Eye of Newt and Toe of Frog...

I seem to have accidentally got into the spirit of all these halloween manis that I've seen floating around the web with my latest creation. I wanted to use green polishes because I hadn't done a green mani for some time and picked out a couple I thought went well together-Sally Hansen-Grass Slipper and Barry M-Watermelon. I had originally wanted to stamp one on top of the other but utterly failed at stamping-I don't know if it's my technique, my stampers or my new Cheeky plates but I just can't seem to get the polish to lift off the plate and onto the stamper at all which is incredibly frustrating. Having given up on that idea I wanted something simple and grabbed my dotting tools and did a double dot mani. Looking at them-I think they look a bit like eyes, hence the title!

Oh and let me apologise for the ridiculous length of my left ring finger-I don't know what I do but I somehow always manage to break/tear this nail and it's always right down to the quick. I'm going to have to file the rest of my nails down too so it looks less silly, sigh.

Anyway, pictures!

Nothing amazing but still I think it looks pretty cool!

Hope you all had awesome weekends

~Nail Art Novice~



Title taken from Shakespeare's Macbeth

Mish Mash Challenge Week 10-Triangles

How is it OCTOBER already?? I honestly have no idea where this year is going.
Today I've got another Mish Mash challenge for you, and for the first time in weeks not only is this one going up on time but I'm actually scheduling it in advance! Not quite sure where my efficiency came from this week but I'm not complaining.
This week's theme is triangles and I've done a tape mani in a style I've wanted to try for a while because I think they look awesome. What I didn't anticipate was quite how long it would take to apply 9 pieces of tape to each nail, paint over them and remove them, but oh well, the results are worth it!

I started with a gradient (yes, another one, I love them!) of Revlon-Fire, Barry M-Satsuma and Mango and Revlon-Electric because I wanted to get away from the blues that I have been using a lot of recently for one reason or another. Can't get much further away from blue than bright red/orange, right? After I'd done the gradients (and totally forgotten to take a picture of them, much as I intended to) and they'd dried sufficiently, I applied the tape. Normally with tape manis I tape up the nails on one hand and then paint over them and remove, but as there were so many strips per nail with this one I had to do one at a time, which took AGES. I painted over the top with Barry M-Black Multi Glitter.

Here's what I ended up with:

I have to say I love it-it took me so long to do that I was actually fed up of it, but it was worth it in the end. Some of my triangles are slightly wibbly but I still love them. I like the firey colours vs the black overlay too-and not a hint of blue in sight!

Check out the other ladies' fabulous triangle manis in the inlinkz below, and I'll see you soon!

~Nail Art Novice~

A Rather Blue-tiful Gradient

I'm sorry, you know I can't resist a terrible pun!

I was really sad to have to take off my blue Mish Mash nails as I was really enjoying them-but they were starting to look a little tatty and I wanted something that would match the dress I am wearing to my friends' engagement party this evening. I love me a good gradient, and I had 3 perfect blues that matched my dress perfectly and I figured they'd make a really pretty gradient-and I wasn't wrong!

Polishes used: Barry M-Teal, Rimmel-Azure and Barry M-Navy. I have actually also got a coat of OPI-I Juggle...Men  on there too to add extra sparkle, but you can't see it any of the pictures and can barely see it in real life except as a purple shimmer every now and again.

This is so blue-tiful that it dazzled my camera a little-these are the best photos I could get! I will also try to add one of me in my dress at some point if there's a nice one!

What can I say other than I LOVE this-it's so me and it's also so shiny and gorgeous! And now I must go, for my party abeckons!

~Nail Art Novice~

Mish Mash Challenge Week 9-Blue

Hello again!
Time for another Mish Mash challenge and I was rather looking forward to this one as I have a LOT of blue polishes-almost 30! I was originally going to try and use them all in today's mani but decided that would take forever so I randomly chose 10 instead. (By randomly I mean I stuck my hand in the box and pulled them out without looking, haha).
Polishes used: Barry M-Matt White, Guava, Denim, Rimmel-Midnight Blue, Aqua Cool, Royal Blue (Metal Rush), Maybelline-Dark Denim, China Glaze-For Audrey, Avon-On Point Blue, Sally Hansen-Himalayan Blue and Revlon-Royal.

 I decided to do a mosaic/colour blocked mani to show them off to their best potential so started with a white base and some striping tape, then added each colour semi-randomly to my nails.

(Kindly ignore my higgeldy-piggeldy nail lengths and shapes!)
I really like this, it's very me and really quite simple to do-the longest part was getting all the tape on, man that took forever! Some of the colours have bleached slightly in these photos, they look even better in real life with the contrasts between the colours. One day when I have time to spare I'm going to do one of these using ALL my blues, I reckon it'd look amazing!

Don't forget to check out the other fantastic 'blue' entries in the inlinkz below, and I hope you're having a marvellous Thursday!

~Nail Art Novice~

Four Petal Flowers

Hello loves! I am back from my weekend away camping and we had a really amazing time-the weather held off for us and it was a really good weekend. I didn't end up doing any camping-related nail art and for once I actually went with naked nails by choice-shocking! When I got back yesterday though, I wanted to do something a bit pretty to make up for the time I'd missed so I chose these little four-petal flowers. I think my nail art skills are getting a little rusty through under-use though-these are all a little wobbly and imperfect. Ah well!

Polishes used: Barry M-Lychee for the base/centres, and the flowers were done in Rimmel-Block Your Green, Revlon-Fire, Barry M-Cobalt Blue & Satsuma and Sinful Colors-Amethyst which is my new favourite purple cream.

The green seems to have bled through the Lychee a little and turned it a little yellow which is annoying but I can deal with it. As I was taking the pictures, I had a sudden urge to see what this would look like Matted so I added a top coat of Rimmel's Matte Finish and I think I actually prefer them this way!

As I said, they're a little wibbly but I still like them-I'm really enjoying the more subtler look rather than inyourfacecolourseverywhere like I normally do, haha.

That's all from me for now, I'm hoping to get back to blogging regularly again now summer is over and I shouldn't be jetting off all over the place as often so I'll see you soon!

~Nail Art Novice~