The Land of the Free Because of the Brave

Hi guys!  I haven't blogged in a while.  I started a new summer job co-leading a summer activities program for kids on Monday.  I am pretty busy with it.  But I really wanted to do a good ol' patriotic manicure.  It is the Fourth of July in only three days.  I am an American, so I am going to be seeing fireworks.

My family used to always take 3-4 week camping trips in Canada every summer.  So, I was rarely in the USA during the Fourth of July.  It is cool to be here during the most American holiday.

Okay!  Here's what you came here to see:

I started out with a coat of OPI Natural Nail Base Coat.  I then painted two coats of Sinful Colors Snow Me White on my ring fingers, and two coats of Pure Ice Short Bet (a tan) on the rest of my nails.  I applied a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly on the ring fingers to prep for striping tape.

I looked at pictures of camouflage print on Google.  I also watched some tutorials for camo nails.  I used the technique that Demelza's World used to create this effect.  Here's the link to her video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4K3Q9TCAXU

So, I started with my lightest colors and then went on from there.  I took a medium sized dotting tool and stippled on the blotches of colors.  I first used Essie Da Bush, a light earthy green.  I then moved on to Essie Fall in Line, the military green polish which inspired me to create this mani.  After that, I stippled on my black, Sinful Colors Black on Black.  I did the black before the brown because I wasn't sure if I was going to use brown at first.  I decided it needed it.  So, I stippled on the brown, Essie Mink Muffs, last.  I just did 3-4 blotches of each color on each nail.  Don't be afraid to overlap colors!  This creates a better effect!  It was quite easy and I am very happy and surprised with how well it came out!

I got plenty of polish on my cuticles.  That is totally fine, though!  Just clean it up at the end!  I used to avoid a mess like that at all costs, but your manicures really will turn out better if you concentrate on the art and then clean up after.

For the flag nails, I applied striping tape with my trusty curved tweezers and then painted on a generous coat of Sinful Colors Gogo Girl.  I immediately removed the tape.  When that was dry, I used navy blue acrylic paint to create the blue portion of the flag.  I used a small detail brush to do this.  When that was all dry (if you use matte acrylics, it is easy to tell when the paint's dry.  It will turn matte.) I used a detail brush to paint on some silver glitter polish (Sinful Colors Queen of Beauty) on the blue to represent the stars.

I finished off with two coats of Dries Instantly over everything.

The reason I am patriotic is not because of the government of anything like that.  No country is perfect.  I am patriotic because I respect all of the brave men and women who have fought for my freedom, died for my freedom, or sacrificed (health, family, ambitions, etc.) for my freedom.  America is a beautiful country.  There is such a diverse landscape.  In 2009 My family and I drove cross country for four weeks.  We camped at Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks.  We saw Mount Rushmore, Bighorn Canyon, and tons of other things.  It was amazing.

America would be nothing if not for the brave people who have defended and protected, and continue to defend and protect it.  I am truly grateful to them.

America is the Land of the Free BECAUSE of the Brave.

Autumn Earthy Tones

Hi!  I am back again!  I came up with this one yesterday:

I started out with a coat of Essie Protein Base Coat.  I then applied three coats of Essie Da Bush (I LOVE that polish name!)  I needed three coats because this polish is rather thin.  I waited for that to dry and then took some clear polish and a dotting tool to apply the studs with.  I would put a dot of clear polish on my nail, and then use the smaller end of the dotting tool dipped in clear polish to pick up a stud and apply it to my nail.  I put three near each cuticle.  These are 1.5 mm gold studs from Born Pretty Store.

I then took the brush from the bottle of Essie Mink Muffs (the brown) and put a curved stroke of it about half way up each nail.  I then filled in the tip of the nail with the polish.  I had to go over each of those again to make the brown opaque.  I used a nail art bush dipped in Essie Good As Gold to paint on the gold line separating the two colors.  If I made the line too thick, I just took one of my base colors and went over the edge of it to clean it up.

It's okay to get polish on your skin!  I used to try to avoid this at all costs, but now I don't mind getting a little on my skin.  It would have been hard to get nothing on my skin when I used the brush to make the brown curved lines.  It is easy to clean up the edges with a nail art brush or Q-tip dipped in acetone or nail polish remover!

I finished off with two coats of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly.  Sadly, mine is old, so you can see a lot of bubbles on my nails. =(  This manicure looks much better in person since you can't notice the bubbles when you aren't super close to them.  

I have been watching the show "Supernatural" on Netflix for a couple months now.  I am in season 4 and I LOVE the show!  I am dying to do a "Supernatural" inspired manicure sometime!

Hey!  This is my 100th post!  So exciting!

Earthy with Triangles

Okay guys, I am sure you can notice that I am not the most creative person when it comes to titles.  I am the same way with college essays.  Haha!  So, I actually have a few manicures piled up so I can blog even when I am too busy to paint my nails, which hasn't really been happening lately. =)  I was planning on posting this one later, but I love it so much and am super excited about it.  I currently have this on my nails:

I started out with a base coat of Sally Hansen Double Duty.  I then painted two coats of each color onto my nails.  On my ring fingers and thumbs I used Essie Mink Muffs; on my pointers I used Sally Hansen Espresso; Essie Da Bush (I LOVE that name!) on my middle fingers; and Essie Borrowed & Blue on my pinkies.  I love earthy color combinations.  Color combinations can really make a manicure interesting, even if the designs aren't too complicated.  I really like simple, striking manicures.

After putting on all of my colors, I applied a coat of Seche Vite so the tape wouldn't pull up my color.  For the little triangles at my cuticles, I used Essie Wicked (one of my favorite polishes.)  To create the triangles, I took two thin strips of scotch tape and overlapped the ends so they formed a narrow "V" shape.  I then put the hollow of the "V" where I wanted the dark red triangles to be.  Once I painted on my color, I quickly removed the tape.  To finish off the manicure, I applied two coats of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly.  There are a lot of bubbles in the manicure because I need a new bottle of Dries Instantly.  Mine is really thick and gloopy.  It is too bad that you can only use half of the bottle before throwing it out.  I am loving the length of my nails at the moment.  I can't have them too long because then they drive me crazy.  I have been putting up with them well this time, though.  =)   I hope you like this manicure!  

Oceany

Here's a manicure that I created a few months before I started my blog:

From my thumb to my ring finger, I used Essie Borrowed & Blue (I also used that on my pinkie), Essie Chinchilly, Essie Mink Muffs, and Essie Da Bush.  I used a dotting tool to make the starfish.  The purple ones are Revlon Impulsive and the coral ones are Essie Haute as Hello.

I have so many pictures of old manicures that I did, but, sadly, the majority of them were taken with my phone.  The camera on that only has 2 mega pixels, so the quality is not very good.

Scotch Tape Chevron!

Today I FINALLY tried something that I have been wanting to do for a long time now: Chevron using painted scotch tape!  Cutepolish taught me how to do this, but I had never gotten around to doing it.  I am extremely happy with the final result:

The way I did this was the way that Cutepolish did it in her video on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QCWF6oK7Wk).  It would take a while to explain, so it would be better for you to watch her video so you can understand how to do it.  I followed all of her directions.

I painted my tape this morning and cut it into strips soon after so it had hours to completely set before I even started my manicure.  The dark blue is Sinful Colors Rain Storm and the brown is Essie Mink Muffs.  My base color is Revlon Dreamer.  I used a very thin tipped pair of scissors to cut off the excess tape.  That made all the difference.  I had tried to use larger scissors, but that was much too difficult.  The top coat that I used was Sally Hansen Dries Instantly, the top coat I always use.  This design was pretty easy, but very time consuming, at least for me.  It was loads of fun, though.

Here's a small update on those Sally Hansen Salon Effects Real Nail Polish Strips:
I actually still have them on my toenails.  I had to put on another coat of my silver polish on the nails that didn't have the strips, but the strips are still totally intact.