Tan to Rosy

This is one of my favorite manicures!  I loved how feminine and pretty it is!

I started out with a coat of OPI Natural Nail Base Coat.  Then I applied two coats of Rimmel Caramel Cupcake, a tan polish.  I painted on one coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly after this so the sponge I planned on doing the gradient with wouldn't pull up my base color.

I then took a triangular makeup sponge and applied a stripe of Caramel Cupcake and a stripe of Sally Hansen Rockin' Hard onto the sponge.  I made the colors overlap a bit.  I then stippled that onto my nails.  I made sure to stipple quite a lot so the colors would blend.  I applied more polish to the sponge whenever I needed to.  

I immediately applied a coat of Salon perfect Cosmic Dust , a very fine holographic glitter which is absolutely mesmerizing in the sunlight, once I was done with all the sponging.  I finished off with two coats of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly.

I got Instagram today!  You can follow me!  My username is popstermargie
https://instagram.com/popstermargie/

Summery Hearts

I have finally had some inspiration for nail art. I was in a bit of a rut when it came to thinking of ideas for nail art, but today I was really in the mood and ideas were coming to me! Yay! Before I show you what I have done, I want to tell you a teeny bit about nail files again. A few posts ago I told you about my nail care routine and I showed you that "Ruby Stone" crystal nail file. Well, that thing turned out to not be so great. It was so "gentle" on my nails that it didn't really do anything and the texture just gave me chills. So, I got a super nice crystal nail file from Amazon! It is by OPI and it was only a little over $5. It works wonderfully! All the nail art girls online rave about these types of crystal or glass files and I really know why now! It is gentle on the nails, but it also files very quickly! It doesn't leave other layers of nail sticking out where you just filed and it leaves your nails nice and smooth at the edges, instead of sharp.

Okay! On with the manicure!

I started with a coat of Essie Protein Base Coat and then painted on two coats of Sinful Colors Snow Me White, which is the best white polish I have used. I then applied one coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly to all my nails because I was going to be taping and sponging. Before I even started the manicure, I took masking tape and cut out hearts to stick to my nails. Here is what I used to create the hearts:

So, when the top coat had dried, I applied two small hearts made out of masking tape to my ring fingers and one large heart to my thumbs. I chose to use masking tape because it is thick and I figured it would be easy to grab with tweezers when I needed to remove it from my nails. I used a square of tape with a heart shape cut out of it on both my pointers so I could achieve a small colorful heart on those nails. Here is what my gradient sponge looked like:

The teal is Sally Hansen Jazzy Jade; the tan is Rimmel Caramel Cupcake; and the coral is Sally Hansen Coral Reef. On my middles and pinkies I did plain gradients. After I sponged over the other nails, though, I used my tweezers to remove the masking tape hearts. This was very easy because they didn't completely adhere to my nails, so the edges were easy to grip with tweezers. It didn't matter that they were not totally stuck to my nails because you do not use a sweeping motion when sponging; you use a stippling, dabbing motion. Also, the paint is contained in the sponge and is not runny, so nothing could seep underneath the tape. After removing all the tape, I applied two coats of Dries Instantly to finish off the manicure.

Maroon Paisley

This didn't turn out as neatly as I had wanted, but I still like the effect:

I started out with a base coat of Sally Hansen Double Duty.  Then I applied two coats of Rimmel Caramel Cupcake.  After that, I stamped on the paisley pattern from Bundle Monster's plate BM-315 with Essie Wicked as my color.  I made sure to not stamp on the paint the same on each nail because I wanted the paisley designs to be facing different ways.  It smudged a little when I stamped, but it looks okay, I think.  I then applied a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly and then a coat of NYC Matte Me Crazy for the matte effect.

If any of you have any suggestions or comments for me, feel free to leave a comment!  I would love to hear from you!  Suggestions on ways to make this blog more interesting to you would be greatly appreciated!  And any time you have nail art ideas or questions, leave a comment!  =)  

Zigzag and Dots

A couple nights ago I was watching TV when a nail art idea suddenly came to me.  The idea turned into this:

Before I even started painting my nails, I took scotch tape and cut strips of it down the middle with a pair of zigzag scissors.
Then I applied two coats of Rimmel Caramel Cupcake to my nails.  (No, I did not apply a base coat.
Mostly because I didn't feel like spending even more time waiting for stuff to dry and also because this nude color doesn't stain.)  When that was dry, I applied a coat of Seche Vite so the tape wouldn't lift up my base color.  I then applied the tape where I wanted the tan to stay.
I used Milani Sail Away as my second color and I removed each piece of tape immediately after painting on the blue.  The Seche Vite was GREAT for taping over!  The base color did not lift up anywhere!  This top coat is living up to my expectations!
After all the taping, painting, and removing tape, I took a dotting tool and put a dot of the opposite color paint in between zigzags, if that makes any sense (look at the pictures and you'll get it.)  I love this because it looks like the two halves are stuck together like puzzle pieces!  I didn't need to dot on any white because the polishes I used are very opaque.
When everything was dry, I painted on two coats of Seche Vite.

Christmas Trees

I only have one more exam for school and then I am officially done with this semester.  The exam can't come soon enough.  So, anyway, I saw this picture of Christmas tree nails on Pinterest a while ago and decided to try them out.  I did a variation of my own, though:

I started out by painting two coats of Rimmel Caramel Cupcake on all my nails.  Then I applied a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly on my ring finger and thumb.  On the other fingers I applied a coat of red glitter.  Then I finished those nails off with a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly.

I put masking tape on my ring finger and thumb so that I could achieve a neat triangular Christmas tree.  I painted a coat of Revlon Rain Forest for the trees and immediately removed the masking tape.  Then I stuck on some 1.5 mm gold studs from Born Pretty Store (which I shall never shop at again--I will tell you about it at the end of this post) for the stars at the tops of the trees.  I stuck them on with some Dries Instantly.  I finished those nails off with two coats of Dries Instantly.  Studs stay on your nails for much longer if you apply a suitable amount of top coat.  If I apply only one coat, they usually get scraped off more easily.  Two coats makes it almost impossible for the studs to come off, unless you are scratching at them very hard to try to remove them.

So, here's a little heads up about Born Pretty Store:
They sell great stuff for great prices, but most of their merchandise ships from Asia, so, depending on where you live, it can take a very long time to get to you if you choose free shipping (which I always do.)  Well, on October 4th I ordered some tiny hexagonal sequins for my nails.  They, apparently, shipped on October 9th.  I have still not received them, though, and my credit card was charged when they shipped.  Generally, things from Born Pretty Store take no more than one month to reach me.  I have contacted Born Pretty Store three times now to ask for another item or a refund and they have been of no help at all.  I am truly not cranky when it comes to mail mix-ups.  I am not at all annoyed that there was a problem with the package.  My complaint is that the customer service is terrible and I can't order anything else there because I do not want to risk something like that happening again.  Good thing my order was just a little over $5!  It would be awful if it was a lot more money than that!  I guess I will be sticking to Amazon for all of my nail art needs from now on.

Sponging For My First Time!

Today I finally tried sponging for my first time.  I had always said that I will never sponge my nails because it makes too much of a mess, but I finally broke down and bought some triangular makeup sponges from Target.  I cut a small piece off mine to do the sponging with:

My first attempt didn't come out that well, but I'll get better with time:

I just sponged my ring fingers and thumbs.  It came out a bit blotchy and I covered almost all the tan on my ring finger.  The tan is Rimmel Caramel Cupcake and the blue is L'Oreal Now You Sea Me.  I painted the very tips of my sponged nails with the nail polish brush to get them more opaque.  I used Sally Hansen Dries Instantly as my top coat.  Applying that soon after sponging smooths it out a little.  Cleaning the nail polish from around my nails after sponging was not a pain.  I just used a Q-tip dipped in polish remover.

I want to add something else quick to this post:

For the past month, possibly, I have been using this on my cuticles at night.  I generally watch some Netflix before I go to bed and I apply lotion to my hands and this cuticle cream to my cuticles and wear cotton gloves.  I didn't expect my cuticles to get any better (they have always grown up with my nails and they would peel and I always have to push them back.)  I still do carefully push my cuticles back with my towel after I get out of the shower, but my cuticles are staying very nice and pushed back lately and I am pretty sure that it is from this cuticle cream.  I highly recommend it to anyone who has annoying cuticle problems.  It has totally fixed mine!  

Studs and Stripes

I finally got around to painting my nails again.  College starts for me in a few days so I probably won't have as much time to do my nails then, but I will try to do at least one manicure a week...maybe.  Haha!  Today I felt like using a matte top coat.  Matte polish always reminds me of wax when it is dry:

I haven't been able to get good pictures inside my house, so, again, I went outside to take the pictures.  Luckily, it's been sunny.

I used Rimmel 60 Seconds in Caramel Cupcake as my base color and then applied a coat of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly to make sure that the base was totally set before I applied striping tape, that I purchased from Amazon, to my nails.  After I applied my striping tape and painted over top with Covergirl Out of the Blue, I immediately removed the tape using tweezers.  That left me with a tan stripe across each nail.  I then applied some silver 1.5 mm studs (from Born Pretty Store) using dots of Sally Hansen Dries Instantly as my "glue."  After everything was dry I applied a thick coat of Dries Instantly and then a coat of NYC Matte Me Crazy.  

I Just Created a Blog!

For a long time now I have been enjoying visiting other people's nail art blogs, so I suddenly decided to create my own!  I am very new to blogging, so it will take me a little while to figure everything out, but I wanted to make a first post to test everything out!

A few days ago I created a Scotch tape manicure:

The base color I used was Rimmel London 60 Seconds in Caramel Cupcake.  Then I applied Scotch tape where I did not want to paint any of my black.  The black that I painted over top was Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear in Black Out.  For my top coat I used Sally Hansen Dries Instantly.

I thought of this design one night as I was trying to sleep and, luckily, it turned out just the way I was picturing it!  I hope you enjoy!