52wkCrumpet13: grey (in a candy cane style)

This is week thirteen of Crumpet's 52 week challenge! The "rules" are very flexible and you have all week to accomplish the mani. As always, must be done on your own nails, using the colours suggested (or parts thereof).
This week's prompt: distressed and grey (either each alone or combined). I chose grey as after all it IS Christmas and I could not think of a festive way that I would want to wear distressed nails. But I had an old fab grey that I decided to use and since we are allowed to also use white and red, I jazzed them up for Christmas.

I started with a one coat base of Layla Silver Galaxy. I love this polish and it is one of my first Laylas, and my first magnetic. In the meantime I have purchased a total of six magnetics from Layla, and a double up of this one!! The polish has a gradient grey with little sparkly bits! You can do one or two coats, I did one today. I probably should have done two; if you look closely at my index finger you can see the blue gel polish shining through. I top coated with Out the Door before moving on.

Armed with my fine line brush I decided to use gel polish and my new knowledge to paint the lines. I used Gelicious Queen of Hearts for the red, and their basic French White for the white. I did the red lines first and then cured the nails. Then I added wisps of white on each side and cured again. I purposely did not want a big band of white next to a band of red. More swirvy is what I was going for.

right hand

My right hand was not as difficult as I thought it would be. Using the gel had the bonus of being able to correct as you go (as long as I didn't cure). A couple got too thick and one white line wisped over the red so I got a flat brush with rubbing alcohol and lightly removed it before curing. Then I top coated.

The nails look really nice and festive but in the macro photos you can see some bleeding. I probably should have waited more before top coating, I guess. In the sun the silver really sparkles! I may have bent the rules a tad, but this will be a great Christmas mani to take me through the weekend.
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Frohe Festtage and all the jazz!!! xx

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52wkCrumpet4: 1970s design with grey and red

This is week four of Crumpet's 52 week challenge! The "rules" are very flexible and you have all week to accomplish the mani. As always, must be done on your own nails, using the colours suggested (or parts thereof).
This week's prompt: 1970s design, and grey and another colour (either each alone or combined). I combined.

right hand

I went to high school in the 70s so grey was a fab choice as my school colours were grey and red. So those are the colours I am working off of. The very bottom base is still the Gelicious Lemon Meringue gel that I applied last week. Using non-acetone remover I removed my yellow flowers. My polish choices are Layla Ceramic Effect Sweet Concrete (grey) and Zoya Sooki (red) and I applied in alternating accents (ring, thumb, index, pinkie). Two coats each then I top coated. I think grey and red are a nice combo and this red has a tomato aspect to it - so, very cheerful.

I have vivid memories of my jean situation during the 70s. It seemed that the proverbial "everyone except me" was wearing these cool bell bottom jeans with double button up fronts. Or double zips. Like sailor jeans, but wide and bell-bottomy. I had to wait for-ever until the style was at FedCo where we always shopped. I was so proud of those jeans! I felt like I fit in and was finally "cool". They were a faded jean with double brass buttons – and actually long enough for my tall skinny legs!!

Using black acrylic paint I drew the bell bottoms then highlighted with bronze acrylic paint. So, that is my interpretation of 70s design this week. More a 70s memory, or a 70s style than a design per se.
Looking forward to seeing the others - ciao bellas x

An InLinkz Link-up

Kia ora koutou: Waitangi Day silver fern and koru

Today is Waitangi Day in New Zealand (read up on here). Up north there are all sorts of celebrations, marae visits, hui, political speakers, bbqs etc. Down south, where I live, it is a day off and people are upset that they can't go shopping and go to the lake! I am not 100% happy with this mani but am posting regardless as I will be wearing it through to the weekend (Ripponburn tomorrow avo!). In a nutshell, I feel the background is too dark. Maybe. My problem lately.

I started with no base coat and two coats of Layla Coffee Love. This is one of my favourite holos. A beautiful brown shimmer. With these Laylas there is no need for a base coat. The polish works best directly on the nail. It dries a tad matte so a nice top coat makes the colour really shine - especially in the sun!!! I didn't top coat before drawing, just waited a bit.

The silver fern (go the All Blacks) and the koru are two very kiwi icons, and set deep in our culture. Working slowly, I freehand drew a silver fern on both ring fingers. Very fiddly. I dot filled the fronds with Zoya Storm, a black holo. For the green dots I started with my right hand and chose too large dots. So did better on my left with a smaller tool. I am happy with the koru on my thumb. Didn't really know what to do with the rest. A koru (or fern) on every finger would have been too much.

indoor lighting

All in all I love the base Layla colour and am very happy with my fern and koru (also the fern on my right hand, legend!). But somehow, it is all very uneventful, no really "wow" effect. And I am afraid the fern is too hard to see, so no one will really notice. Maybe I am just being too hard on myself.

right hand: great fern but dots too large

Good news: I got called for a job interview early March! Disappointing news: café still not sold and time is running out. Frustrating news: I have been working on a pendant for my daughter and am afraid I messed it up. It had been going so beautifully all these days. Have let it sit by the side while I think and re-think colour choices. Now I am afraid the background is too dark. Jury still out on that one.

200th post! Hand painted green skittlette

This is my 200th post!!! I am slowly coming up on one year of blogging (29 Sept) and in honour of all my new found friends, ideas, "success" I will be starting the 31 day nail challenge on 1 Oct. Thanks to all my fellow bloggers for giving me inspiration and for reading my little ramblings about life, nails and love - oh, and travel!
Hands down, I love this mani! Not to toot my own horn and all that - but I love it! I am so happy with the flowers (on my second outing) and just love all the green.

I started with the flower part of the skittle. Figuring, if that goes downhill I can change plan mid game. My base is two coats of Butter London All Hail the Queen (a totally fab nude shimmer). I wanted to darker this a bit so thought up this pk-esque way of adding depth. I dropped Layla Coffee Love on the nails, let it sit a sec then sponged around them. That gave me a flecked base for the flowers.

I wanted a darker green than the leafy green I have in my acrylic set. Here is the link to the set off BPS as it really is good, inexpensive and easy to use (link). I used the green supplied and mixed it with royal blue and black to create a dark green. Then I meshed this with white for the flowers.

I drew some random flowers (the one stroke approach) then used a small brush just dipped in black for the stems. I am still not happy with that brush, not tiny enough. I need to go through my brushes and sort them all. I seem to have brushes everywhere and just grab what is in front. Used a toothpick for the white dots. I quickly top coated this before moving on.

This skittlette is again ABBCC = two sets of identical nails and one accent. So the flowers are BB. For CC I applied my new - and totally groovy gorgeous! - Layla hologram Emerald Divine! I did not base coat, but did buff. I hadn't buffed my nails in a while so did that. I applied two coats of ED. This is probably a bit lighter than I thought it would be, but it is just beautiful. Thank you CandyGirl for finally getting this in stock!!! I think Layla makes the best holos - so elegant, super shiny. I have four now and all are great. My A accent nail is piCture pOlish Kryptonite - another great holo.

I am even happy with my right hand flowerwise! Even the Mr said, these look like flowers! Last time he thought they were blobs! Sorry for all the pics, but they are too beautiful (will die of big ego soon haha!!).