Super Sparkly Nails!

I went on a little trip over the weekend, so I decided to use some Sally Hansen Salon Effects strips. I have gotten better at my application technique. I'll tell you how I applied them down below:

I applied these last Wednesday and had to take them off last night (Sunday) because they had chipped A LOT. These are great fun, but I do not think they last for ten days, as the box says. I really don't mind, though, because I change my nails quite often anyway. So, my grandparents had gotten me a box of a bunch of different Salon Effects strips last Christmas. You are supposed to use a package for each hand, but I save mine by using only one package for two hands. My nails are small, so I am able to apply a strip and use scissors to cut off the excess to use on my opposite hand's nail. I will take you through how I use these: I used one package of Blue Ice strips. They're super sparkly and I LOVE them! I made sure my nails had no lotion or skin oil on them by taking a cotton ball with rubbing alcohol on it and swiping it over all my nails. I then chose the nail polish strips that would fit best on each of my nails. I would apply one and made sure it was not touching my cuticle at all so that it could be totally pressed down onto my nail. I would then use scissors to cut off the excess to use on my other nail. This time, I never used the file tool that came with the strips. I find that that can rough up the strip at the tip of your nail. I let my nails get a teeny bit long before using these so that I could just use my fingers to press on the little bit of excess strip hanging over the tip of my nail. My nail would cut the strip and then I would gently remove that. I recently got a Sally Hansen rubber cuticle pusher (which is making my cuticles look SO great! I would definitely recommend you get one!) and I would use that to press down on the surface of the strip to make sure it was completely adhered to my nails. After applying the strips to all of my nails, I used one of the left over large strips (each package comes with eight so you can try to match them to your nail size) and applied it to my big toenails. I had to throw out the remaining strip. You cannot save these once a package is open because they are made of real nail polish and they dry out. I applied the ones on my toes over top of polish, which is not recommended, but it worked fine. I finished all of them off with two coats of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly. You do not need to use a top coat, but I prefer to. I noticed that, as they were drying on my nails, the edges of the strips near the sides of my nails and my cuticles would lift up a little. It didn't matter much, but it could be that I still had oil residue near my cuticles. Who knows. I was extremely happy with these, though, because of how beautiful they are! I used the tin foil and cotton ball method to remove the strips.

Inspired By Socks

I was babysitting last week and I suddenly saw inspiration for nail art on one of the children's (a two year old boy) socks. They were gray on the bottom with two bright blue Vs across them. I wrote down my idea so I wouldn't forget it and created a manicure the same day!

I actually started out by cutting forty small strips of striping tape so I wouldn't need to cut it when my nails were tacky. I then applied one coat of Essie Protein Base Coat. After that, I painted on two coats of Covergirl Out of the Blue and then a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly. Then I placed my tape. I applied it to each nail right before painting on the next color instead of applying all the tape and then doing all the painting and tape removal. I wanted the double Vs to go in a different direction on all of my nails to add in some variety. The color I painted over top was Sinful Colors Cool Gray. I immediately removed the tape after painting each nail. I finished off with two coats of Dries Instantly. I am sorry I haven't posted much. When I am busy and the thought of posting stresses me out, I opt out of blogging. I always do a better job if I am in the mood to do it. The best advice I have ever heard from a blogger is to do the blog for yourself. Do not do it for everyone else, or the quality of the blog will not be good and blogging will become a chore instead of a hobby. I will be going away for a few days, but I will be back after that! I hope you are all enjoying summer (or winter if you live on the other side of the world!)

Techie Nails!

I am excited about this manicure! I knew I would get back into the mode soon enough! I have been wanting to use the binary code image from one of my stamping plates since I got them a while ago!

I used so many polishes for this manicure! I started out with a base coat of Essie Protein Base Coat. I used two coats of all of my base colors. On my thumbs I painted NYC High Line Green; on my pointers I did a gradient, but my base color was Revlon Dreamer; on my middle and ring fingers I painted Sally Hansen Black Out; and on my pinkies I painted Sally Hansen Celeb City. After that, I got ready to do a gradient on my pointers by applying a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly so I could avoid removing my base color with the sponge. I then got down to stamping on my other nails. On my pinkies I used Bundle Monster plate BM-422. The polish I stamped with was Sally Hansen Black Out. On my ring and middle fingers I used Bundle Monster plate BM-415. I stamped with Sally Hansen White On. On my thumbs I used plate BM415 again and used Essie Penny Talk. On those nails I then applied two coats of Dries Instantly.

For the pointers I created a gradient. I wanted it to be light in the centers and fade into darker blue at the tips and near my cuticles. So, I applied a stripe of Revlon Dreamer in the center of a makeup sponge, and then put stripes of Sinful Colors Rain Storm on either side of that line, and then put stripes of Sally Hansen Thinking of Blue on either sides of those lines. I then used a stippling motion to apply it to my pointer nails. When that was dry, I used Essie Borrowed & Blue and the same image I used on my pinkies (from BM-422). I finished those nails off with two coats of Dries Instantly, as well.

Lilac With Studs

Sorry I haven't posted in so long! I honestly haven't felt like it! When I did that last post I was so super excited about nail art, and almost did another design the next day. But, I had things to do and decided against taking off all my hard work so soon. So, those stayed on my nails for days, and then I wanted to give my nails a little break. This design is actually something I did a while ago. It is not the most exciting, but I like the color. I am lacking inspiration and patience for nail art! I should be back to normal soon, though!

I started out with a base coat of Sally Hansen Double Duty. I then painted on two coats of Pure Ice New Lilac. I used some Double Duty to stick the 1.5 mm silver studs (from Born Pretty Store) to my nails. I finished off with two coats of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly. I used to always put on lotion and Burt's Bees Lemon Butter Cuticle Cream and then put on some cotton gloves for a while before bed. I would be watching Netflix at that time. Lately, I haven't been watching as much Netflix before bed, though, so I also haven't been following that regime. I have noticed a difference in my cuticles. I continued to apply lotion and cuticle cream before going to sleep, but it is not the same when you don't wear gloves! The gloves really ensure the moisture will be taken in by your skin! So, I am going to try to be better about giving myself a little hand spa for at least a half hour in the evenings! The gloves make all the difference!

Interspecies Romance

I wanted to use some nail stickers to create a super cute manicure! I sort of just made this manicure up as I went along and I am extremely happy with the result. Sorry about the state of my cuticles. They are very dry for some reason:

I started out with a coat of Essie Protein Base Coat. I then painted on two coats of Essie Borrowed & Blue. After that had dried for a while, I applied strips of striping tape a few millimeters away from the tips of my nails. I used these so I could create perfectly straight french tips. On my thumb, pointer, and middle fingernails I used Sally Hansen Rockin' Hard, and on my ring and pinkie fingernails I used Rimmel Wild Orchid. (I just used the brushes in the bottles.) I really like the asymmetrical result. I would usually paint my nails with alternating colors, but I wanted to try something different. After painting on each french tip, I immediately took a pair of tweezers and removed the striping tape. Then, using the tweezers again, I applied a poodle nail sticker to my ring fingernail and made it appear as if it was standing on the french tip. I also took a cat nail sticker and made it stand on the french tip on my pointer fingernail. I was going to leave it at that, but then I was looking at the nearly finished product and I imagined a heart on my middle fingernail. I HAD to add that heart, and luckily I did have a heart nail sticker! (If I hadn't, I would have used polish.)

I finished off with two coats of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly.