Easter Egg Nails

Arden: Ok, here's my second try at Easter egg nails, and these were much more successful!  They might be the design I go with on Easter Sunday itself!

I was trying to go for the kinds of Easter eggs my family used to dye-- where you've drawn on designs in white crayon before you dye them, and then the dye leaves them unevenly colored.  Like this:

Using that as my inspiration, here's what I came up with:

How I Did It:
I started my painting each nail white (Sally Hansen White On) and then applied a fast-drying top coat (Essie Good to Go).  Once each nail was dry, I applied tape.  I used both striping tape for the thin lines and washi tape cut using zigzig scissors.  Then I applied several shades of the same color to a makeup sponge, and sponged over the tape.  I immediately removed the tape, and voila!  Easter egg nails!

Left hand pic!  I think my egg designs got better on my left hand, but sadly my hand positioning for pictures with that hand needs some work!

Colors Used (so many!):

Orange/Yellow:
Julep Marjorie
Color Club Ringo & Love Letter

Pink:
Julep Drew & Helen
Color Club Hot Tub

Purple:
Julep Bette, Charlotte, Joanna, & Helen


Blue:
Julep Annie & Joanna
Essie Bouncer, It's Me

Green:
Julep Diana & Shenae
Color Club Double Dare

What do you think?  Have you decided on your Easter manicure yet?  Let me know in the comments!

Rainbow Nails inspired by Kesha!

Arden: Hey everyone!  Oh my goodness, I am so excited to share these nails with you.  I was looking for some inspiration, and stumbled across a gallery of pictures from Coachella, and that led me to realize that Kesha currently has some AMAZING rainbow hair:

Full disclosure: I love Kesha.  She's just amazing.  (Also, she's from my hometown!  Woot woot!)

After I committed to doing something bright and colorful, I remembered this picture that Lisl posted from Coachella:


Super awesome, right?  I wanna go grab some glowsticks and do this to my hair right now!

Using the color scheme of Kesha's hair and the radiating shape of those glowsticks, here's what I came up with:

How I Did It: Started with a white base.  Then I applied tape (I used both striping tape and washi tape).  Then I applied all of the colors onto a makeup sponge, and sponged them on to each nail.  For my middle finger, I then applied more striping tape and painted white over it.

Colors Used:
Sally Hansen White On 
Sinful Colors Rise 'N Shine
Maybelline Color Show Shocking Seas
Color Club Hot Tub, Ringo, & Love Letter
Julep Korin and Bette

Bonus shots outside in the sun:

I just love the neons on these nails so much!!!  They really just scream "spring" to me.  I can't stop looking at them!  I hope they'd make Kesha proud.

As Seen on Pinterest: Koi Goldfish Nails

Arden: Hey everyone!  Today's prompt in the 33 Day Challenge is to create something inspired from Pinterest, which means it's time for a new installment of my series "As Seen on Pinterest."  The manicure I have for today is one I did several months ago (seriously, I think it was back in September) and for some reason never posted on the blog.  It was inspired by this manicure by Elizabeth of Did My Nails, which I found on Pinterest and instantly had to try!

*Full disclosure: I did these nails so long ago, I don't remember all of the polishes I used.  I'll try to guess as well as I can!*

I started with a base coat of Sally Hansen Barracuda.  Then I used Saran Wrap to dab on several other blue/blueish green polishes to make the water for the koi pond.  I added a layer of Revlon Snowflurries and ended up with this:

I liked it, but felt like it might be a little too busy for the background of my fish, so I added two layers of one of Lisl's new birthday polishes-- Girly Bits Cosmic Ocean.

Then it was time to paint on my fish!  Using our set of acrylic paints, I painted a little koi fish on each nail.  Sadly, my fish were not nearly as beautiful as the originals (mine look a little like goldfish with turtle bodies), but they still looked pretty cool.

I was pretty proud of myself for my ability to draw koi using my non-dominant hand, so here's a picture!

What do you think?  Like the koi? Think they don't look anything like fish?  Weigh in in the comments!  And be sure to check out everyone else's entries today below.

New Technique: Marbling without Water

Arden: Hey everyone!  Today's prompt in the 33 Day Challenge is to try out a technique that is new to you.  If I were a person who embraced adversity, this probably would've been the perfect opportunity to try out water marbling again.  But everytime I've ever tried to do water marble nails I've ended up wanting to bash my head into the wall.  I've just never gotten it to work.  So instead of suffering through the same crushing defeat again, I decided to try out this marbling without water technique by Robin Moses.

First, watch this tutorial video.  It is super great!

 I started by painting my nails with a base coat, and then two coats of OPI Don't Touch My Tutu (whenever I do nude nails, I always start with this polish, because I feel like it helps me work up to a nice opacity quicker).  Then I applied a very thick coat of Julep Layne (a more pinkish nude) to my first nail.

I dabbed on white (Julep Bunny), black (Sally Hansen Black Out), and sparkly tan (Julep Cynthia) polish and used a small nail art brush to swirl them together.  I will say that I don't think my nude coat was as wet/thick as the one in the video, because my colors did not swirl that well together.  When i try this again I will definitely try to make the base coat thicker.  But the polishes still swirled pretty well.

When I finished with each nail, I went back and dabbed on some gold glitter polish using my Color Club gold striper.  I added a top coat and voila!

Obviously, not as totally awesome as the original, but still pretty good!  I'm gonna call this new technique a success.  (And not nearly as maddening as water marbling.  Which I will try again someday.  Maybe.)

Be sure to check out the rest of entries in the 33DC below!

Ladybug Nail Tutorial

Arden: Hey everyone! Today's prompt in the 33 Day Challenge is to follow someone else's tutorial.  I chose to create these cute ladybug nails, following a tutorial from the blog Swatch and Learn.

And since I haven't done one of these in a while, I decided to create my own step by step tutorial as well!

I started by painting my nails with a base coat, then two coats of Julep Jackie (aka the best red polish ever).

As you can tell in the photo, I didn't get full coverage from two coats, but knew I was about to paint the tips black so I figured it would be fine.

After that, it was really easy.

1. Paint a black line with a striper brush to help mark the face of the ladybug.

2. Fill in the tip with a black polish (I used Sally Hansen Black Out).

3. Paint another black line down the center of your nail.

4. Add black dots on either side of the line using a dotting tool.

5. Add white dots at the tip using a dotting tool.

6. Add small black dots on top of the white to finish the eyes.  (This wasn't in the original tutorial, I just thought it would make the eyes cuter.)

Here's the finished product:

I love these little guys!  They're so cute!  And for a 100% freehanded design, these were pretty quick and easy!  Definitely a good manicure design for a beginner to try.

Let me know how you like them, and check out everyone else's entry in the 33DC today below.

South American Favela Painting Project Nails

 
Arden: Hi everyone!  Today we're supposed to create "South American" nails in the 33 Day Challenge.  Goodness gracious-- that's a whole continent of inspiration to choose from!  It was quite a difficult task.  I ultimately decided to use this picture for inspiration, created by an artist duo who've painted these awesome enormous mural on the walls of a favela in Rio de Janeiro.  To learn more about the Favela Painting project, click here.  (And if you're interested in how art has flourished in the slum favelas of Brazil, might I recommend the excellent documentary Favela Rising?)

I created these nails by painting the lighter shade of each color on every nail.  I then painted strokes of the darker color on top of each nail using the cloud/stairs method.  Next, I added white jagged lines using our Color Club white striper polish.  Finally, I made little black dots/lines for the windows on the buildings using the Color Club black striper polish.  I added a top coat and they were good to go!

Colors used (thumb to pinkie):
Sally Hansen Barracuda
Cover Girl Outlast Stay Brilliant glosstini Blue Hawaiian
Revlon Minted
OPI Did It On 'Em
CoverGirl Outlast Stay Brilliant Coral Silk
Essie Geranium
Sally Hansen Pink Blink
Essie Pink Daquiri
Julep Leila
Sally Hansen Butterscotch

Ok, so these are obviously not in any way a super realistic depiction of the favela murals, but they were bright and fun and geometric, so I still think we can call them a success.

As always, be sure to check out the other entries in today's 33 Day Challenge group after the break.

33DC 3D Nail Cupcake Nails

Hey y'all! It's Lisl! So this post was supposed to go up Wednesday (some challenge do-er I am), but life things have happened so here it is now! Today! Saturday!  Wednesday's prompt was 3D nails, which I was really excited about because my BFF Sherbear sent me these awesome 3D nail art doohickeys (I think that is the official term) from Born Pretty Store.

The 3D Nail stickers came in this nice lil' wheel, so many options to choose from!  I chose the cupcake because I wanted to do cupcake nails for a while (hard choice though guys, really hard choice).

Trivial Pursuit Nails

Arden: Hey everyone!  Today's prompt in the 33 day challenge was to "create artwork using your oldest untried polish."  I looked through my collection, and it turns out I really don't have that many polishes that I've never tried.  I tend to try new polishes out as soon as I get them!  So I ended up going with a couple polishes I've barely ever used: Julep Marjorie (shimmery orange) and Julep Drew (hot pink).  I had only ever used Marjorie before to make the center dots in these flower nails, and I know I'd tried out Drew before, but don't think I'd ever done any nail art using it.

I decided for this challenge I would finally do a pattern I'd been itching to try for a while: nails that look like Trivial Pursuit pieces!  I got the idea from this post I found on Pinterest; the original blogger didn't reference Trivial Pursuit, but that was the first thing I thought of when I saw that design!

Full disclosure: I decided to emulate the newer Trivial Pursuit pieces that have replaced the brown piece with a purple wedge, because purple is much prettier than brown. I hope this doesn't anger any hardcore Trivial Pursuit enthusiasts!

I started with a base coat, then painted on two coats of OPI On Her Majesty's Secret Service.  I then used three pieces of striping tape per nail to create the 6-wedge design of a Trivial Pursuit playing token.

I then painted each wedge a different color.  I just used the regular brush from the polish bottle, but it did require me to be super careful (especially on my pinkies) so you might prefer to use a smaller brush to paint on your wedges.

Colors used (clockwise from top right):
Sally Hansen Butterscotch 
Sinful Colors Rise and Shine
Julep Drew
Essie Butler Please
Zoya Mira
Julep Marjorie

I then carefully peeled the tape off using tweezers and added a top coat of Essie Good as Gold.  I was a little worried I might have some issues with streaking, but no problems this time.  (Maybe I just waited long enough for the polishes to dry). 

As you can tell above, I had some trouble with the polishes applying evenly.  The top coat helped some with that, but I still think the orange and yellow wedges are a little messy (especially on my first two fingers; I think I must've gotten better at it as I went along).

 

I wasn't sure how the Trivial Pursuit design would look over the sparkly base of Her Majesty's Secret Service, but I think it turned out ok!  A solid color might've looked more crisp, but I feel like the colors of all of the wedges pop more against the sparkly background.

My attempt at doing a more artsy hand pose.  Successful, or claw-like?  You decide!

Overall I was pretty pleased with this rainbow wheel manicure design!  Let me know what you think in the comments, and as always, check out all the other entries in today's challenge below!

Mexican Desert Nails

Arden: Hey everybody!  Today's prompt in the 33 Day Challenge is "Mexican nails."  Not gonna lie-- I have no idea what that's supposed to refer to.  I didn't want to portray any stereotypes, so I decided to do something pretty safe: a desert sunset landscape.  The inspiration for these nails came from this paper mosaic I made a couple years ago and now hangs on my wall:

To create these nails, I started with a base coat, then painted on one coat of white polish (Sally Hansen White On).  Then, starting at the base of my nail, I took a nail art brush and painted on strokes of the navy polish.  I repeated this method for the purple, pink, yellow, and gold polish.  Finally, I took a striping brush and painted on the ground and the cacti.  (And then added a top coat of Essie Good to Go.  Can't forget that top coat!)

Colors used in the sunset:
Julep Lacey
Zoya Mira
CoverGirl Boundless Color Fuschia Girl
Zoya Creamy
Essie Good as Gold

The edges of these were a little messier than I would've liked, but overall I think they turned out pretty good.  If I were to do it again, the only change I'd make would be not to paint a cactus on each nail-- maybe just the pointer and ring finger.

As always, be sure to check out all of the other great nail art designs below!

Striping Tape Multicolored Nails

Arden: Hey everyone!  Today's prompt in the 33 Day Challenge is "tape manicure."  I originally was going to do a manicure that involved regular Scotch tape, but then I saw this design on Pinterest and just had to try it out!

I started with one coat of L'Oreal All in One Base coat, and then painted two coats of Sally Hansen White Out.  I added a coat of Essie Good to Go to help my nails dry faster, and then applied striping tape in a random, vaguely spiderweb-like pattern.  I think I used 4-5 pieces of striping tape per nail.

I then cut up a makeup sponge into a bunch of little pieces (one for every color I would be using).  I took the first color I was going to use, dabbed a bit on a piece of junk mail (wax paper or aluminum foil also work well), dipped a piece of sponge in it, and sponged a tiny amount on each nail.  I repeated the process for each color.  When I was done, I removed the tape with tweezers and followed up with a top coat.

Colors used:
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Pink Blink
CoverGirl Boundless Color Fuchsia Girl
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Lightening
Essie Mint Candy Apple
Color Club London Calling
Essie Butler Please
Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Lacey Lilac

I think these turned out AMAZING.  I freaking love them, they might be my most favorite nails I've ever done (I know I say that kind of a lot).  I just loved the sponged nature of the rainbow colors, and how crisp the tape lines look in comparison to the smudginess of the colors.

This was also not that difficult to do-- sponging on colors was great because if I messed up, I could just sponge something else on top of it and no one could tell.  The most time-consuming part of this manicure was applying all of the striping tape (as it always is with striping tape manicures).  The rest was super user-friendly!

What do you guys think of this manicure?  Let me know in the comments!

If you haven't entered our giveaway yet, you should do it!  You can see all the rules and prizes here.

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Also, be sure to check out all of the other people who are participating in the 33DC below!