Penguins

Penguins are pretty easy.  On my left hand I liked the penguin on the pinkie and thumb.  On my right hand I liked the ring finger penguin.  I thought the polar bear and the peeking penguin were also sort of cute.  I used the nail polish brushes themselves to do almost all of the black penguins and white belly parts.  I used this Youtube tutorial to do the dancing penguin.  Surprise, it is cuter dancing on youtube. 

Sunset nails

This is another manicure that everyone who does nail art tries at least once.  I started out with a base of Wet 'n Wild French White cream so the yellow show up better.  I painted on two coats of Spoiled Mind Your Own Beeswax to the bottom half and one coat of Wet 'n Wild Dream Poppy to the top.  Then I sponged Essie Brazilliant onto the center section to blend the two colors together.  Frankly, I could have done a better job with the gradient.  I used the Salon Express stamping kit for the palm trees.  The palm tree stamp worked really well from that kit.  Designs from that kit are hit and miss. The thumb only needed one palm tree.   I used a dotting tool and Wet 'n Wild Black Creme for the "land" at the bottom of the nail.  I liked them, and I'll do this again. 

Candy Corn Nails

First I added a layer of Wet 'n Wild French White Creme on the whole nail, two coats.  Then I added two coats of Wet 'n Wild Spoiled Mind Your Own Beeswax just shy of 2/3 of the way up my nails.  Next, I added Essie Brazilliant to the center.  I finished with a coat of Essie Pure Pearlfection followed by a coat of Pro FX Quick Dry Top Coat.  I should have used tape to get straighter lines, but I went with freehand and it isn't too terrible.  I really like the Pure Pearlfection over the top for a subtle shimmer effect.  Happy Halloween! 

Minnesota Vikings Nails

This is my Vikings manicure this week.  I did the striped nails with pieces of scotch tape.  I think at this point I might make better strips just using the brush itself.  I think the stripes read more cheerleader or flag of a purple/white/yellow country then football.  Oh well.  Wet n Wild French White Creme, Wet n Wild Spoiled Mind Your Own Beeswax, Sinful Colors Let's Talk.  Sinful Colors Let's Talk is a dark, bright purple on my nails, but looks blue in the pictures.  The thumb is China Glaze Mahogany Magic and a dotting tool and Wet n Wild French White Creme for the laces.  The ring finger is Essie Smooth Sailing with Finger Paints Go Van Gogh painted in an arch along the bottom.  Wet n Wild French White Creme and a dotting tool was used to make the goal posts. 

Hunger Games Manicure, The Girl Who Was on Fire Nails

Why didn't I take this picture with the Hunger Games book?  It is currently out on loan.  Catching Fire is the second book in the series.  If you haven't read The Hunger Games, you should.  In the book they mention a manicure the main character, Katniss, got in her Hunger Games makeover.  It is described in the book as flames carefully painted on her nails.  Here is how I did my version.

This will all sound way more complicated then it is.  I did a yellow/coral/red gradient nail with a make-up sponge.  Then I used a dotting tool to add black over the top to make flames.
Step 1-  Base coat.  I used Essie All in One Base.
Step 2- One coat of white or milky colored ridge filler.  Most yellows take several coats.  Over a white polish, you need less coats of yellow polish.  I used Sally Hansen Whirlwind White.

Step 3-  Do as I say, not as I do.  Add one coat of yellow to the entire nail.  I used Wet n Wild Spoiled Mind Your Own Beeswax.  I only added the yellow halfway on the nail, but the orange/coral polish will cover better over yellow then it will white.
Step 4-  Add a 2nd coat of yellow halfway up the nail.
Step 5- My only polish color that didn't have shimmer was the yellow.  So I added a coat of Essie Pure Pearlfection halfway up the nail over the part that will remain yellow.  If none of your polish colors have shimmer, wait until you are done with the yellow/orange/red gradient, and then add a coat of shimmer.  You will want the entire gradient to have shimmer. This part will eventually become the fire.

Step 6-  Sponge an orange or coral polish beginning half way and ending 3/4 of the way up the nail.  I use a small section of a make-up sponge to do this.  If the orange/coral ends up being sponged on the entire last 1/2 of the nail, that is perfectly fine.  You will go over it with red anyway.  I used Zoya Rica.

Step 7-  Sponge a red polish onto the last 1/4 of the nail.  I used Zoya Jade.

Step 8-  Paint squiggles on the nail with a black polish.  I used Wet n Wild Black Cream.  Ideally you want a cream finish to contrast with the shimmery fire gradient.  You can either use a dotting tool or a nail art brush to paint the squiggles.  I used a dotting tool.  When I was trying this out over an old manicure a few weeks ago, I used a art brush and that worked fine too.
Step 9-  Paint black in a fine line along the edges and cuticle of the nail using either a dotting tool or a nail art brush.  Paint closed any areas at the top (by cuticle) that seem like they should be connected.  I connected a few too many squiggles.  The video shows how to do step 8 and 9 and shows an alternate way to do a fire nail. 
Step 10- Top coat.  I used Seche Vite.

I'm obviously a nail art beginner (see above pictures :)).  But, anything I can do, you can do.  I have the art skills of a second grader.  This looks complicated, but isn't.  It does take a bit of time, but probably less then you think it will take.  You could do this with other colors as a base (blues?) to look like cars or bikes painted with flames.  And remember...

May the odds be ever in your favor.

Wet 'n Wild Spoiled Nail Polish from CVS

Wet 'n Wild has released a line of 72 colors called Spoiled that is sold exclusively at CVS.  I got mine on sale, but I believe these are about 2$ a bottle.  If you love metalic blues, you are in luck.  There are lots of them.  There are also several sparse, chunky glitters if that is your thing.  The most talked about thing with Spoiled polishes is the brush.  It is huge.  In the picture on the right, you can see the size of the Spoiled brush (yellow) vs. the Essie brush (lavender).   Most people seem to hate it.  I however am completely in love with this brush.  I've had polish on my nails almost continuously since the 5th grade.  This is the first brush ever in my entire lifetime that has allowed me paint inside the lines.  I'm positively thrilled with this brush.  I think the reason the giant brush works for my nails is a combination of the fact that my nails are very curved and my cuticles are curved.  At least this is what I think may be why I like it based on what I have read.  However, my litmus test for nail polish is how it wears.  I like to get 6 to 7 days out of a polish.  I only got 3-4 days with this polish, so I won't be getting more of this line.  Well, I may go back for a glitter, because most glitters wear well for me.  Click to see more Spoiled swatches on Nouveau Cheap.

The yellow color is Spoiled Mind Your Own Beeswax.  I bought this mainly for nail art purposes.  Yellow is just not my color.   In the pic above I used 4 coats.  That is pretty much par for the coarse for yellow polish.  A good plan for yellow polish is to do either a coat of ridge filler (milky color) or a coat of white before using yellow polish, so you don't need so many coats.  The brown color is Spoiled Pumping Gas with 2 coats.  I don't know what is on the thumb in the picture.  It wasn't there in real life.

 The smiley face nail art was done with a tooth pic for the eyes and a DIY nail art brush for the smile.  The smiley faces painted by my left (non dominant) hand looked deranged.  Here is the tutorial I used for how to do the smiley faces.