Me, Myself and I-The Ultimate Skittle

Hello!
I found out the other day that one of my favourite nail art blogs-Nailed It NZ- is having a nail art contest (and giveaway!) to celebrate her first year of blogging and I decided I really want to enter (despite the fact that I have little chance of winning looking at some of the amazing entries so far!)
The theme is 'Me Myself and I' and Jessie also says 'Make sure your manicure tells me something about you - I'm interested!.. Whatever you like - I like reading, so feel free to tell me a story about how your nails relate to you!' which I think is a really fun addition to it!

I sat down and had a think about what I wanted to do-you can submit up to three entries so it was a tricky decision! I decided this is what I wanted to do first though.

First-the back story! I am known in the blogosphere as Nail Art Novice because that's really what I am! This time last year, the only remotely interesting thing I did to my manicures was to add Crackle top coat. I started this blog in January and have since then learned a lot more cool tricks-whether that's by following other people's tutorials, getting advice and tips from some of the awesome ladies I've met through the nail blog networks on Facebook or just by playing around by myself to see what I can come up with. I still consider myself to be a Novice though, there's so many things I've never attempted yet, and I think I'll always be one because I'm hoping to keep improving my skills.

For this mani then, to represent me, to represent my blog and to represent my new found passion for nail art I decided to do the Ultimate Skittle incorporating all the different techniques that I've tried since starting my blog. I was originally going to do it in a rainbow of colours, because I really love rainbows, but thought that might start to look a bit too random and mismatched. Instead, I've decided to go with some of my favourite colours-blues and greens, with some silver and gold in there to add some contrast and detail. Quite co-incidentally I've also used polishes from the 3 brands I own the most of-Rimmel, Barry M and Revlon, although that was purely by chance!

Polishes used: Barry M-Navy, Barry M-Teal, Rimmel-Camouflage, Rimmel-Jaded Glamour, Barry M-Gold Foil and Revlon-Silver Screen. The glitter top coat is China Glaze-Fairy Dust and there's also a small amount of MaxFactor-Fantasy Fire and Barry M's silver nail art pen on my left thumb.

Techniques used:
Left hand, little finger to thumb: Dotticure, Striping Tape, Stamping, Gradient, Freehand scarab nail art (inspired by this tutorial by Holy Grail Nails)
Right hand, little finger to thumb: Splatter mani, Fishtail, Fan brush, Saran Wrap, Freehand rose nail art

This was the mess of my work station half way through!

and this was the state my fingers were in!

But it all turned out good in the end!

I really love these colours together in all the various combinations and would definitely wear all of these as full manis. I'm a bit unimpressed with my fan brush this time around, but I think that's more because all of the colours have blended together to make 'generic green' than anything else. The nail I spent by FAR the longest on was actually the stamp-what you can see is my 5th or 6th attempt and my 4th stamp choice and if this one hadn't have worked I was going to do something else! It made me so mad! Luckily it came out well on my last attempt, phew!

OK, I hadn't realised how long this post had got (sorry) so I'll leave you now!

~Nail Art Novice~