." It was a fun night with a festive mani, but next time i will know when to stop.

 

For my base of the candy canes i went with the unconventional approach and used red as a base. This particular red is one i picked up cheap from a blog sale. Orly's "Ruby Passion" is something i never would have bought in stores for retail because i'm not much of a red person. The light silver shimmer embedded in this candy crimson was just the right sugary sparkle i needed for me candy canes.

With an Art Deco striper polish in white and gold i created diagonal stripes in varied widths and random distances from each other. I'll be the first to say that my stripe spaceing was a little odd, and i was not perfectly happy with it. But this was a learning experience. With the gold striper i did one or two gold glitter stripes on each nail over the white.

As i often do, in my impatiences i managed to bump one of my nails during the drying process. Not happy. Of course i did the only thing i know how, and that was cover it with glitter. The glitter i used here is called "Twilight." It seems to be a special edition polish by Orly put out for the holidays. It is sold along side a similar micro glitter in a clear base in the color gold called  "Shooting Star."

My kitty and her disappointment when she saw what i did to my nails

Orly "Close Your Eyes"

Hey hey. I just have a quick post for you today featuring a beautiful color i received in a Secret Santa from Polishaholics. I never even knew this color existed, i was entirely stunned when i saw it. I have a billion shades of purple, but none are quite like Orly's "Close Your Eyes." The name is a total love too. 

Now that i think about it, this is a sort of wine color. Lightly shimmered with a fabulous glossy sheen, this is one of my new favorites. I would have never picked this up for myself because i have dramatic taste. I like bright and bold. But this is sassy and classy.

A gold shimmer in this polish livens up the deep wine plum shade. This photo shows two coats in natural light. It offers very nice coverage and a dreamy formula. However, i tend to have and issue when trying to get Orly polish to dry on the go. This one was no different, as you'll see in the next photo.

See, i messed them up because it took forever to dry. I still love it enough to try and fix it. However, it was obviously not a good enough fix. So i did what any girl would do. I put some glitter on it.

Introducing Milani "Diamond Dazzle." This was a glitter i picked up on a whim months and months ago. Originally i was going to use it to add a little fierce to my frankens, but never got around to it. I'm glad i never wasted it, because this is freeking beautiful. A very spread out silver holo micro glitter. This is only one coat, but it was enough to mask my mess.

And there you have it. Orly "Close Your Eyes" and Milani "Diamond Dazzle."

Penguin Party

OMFG, i have been so freeking lazy about my blog lately. And the reason for this is because i have also been very lazy with my nails as of late. So really, you have not been missing much. I have a few simple manis and a holo swatch from Secret Santa, but over all, not much nail action these past weeks. But today i am back, with my super cute penguin mani. I wasn't to into doing themed nails for any other holiday up until now. Christmas just has to many too cute ideas for nail art/designs. This post will be a step by step and will walk you through the basic method used to create this winter wonderland. :)

For the base....

Nubar "Baby Blue"

China Glaze "Shower Together"

China Glaze "Blue Iguana"

China Glaze "Frostbite"

Milani "Diamond Dazzle"

Foundation Sponge

I began with two coats of Nubar's "Baby Blue" Since i wanted the lightest color at the top of my gradient it had to be the base. Despite how crappy and thin the formula is on this polish it didn't matter much for this particular mani because most of it will be covered by the other blues once sponged on.

With a quarter of a foundation sponge i lightly sponged on China Glaze "Shower Together" this is my next darkest shade of blue closest to "Baby Blue." Do not cover all the Baby Blue. Leave the tops near the cuticle and spots neat the edge alone. Use the sponge to blend out the color by dragging it lightly. Don't worry to much about blending because the sparkle used later will help mesh together the blues.

My next color used was China Glaze "Blue Iguana." This was not so much of a color change but added a little tint and sparkle. I tried not to overwhelm the previous two color by only using a small amount, bringing it more to the tip and occasionally up to the top in a light spongy manner. Again, use your sponge to slightly blend together the colors.

With a much darker blue, China Glaze "Frostbite", I sponged on the rest of my gradient to the tips. Only a tiny amount of this blue was needed because it was so bold and so much darker then the other colors used. Your color layers do not have to be perfect or straight, just good enough for who it's for.

Finally, a coat of Milani "Diamond Dazzle" a clear glitter coat was used over my gradient to bring all the blues together. I only used one coat because i didn't want to much glitter. If you don't own any of these colors just find four different shades of blue, organize them lightest to darkest and use those for the gradient. To replace "Diamond Dazzle" you'll want to choose a glitter that does not come out lumpy. "Diamond Dazzle" is a very fine micro glitter which will leave you a smooth surface for your penguins.

For the penguins and snow...

OPI "I Only Date Warewolves"

Pure Ice "Super Star"

Prisma "Unknown Orange"

Dotting Tools

Tiny Paint Brush

Now you may be intimidated by the penguins, but they are very simple. Begin with your black. You can make a simple penguin shape with a normal nail polish brush. The first shape will be a skinny penguin but you can make him wider by adding more black. Very Carefully.

With Pure Ice "Super Star" you will make a similar penguin shape for the belly. Start your belly a little more then half way down from the top. Don't make your belly to large, or your penguin will look funny.

Also while you have your white out, make two white dots for the eyes with your dotting tool.

With a smaller dotting tool make two tiny black dots inside the white dots. Where you place the black dots will determine your penguin's expression, be careful not to make him too lopy.

With a small paint brush use an orange to create a small triangle for the beak, and two blobs for the feet

Again with the dotting tool and "Super Star" i made verious tiny white dots to create my snow above my penguin. Don't over load on the snow, you'll regret it.

Again with my tiny paint brush i made my snow flakes. Started with three radial white line from the corner of my nail. Then make wide "v" shapes toward the tips of the lines. Make your lines longer as needed.

Finish with a clear coat.