Secret Message Nail Art- an understated approach to nail art?

I am a bad, bad blogger. I took this shot several weeks ago and meant to share it, but then I got totally sidetracked. It's a good thing I'm not a doctor or an air traffic controller or something, else people would be dying while I wondered what it was I'd needed to do...

So, today's nail art is sort of backwards, in that you do the nail art first and then cover it up with your base coat. I know, it sounds totally bizarre, but look at the end result!

This was a super easy look, and it will absolutely make people look at your nails. I started with a base coat of solid white, just a cheapie 99 cent white polish from Love My Nails. It works well enough, although it tends to streak a bit on the first coat. Still, for 99 cents I'll deal.

Once that had dried a bit, I used my Art Deco black striper to draw vertical stripes down my nails fairly evenly spaced. This is a cute look on its own, but I had something else in mind. I'd noticed that the Sally Hansen Purple Diamond Nail Prisms dries very translucent, and I wanted to experiment with it.

Once the black and white had dried, I brushed a layer of Purple Diamond over the stripes and sat back to watch it dry. I wish I had video capabilities, because this is an absolutely gorgeous look. It's subtle enough to not look like you're wearing circus tent stripes on your nails, but it's still striped enough to make people wonder how you managed it. I can't wait to wear this one as a full manicure.

So what do you think- do you want to try some hidden nail art? Does it look interesting to you?

Can holographic polishes really be called understated? Who knows?

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Happy Holidaze the twoth!

Wow, I am absolutely blown away by the response to yesterday's post! You guys really like this nail art thing, don't you? Since you don't seem to mind me doing a single nail along with a demonstration of how it's done, I may try and see if I can do more nail art, even when I'm showcasing new polishes or whatever. I think that could be doable... what do you think? Worth the effort? :D

Today's holiday nail art is something for Hannukah. I have so many Jewish friends, and I absolutely love how blue and silver look together. That made today's nail art almost do itself!

As always, you can click the picture to make it bigger, if you'd like to see more detail. One thing I've found myself worrying about while doing nail art is the need to make things perfect. But if you look closely, you'll see that this is far from perfect- the dots aren't all perfectly round (I still don't have a dotting tool- shhh!), my stripes are irregular and sometimes overlap. But it's still pretty, and the whole look works well together as a whole.

So don't be afraid to try something like this. It really is a lot easier than you would think. Be patient, don't try to go too fast, and remember to brace your hand with your little finger while you paint. That step alone can make painting so much easier!

Also, like yesterday, I have an animated gif to help you visualize the steps of putting a look like this together. I'm trying something a bit new with it- I've labeled the steps to help you see what's going on, because there really is no good way to paint glitter. :D

To recreate today's nail, you'll need a few supplies:

• base coat
• a blue polish of your choice
• white and silver stripers OR
• white and silver polish & a skinny brush
• clear polish to adhere glitter pieces & rhinestone
• dotting tool
• a manicure stick (for placing glitter & rhinestone)
• silver glitter
• a rhinestone
• top coat

1. Base coat. Always do a base coat.
2. 2 coats of your background color- blue, in this case. For this nail, I used Sally Hansen Ultra HD Laser, but feel free to use any deep blue you like.
3. Once your background is dry, paint white four slashes across the nail starting from the bottom corner. They fan out like a flower, almost. I used my Art Deco Illustration Nails paint in white.
4. Use your dotting tool to paint white dots between the slashes. Do as many as you like. At the outer edges, I only had room for 2-3, but I did 5 on the inner sections.
5. I decided the design needed a bit more punch, so I added silver stripes along the bottoms of the white stripes. Just use your striper (or your striper brush and your silver polish) to paint slashes along the bottoms of the white ones. I used my Art Deco Illustration Nails paint in silver.
6. Once the white and silver are dry, sprinkle a tiny bit of glitter onto some paper. Paint a small amount of clear polish onto the first silver stripe, then place single glitter pieces in a line along the edge. Use the manicure stick to pick up and place the glitter pieces one by one. Repeat along all the silver stripes.
7. Use a bit more clear polish at the base where all the stripes begin. Place a single rhinestone on top, covering the junction and dressing up the look.
8. Let everything dry a bit, then coat with your favorite top coat. I used 2 coats of Seche Vite.

Repeat this for as many or as few nails as you like. It's a bit tedious, but it really isn't difficult. The main thing to remember is that you can do it if you practice! And even if it doesn't work out (believe me, not all of mine are keepers!), it's just nail polish!

You could customize this in several ways. First, you could change any of the colors and still have it look gorgeous. I can see this being downright amazing with black, silver, and red! You could also skip the careful application of glitter pieces and instead use a glitter striper. Instead of the rhinestone, you could put a big dot of glitter, or a nail decal. Nail art is endlessly customizable, and you should never be afraid to change things up.

I hope everyone has had a great week, and that you're heading into an even better weekend. Give someone something to smile about today! ♥

Ready for a Spring Manicure?

Whew!! What a day! I've been off wandering with my husband and our son, enjoying the wonderful weather and trying to work out some of this fibro stiffness I've been fighting with. We've been having a lot of fun looking at various home items and dreaming about our ideal house. We do this periodically, looking at furniture or appliances. Lately, though, I've been really drooling over electronics.

I wish I knew why I was so into shiny new gadgets. HD video cameras, Nikon dSLRs, home theater systems, CD changers, flat panel TVs... I could look and look and look for hours, it seems. My husband is no better. Anytime I lose him in a shop, all I have to do is wander over to the electronics department and there he is!

It's been fun. Exhausting, but fun. Still, I think I've been overdoing. It felt good to sit down and spend an hour doing nothing but painting my nails! This time I went for something springlike because I got the most gorgeous yellow polish I think I've ever seen! I've always shied away from yellow because it's seemed to hard to wear, but Hard Candy's Splendid is actually good with my skin tone! Then, when I held it next to my Essence Lime Up! I realized they were absolutely perfect together, and I was going to need to do a fun manicure using them both.


First off, before I get to that fun green & yellow mani, let me talk about Splendid first. You know how yellow is always a pain in the butt to apply? Well, this one isn't. It's creamy and opaque and almost a one coater! I was stunned at it, seriously. What you see in the main picture to the right is two coats. Gorgeous... absolutely GORGEOUS!

I also checked to see how well it stamps over both black and white. I wasn't expecting much, because yellow is traditionally a sheer color whether it's in nail polish or artist pigments. It's just really tough to get an opaque yellow! But Hard Candy have done it, as you can see. It shows up beautifully over both black and white, and is such a cheerful color! What can I say, I'm sold!

So... back to the mani. I started with a base of Splendid, then used Essence's Lime Up! to paint 1/2 of each nail on a diagonal. My ring fingers got the base green, the rest got green tips. I was going to apply some pink flower decals over this, then realized I wanted something with a bit more punch to try and pull it all together, although this is cute enough to wear as-is.

For the record, this would also be a great base for a full-nail Konad stamp. Can't you see it- stamping with Lime Up! over the yellow background, so that there's a green print over the yellow? I think it'd be adorable...

Ah well... I decided to use my silver Art Deco striper to paint a line along the join (and disguise some of my wobbly edges), then to put silver pinstripes along the green sections. I added pink flower decals from Viva la Nail for a bit more punch and decided I was happy with things. All in all it was a simple manicure that ended up looking a bit more complex than it really was!

And for once, I decided to do something I rarely do... I'm showing BOTH HANDS! See, I really do paint both hands the same, even if my right hand rarely comes out quite as well as the left. This one was pretty easy to do, though.


So even though it's actually fall and cooler weather is coming in, I needed to try something a bit brighter and sunnier. I think this fit the bill! What do you think?

Items have been provided by the manufacturers for consideration.

See my disclosure statement for more information.

Dollar Store Haul - Awesome Finds!

Yesterday was awful. (Note the lack of blog post yesterday... I just couldn't write. Blah!) It was one of those days where everything I touched went wrong, everything I said was misunderstood, and ended up with me sitting in the car with my husband, crying like an idiot because things were just so horrible. The tears didn't last long, and my husband is an amazing guy who managed to cheer me up immensely. Still, it was a very unpleasant day.

He decided a trip to the Dollar Tree was in order. We were right across the street filling my monthly meds anyway, so it wasn't a big deal to hop on over. He even acted as my hands while I used my crutches to hobble around the store. (It's kind of hard to shop when you can't carry a basket or push a cart!)

I ended up finding lots of goodies! Normally my local Dollar Tree doesn't have that great a selection because it's so small, but yesterday was definitely the exception to the rule! There was the usual selection of LA Colors Art Deco stripers, of which I only own a few. I picked up blue and silver glitters, because everyone needs glitter stripers, yes? But tucked away in a little hidey-hole were these four Maybelline Express Finish polishes!

Now, ages ago (before I started this blog!) I'd seen a post by Colette about her massive Dollar Tree haul, and I saw some polishes that I absolutely NEEDED. The aluminum line seemed so interesting to me, but I knew there was no way I'd find them at my tiny little store. But there they were- two aluminums, a matte gold, and a water polish! Can you believe it??

The water polish is downright bizarre to me. It's so thin and pale and runny, I don't quite get the point. Is it just supposed to make your nails look bruised and discolored? Do you wear it over something else? Do you layer it til it's... I don't even know. But one blah polish out of 6 isn't bad at all!

The glitter stripers are cute. They're good for nail art, and they're also good for frankening. I cannot get over how gorgeous that blue is... I picked up two other glitter polishes that color yesterday and put them back, so I'm glad to have gotten this one! It's just vivid sapphire blue glitter in a clear base, but I absolutely adore it!

The silver glitter is your typical, run-of-the-mill silver glitter in a clear base, but I didn't realize I didn't have one until the other day when I reached to grab one and then saw I didn't have it! That was an interesting moment! So when I saw this at the Dollar Tree, I grabbed it!

Then there are the other items I got. I needed some basics, since my lace nails destroyed my large emery board and my 4-sided buffer block. That was a LOT of buffing, let me tell you! So I bought a 4-pack of emery boards and a 8 sided buffer. I thought that was going to be that, and it was more than enough, but once we got to Walgreens to pick up my meds, I saw the most perfect set of nail decals EVER.

That pack of nail decals? OH. MY. DOG!!! There are cupcakes n crossbones, little skulls in bows and skulls in top hats, devil kitties and bats and... it's SO ADORABLE I could DIE!!! I mean it... I saw these and squealed so loudly that my husband heard me all the way across the store. It was worth it, too! Just look!

So, that was my haul. Other than a quick 1 coat swatch on all of them, I haven't done my nails in 3 days. It's been really, really grumpy in Laynieland. I'm hoping to change that soon! To help that, tell me about your latest purchases- have you found something amazing and vintage? A hard-to-find? Cheer me up! :D

Quick tidbit... Art Deco Illustration Nails = Konad Clone?

While looking through the Poka Pika Nails blog, I saw that she'd gotten a set of Art Deco stamping plates. I was excited to see this, since I seem to be obsessed with nail stamping for some reason. I did a bit of digging and found the website for Art Deco Nails, but I wasn't able to actually view the site due to an error. The google site cache showed me I was on the right track, though. A few more minutes of searching and I found the Art Deco stamping items on Amazon.co.uk.

I'm a bit surprised, I have to admit. The image plates look like they've got the same images as the Konad plates. Can anyone confirm this, or does anyone know anything about these? They look to be at least as expensive as Konad stuff, if not a bit more! I was hoping for more images to choose from...