Saturday, September 1, 2012

Week 35: Off to College (Final Post)

This comming monday I leave for my freshman year at College! I'm very excited but also very sad because it means that I will most likely have no time for blogging. I have decided to make this my last post; perhaps if I have time I will do a few manicures while on break. For my final manicure I did my nails in my College colors: Blue and Yellow, but instead of being really obvious (writing the name of my college or drawing the mascot) I decided to take the classy apporach and simply use the colors. I used a royal blue as the basecoat and did two diagonal lines of yellow on top. I think no matter what the colors are this always looks nice.Thank you so much for reading, wish me luck! :)

Saturday, August 25, 2012

Week 34: Splatter Paint (Artstreet)







This weekend is Artstreet, an annual Green Bay "fair" featuring over 200 local artists, musicians, and plenty of crab rangoon and funnel cake. Artstreet is one of my favorite things about the summer even though I know it means that summer is comming to an end.  For my homage to Artstreet I splatter-painted my nails as many artstreet posters are wont ot do. First I put on a white base coat and then I wrote Artstreet and scribbled on top in orange, pink and yellow.

 My right pinkie was left over so I painted it black and splatter painted it for something a little different. Unfortunately I was unable to go to Artstreet today but I plan to go tomorrow and enjoy everything it has to offer.

Saturday, August 18, 2012

Week 33: Stop the Violence


Today I attended a concert held in honor of my friend Jesse. This concert was organized to raise money for Jesse who was jumped earlier in the summer and ended up in the emergency room. Jesse had been badly hurt and had to have his jaw wired shut for two weeks. He is now much better but the hospital bills were astronomical so the concert was a fun way for everyone to chip in and help him out. The concert was entitled Stop the Violence and featured many local musicians. So this is my tribute to Jesse. Glad you're okay man.



Saturday, August 11, 2012

Week 32: Beaches

I guess I'm still in vacation mode because this week's manicure features a sunset beach scene.




Salt and Nailpolish aka sand
To create the sand I mixed a tan polish with a coppery polish and some salt I used the flat end of an orange stick to mix and apply the "sand."I created the water by mixing a dark blue with a sheer,sparkly green and applied it with a sponge (the tip of an eyeshadow applicator.) To make the sunset I started with a sheer purple base then mixed a metalic mauve and yellow and applied it with a sponge on top and then in the center I added an extra dab of yellow with the other side of the sponge - still an eyeshadow applicator. The manicure turned out pretty good considering I did my nails in the light from my bedside lamp and couldn't really see what I was doing, but I guess that's why it's good to use a sponge it makes all smudging and mixing look intentional.
I used every single one of these supplies! And yes that is a graduation themed paper plate




Friday, August 10, 2012

Week 31: Vacay!

I'm super duper late; but it's all for a good reason. I was out of town this past week on vacation! It made me realize that we all NEED vacations because not only are they good for your mind and soul, but they are also good for your nails! My nails have not looked this healthy in months.
They are long, a helathy white-ish color and nearly breakage free. I felt that it was appropriate to shoot them in nature because my nails are au natural (well, almost, I do have a clear coat on.) Okay, I'll post again tomorrow only with an actual manicure.















A picture form my vacation (School House Beach, Washington Island)
Toodles.

Saturday, July 28, 2012

Week 30: Olympics


I actually missed the opening ceremony but I figured this made up for it.


From left pinky to right pinky: Silver Medal, American Flag (because I have to cheer for my country,) 2012 Olympic Logo, Bronze Medal, Olympic Logo, Olympic Logo (not a typo, both thumbs are sporting the olympic signia,) Gold medal, British Flag (london is hosting,) Olympic Torch, Gatorade Logo (because all athletes need gatorade.)


Ciao, I've got some gymastics to watch.

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Week 29: Jail Break


This week's manicure admittedly looks very Halloween, but if you look closer you'll realize that my nails have been incarcerated. My thumbs are being strangled with barbed wire;black with a design in grey, my pointers are wearing some striped pajamas; white with black stripes(horizontal,)  both middle fingers are stuck behind bars; black with grey stripes(vert,) my ring fingers are sporting the classic orange jumpsuit; orange with black numbers, and finally my pinky nails are weighed down by handcuffs; black with grey design. I'm not really sure what inspired this week's manicure but it just popped into my head one day "hey it would be really cool to do a barbed wire design" and just evolved from there. maybe I've been watching too many cop shows and murder mysteries. So... opinions! Three months too early or is jail cool year-round? Gotta go watch some Rookie Blue.

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Week 28: Tupac Hologram

I know the Tupac hologram at Coachella is old news, but I was watching Jimmy Kimmel and he had Gary Oldman reading from R. Kelly's new memoir Soulacoaster and mentioned the Tupac hologram; I have been wanting to do hologram nails and thought OMG Tupac is perfect! (If you want to watch the video - which I thought was somewhat funny- just follow this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oh8Fe3liIIc)



So to do my Hologram nails I started with a sheer iridescent base coat and printed out the pictures I wanted to use- in this case Tupac, music notes, and lyrics from the song "Me Against the World." The whole process was very similar to newsprint nails; I soaked the images in rubbing alcohol then pressed them onto my nails. This time I let the sheets of paper dry on my nails so that I had to soak them in water to take the paper off but it left a film of paper on them which made everything cloudy which I thought improved the whole look. I think this method would work great for any manicure since you can print pictures of whatever you want to transfer to your nails. To finish the manicure I just sealed it all in with a top coat.

The Tupac images turned out the best, I think it was because there was so much more ink the music notes were really fritzy but actually the lyrics were okay except I forgot to flip them before I printed so they are all backwards, that is important if you want your image to go on one way you have to print it the opposite. I hope you don't think I'm cheating by using the same technique as the newsprint nails, I thought they were different enough that it could slide. Let me know what you think below!

Saturday, July 7, 2012

Week 27: Stained Glass

I have actually been wanting to do stained glass nails for a while; but I had an elaborate plan that involved colored tissue paper (which I do not posses and kept neglecting to purchase.) Finally I decided, screw it, if I want to to stained glass nails I will do stained glass nails... and so my friends, here we are.

I used a toothpick (of course!) to draw on the panes, if the lines criss crossing my nails can be referred to as panes, in black. Then I used a few of my sheerest colors for the colored glass I found my Revlon Glimmer Gloss ( the red one) to work out the best because it doesn't have a sparkle but still goes on sheer, which, now that I think about it is probably why I don't use it very much otherwise. I used four different colors a purple, yellow, green and the previously mentioned red. The green is kind of hard to see so if it just looks clear or slightly grey, that's the green you're seeing.








I would still like to try this with  the tissue paper, if I do I'll post it here Toodles!

Saturday, June 30, 2012

Week 26: Fireworks

This wednsday is the fourth of July, aka America's independence day! Nothing says fourth of july better than fireworks. To show off my American pride I sent up patriotic flares in red, white and blue.

The blue I used was a dark navy and the red really didn't show up on my black background either; about my third nail in I came up with the grand idea to paint all the fireworks in white and just cover some up with red and bue to make the colors stand out more. The above picture is of all nails with white based fireworks.

This is what my first nail looked like wiht nothing under the blue and red to make them pop...
 
the blue firework is in the top right-ish corner and the red is in the bottom right corner. I think if I were to do these nails again I would actually light fireworks from them, just kidding, but if I could figure out how to do it (safely) I totally would. Do they use fireworks to celebrate independence days in other countries, or is it just an American thing? If you know please fill me in below.
Happy Fourth of July!



Saturday, June 23, 2012

Week: 25 Porcelain

Ok, so this week I did a freehand of what I thought porcelain looked like. Then, when I had finished, I actually looked up a picture of porcelain on google, this is what I found...

My nails aren't nearly as intricate but they do look delecate. Hmm I just noticed that the objects in this picture are soda cans, I wonder why. Anyways I started with (as always) a strenthening base coat, then I painted a milky white base and (finally) added the design, in blue, using the pointy end of what is actually supposed to be a cutical pusher.   
I'm really pleased with them, my nails turned out more like broken shards of an ancient vase or plate than a whole and healthy saucer. Should I have added more detail? I'm conflicted, on the one hand less is more but on the other hand, shouldn't more be more? Weigh in below!


Saturday, June 16, 2012

Week 24: Tiara Tips

This is my regal twist on the french tip. I painted my nails black and then used a toothpick to draw little tiaras on the tips in silver (which you can't really tell fro the above picture.)






To add a little glitz I stuck some gems on my tiaras.  I've  already lost a lot of my gems at work (why must retail be so hard on my nails?) But I think they still look okay.
From far away you can't really tell what is on my nails; although I have gotten a lot of complimentson this manicure so far. Any suggestions on how to make my tiara tips better, besides more artistic tallent? Could this be the new french? Let me know!

Saturday, June 9, 2012

Week 23: Jaws

This is my very first post from my new laptop! That's right, straight from my very own bed. This week I did shark nails which aren't completely finished; I still have to add teeth, but there are so many layers that have to dry I just ran out of time. Tomorrow I will add new pics of my sharks and their pearly whites but for now you get this...

These nails were inspired by the shark dress that MIA wore to an H&M launch party way back in 09. For some reason I thought about that dress the other day and I remembered absolutely loving it so I thought hey, why not? I promise I will have pictures (complete with teeth) tommorow. Tah-tah!




As promised finalized sharks complete with their chompers. Duh-duh Duh-duh Duh-duh. Watch It!