Rainbow Zebra- how to do the zebra print

Whew, I finally got this one edited and uploaded! Here's the second half of the rainbow zebra tutorial... Hopefully it makes sense!

I love the metallic sparkle of the left nail. It's sponged over silver, as opposed to the right which is over white.

I love zebras. They're cute!

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Monochromatic Medly

Hi again. It's still all kinds of pukey at my house, so we'll look at another blast from the past. Anything to distract me, yes?

This design is another monochromatic look. I was again looking to show that you don't need a ton of colors or tools to make pretty nail art. I think it worked decently!

The steps for this one are simple, and could be switched up easily based on whatever you have on hand. You don't need a lot to do this.

Supplies needed:

• base coat
• three shades of nail polish: a dark shade, a medium shade, and a light shade.
• accent pieces
• top coat
• something to make blobs with

For accent pieces, you could use just about anything: glitter polish, glitter in various sizes or shapes, striping tape, rhinestones, flat-backed pearls, or stickers. This would be gorgeous with a line of tiny swarovski crystals accenting the line, or with little flower rhinestones. You could also accent a few of the light-colored blobs with glitter polish for a bit more shine. What can I say, I'm all about the glitter!

It breaks down something like this:

1. Paint your nails with your base coat.
2. Paint your nails with your darkest color. For this design I used black.
3. Paint one corner with your midtone color. I used silver.
4. Paint splotches of your lightest color over the darkest color. I used white.
5. Add a line of accent pieces along the midtone color. I used silver holographic rhombus glitter from Born Pretty.
6. Add topcoat.

A design like this can also be tweaked to fit different situations. You could replace the spotches with little hearts for valentine's day, use purple green and gold for Mardi Gras, use earth tones for fall or pastels for spring. You could use tiny flower stickers in place of the white blobs, or shiny hearts.

It really is up to you, and can be silly, bright or elegant. I worked up quite a few variations, just to give you an idea of just how versatile this type of design is!

 

 

 

So again, I feel like I can't say this often enough: experiment! Play with your polishes, try things out together. Try different colors together to see if they work, and if you like it, go for it! It's only nail polish, and no mistakes are permanent!

Til next time!

Rhombus glitter was provided by Born Pretty for consideration.

See my disclosure statement for more information.

It's animal print mayhem!

Several colors on this nail were
custom-blended to achieve the
look I wanted. So much fun!

Hi again! Today I've just got one nail design to share with you, but it's one I've fallen in love with! I've got such a love for animal prints, and I wanted to do something more than the typical look.

I painted the zebra and giraffe sections as soon as I'd figured out what I wanted, but the top segment stayed empty for several months while I tried to figure out what to paint there. I'm still not sure it works, but I'm definitely enjoying the look of it!

I'd share the polishes I used to make this, but I custom-blended several of them. Also, since it's been so long since I started it that I can't remember what polishes I used! I really need to start keeping a spreadsheet of what polishes I use to make what colors and which nail designs...

Yea, right... I'll add it to the list of things I need to do, then promptly forget about it!

So, what do you think about this one? Would you wear it? Would you like to see a tutorial on how I made it? Leave me a comment if you want a tutorial, I might be persuaded...

I maybe crazy, but it's fun!

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Green and Gold Animal Print- is it Tiger? is it Zebra? Who knows?

Hi hi!! I have to share this, even though I should be asleep. I had a weird night and should have been spending the day with my mom taking her to the doctor, but I seem to have a tummy bug. So I figured I'd give you something fun to look at while I'm feeling icky!

This is the last installment for this version of Animal Print week (which actually lasted two weeks, or... is it three? I can't count!) Still, it's cute as a button and can be done in the colors of your choice!

It's super simple too. Apply your base coat and then 2-3 layers of your background color. (This one is Manbug by BB Couture.) Once that's dry, add stripes of the metallic polish of your choice (I've forgotten which one I used here! EEP!) and follow up with thin black stripes under each metallic stripe as an accent. If your background color is darker, you can use silver and white as accent colors and it would really pop!

So, try it, and if you do, show me! I love seeing people trying what I've shown! Til next time!

The tiger zebra is actually a very rare animal. Green is considered the ultimate beauty for their coat.

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Animal Print Week (continued): Rawwr!

Ok, this isn't all that different from your typical tiger print. Still, I wanted to jazz it up a bit, so I used my uber-gorgeous black glitter to hit the black stripes, giving them an understated sparkle that is seriously fun.

It's pretty easy to do, too! Start out with your favorite orange polish as the background color. I'm really partial to Deborah Lippmann's Lara's Theme. This orange is like a traffic cone! Add in some tiger stripes with the black of your choice- you could use a simple Art Deco striping polish in black, or a Migi NailArt pen. The Sally Hansen Nail Art Pens in black would be perfect for this too! It's really not brand-dependent.

The fun comes once you've got the base design created. I added glitter in two ways. First, I added a single stripe of sheer shimmer down the center of the nail using Love My Nails Dazzling. Then, I mixed some black microglitter with clear polish and touched it to the black stripes. This added some depth and subtle sparkle to the black stripes. Love it!

I added a coat of Seche Vite over the whole thing and then admired my sparkly tiger manicure! Fun, no?

Be good, and I'll see ya next time!

Some polishes may have been provided by the manufacturer for consideration.

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Animal Print Week: Pink Leopard Print-ish

Wheee! I can't believe I missed Monday, but I was having technical difficulties. Whatever... I'm here today with a fun animal print-inspired nail design that I hope you love as much as I do! It's super easy, too, and I couldn't help but call it Glitterlicious

I have to admit, it's not exactly leopard print. I showed it to a good friend who wasn't sure exactly what animal would have this design, but who cares, right? It's hot pink and cool blue, and it's perfect for summer!

This design starts, like all the others, with a coat of your favorite base coat. This makes sure your art lasts longer than your favorite sitcoms. I've been using Qtica Natural Nail Growth Stimulator, and my nails have been growing like mad! They're seemingly stronger than ever, and they're growing longer than I think I've ever had them! YAY!

After that, you simply paint your nails in whatever color you choose for your background color. I chose a bright hot pink. Two coats should do it, but of course it varies based on which polish you choose.  Then comes the fun part!

To add the splotches, I used Sally Hansen's Nail Art Pen in Blue. This way I didn't have to worry about controlling a brush- I just doodled in vague spots from memory. I probably should have looked at a picture of leopard print, but you know what? This is inspired by... I can do it any way I want to! :D

One tip to remember- be sure your background color is completely dry before you try and use the Sally Hansen Nail Art Pens. Otherwise, they just don't work, and that's no fun at all!

Once my splotches were dry, I decided I wanted a bit more color. I dug around in my nail art box til I found my Kiss Nail Artist Paint in Soft Purple. This was just the ticket! I used the thin artist brush to just brush a thin line of color right under the bottom sides of each little blob. I thought of it as if each blob were a 3d shape and I were shining a light from the base of the nail, and everywhere that light would hit I put a touch of purple.  Easy- remember, you can't really mess it up. Even if you do, it's just nail polish!

When I finished with the purple, I realized it still wasn't ready. I knew what I needed: GLITTER! I grabbed my superfine glitter in royal blue, tapped out a small bit into a plastic cup, and poured just a bit of clear nail polish on top of it. A bit of mixing, and it was perfect! I dabbed this custom glitter polish over the blue splotches, loving the way the glitter caught the light and made the whole design pop!

After that, it just needed a coat of Seche Vite and it was done! I love the finished result, and I'm seriously tempted to do this on my own nails now! (This was on a false nail, or I'd show you a whole set of them!) Check out the animation below for the how-to!

So, what do you think? Can you see yourself wearing this design? If so, let me know in the comments! I'd love to see what you come up with!

Til next time!

Some products may have been provided by the manufacturer for consideration.

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Happy Holidaze the sixth- Laynie loses her mind with glitter!

I'm taking a break from the batch of nail tips I decorated, but don't worry. You're still getting the holiday nail art, but today it's more of a cautionary tale, although I'm not quite sure what I'm cautioning you against. I think it's a simple Don't do this, because it isn't pretty!

But first, let me show you yesterday's adventures! I finally sold the monster nails, so I treated myself to a sample pack of glitter! Unfortunately, it came packaged in cute little baggies, which doesn't work for me. I debated for quite a while in Michaels, trying to figure how I was going to store this stuff so that I could use it!

Then it hit me. I saw a set of paint pots for $2.75 hanging in the section with palettes and containers and things for painting. Have I mentioned I'm frugal? Yea, I don't want to spend $10 on something to store my $4 glitter, so this was just right for me! The only issue would be transferring the glitter from the packets to the pots, but I could be careful, right?

Right. The thing I forgot to take into consideration was that this is microglitter. It's so incredibly fine that it can waft into the air like a dust cloud, gently drifting and lazily gliding on air currents in the room. How do I know this, you ask yourself? Lemme tell you...

Because I'm so frugal, I wanted to get every last speck of the glitter out of the packages. I spent good money on that stuff, and I don't want to waste it! I cut the edge of the first bag off (emerald green, ine you were wondering, and haven't seen me since the incident!), gently tap-tap-tapped it into the pot, being careful not to spill any. Then, I lifted the bag up with the cut end pointing up, intending to tap it on my finger to pull down the glitter stuck to the edges of the bag. It worked perfectly while the bag was closed!

Unfortunately, I didn't think this through carefully enough. When I tapped the bag on my finger, instead of this causing gravity and inertia to pull the glitter on the edges of the bag down to the bottom it turned the bag into a very small bellows, sending a tiny mushroom cloud of green glitter directly into my face.  It felt like it was in slow motion, this tiny cloud expanding toward my face, enveloping my head in its sparkly green goodness. Except it wasn't quite goodness that enveloped my head. It was glitter, and glitter never goes away.

I won't waste your time with the tales of how I finally got all the bits of glitter picked up and shaken out of my hair. Let's just say it included lots of masking tape, lots of cursing, and lots of my family pointing and laughing at me. I deserved it, clearly, but really... how was I supposed to know this was going to happen?

I finally got the glitter packed away and most of the random glitter fallout picked up. What am I saying... I know I'm going to be finding glitter in random places for the next 15 years. Glitter is like herpes- once you get it on you, it never goes away.

And on to the nail art, since I've shared my secret shame. Unfortunately, this isn't much less embarrassing. I had visions of a cute, sassy Konad look that would be fun to wear. What I ended up with was more like the 80s threw up all over my nails. It's not horrible, granted, and it's better than I could do when I first got the Konad stuff. But still?

This isn't good. Not by a long shot. And the more I did to it, the worse it got.

It all started with the package I won from Scandalously Polished over twitter. I had no idea what to expect, so I was absolutely BLOWN AWAY when I saw it was 10 polishes and 4 nail foils! CRAZY! She is super awesome, and if you haven't seen her blog, then scoot over right after you read this and say hi!

In that package was a polish from H&M called Bella's Choice. I'm going to assume this has something to do with that vampire thing going around... Dusk or Nightfall or Twilight or something, yea? Whatever... it's an absolutely gorgeous turquoise creme that I couldn't wait to put on. I was hoping it would look wonderful on me!

In truth, not so much. It made me look somewhat ill. My husband looked at it and called it "that puke polish you're wearing." I wore it grocery shopping and the cashier caught sight of my nails, did a double take, then quickly looked away with a strange look on her face. I think she didn't want to ask if I was feeling ok, but you could tell she didn't think it looked good. I like the color, though, so I figured maybe if I stamped over it, I'd be able to wear it.

Enter the second color she sent- H&M Goddess on Stage. This polish is magnificent, y'all. I really don't even have the words to describe how amazing this is. Creamy, gorgeous, just luscious. I thought it would play nicely with Bella's Choice and make something wearable for me. But it actually stamped sort of sheerly, and in my stamping ineptitude I ended up missing spots and stuff.

No big deal, I thought to myself, I can just fix those spots with a brush. Sure, except that I couldn't copy the consistent thinness of the stamped image, leaving me with heavy purple spots on the edges of the print. Oh yea, that looks GREAT.

Maybe I can add some color to the spots, to draw the eye away from the dark edges, I continued thinking to myself. I pulled out my pink and white creme polishes and added some to the dots, but that wasn't enough, in my opinion. My husband did think it made everything look better, even better than the stamp alone. "It covers the puke nicely!"

Thanks hon. I feel much better now.

As a finishing touch, I added lime green and yellow creme dots to the remaining spots and covered it all in Seche Vite. And you know what?

It wasn't horrible, but I don't think I'll be wearing this one again. There are just too many things here that just didn't work well together, and I'm just... no. No. Never again!

Do you have any horrible stories about manicures that just didn't work as well as you hoped? I'd love to hear them to make me feel better about this one!

Tiger Stripes- They're Fun When You Throw In A Gradient!

Let's be honest- animal prints are fun. They're especially fun for nail art, but they can seem a bit flat-looking sometimes. I decided I was going to try to do a tiger print with a bit of depth to it!

I started out with my standard base coat, then two coats of Love My Nails Hot Tamale. This is a gorgeous orange that's absolutely loaded with shimmer. I wanted a bit more, though, so I mixed it with a bit of white polish. Oddly enough, it turned pink! I wish I'd gotten pictures of that stage, but I wasn't thinking. Instead, I added some Sinful Colors Let's Meet (Yellow) to warm that pink up to a pale orange again.

Once I had a pale orange I was happy with, I sponged it lightly over the center high part of my nails. It ended up being a sort-of blended pale stripe down the centers. It still seemed too white/pink for me, so I ended up painting a coat of Let's Meet over my nails to make everything work together. At this point, it was late and I seriously needed sleep, so I added a coat of Seche Vite and let it dry for a bit, then went to sleep.

The next morning, I had to go run some errands, and didn't realize until I was already out of the house that I had odd nails that I hadn't even cleaned up edges on! Thankfully, I don't think anyone noticed. If they did, they probably thought I was insane! My nails looked weird! But that's ok... if they got a giggle, then maybe their day got a little brighter. I'm ok with that!

So, once I got home, I pulled out my Sally Hansen Nail Art pens, choosing the black for the tiger stripes. It was a simple matter to draw on stripes, and my biggest challenge was not drawing too many stripes! I added another coat of Seche Vite, then looked at them. They were pretty, but something was missing...

My basic rule of thumb is this: when in doubt, add glitter! In this case, it worked splendidly! Instead of brushing glitter over the entire nail, though, I wanted to enhance the light parts of the nail. I ended up using a very thin nail art brush to paint the glitter polish onto the appropriate areas.

Sounds fiddly, doesn't it? Oh yea. You could say that. First I painted on a layer of Love My Nails Dazzling (my go-to glitter of choice). It was pretty, but it wasn't enough. So, I pulled out my Sinful Colors Call You Later. This stuff is seriously gorgeous, a mix of gold and copper glitters in multiple sizes that absolutely sings on the nail. It turned out to be the absolute perfect addition, and once I was finished with the glitters I couldn't help but smile.
 

Once I got those applied I added one more coat of Seche Vite. (I hope you aren't counting, but basically, that's a lot.) Believe it or not, it dried fairly quickly and was super smooth even with all the glitter. I did a quick cleanup with my acetone & paintbrush and then I wasn't ashamed to leave the house anymore!

Even my husband seemed amused by this manicure. I showed him my nails and he said, "Awww, you're a kitty!" It made me smile.
Normally he just sort of shrugs and says, "Ew, stinky." To get a positive reaction makes me happy!

So tell me, what do you think about animal prints. Do you like them? Do you love them even more in rainbow colors? Are you a purist who thinks animal prints belong only on the animals who wear them? Tell me all about it in the comments!

Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen was provided by the company for evaluation.