Sunday, April 22, 2012

Fish eggs && Flocking Powder

So Ive been seeing alot of people doing Fish Egg manis and Ive been wanting to try it so much. I love the effect micro beads give to your nails and I love the way it looks. I went to Michael's one day and bought a 6 pack of micro beads. I love how inexpensive they are and the fact that a nail polish brand is selling sets of these for $25. I think its pretty pointless to buy the set when you can just go to Michael's and get the beads for around $5, and you most likely already have polish to use. You can use any color you want and get the same effect. 

Back to my mani.... I used Pure Ice All Night Long for the polish. The color of the micro beads I used are called Passion. I also decided to try an effect I saw on Let Them Have Polish. It was done using flocking powder. Flocking powder is this sweater-like material that I also bought at Michael's. I like the way it looks on my nails but the texture isnt what you would think it would be. It looks like it would be very soft to the touch but its not at all. In the jar it kinda feels like stale cotton candy in a way. Either way, both of these effects are very cool on your nails.


Now this is my very first time trying this look out so please excuse the chips.

This is my right hand and I think it turned out better than my non-dominant hand which is different for me. lol

My sister wanted me to do her nails like this but she wanted me to use the cherry micro beads.  
On hers I put a coat of SV over them so hopefully the beads wont fall off.

After I was done with my nails I mixed the micro beads and flocking powder just to play around and it actually looked pretty good. 
This might be a nice effect too but I didnt try it out. Maybe my next mani I will?? We will see.


I hope you liked this post because I sure had a fun time doing it. I would wear micro beads alot if I didnt have a job where I most likely wont be able to wear nail polish!! :(((

Monday, April 2, 2012

Easter Eggs

I know I havent posted anything in a while, I have been really busy with work and just everything involved in life. BUT, I have to post this mani I did tonight. I tried doing easter eggs on myself and it was not very good at all. Im so bad at doing free hand nail art on myself because my hand is very shaky. When it comes to doing it on other people though, Im so much better. Still not a pro obviously but practice makes perfect! So here it is.....

I wish I had a more clear picture of it but the only camera I have right now is my cell phone. I know, VERY sad. I will upgrade eventually. Anyways, for this mani I used Julep Niecy and Jessica, Sinful Colors Happy Ending, Kiss Nail Art Paint in Soft Purple and Sally Hansen Mellow Yellow. Of course a base coat by Beauty Secrets and the most obvious a coat of Seche Vite. All of the nail art was free hand so that makes me even prouder of this one. My sister loves it too and Im glad because this one took me a little bit of time! Thanks for reading and I hope you love this one just as much as I do! HAPPY EASTER!!!!

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

First water marble tutorial!!

Hello There!!! And welcome to my first tutorial!
Water marble is one of the hardest things to get the hang of in the nail world. I still have some trouble sometimes but I do it alot. It takes LOTS and LOTS of practice! Once you get the hang of it though, its the easiest thing ever to do. Here I will be showing you my way of doing it and the few tricks Ive learned to get the goal accomplished. :]
 
Things you will need::
  • A shallow bowl or a Styrofoam cup. (I know I spelled that wrong!!)
  • BOTTLED water at room temperature. Faucet water will NOT work!
  • Any kind of tape. I use masking tape most of the time.
  • A base color. Usually white. Ive used black before too.
  • A couple different colors of nail polish.
  • Toothpicks
  • Paper towels
  • An old bath towel
  • And of course, base and top coat.
(If you dont like using tape, you could also use petroleum jelly if you dont mind the mess.)

First thing to do is get everything set up. Make sure your water is at room temp and it comes out of a bottle. Alot of people dont think this step is that important but it is!! I think it has something to do with the chemicals that faucet water has. Bottled water is filtered therefore, no chemicals for the polish to interact with! Apply a coat of your favorite base coat and let it dry, once that is dry apply your base color. One coat will be enough, it will get covered anyway, so the coverage isnt really that important. Once your done with all that, pour your water in the cup or bowl, whichever you prefer, basically to the top but you have to let some room to put your finger in without spilling water everywhere.

         This is my base color. Pure Ice Super Star.
And the skin around my nail covered.

Taping my nails isnt always something I do. Its really up to you but a little scrubbing after your all done takes up all the excess polish without ruining your marble.

Now comes the fun part!
Start dropping polish in the water. Do one color at a time and if you are using a lighter color and two darker colors drop the lighter color between the two darker colors. For example, the colors I chose for this marble are red, pink, and white. Since I used white, I dropped a dot of white polish after the pink and one dot after the red. When you drop dots of polish into the water it should spread out and once your done dropping all your dots Your polish in the water should look like a target....

                   Like sooo.......
Now, I have found that some brands of nail polish dont work as well for water marbling as others do. The brand that works very well for me is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Polish. Your best bet is to get cheap polish and maybe set it aside for water marbling, if your planning on doing it alot, because you will waste alot of polish doing this.

Now take your tooth pick and start dragging it through the polish. Its up to you where you start. You can start from the sides and go in through the middle. (like I did) Or you could start from the middle and go outwards. You could even do swirls starting from the middle and making a swirl. The possibilities are truly endless, thats why I love doing water marble. No nail will be the same, they will all be unique.

With your tape covered finger, find a design in the polish that you like and dip your nail into the polish, on top of the design you want on your nail. Leave it in the water for a few seconds and clean the excess polish out using a tooth pick. You will need to clean the tooth pick after each swipe, and cleaning out the excess.

Remove your finger from the water. I always blow on my finger to take out the air bubbles. Now remove your tape and clean up begins!


My finger after taking the tape off. Using tape makes cleaning up easier then anything else. There wont be too much to clean up. The reason why I dont always use tape is because its very uncomfortable to me. It also makes working with a tooth pick harder. (In my opinion, of course.) :]


Using nail polish remover and a qtip, clean up around your cuticles. I got these qtips at Walmart. They are called Swispers Nail Polish Clean Up or something around there... Lol These qtips work GREAT for nail polish clean up because they are shaped perfectly!


My cleaned up nail!

Now just add top coat and your done! You could also add some glitter if you would like, or a stamp or two. Just to jazz them up even more!


I really really hope this tutorial helps all of you interested in learning to do water marbling. This is my first tutorial, like Ive mentioned, so I hope I didnt leave anything out! If you try this and my tutorial helped you out alot just leave me a comment. I would love to hear from you and see your designs. Thanks so MUCH for reading and GOOD LUCK!!!

Monday, February 6, 2012

Another Valentine's Day Nail

So tonight I have for you a mani I did today, while I was supposed to be cleaning. (I got distracted!) Opps! :] It was originally supposed to be plain crackle but I added a heart in black crackle just to see how it would look. Here is the AWESOME picture!!





I should have taken a close up of the heart because its so cool! I wasnt expecting it to crackle too because I put on a really heavy coat of it because my black crackle was pretty thick. But it looks great close up. I want to add some glitter to this one to really spice it up. For this mani I used Nail growth miracle base coat, Pure Ice Super Star for the base color, Sally Hansen Fuchsia Shock, and Salon Perfect Cracked Coal for the heart. And of course a coat of Seche Vite. I really hope you like this one as much as I do!!

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Christmas Time Water Marble Fuuuun

Yes, it is WAYYY past Christmas, but like I said last night, I found a lot of nail pictures on my phone and finally got them all on my computer. SO here comes the fun part!!

Water marbling is probably the funnest nail technique I know. I havent quite "mastered" it yet but Im pretty close. I love water marble because you can pretty much give your nails a tie-dyed look. Yes, everyone has a little hippie in them and I choose to let mine out in full force. I think Im kinda getting off topic here. Back to Christmas time marbleing!!
I know the green isnt very christmasy so I probably shouldnt call this one a Christmas time marble. Thats the only green I had at the time!!! Anyway, I really like how this one turned out. I forgot what polishes I used because it was last year. I know, not that long ago, but I have a bad memory. So please excuse me! :] What do you think of this water marble fun time? Also, when you do water marble, what are your favorite colors to use??

See Ya Next Time!!! :]

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Sister's Water Marble Tips

I did this on my sister's nails a while ago. She put her acrylics on while I helped her a little. And this is why I will never put acrylics on, I would much rather grow my nails or go to a salon to get them done. Hahah I suck at acrylics, but ANYWAYS... I did this manicure a very long time ago and recently found the picture of it. I dont remember what colors I used so Ill just show the picture. I hope you like it!!

Valentine's Day Nails

I really do not like Valentine's Day, but I love hearts. So any excuse to have hearts on my nails I will grab at the opportunity. These were done with nail polish, glitter, a few stamping plates, and rhinestones. I kinda love these nails. There are a few mistakes in them though so just look past that. :]


I used Funky Singers - Pop artist for the pink, Pure Ice - Crimson for the red on top, and put some glitter over that. For my stamping plates I used Salon Express SE21 for the hearts on my middle and pointer finger and SE20 for my thumb and pinkie. The black stamp on my pinky is from the ever so popular konad m57. I love how the rhinestones and in the middle of most of the hearts. I think this is a very cute nail design for Valentine's Day. Let me know what you think!