The Fault in our Stars nails!

About a month ago I read "The Fault in our Stars" by John Green, after my friends recommending it for ages and ages. I've read another book by John Green, "Looking for Alaska" and loved that one so I figured that TFioS should be just as awesome. I was right. TFioS is probably the saddest book I've ever read, I was crying all through the second half. But it's SO good! I finished it in two days because I couldn't put it down. :P I seriously recommend you all go and read it (but don't blame me for any emotional damage it may cause).

I based my nails on the book cover and a quote from the book. The inspiration for this design came from a poster design on tumblr, but I don't know who originally came up with it (sorry!).

 

This is also my first Franken polish (I think that's what they're called). I didn't have a blue that was the right shade for the base, so I mixed some Max Factor "Candy Blue", Rimmel "Aqua Cool", Barry M "White" and some clear polish into an empty polish bottle. I didn't really measure how much of each colour I was putting in, I just added them until I got a shade that I liked. I'm actually really happy with how it came out, even if it is a little sheer. This is two coats of my polish. Then, I added details in with Barry M's "Black" and "White" using a thin paintbrush.

Have any of you read The Fault in our Stars? Are you planning to? Tell me what you think!

Rainbow nails!

It's been ages since my last post... again. Sorry! :( I would say that I have reasons, but honestly I'm just kinda lazy. And when I have to choose between doing homework and writing a blog post, I'm not sure my teachers would appreciate if I chose to do the blog post instead. :P

Recently, I've been lacking in inspiration for designs. I think it's mostly because I just want to do Christmas designs but it's still slightly too early for them. Anyway, whenever I'm stuck for ideas I tend to just throw a bunch of colours around and go kinda crazy. And so, these rainbow nails were born!

 

They aren't the neatest lines, but I think that makes it look even more fun. The colours I used were; Barry M's "Bright Red, Nail Inc's "Atomic", Barry M's "Yellow", Barry M's "Spring Green", Max Factor's "Candy Blue", Barry M's "Indigo" and finally Rimmel's "Ultra Violet". All of these were over a base of Barry M's "White".

Hopefully I can get into a habit of blogging more regularly but it all depends on school work... sorry guys. :( Also, on a side note, are there any qualified nail technicians out there? I've been looking into doing some proper nail courses and it would be great to get some advice. :)

Oreo nails!

Okay, I'm back. Finally! I think the whole light situation is sorted now (fingers crossed). I brought a light tent and some lamps from Ebay, as well as a super bright bulb which should mean I'll be able to get some half decent pictures now.

Anyway, today's nails kind of have a story behind them. At college I do a subject called Communication and Culture, which we shorten to C&C. One of my friends pointed out that C&C can also stand for Cookies and Cream (aka, Oreos) which we all thought was awesome. So now, instead of saying I have a C&C lesson next, it's officially called Oreos between me and my friends. I suppose it makes school work just a little more fun. Here they are:

 

Sorry for the awkwardness of these pictures, I was too busy concentrating on getting a picture to notice what my hands were doing!

For these, I started with a base of Maybelline My Varnish's "Gemey Paris". Honestly, I've never used that brand before (I stole it from my sister, shh) but I was impressed, it went on amazingly. Especially since it's been lying sideways on a desk for god knows how long. After that, I sponged some of Rimmel's "Aqua Cool" in the middle of the nail. To finish, I added some milk splats to the tips of my nails with the end of a paintbrush and Barry M's "White" then painted in the details with a small brush and Barry M's "Black" and "White", a dark brown by Miss Sporty which doesn't have a name, and Rimmel's "Aqua Cool" mixed with a little of Max Factor's "Candy Blue".

I'm really happy with how these came out, I didn't think I'd be able to paint the logo as neatly as I'd managed to. I think it's definitely helped that I brought some nail art brushes, the long thin ones are so amazing for painting little tiny details!

Summer Challenge Catchup, Day 3: Favourite Summer Song

 When I saw this theme, I wasn't sure at all what I wanted to do my nails as. I don't really have a favourite summer song, I just listen to whatever is playing on the radio most of the time. So, I asked one of my best friends who is a huge music fan. A particular favourite is a woman who she describes as being one of the most perfect people alive. That is, Cheryl Cole. So, she suggested I take the design from the trousers Cheryl wears in her Call My Name music video and put it onto my nails. She's a genius. Here are said trousers:

 

And here are my nails.

 Yes, the Cheryl logo on my ring finger is upside down... I was too lazy to redo it and put it the right way round.

The logo was supposed to be like on the album cover, I think it turned out pretty good. Even if it did take about 5 attempts to get it all to fit on my nail! The colours I used for this design were, Barry M's "Bright Red", "Lemon Ice Cream", "Mint Green", "Black" and "White", Nails Inc's "Atomic", Max Factor's "Candy Blue" and Rimmel's "Ultra Violet". I also used some pink acrylic paint to write Cheryl before going over it with white polish. Using acrylic paint meant that I could erase it with water as many times as I liked. For the animal print, I used image plate BM221 and Barry M's "Black".

I'm happy with how these nails turned out overall, I think they're pretty cool. What do you think? :)

Summer Challenge, Day 16: Recreate your favourite manicure!

Today is the last day of the Summer Challenge (except for the challenges that I've missed)! So, to round it all off the last theme was to recreate a design someone else has done during the challenge. When I was scrolling through the pictures from throughout the challenge, one design that stood out to me was this whale design by Creative Nail Design. It's just so adorable and simple! I love it. :)

For the colours, I used 3 coats Barry M's "Blue Moon" for the base on all the nails. Then, I used Rimmel's "Aqua Cool" on the pinky and half of the ring finger. Over that, I put W7's "Cosmic Blue". For the whale, I used Max Factor's "Candy Blue", Barry M's "White" and Barry M's "Black". For the water that the whale is squirting, I used the same colours as the sea on the pinky finger.

I really like this design, it's just so adorable and easy to recreate. Hopefully everyone doing the challenge had fun and got more of the themes done than I did! Also, sorry about not posting the haul yet. I completely forgot! It's coming soon... promise.

Summer Challenge, Day 15: Ocean/Sea

So the Summer Challenge is drawing to a close, with only one more day left to go. That is, for everyone who  has kept up to date with all of the challenges. Me, however? I still have to go back and do 8 challenges that I've missed. These will come every other day after the last challenge, in the order that they should have been created originally.

Anyway, I'm back from an amazing holiday in Great Yarmouth and ready to go again. I bought 10 new polishes over the past week, so a haul post will be up tomorrow. Today is the second to last challenge in the list, Ocean/Sea. For this I figured some water marbling was most appropriate. Even though it is a pain to do. Here's how it turned out:

I wasn't aiming to do anything in particular with this design, I just kind of threw the colours in and used a toothpick to drag lines through the rings. I'm pretty happy with how they turned out though, even if they don't really look like an ocean. Usually my water marbling turns out horribly. The colours I used for this were Barry M's "Denim", Barry M's "Blue Moon", Max Factor's "Candy Blue" and Rimmel's "Aqua Cool", over a base of Barry M's "White".

Birthday Nails!

Yesterday was my birthday! I turned 16, and of course nail art was necessary. I also have lots of swatching of new nail polishes I should get done soon, so two birds one stone. :)

I chose to use Ciaté's "Bonbon" as my base colour. I got this polish as a free gift from this month's issue of Marie Claire. It's a grey/beige (I think the word's greige?) with what looks like to me some purple/lilac tones to it. The application was okay, although I found it to be a little streaky on the first coat. These swatches show 2 coats.

I really like this colour, it's unlike anything I already own and that's always a good thing. But since it was my birthday I couldn't just leave them plain. I figured I would try some free handing, even though I'm not amazing at it. Free hand nail art is what I started doing (before this blog started), but I haven't done very much of it recently. I think this is mostly because I get stuck for ideas easily, and have to take inspiration from others. The inspiration for these nails came from various images when I did a image search on Google for "birthday nails".

I should have let the cake nail dry a little longer. It smudged with the top coat. Oops. :') Oh well, I still think it looks pretty cute. I like how the pink looks against Bonbon.

I used a lot of colours for this nail art, so here's a list. I like lists.

Barbara Daly's "Kiwi"

Barry M's "Pink Flamingo"

Barry M's "Yellow"

Barry M's "Bright Red"

Max Factor's "Candy Blue" 

Nails Inc's "Atomic"

Rimmel Nail Tip Whitener

What do you think? Should I try and freehand more often, or stick to other forms of nail art?

Yellow and Blue gradients

A trend that is sweeping the nail-world right now is gradients. I think a part of this style gaining popularity is through Sammy from The Nailasaurus posting her tutorial which makes creating gradients a hell of a lot easier. You can find that here. This is the technique I used to paint my nails.

The yellow is Barry M's "Lemon Ice Cream" and the blue is Max Factor's "Candy Blue".

I've still not decided whether or not this combination is something I like. The colours are very bright and "in-your-face", but at the same time there's something hypnotising and summer-y about them.

Thoughts?