Ring Finger Art - Manicure Update

So, as I said last night, I wanted to add something to my Olympic inspired manicure. Well, I played around with some tape and crafting scissors and did some additional detail to my ring fingers. Not bad for a first try:

Ignore the dry cuticles...they are still recovering from the glitter removal from yesterday. I did the striping with scotch tape. I used a pair of scrapbooking shears to cut a pattern into the bottom one.

I like the look, it's subtle and ties in the 2 colors.

Simple Olympic Manicure - Go USA!!!

I wanted to do something patriotic in honor of the Olympics, but I don't have any fancy stamping machine, and I can't freehand nail art. I had to go with what I am good at. I had some new e.l.f. polishes I got a few weeks ago, and I had the perfect colors.

Introducing e.l.f. Dark Navy and e.l.f. Cranberry. I picked these because they are deep and sparkly.

I bought these during the 50% off e.l.f. sale so they were $1 each. I have had good luck with their polish, and you can't beat the price.

Now, I had to sit through the foil treatment to get my previous glittery manicure off. It went very well...whoever came up with that is my hero!

The great thing about this polish is I only had to do one coat. It was good because I was in a rush and was lacking any patience to wait for 3 coats to dry. 

I decided to alternate the colors. Simple way for me to use the 2 colors I wanted. I know there is no white, but I have plans for that over the next few days :) You'll need to come back and see what I have in mind.

Here are the bottle shots:

And, on the recommendation of my sister, I invested in Seche Clear and Seche Vite...I am loving them both!

Edited to add: I went back and did a second coat. I had visions of a manicure failure when I woke up tomorrow for work :)

Go Team USA!!

I was watching the women's swimming qualifications this morning on the 2012 London Olympics.  If you didn't know the Olympics are on you must be living under a rock.  If you live under a rock you probably don't have a computer or Internet, so you probably aren't reading this...so nevermind!!  :)

I noticed that many of the swimmers had their nails painted and some with some very patriotic nail art!  So that inspired me to show my patriotic side.

I started to rifle through my box of nail polish to see what I had for colors.  I found a blue by SinfulColors called Love Nails and a red by ELF called Red Velvet.  Not the exact shades I wanted but they will have to do!

So here's today's line up...

My base and top coat by Seche, my blue, my red and my stamping white.

Now it's on to find my stamping inspiration...

In the middle is a French manicure tip with little stars...I'll put this over the blue.

In the middle on the bottom are some diagonal stripes.  This will go over the red.

So I decide to do the ever popular accent nail on my ring fingers.  So I paint all my nails red except for the ring fingers.  I do those in blue.

See?

So the nail stamping itself proved to be very challenging.  I had redo several nails...it was quite frustrating.

My cotton ball was looking patriotic but my nails didn't...

But I kept with it, like a true US Olympian would and got this!!

It's not perfect but I think it looks great!!

Just goes to show if your nails don't turn out the way you want the first time around just stick with it and it will get better!!!!

GO TEAM USA!!

Refreshed Manicure...with Glitter!

Sometimes when I don't have the time to redo my whole manicure, I look for ways to refresh what I already have on. Helps to save time, and also give you a new look without having to start from scratch.

So, this morning I did a new coat of my most recent polish, Cheers from Revlon.

This coat went over my base, 2 coats from a few days ago and my top coat. Once this was dry, I went on a hunt as to what I wanted to do to make it fresh.

I bought a bottle of Wet and Wild called Hallucinate...isn't she pretty!!

I put one coat of Hallucinate over my existing manicure, and now I have this:

It's very subtle. This is just one coat and no top coat yet.

Here is a second coat.

I think 1 coat is fine, but 2 gives it a little more sparkle and dimension.

So, I will just throw my top coat on, and I am good for a few more days!

I love this topcoat. It does dry really fast (faster than my Orly top coat) and it does give a nice shine. Here is a picture of the finished product. Pretty awesome and shiny and sparkly!!

Ok, So I Lied...

I had posted on Facebook that I gave up painting my nails tonight. Nothing was working. The paint wasn't drying, I didn't like the color...blah blah blah. Thing is, if I don't paint my nails, they will break. They do much better when they are covered. So, I took a break, and tried again.

This is Cheers from Revlon. It is one of their Top Speed fast drying polishes. It is a nice soft pink. I can't wait to use this under crackle or glitter. Which I actually might do something to it every few days and see if I can change it up.

Here is 2 coats, base and top coats.

So, if at first you don't succeed, bitch, moan and whine...and then freaking paint your nails!!

And, on an off note, my cell phone was moody today too. Called Verizon, and so far it seems like they fixed it. Yay for good customer service!!

Say hello to my new little friends...

So, at lunch I hit up the CVS to get the Revlon polish that is on sale. I also had coupons for $1.00 off 1 bottle (Thanks to my girl Rachel!).

So, here they are:

From left to right: Sequin, Blue Slate, Wild Strawberry, Cheers, Cotton Candy and Decadent.

After coupons and in CVS Extra Care Bucks...I paid about 99 cents a bottle. Can wait to slap one of these on!

Intro to Nail Stamping

Hi there!  I am the other half of this crazy blog, Karen.  I have been addicted to crazy nail designs for a while.  I started with crackle nail polish which is aptly named.  It's as addicting as crack!!

At one point, my husband was traveling so I decided to try nail stamping.  It was an investment to get started.  I got most everything on Amazon.  I'll show you all the pieces shortly.

My best tip I can give you when doing your nails is to remove your old nail polish with pure acetone, like this:

I got this at Target and it will last me forever.

This will give you the cleanest nails possible, though it will dry out your fingers and cuticles.  So it's best to use some cuticle oil if possible.

In addition, always wash your hands before painting.  The cleaner the nail the better the polish will stick!

Once you have removed the old polish, you can move on to the base coat.  I use a different product.  It's called Seche Clear.  I like this as a base coat.  The key to a lasting manicure is a good base coat and a good top coat.

I'm not going to post a picture of me in the base coat...it's clear.  Just know it's there.  I swear I put it on!!  

Since my sister mentioned this in her previous post, I actually have used the SinfulColors brand of nail polish.  

I bought a few bottles at Target over the weekend and I haven't tried this one yet.  So this is as new to me as it is you.

This is SinfulColors Mint Apple.  It's kind of a teal color.  It looks pretty in the bottle so we'll see how many coats it takes to make them look good!

Coat #1

Coverage isn't bad but it looks like I will need two coats for sure.  (Sorry for the bad pictures - I need to find good lighting.)

On to Coat #2

Much better coverage.  Now I wait for them to dry so I can start stamping!

The key to stamping is that the nail polish must be VERY dry before stamping or else you will mess up the base coat and you will have to repaint it all over again!

There is a certain finesse when it comes to stamping.  I have several stamping discs (which I will show you shortly) and I cannot get some designs to transfer very well.  Some work great, some don't look good at all. Could be user error.  So I stick with the ones I know work.

These are my discs...

I got a bunch on Amazon.com.  I think I paid $19.99 for all of them.  There are some holiday ones for Halloween and Christmas that I have not used yet that I am looking forward to using.

Now to pick a design...

I'm going to attempt the heart with angel wings on the bottom of the disc...wish me luck.

The other two pieces of the stamping process is the scraper and the stamper.  Here they are...

These are made by Konad.  They are THE name in nail stamping.  My scraper is filthy but it still scrapes!  I'm also going to use the black Konad Special Nail Polish.  This polish is very thick and best for stamping. You can use regular polish but it won't come out as dark.

Here come the instructions!!!

Step 1:  Paint your design

Step 2: Scrape your design

Step 3:  Stamp onto the disc.  Make sure you use even pressure and don't roll onto the disc.

This is how it will look on the stamp...

Step 4:  Roll design onto the nail.  Since I only have two hands and I think my family will send me to be evaluated at the local loony bin if I ask them to take a picture for me...envision rolling the design onto the contour of the nail.

You should see this as a final result...

I am only applying this to each ring finger.

Off to do the other finger.  BRB!

...

...

...

And DONE!

Crappy picture...sorry.

Now off to do top coat.

I have the matching top coat to my base coat.  It's called Seche Vite.  You can buy this at Target or online.  Love this Fast Dry Top Coat.  Dries super fast!

And here is the final results!!!

And I used my flash!  Looks better!!  Since it has gotten kind of dark since I started...

TA-DA!!!!

This was a pretty simple intro to stamping...next time I'll try a different style - either whole nail or layering.

Til then!!

~Karen~

Nail Polish Deals This Week 7/22

I am always on the lookout for deals on polish, and there are a couple of different ones going on. Depending on where you are located, hopefully one of these is in your area.

CVS has a great deal on Revlon Nail Polish. They are $4.99 a bottle and you can get a $3.00 Extra Care Buck on each of them...up to 6 bottles. So, in reality, they are $1.99 each after the savings.

CVS also has a deal on Sally Hansen. Spend $10.00 on Sally Hansen products, and get a $3.00 Extra Care Buck back. Great deal!

Lastly, L'Oreal has a buy $15.00 and get a $5.00 Extra Care Buck back...nail polish is included!!

Walgreens has Sinfulcolors nail polish on sale for 99 cents. I haven't tried this one before, but for the price, it might be a great deal.

I am certainly hitting the Walgreens deal and the Revlon deal at CVS. Not like I NEED more polish, but it can't hurt to get more :)

My very first post!!

I am Michelle and I love painting my nails. For years, I bit my nails. Very recently, I wanted to have cute, pretty nails like everyone else. So, I figured if I can paint my nails on a regular basis, it will help me not nibble away. So, I started to explore the world of nail polish. I never knew there was so much. Crackle and glitter quickly became my new best friends. I think right now I have over 100 bottles of various polishes. Some were super cheap, some were not. All were chosen with love and awesomeness.


So, now I paint my nails every few days. There is no rhyme or reason...its whatever I feel at that moment.

My very first post is crackle. I scored a great deal at CVS a few months ago and got 4 bottles of Sally Hansen crackle for 75% off. Score!!

My first step in painting is base coat. Right now, I am using Orly Bonder. It is a rubberized formula that states it helps bond polish to your nail. I still get chips after a few days, so I can't say that it bonds, but I like it, and I own it...so I will use it.

I used a white base called White On The Spot (Milani Nail Laquer High Speed Fast Dry). They advertise as a 1 coat polish, but we all know that isn't the case...I used 2. This is a reasonably priced polish (under $5.00) and works pretty well. They have some hot neon colors too that I will be getting in the near future.

For the crackle, I chose the Sally Hansen Vintage Violet. Kind of a purple with a metallic hint. At least it looks that way in the bottle. It just looks purple on. But, still cool and cost me almost nothing, so what is not to love.

Finally,  always use a top coat. I am using Orly In a Snap. It doesn't dry that fast, and your nails will stay tacky for a while. But, I own it...therefore I will use it.

Nails are a hit or miss art. You can't tell if the polish will be good or bad until you try it.