Mani Monday: Sally stitches

I've been seeing all these quilt manicures and the first thing I though of was Sally stictches' dress. I gave it a go and here's the results. I'm pretty content with them. :)

Up for review: Carmex healing lotion

This stuff is the greatest lotion I've ever used. I'm not a lotion person. Especially if it makes your skin feel greasy. But this lotion is perfect. It just has a light scent so it's not overwhelming and it makes your skin super soft.
It's about $6 per tube but so worth it. You can find it at most drug stores and of course super stores.

Under review: influenster voxbox 2

I got my second voxbox a month or so ago and can't wait to tell you about all the goodies that came in it.
They provided me with the new shampoo called Clear, two Sally products (you know I love Sally), a Quaker soft baked bar, always radiant products, and Hawaiian tropic silk hydration sunscreen! I'll tell you more about each product later this week.

Opi nail apps: under review

I'm going to start out by saying I was completely ecstatic about trying these polish strips. I love the Sally and kiss ones and assumed OPI wouldnt let me down with theirs. I was definitely wrong. Unlike Sally, you have to rub these strips to warm them up. They're really thick and plasticy so they don't apply well. The ends are all wrinkly and it took me a while to file the ends off. They're supposed to be sugar skulls but the designs are so big and poorly placed that you can't tell what they are once they're on your nails. Overall, I'm really disappointed in these. I'll stick to my Sally strips from now on.
Have you guys tried any? What are your thoughts?

Take a walk on the wild side: leopard/gradient/striping

So, I haven't posted in forever. I've not been doing any intense nail art. I got quite obsessed with cremes so I had mostly normal brightly colored manicures the past few months. I saw a tutorial on leopard nails  at Chalkboardnails.com though, and I had to try them. I have also seen several different ways to do gradient nails and decided to give that a go as well. Here's the results. 

I'm absolutely obsessed with the way the leopard turned out. I don't love the gradients so much. but they're tolerable. I added a glitter over my pinky to hide some of the mistakes. I think I should have chosen colors that were more similar. Or perhaps not a metallic. I used striping tape on my ring finger because there's no way in hell I could have free handed perfect stripes. haha

Polishes used:

White - Sinful Colors: Snow Me White

Black - China Glaze: Liquid Leather

Gold- Nicole: Not a Gold Bigger

Glitter - Color Club: Take the Stage

Tools used:
Dotters for the leopard

make up sponge, aluminum foil, toothpick for the gradients

striping tape for the stripes 

As we venture through time and space -- GALAXY Nails!

I typed this blog up in January. Why didn’t I post it? I kept thinking I would do galaxy nails again. Perfect it. But then I fell in love with other nail fashions and everyone was doing the galaxy nails… but here goes. It’s not winter, it’s now summer… enjoy!

As a child, I always loved learning about the cosmos… I even had a place mat that had all the planets (including Pluto) in order. When I saw galaxy nails all over tumblr and pinterest, I had to try it!

While looking through the instructions, I thought it would be hard. A make-up sponge? Tweezers? More than 5 different colors? It’s simpler than I thought.

I flew to LA with these bad boys and they held up to Hollywoods’ glitz & glamour. Eat your heart out, Orlando Bloom!

The first nail was a little tricky, but once I got the hand of it… it was super fun!

Here’s a list of what you’ll need, what I used, and other random suggestions:

1)     Make-up Sponge

2)     Tweezers

3)     Blue or purple dark base – China Glaze VIII (dark eggplant purple)

4)     Medium blue/purple – Sally Hansen Thinking of Blue (navy)

5)     Lighter color – Mattese Elite Dead Punk Rocker ( metallic gray/blue)

a.      Any kind of gray/blue/purple would work!

6)     Bright color – Sally Hansen Tough Luck (lime green shimmer)

a.      This shimmer looked amazing! It brought it all together

7)     Glittery top coat – China Glaze Fairy Dust

The amount and types of colors could be interchanged so much! I think that’s why I love galaxy nails so much, it will always be different.

Instructions after you have put on your base color and it’s dried:

1)     Rip an incredibly small piece off of your make up-sponge

2)     Dip it into your medium; make sure to sponge it around on your paper (or aluminum) to get the excess off of it.

3)     Dab it in a circular motion on center of your nail.

4)     Wait until it’s dry.

5)     Dip another side of the sponge into your lighter color

6)     Dab it across your nail any way you would like. I did it diagonally.

7)     Dry.

8)     Sponge your bright color and go over your ligher color!

9)     Some people use a white or light gray to dot tiny, tiny stars, but I didn’t do that.

10) DRY!

11)  Use your glittery top coat!

12) You’re done!

Drinking on the plane to LA !

I love it. My friend’s sister refers to this as if it’s one easy coat. But it certainly is easy to try and one of the easiest nail arts. If it smudges, it looks like it’s SUPPOSE to be like that.

Get creative with this! I'm thinking of doing a daytime galaxy color scheme. The sponge tool is a must try for anyone getting into nail art.

Try it out! And let us know what you did differently. 

Neon Trees Nails

So, Neon Trees is one of my favorite bands and I'm going to see them tonight. I did a mani in honor of them haha. This is their album cover for their new single Everybody Talks.
I tried to do the head sunglasses on my thumb. It came out a bit shaky but from far away it looks great. haha. I love them though. They're pretty fun and I got to use three of my favorite glitters. =)
I used two coats of everything. I had to play with the black glitter a little to get it to go every where.

Black: China Glaze - Liquid Leather

Red Glitter: Wet N Wild - Behind Closed Doors

Black Glitter: Wet N Wild - Tangled In My Web

Multi Colored Glitter: Spoiled - Shuffle The Deck

White: OPI - Skull & Glossbones