Sky Blue Dotticure

Today I have a dotticure to share:

This manicure was quick and easy to do, and a lot of fun to wear. It's simply a bright sky blue base, with silver, orange, and dark teal layered polka-dots. This is the perfect type of mani to do if you want to incorporate a little nail art into your manicure, but don't want to do a lot of thinking or planning. I haven't been doing a lot of manicures lately, so it has been really fun to revisit this hobby after a little while away!

Yellow, Green, and Blue Dotticure

 Today I have a nail art manicure to share:

This yellow, green, and blue dotticure was really quick and easy to do. I just alternated some blue and green holographic polishes as my base colours, and then added dots of various sizes and colours with a dotting tool. The overall look was very whimsical - it was a lot of fun to wear!

Below, I have a shot of the polishes that I used o create this mani:

I used 3 polishes to create this manicure. The base colours were two different holographic polishes from Cirque Colors, 'Emerald' and 'Sapphire'. These polishes were both originally released in Cirque Colors' 'Facets 2018 Collection', which was themed around various precious gemstones. The third polish was a bright yellow that I used for the dot design. It is called 'Hit the Lights' and it was part of Nicole by OPI's collaboration collection with Selena Gomez, which was released way back in January 2013!

I have so many nostalgic feelings around the (now retired) Nicole by OPI line! I remember how OPI saved the majority of their fun, bright, and bold shades and formulations for this line. It was so much fun to browse through them in the drug stores!

Below, I have some additional shots of the manicure.

Blue, Orange, and Silver Stamped and Dotted Manicure

I finally managed to do a little nail stamping! It's been a while, but it was fun to get back into it again. Here's what I came up with:

I started with a simple base of Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure 'Calypso Blue'. Then I stamped some silver accents on my middle and ring fingers using an image from my ÜberChic Beauty ‘Culture Rich’ stamping plate. I finished it off by using a dotting tool to add orange dots on the nails.

The manicure came together rather quickly, as the embellishments were done pretty much at the spur of the moment. However, I really like how it turned out!

 

Leadlighting Manicure featuring Essie's Silk Watercolor Collection

Polishes Used	Polishes Used
Essie ‘Highest Bidder’	Essie ‘Point of Blue’
Essie ‘Love Sheen’	Essie ‘No Shrinking Violet’
Essie ‘Blush Stroke’	Essie ‘White Page’
Essie ‘Art New-Beau’	Maniology ‘Straight Up Black’
Essie ‘Muse, Myself’	Stamping Plate Used
Essie ‘Pen & Inky’	Moyou London Trend Hunter - 01

After reviewing my purchase of Essie's 'Glazed Days' collection which was released earlier this year, I decided to go back and do a manicure using Essie's 'Silk Watercolor' collection that I purchased back when it was released in 2015. 

Essie 'Silk Watercolor' Collection

I never did a complete review of the 'Silk Watercolor' collection when I purchased it. However, I did feature one of the shades in a blog post. It was the pink shade, 'Blush Stroke', which I used for a 'Pond' manicure. Here's a link to that post. 

For today's manicure, I decided to use all of the shades from the collection to create a cute, colourful look. I started with 'White Page' as my white base colour, and then stamped two different floral images on my thumbs, and ring fingers. The images were from Moyou London stamping plate 'Trend Hunter - 01', and the black stamping polish I used was Maniology's 'Straight Up Black'. I also stamped the cross pattern on my middle fingers from a portion of one of the images on the same plate using the same polish. 

Next, I coloured in the flower portions of the images with each of the colours from the 'Silk Watercolor' collection using the 'leadlight technique', which involves using a dotting tool (or any other tool or brush that can transfer polish) to place the transparent jelly polishes over different parts of the image. After this, I embellished the image on my middle finger with some black dots, and then added multi coloured dots on the bottom portion of my index, and pinky fingers. The multi-coloured dots were also made with the 'Silk Watercolor' collection. I completed the look by using a quick dry, glossy top coat in order to smoothe everything out, and add shine.

Below, is a collage with a few additional shots of the manicure:

Here are some of my thoughts about the 'Silk Watercolor' collection. I'm quite pleased with the colour saturation from the jelly polishes in the collection. The jellies look great over the white polish even with only one coat, which is really important for leadlighting. The white polish is pretty much your standard white polish. It performs well, but if you already have a white polish that you like, I don't see a specific need to get this one.

I also really like the colour range. There are more warm shades in the collection than cool shades, and I find that a lot of the colours are sort of 'in-between' shades, as opposed to 'true' shades ie 'pinky-red' as opposed to 'true' red. This works well for me, as I already have jelly polishes that are more classic shades, so these polishes are a great addition to my collection.

The 'Silk Watercolor' formula is really good as well. The jelly polishes are on the slightly thinner side, and have enough pigment to perform well for leadlighting, as well as on their own, as seen in my 'pond' manicure. Of course, I haven't used all of the jellies on their own yet, so I'm estimating the performance based on 'Blush Stroke', the one I've used (sort of) on it's own, as well as my experience with using all of the polishes in this manicure. 

All in all, really like these polishes. I really enjoyed creating this look, and I love how it turned out. I even got a couple compliments on this manicure! 

Red Metallic Christmas Mani

Today I have an impromptu holiday-themed manicure to share.

I did this manicure very quickly. I didn't have time to remove my old polish and start from scratch, but I also didn't want to continue with my old manicure since it had started to show some wear and tear. I ended up painting right over my old manicure. As a result, you can see the bumpiness of the glitter I was wearing underneath the red metallic polish on my index and pinky fingers.

Unfortunately, I don't recall which polishes I used right now, because I was in such a rush that I didn't even think about taking a picture of the polishes. Basically I used three metallic polishes to create this look - a red, a green, and a gold.

On the middle finger, I made a Christmas Tree by using scotch tape to mask off the top corners of the nail, leaving an exposed triangle in the middle. Along the border of the exposed triangle, I used the edge of the tape cut by the metal teeth on the scotch tape holder. That edge was bordered with small triangles, similar to fabric cut with pinking shears.  I thought that this was perfect to represent the jagged boughs of the Christmas tree.  I then filled in the exposed area with a beautiful metallic green polish, and then dotted gold polish on top to represent ornaments and the star on the top of the tree.

My ring finger features an abstract design made using a dotting tool, and splotches of nail polish.

Overall, I really like the techniques that I used in this manicure, even though the execution was not perfect.  Sometimes that's just the way it goes - necessity is the mother of invention, so this is one of those times when I had to come up some ideas really quickly to cover up an old chipping mani with something presentable. They turned out to be pretty cool ideas that I hope to use again in the future!

Blue and Gold manicure using Quo by Orly 'Celestial Star'

Today I have a quick 'remix mani' to share:

Polishes Used

Quo by Orly 'Celestial Star'

Sally Hansen Color Foil 'Yellow Gold'

I kept my ring finger the same from my previous 'Venetian Marble Mani', and painted over the other fingers with a deep blue sparkly polish from Quo by Orly, called 'Celestial Star'. I did a bit of stamping on the thumb (not shown), and middle finger, using an image from Bundle Monster + Magically Polished Collaboration plate BM-XL205. The polish I stamped with was Sally Hansen Color Foil in 'Yellow Gold'.  I also embellished the middle finger by painting a diagonal section in gold over the stamp, and then dotting along the edge with the blue polish.

This was one of those situations when my previous manicure was showing a bit of chipping on a few nails, but I didn't feel like removing my nail polish and starting fresh with a new manicure. Hence the remix mani, where I salvage or touch up any nails that still look fine, and paint over and/or embellish the rest!

I believe that the 'Celestial Star' polish was also untried, so I'm happy that I got to use it. I bought it years ago, along with 2 others from the same collection (the others were called 'Turquoise Moonlight', and 'Night Sky'). From what I can see on line, it looks like they came out around 2011. I noticed the polishes when I was organizing my collection recently. All 3 of them looked like they were thickening and evaporating in the bottles, even though I don't recall ever having used them (I may have years ago, and forgotten perhaps?), and the bottles seemed to be completely closed. I noticed this with a few other glitters, foils, and crackles. It seems that my creme polishes hold up relatively well over the years, but on occasion, some of the special effect polishes will thicken and/or dry out.

In addition to the 3 Quo by Orly polishes I just mentioned, I found 7 others that this appeared to be happening to. I put them aside to do a 'Project Polish' with - a challenge to use them up within a certain time period by putting them into heavy rotation. This may be a little tricky though, since they are all special effect polishes. I'm going to have to get creative to still be able to incorporate nail art while using polishes as my manicure base! I'll try to do a more detailed post later with pictures of the polishes.

Blue and Gold Mani with Water Marble Decal Accent

Well, hello!  It's been a while, but I'm finally back.  I really can't believe how quickly time flies - one minute you're in the groove of updating your blog, and the next, over 2 years have passed since you last posted! As I explained in my 'Nail Polish Declutter' post, I had been taking a hiatus from nail art. I recently decided to try to get back into it again, so I'm restarting this blog to journal my journey.

Blue and Gold Mani with Water Marble Decal Accent

The picture above is a quick manicure I did using two Orly polishes from my collection that caught my eye ('Luxe' and 'Sweet Peacock'), and one of the water marble decals I made in my 'Water Marbling Made Easy' post over 3 years ago (yes, it was one of the exact same decals I made that long ago - they really hold up well when carefully stored away between sheets of paper towel!). To jazz up the look, I made a diagonal stripe of gold on the thumbnail, and used a dotting tool to make contrasting dots and rings on some of my nails. Not bad for my first attempt at nail art in what feels like ages!

I actually did this look a few weeks ago, but it took me a while to post it. I'm working with all different equipment from the last time I posted, so it took some time to get all my files, gear and programs together to be able to start blogging again.

Polishes Used: Orly polishes 'Luxe' and 'Sweet Peacock'

All in all, I'm happy with the way this look turned out. I'm also really looking forward to posting new looks in the future!

60's Print Mani Version 2.0

Hello! The manicure that I have to share with you today is a 'remix' of my last one:

60's Print Mani Version 2.0

Polishes Used	Plate Used
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri ‘Navy Fleet’	Moyou London Time Traveller Collection:
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri ‘Brisk Blue’	Back to the 60’s - 04
Nubar ‘Marble Tower’
Revlon ‘Spidey Sense’

Sometimes when you design a manicure, you see an alternate creative choice that you could have made after you have already gone in another direction. This is exactly what happened with the first version of this manicure. I even mentioned the changes that I wanted to make in my last post! Rather than save the idea for another day, I decided to modify the manicure for the second day of wear.

I really like this version! The intricate design reminds me of stained glass windows, and Fabergé eggs! I also really like how the tiny dots of metallic red polish make such a huge impact on the overall look of the manicure. The red polish I used was 'Spidey Sense' from Revlon's Limited Edition 'Amazing Spider Man 2' Electric Chromes collection that was released for Summer 2014.

Polishes Used

Grey, Dark Teal, and Blue 60's Print Mani

Today I have a very simple stamping manicure to share with you.

To add a little something extra into the basic design, I decided to add a third color by doing a bit of dotting on the middle finger, and I used the advanced stamping technique to incorporate the third colour into the stamp on my ring finger.

In retrospect, I wish I had used the stamp on my middle finger on all of my nails for a fun, uniform print. I really love how that print looks with these 3 colours! Here is the information on the colours I used:

Polishes Used:	Plate Used:
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri ‘Navy Fleet’	Moyou London Time Traveller Collection:
Sally Hansen Insta-Dri ‘Brisk Blue’	Back to the 60’s - 04
Nubar ‘Marble Tower’

Overall, I really like this manicure. It's very similar to another one I did recently, and absolutely adored. I was also pleasantly surprised with how much I really like these 60's inspired patterns from the Moyou London 'Back to the 60's' plate 4. It was one of those situations where I mainly bought the plate for one pattern that I decided I simply had to have - a classic quatrefoil pattern - and was just sort of impartial to the other patterns on the plate. Initially when I was designing this manicure, I reached for the plate to use the quatrefoil pattern, but then the 2 patterns that I ended up using caught my eye, so I switched gears and used them instead!

Grey, Orange, and Blue Water Marble and Stamping Mani

Due to the huge supply of water marble nail decals that I whipped up recently, today, I have yet another water marble manicure to share!

In addition to the water marble decal on my ring finger, I also did a little stamping and dotting on my middle finger. I can't even emphasize how much I really love this manicure. I like how toned down, yet fun and interesting the final look is. I would definitely say this is one of my favourite looks I've done so far this year.

Polishes Used:
NYC 'Water Street Blue'
NYC 'Deep Breath'
NYC 'Spring Street'
NYC 'NY Blues'
NYC 'Sidewalkers'

Plate Used:
Bundle Monster BM-212


I'm really excited about designing more mixed manicures like this one using my remaining water marble decals along with other nail art techniques. This has been so much fun, and I'm loving the results!

Light Pink and Mint Green Easter Manicure

Happy Easter to all those celebrating!

Today, I have an Easter manicure to share:

Light Pink and Mint Green Easter Manicure

Polishes Used:
Sally Hansen Color Foil 'Yellow Gold'
Nicole by OPI 'Selena' from the Selena Gomez Collection
Nicole by OPI 'Alex by the Books' from the Modern Family Collection
NCLA 'Lavish Spender'
NCLA 'Posh and Privileged'

Plate Used:
Moyou London Festive Collection Plate 14

Polishes Used

For me, one of the best things about this manicure was getting to use 4 untried polishes that I've been really looking forward to using! 'Selena' and 'Alex by the Books' were both purchased last summer during a big sale one of my local drug store chains was having, clearing out the Nicole by OPI 'Modern Family', and 'Selena Gomez' collections. I remember that these two colours were sold out at the 2 super convenient locations that I most frequently go to, so I had to go hunting at a few other locations.  I also remember being so pumped when I finally found them, that I bought backups!

The story behind the other 2 polishes was kind of the opposite scenario. They are both from an NCLA collection called 'Duchess of L.A.'. I remember seeing another polish from the collection somewhere on line, and instantly being mesmerized by its beauty. The colour was called 'Let Them Eat Cake', and was a milky lilac based polish with purple, blue, silver, and white glitters. That started me on researching the collection, and eventually being taken with 'Lavish Spender', and 'Posh and Privileged' too. Now, I'm generally a pretty frugal shopper, and try to get most things on sale or clearance. That preference, along with the higher price of this indie brand, kept me from actually making the purchase for quite some time. Eventually, after months of price-watching to no avail, shortly after the holidays, I decided to go ahead and splurge on the polishes as a belated Christmas gift for myself!

Now that the Crackle Polish Challenge that I've been doing for the last two and a half months is over, I decided to celebrate my new-found freedom from crackle nail polish by using some of my most anticipated untried polishes. The fact that these were all pastels worked perfectly for the occasion, so I jumped at the chance to use them for this mani!

Overall, I really love the finished look of the mani! It reminds me of decorated, and speckled Easter Eggs. I also like how the polishes work so well together. It was also fun to do a manicure where I actually intended to design different versions on each hand, that complimented each other!

Crackle Polish Challenge #20 - Blue Crackle Dotticure

2015 Crackle Polish Challenge Manicure #20

Featured crackle application:
Using crackle polish for a dotted manicure

Featured crackle polish:
OPI 'Blue Shatter'

Blue Crackle Dotticure

Polishes Used:
Konad Special Polish in Black
OPI 'Blue Shatter'
Essie 'Rock the Boat'

I'm really pleased with the way this dotted crackle effect turned out! The cracks on the blue shimmery dots kind of resemble the edges of the facets on the surface of a cut blue sapphire. It's like there are small gemstones all over my nail!

The only thing I was a little disappointed with is that I had trouble getting the crackle polish to work on 2 of my nails. The very first attempt with crackle dotting was done on the 3 fingers prominently displayed in the picture above. I was originally going to do something else with my other two fingers, but changed my mind (more on that later). When I went back to dot the remaining 2 fingers, for some reason, I couldn't get the polish to crack any more! I even went back and started from scratch 3 separate times, but could not recreate the effect.

When I first tried it, I didn't put much thought into it - I was experimenting, so I didn't pay too much attention to my technique. I just put a small blob of polish on the back of a piece of plastic, and started dotting. It worked fine. When It came out beautifully, and I later decided that wanted to continue doing it, I just could not recreate the results.  It was so frustrating! I may have to try again with a different polish. Here are some additional shots of the manicure:

On my left hand, I did a different crackle mani using the same colours.  Originally, my plan for both hands was to do a stamped hounds-tooth design (from Bundle Monster plate BM-322) on my middle and ring fingers, and use the dot design only for the thumb, index and pinky fingers.  I painted my nails with 'Rock the Boat', and did the crackle stamping on the accent fingers of both hands. I started doing the dots on the right hand. When I finished, I didn't like the way the 2 designs looked together, so I decided to nix the hounds-tooth and just do the same dot design on the ring and middle fingers (as mentioned above, this is where it all started to go wrong!).

When I got to my left hand, I didn't want to remove the hounds-tooth because I liked the way it looked, so I just decided to do another design on the remaining three fingers that worked with the hounds-tooth pattern. Here's the finished result:

Alternate Version Blue Crackle Mani
Using BM-322

Since this manicure also features a crackle polish technique that I am now using for the second time, I think I should go ahead and acknowledge it.  I'm calling it the 'Crackle Curve'. It's the sweep of crackle nail polish that starts at or near the base of one corner of the nail, and ends up at the top corner of the opposite side of the nail. The other time I used this technique was in the Pink, Red, and White Valentine's Day Mani. So to make it official:

2015 Crackle Polish Challenge Manicure #20.5 - Blue Houndstooth Crackle Manicure:

Featured crackle application:
The 'Crackle Curve' technique

Featured crackle polish:
OPI 'Blue Shatter'

Stay tuned for my next post which will be the final instalment of the 2015 Crackle Polish Challenge!