Tutorial Tuesday: Fourth of July/Patriotic Nail Tutorial

Ugh it’s been so long since I’ve done any kind of nail art. Lately I’ve been just slapping on a couple of coats of color and a topcoat and calling it good. It’s kinda nice to be stretching my creative muscles and putting out a tutorial for you guys!

Supplies You’ll Need:

Basecoat of your choice: I’m using LynBDesigns’ BSticky; Topcoat of your choice: I’m using LynBDesigns BShiny (my go-to high shine topcoat right now I LOVE IT!); accent nail color: I’m using Kawaii Nail Lacquer’s Stars and Dots’'; (this item is optional!) a clean up product: I’m using Cinema Swatch Lacquer’s That’s A Wrap!; and a red, white and blue polish each. I’m using Zoya Purity, OPI Color So Hot It Berns and China Glaze’s Frostbite. You’ll also need some foam cosmetic sponges, acetone for cleanup and a pair of tweezers to remove the That’s A Wrap if you use it. Also: Not shown… A sparkly topcoat to give you a little sparkle. I used China Glaze’s Fairy something or another. I can’t remember LOL

Step one: Put down a couple of base coats of your white, plus your accent nail. Let dry.

Step Two: Cover up the skin surrounding your nail with That’s A Wrap. I had to use a regular brush as the brush that is included is a little skinny and it drives me nuts LOL.

Step Three: Using your cosmetic sponge, apply your gradient, making sure to place the paint where you want it on the nail. I started off with blue, then white, then red so the red would be at the end of my nail.

Step Four: Commence making a huge mess all over your nails.

Step Five: Peel off That’s A Wrap and do any spot-cleanup that might be necessary.

Step Six: Add your sparkly topcoat and topcoat and allow to dry.

And BOOM! You’ve got nails ready for a hot night of Fourth of July fun! This will also work on short nails, just be careful not to use huge strokes of color on the sponge!

Playing with my new macro lens… I really need to fuss with it more. Cause I suck at using it LOL.

Nail Art Tutorial: Nautical Nails

Alrighty! It’s been a long time since my last nail art tutorial… I’m sorry! I’ve been having doubts about my nail art abilities.

They’re subpar, and I know it. But it’s fun, and I like to do it. So bite me LOL.

Anyways! Here’s the tutorial for some awesome summery nail art!

HEre’s the supplies you’ll need: You’ll need a few polishes. I’m using a white and black from FingerPaints. I’m also using three shades from OPI; one that I frankened and called My Boyfriend Scales Blue Walls, Samoan Sand and Moscow Red. You could use any kind of beachy colors. You mainly need a brown or tan for the sand and a blue for the water. I also used a couple other polishes not shown, an Ella + Milla polish and Co-Bolt Blue from Sally Hansen. You’ll also need a few makeup sponges, a dotting tool and blue painters tape to make stripes out of.

Make horizontal cuts with an Xacto knife on your roll of painters tape. You’ll need enough for two accent nails for both hands.

Paint your nails with a base of white. It doesn’t really matter if it’s a little patchy in spots, or if it’s incredibly nasty all over your fingers. That’s what cleanup is for. Make sure you let this dry completely before you go on to the next steps.

Starting off with the tan, build up a little patch of “sand” on one of your nails.

Taking your blue painters tape strips, lay out the strips the way you want them. Preferably not like this. Because it’s all crooked. And weird looking.

Take your red (or blue) polish and paint over the white and tape. Let it dry just a bit, then pull it off. If you have any messups, cover them up with a little white.

Do the same with the blue.

Add a couple more layers of tan.

Then add your light blue, then a little bit of dark blue

Then take a coral pink polish and doodle on a little starfish and a little shell or something.

Add a few little waves with some tacky white polish and your dotting tool.

Then on your thumb, or whatever other nail you have that you can’t figure out what to do with, sponge on a little blue and dark blue and then use your dotting tool to draw on a little sail boat. Then add some waves with white and blue.

And then on your red striped fingernail, draw on a little anchor.

Topcoat with your favorite topcoat and go!

 

Also attempt to do a crappy looking chevron pattern on your pinkie nail.

Tutorial Thursday: Blue Valentine

I wouldn’t say that I’m jaded. I love Valentine’s Day and all the hearts and flowers that go with it. Just kinda bummed about it because I know I won’t be getting anything. I tell my husband every year not to worry about getting me anything with the small hopes he’ll see through it and get me something anyways. I know I should know better; men are notorious for not getting mixed messages and that’s one of the worst of them all, but I hate to have to come out and tell him yes, I’d like a card and flowers please!

So this tutorial is going to be short, simple, and blue. Blue for the feelings that a lot of people feel this time of year.

Supplies you’ll need: Three blue polishes. I used Polish Yer Hooves’ Don’t It Make Your Cow Eyes Blue, Sally Hansen Blue Frosting and OPI’s Unfor-Greta-Bly Blue (not shown). You’ll also need a fan brush and a pallet to pour your polishes on.

First step, and one that I forgot to take pictures of LOL, is put down your base coat. I used Blue Frosting as my base coat (and five layers later I reached full opacity). Pfft.

Step Two: Load up your fan brush with your lightest blue, which I used Cow Eyes for that.

With a very light hand, brush it over the top coat in a sweeping manner.

Step Three: Using your darker shade, lightly fan on some more lines. Doesn’t have to be perfect, just make sure some of your lighter blue can peek through.

You could even go a little less than I did with the darker blue.

Step Four: Using a nail art brush or a dotting tool, draw out a heart and then add little embellishments.

You can do this to each nail, but I chose to just do it on an accent nail. I love how this blue sparkles!

Top coat and you’re done!

Soooooo pretty! I love all the blues!

My flash kinda blew out this picture, but you get the point. I love how the holo in Cows Eyes just explodes!

Nail Polish Review: Cosmos Lacquers

I’ve got some awesomely talented friends. I mean seriously. I don’t think any girl has friends that are as awesomely talented as mine. You might think you do, but you don’t. Not in the slightest!

One of my good friends is venturing into the murky waters of Indie Polish making. I tried to do that- but failed horribly. I think anyone that ventures into making money off their hobby is seriously seriously risky but usually always rewarding.

Tia’s doing an awesome job cultivating Cosmos Lacquers first line of polishes. Umpteen tests and retests have been done…. Failures have been cataloged and noted…. I’ve watched her each and every step of the way and I have to say I haven’t been more proud. She is REALLY doing a bangup job.

First off in the review is C3P-Oh no! I love the name of this one lol

C3P-Oh no! is an awesome shimmery copper with deep copper micro square glitters interspersed.

It’s gorgeous, isn’t it? I’m not usually a huge fan of coppery-orange polishes. They usually don’t work with my skin tone. But I was pleasantly surprised with this one. It has just the right warm undertones that make sure that it’s not going to turn my uber-pale skin look jaundiced.

This is it with just one coat. You can see while it’s shimmery, it is very opaque. If you were to use it over a polish like OPI’s Deutsch You Want Me Baby I could imagine how wicked it would look. I may have to horde this precious and do that this fall!

And here it is in two coats, complete opacity reached with no streakage often found in shimmer polishes. Now the glitter doesn’t show through quite as well, but you can still see it.

Next up is the beauty that is Fairy Princess. A gorgeous shimmery pink polish with small gold circles it’s a gem.

And yes, it might look like the circles are curling a little, but rest assured it’s just the angle my camera caught it at. They lay completely flat. I love how the little circles look like stars almost.

The first nail is with two coats of Fairy Princess, the rest have three. It really is a very subtle spring-time polish. I love how it glows and shimmers in the light. When I had this on I honestly couldn’t stop staring at it lol.

I am seriously in love with this polish. I love how the gold glitters catch the light and twinkle just like you’d expect a fairy princess’ crown to shimmer. *sigh* I love it.

I will have more polishes to review from Cosmos Lacquer and once she gets her etsy shop up and running, I will edit this post to provide the information. She’s looking at the last part of this month, early June for her store launch. I’ll be sure to keep you all posted!