The subtlest of not subtle water marble ;)

Hi loves!

I hope you guys are having a lovely week so far!! It's been beautiful weather here so I really can't complain too much :) 

Water marbling has always been something I've usually admired from a far... I try my hand at it every once in a while but it just gets so discouraging because the polishes I use don't always work, I mess up a few nails, the clean up is horrendous, or my personal favorite, I spill water all over my desk -_- But enough of my complaining! I decided that me and water marbling were going to become fast friends. I was going to do it until I got the technique down and I only spilled all the water a couple of times ;) To my surprise it went pretty smoothly this time! I think it has a lot to do with the fact that the polishes I chose worked well for marbling. 

So let's get started! I started with a base of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls on all of my nails. Then I used China Glaze Sun-Kissed and I'm With the Lifeguard for my marbling colors and marbled my middle, ring, and thumb. Then I did two coats of I'm With the Lifeguard on my index and two coats of Sun-Kissed on my pinky.

For once my camera wasn't horrendous at photographic neons! I still had to do some color correction... hence why I look like I have jaundice in the last photo -_- but not nearly as much as I'm used to when I work with neons. The difference between the green and yellow was a lot more noticeable in person but they still photographed remarkably well ;) These were so darn bright I needed some sunglasses just to look at them B) 

I don't think I'll ever get tired of using neons in the summertime. What's your favorite thing to wear on your nails in the summer? Thanks guys :) 

Mish Mash Challenge: Metallic

Hi cupcakes!

It's Wednesday so you know what that means right?! Another challenge day for the Mish Mash Challenge hosted by Kimber's Lacquer Korner. :) Today's challenge day theme is metallic. I know exactly what you guys are going to say when you see mine... "another tape mani really?" But hey I didn't know what else to do! And I always love how tape manicures end up so... deal with it yo! ;) 

Anyways, I don't actually own very mani metallic polishes because I don't like them. I don't like being able to see brush strokes and generally I'm just not a big fan of the way they look. But I do have a few and decided to go with a gold, silver, bronze look here.

To start off I painted all of my nails with Sally Hansen InstaDri Silver Sweep. Then I taped off my nails and painted with Maybelline Color Show Bold Gold and ELF Copper. After that I took all three colors and free handed some more triangles on the sides and inside the other ones. Then I used NCY Matte Me Crazy because I like the way metallics look mattified better and added a rhinestone to each and I was done! 

What do you think? I'm so iffy on metallics but I actually kind of liked how these turned out! I think the matte top coat made me like it more too it made the brush strokes less visible in my opinion. 

I can't wait to see what everyone else comes up with don't forget to check them out!
Thanks guys :) 

Born Pretty Store Feather Water Decals

Hello lovelies!

I have another review for you guys from the Born Pretty Store today! If you haven't heard of the Born Pretty Store it's a great online store that sells many nail art supplies for great prices. 

I've seen water decals around the blogosphere a lot lately and have been itching to try them. Daisy was kind enough to send me some really pretty feather decals for review. The pack comes with 11 different designs I'll only be showing you two today but keep your eyes peeled because these decals are WAY too cute to only make one appearance on here ;) 

The two that I used were black and purple white spotted feathers and they're super cute. I didn't do a tutorial on how to use them but I'll just do a quick little explanation here:

1. Choose the design you want to use.

2. Cut out the individual design for one of your nails and remove the clear plastic.

3. Dip the decal in water for 10-20 seconds. 

4. Gently slide the decal off of the paper back.

5. Wet the nail you want to apply the decal to and gently place it on.

6. While your nail is still wet you can move the decal but do it very carefully.

7. Lightly blot the nail with a napkin or tissue to remove excess water.

8. Top coat the nail.

Here's the design that I created using the Born Pretty Store's Feather Water Decals. 

These decals are super easy to use and I really like how you can move them around your nail as long as they're still wet. I don't know about you guys but I can never place something perfectly on my nail the first time ;) These give room to fix that. I can't think of anything bad to say about these, the only thing is with these particular feathers there is a bit of white around them so it's a little more difficult to get a seamless design but with the right base you can't even tell!  

The Feather Water Decals can be purchased HERE for $4.73. Pretty amazing price if you ask me, you get 11 different designs and each design has between 16-20 feathers. That's quite a few manicures! 

If you want to purchase these or anything else from the Born Pretty Store don't got yet!! Use my coupon below! ;) 

What do you think guys? Have you tried water decals before? Will you now? 

Thanks lovelies!

Born Pretty Store Diamond 'Glequin' Glitters

Hello lovelies!

I've got something pretty cool for you guys today :) The wonderful Daisy from the Born Pretty Store was kind enough to send me some diamond 'glequin' glitters for review. If you haven't heard of the Born Pretty Store it's an online store that sells quite a lot of different nail art supplies for really great prices. I actually have regular hexagon glequins from them from a while ago but I was really excited to try the diamond ones. There's so many possibilities! So let's check them out shall we? ;) 

The glitters are super small: 3X3.3cm and come in a pot filled to the top! Seriously I don't think I'm ever going to run out of these even if I used them in every manicure I do for 20 years! The ones I received are a pretty red that look kind of orange in some light. The way I use them is I use a toothpick to pick up the individual glitters and place them on my nail with clear nail polish... it takes quite a while but your nails are super sparkly when you're finished!! B)

Loved this! I'm actually way too embarrassed to tell you how many layers of top coat I have on here.... somewhere around 6ish O.O lol! Not that it needs that many for these glitters to be smooth because they lay really flat on your nail, it's just every time I finished a nail I'd top coat them all... not really sure why guess I just wasn't thinking ;) The only issue I had with these glitters was that a bunch of them get stuck together in the pot so it gets to be kind of a mess trying to get the little glitters to separate. Just means that they take a little longer to use. :) 

The Diamond Nail Art Glitter Glequins come in 10 really pretty colors and can be purchased HERE for only $2.38!

If you want to buy this or any of the Born Pretty Store's awesome nail art supplies don't go yet! I have a coupon for you so use it!! ;) 

What do you think of all these different kinds of 'glequins'? Fun for nail art or too much work? 

Thanks cupcakes :)  

Inspiration Nation: One Stroke Flowers

Hi cupcakes!

I think it's time for another Inspiration Nation post! My inspiration this time comes from a blogger that I have always idolized! She does amazing nail art and her nails are just freaking gorgeous!! That's right I'm talking about the awesome Lucy from Lucy's Stash :) One of the many amazing things that Lucy does is one stroke flowers. I've always wanted to do one stroke flowers... actually I tried them once wayyyyy back in January and it wasn't a complete fail, not nearly as good as hers but I knew I'd want to revisit them some day. Lucy actually wrote up a tutorial post for one of her one stroke flowers so I figured that would be a great place to start ;) 

I started with a base of Zoya Aurora. Gosh I love this color! Zoya really hit the nail on the head with their 2012 Christmas collection! After that was dry I followed Lucy's tutorial and took white and purple acrylic paint and painted on the flowers. Then I took black acrylic paint and outlined them. After some top coat I was done and super proud! 

They aren't perfect but I think they are so much better then my last attempt. Practice makes perfect that's what they say right? Not to mention Lucy's tutorial made it so much easier too!

What do you think? Watch out for more one stroke flowers on the blog because I'm totally hooked!! 

Mish Mash Challenge: Taping

Hi chickies!

It's time for another challenge day in the Mish Mash Challenge hosted by Kimbers Lacquer Korner! Today's theme is taping. I have a very love hate relationship with taping, striping tape to be more specific... I absolutely love the effect it can give but really hate cutting all those stupid little pieces! They always find a way to get stuck all over me -_- But I wanted to do something really cool for this challenge so I sucked it up and cut 2673857489 little pieces of tape.

I'm not sure where this design idea came from, it actually wasn't my first idea but I couldn't quite get that one to work out without swearing profusely! So I just kind of stuck some tape on my nails until I had something I remotely liked ;) 

To start this design I painted all of my nails with two coats of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls and then two coats of China Glaze Orange Knockout on top of that. Once my nails were dry (I used some Poshe top coat to speed up drying time ;) ) I put the vertical pieces of tape on my nails. I put one piece horizontally to make the cut off line nice and clean. I painted over the tape with Lime Crime Peaches <3 Cream and pulled the tape off. When that was dry I put the horizontal pieces of tape on and painted over those pieces with the same polish. After I pulled the tape off I did some touch ups with a striping brush, top coated everything with Poshe and I was done! 

I really quite like how the final result looks! It was a little time consuming but I definitely think it was worth it. What do you guys think? Do you use striping tape? Is there an easier way to cut all those pieces because I don't think I can handle the nightmares!! ;) 

Thanks guys and don't forget to check out everyone else's taping nails! I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with :) 

Nina Pro glitter gradient accent

Hello cupcakes!

Sorry about the lull in posting!! I never meant for it to happen but you know, life gets in the way sometimes -_- Sorry!! 

I realized that my collection was lacking in the bright blue area so I set out to pick one up and decided to try out a new-to-me brand: Nina Ultra Pro. This brand is sold at Sally's Beauty Supply and they've really got a great variety of colors. Anyways I picked up this blue and couldn't wait to try it out. 

Let me tell you this baby is BRIGHT! The pictures make it seem a little dustier then it is in real life. I loved this color so much I almost didn't even add anything to it... but I'm sure you guys know I can't leave well enough alone ;) 

Below is two coats of Nina Ultra Pro Blue Blaze with a glitter gradient accent of Pure Ice Beware on my ring and thumb.

Only down side to this polish? It chipped in less then 24 hours :( I mean it's not really a problem for me because I change my polish so frequently but it was kind of disappointing. 

What do you think? Have you tried Nina Ultra Pro polishes before?