12 Days of Christmas: Day Five Snow

   
     Snow. What an ugly word! I hate snow. If I could have autumn all year round, I would never complain about the weather. Luckily, Pittsburgh hasn't been hit with the white fluffy stuff yet. The weather has been great lately, but enough about that. On to the polish!

     This was a simple look. With how much I've been working, I had to take an easy day. I used a few of my favorite pastels for this look: Illamasqua Nomad, Illamasqua Jo'Mina, and Essie Where's My Chauffeur. I was getting tired of the red and green polish already. I had to mix it up.

  I used a Bundle Monster plate and Zoya Trixie to create the snowflakes. I love how simple and clean this looks. To fill in some of the empty space, I used a small dotting tool. I finished it off with a coat of Seche Vite.

     This is definitely a fun, simple, and refreshing holiday manicure. I love pastels in the winter. 

     Is anyone else hoping the snow holds off?

12 Days of Christmas: Day Four Inspired by a Holiday Movie

      I'm not sure about you, but Elf is one of my favorite holiday movies. I really wanted to use Gremlins as an inspiration. Unfortunately, I failed miserably when trying to paint Gizmo on my nails. It was a hot mess. I opted for a bit of an easier task.

     Aside from the penguins that were featured a few days ago, I've never free handed nail art before. This was quite a learning experience for me. I used my dotting tools and a striping brush to create the elf body. For the lettering, I just used a dotting tool. the body took me a good 15 minutes to paint. I removed it and did it over several times before I was happy with it. 

       For my thumb, I wanted to make swirly twirlies, but it didn't turn out quite like I had anticipated. I used a Bundle Monster stamping plate for the image. It didn't turn out very well and I thought glitter might help it out. Wrong. It was just a hot mess.

     See what I mean? The glitter just didn't work out well. Maybe it's before I'm just not a fan of gold tones on me. I feel that I'm far too pale for it. However, I think the letter nails would have looked better with a full coat of the gold. I guess I'll know better next time.

     This was a lot a fun to do. I never would have imagined that it would turn out how it did. I'm pretty proud of myself. My boyfriend loved it; he told me not to remove it. I'll probably duplicate this for Christmas with the family. 

     What's your favorite holiday movie?

12 Days of Christmas: Day Three Tape Manicure

     Day three! Today's challenge is a tape manicure. I used this as a chance to try out a half moon again. My inspiration came from icicles. I didn't want to get burned out on all the red and green, so I went with a blue holographic base: Color Club Blue Heaven.

     I used the same paper hole reinforcement stickers as I did in my first half moon post found here. I decided to not use a base color for this. I like the natural half moon in this. 

     To add to the icy feel, I used a simple silver glitter striper around the crescent of each nail. It made the lines cleaner without overpowering the holographic look the polish. To finish it off, I used a coat of Seche Vite. (That's a big surprise, isn't it?) What do you think of this look? 

12 Days of Christmas: Day Two Penguin

     This month is flying by already! For any of you who work in retail, I'm sure you can relate. It's just going to get worse the closer we get to Christmas.

     Today's nail art challenge is penguins! Who doesn't love penguins? If you don't, I don't want to know you. Penguins are one of my favorite animals to see at the zoo. They're such funny little birds.

     For this look, I started with a base of Essie Leading Lady, a dark red jelly filled with red glitter. By itself, it's gorgeous. Two coats delivered full coverage. Clean up was easy and the red didn't stain me as so many do. 

     These cute little guys were easy to make. I started by making the body with a simple brush stroke using Cult Nails Nevermore. After that, I used a large dotting tool to make the face and belly with Wet N Wild White Creme. The eyes, beak, and feet were also made with dotting tools. For the yellow, I used Cult Nails Feel Me Up. For the orange, I used Essie Fear or Desire. I finished it up with a coat of Seche Vite.

     After I had already removed this, I thought about adding a scarf or hat. I'm pretty upset that I didn't think of it beforehand! If I replicate this later on, I'll definitely dress them up. 

12 Days of Christmas: Day One Red and Green Only

     Ho, ho ho! It's the first day of my nail art challenge. I'm not very well versed in nail art so this whole challenge is going to be a learning experience. For today's challenge, I decided to start off easy with a dotticure of red and green.

     I used two coats of OPI Here Today Aragon Tomorrow Suede and two coats of Zoya Posh on my index and pinky as an accent. The application on both was a breeze. As with most matte polishes, the dry time was great.

    This look didn't take long at all. I used dotting tools I purchased on eBay for a few dollars. They're super simple to use and easy to work with. 

     Just for fun, I wanted to see how this would look with a top coat. I'm so glad I added Seche Vite to this. I think it looks even more stunning! 

     For the matte look, the red base was my favorite, but the top coat completely changed it up. I love the green with red dots!