Matte Blossoms Nails Did

Yea so as I thought the purple mani was completely ruined by the nail party LOL. I should have gotten a picture of it but just imagine the purple mani with a bunch of neon polish smeared on top. Those kids love their neon with contrasting neon tips!

So, at the party I learned that Shelby's little sister Megan is about as obsessed with Asia as I am! So when I got home, despite the fact that I had just spent the last 6 hours doing mani's I wanted to redo mine. I realized I've developed a bit of OCD when it comes to my nails now...if they chip just the slightest I'm pulling out my nail polish remover! LOL. I remember the days when my nails would be so badly chipped that I wouldn't even care and I'd just sit there picking at the remnants - not anymore!!

Anyway, I wanted to do some more cherry blossoms. I had done them before, but thought I'd use my Japan inspired Konad plate this time. Plus I wanted to do a matte red look inspired from this post by Guildedangel at Naive Nails.

So that all combined got me my NOTD.

I used OPI's Thrill in Brazil for the red, China Glaze liquid leather for the black. And then I used Konad plate M66's cherry blossom design with Konad special polish in black for over the red, and CH White on White for over the black. Topped it all off with CH matte magic and I really like this one.

Granted I have another idea for a mani in mind that I want to do NOW, so...this may not last as long as it should after all. Maybe I'll accidentally chip it...then I'll HAVE to redo them! LOL.

Purple Matte Stitch Nails Did

I figured since I would be doing multiple mani's at the nail party that I'd take the opportunity to mess around with my nail polish and Konad plates since I knew it was just gonna get ruined. And somehow I thought going to a 10 year old's party with corset nails maybe wasn't the most appropriate thing LOL.


So I used China Glaze Neon Purple Panic for the base and then Konaded CG Liquid Leather and CH OMG with plate M60. I turned the OMG stamp just a bit to get the lines going in a different direction.


Then I used Nubar's holographic glitter to just fish around and pick out a few pieces of chunky glitter to place here and there.

I topped it all off with CG's Matte Magic and there you have it. All in all I think for just trying whatever it came out pretty cool!

Polish Party Nails Did - Happy Birthday Shelby!

When I was asked by my friend Simone to be a part of her daughter Shelby's 10th bday party I thought it would be fun. And it was! 13 mani's later (one of them 3x's), my back may have been hurting and my own mani quite ruined but the thank you's and hugs were worth it :)

Happy Birthday Shelby! I hope you and your friends had an awesome time! I know I did :D

Guest Nails Did - Lovely lady Kim

One of the first times I met Kim she was coming in for an interview with me to be one of my reports. Well she dodged the bullet on that one! After that we linked on facebook and have grown a very healthy relationship fueled by mutal hate for M. Night Shyamalan's Ava-crap and Twilight. But also a mutal love of Joss Whedon and nail polish!

Turns out she's also an excellent Konad'er. She actually taught me the way of the q-tip to clean up - SO SMART! She's like my Konad Yoda.

Here is her mani of the moment. She used What's a Tire Jack? matte for Sephora for the base with konad plate m57 and Konad's black nail polish.

It looks awesome. The end result: a lovely velvety two tone black look. It looks very Velvet Underground. LOVE IT!

Tiffany Corsets Saucy Nails Did

Saucy!!! I just got China Glaze for Audrey yesterday and wanted to try it right away! I also looooove corsets, I have about 6 of them at least. Maybe 7. They're so sexy!

So I thought I'd try out both at once, and I really liked the effect. I'm sure I've seen this around the nail blogs done before so its really nothing revolutionary...but the only thing is that I decided to keep the base as opaque and skin like as possible to make it actually seem as if my nails were wearing little corsets :)


So the base is Sally Hansen opaque french pink. Then China Glaze for the blue, CH White on White with a dotter tool for the rivets and a black nail art pen for the laces. Seche Vite holds it all together.

Sexxay!

Muppets for Sheilah Nails Did

I haven't seen Sheilah in about a year now! Oh the days of sitting in edit...doing more gossiping than work, yet still being so efficient you would think all we talked about was putting together W Network nexts and nows. MOAR KISSING SCENES! Oh the good old days. Now the coordinators don't even sit in with the editors. :(

So to entice her to come back I did her request of muppet nails. Granted they're not very good. So all I want is for her to visit with no obligation to stay. I think that's fair!

AHAHAAHAH look at that mess. LOL. Okay so - The thumb is Kermit, pointer is Miss Piggy (it is too!), middle is Gonzo, ring is Animal and pinky is Beeker.


I think Kermit came out the best...which isn't saying much LOL.

Okay everything has a base of CH White on White.

Kermit: CH Liquid Leather for the black and Nubar Green Tea for the Green. I used a darker green art pen to line around everything

Miss Piggy: Nail art pens, CH Solar Power for the Hair and CH Neon Purple Panic for the eyeshadow.

Gonzo: No name light blue from the dollar store for his beak, CH Sexy in the City for his hair, CH Solar Power for his yellow eyelids and CH Liquid Leather for the black.

Animal: (ahahahah..sure) CH Neon Purple Panic for the hair, Liquid Leather for the black, OPI Thrill in Brazil for the red and an orange nail art pen.

Beaker: Actually this one isn't that bad... Pink nail art pen for his skin, orange nail art pen for his nose and hair and Thrill in Brazil for the mouth.

BTW Sheilah, this took 1.5 hours. That's how much I heart you.

Oh friendship.

Best Blog Award

Oh man, I saw these awards in my perusal of other blogs but never really thought I'd have my own nom for Best Blog Award! Very cool. Even though I'm super flattered, there are so many other lovely bloggers who do what I do even better, know so much more about the subject and inspire me every day. It's still very cool to be noticed on both this and Ink on Digital Paper for my two loves - being hyper-critical and in love with nail art!


A big thanks to The Office Bride who nominated me for this!

The rules of this award are as follows:

1. To accept the award, you must post it on your blog with the name of the person who has granted you the award, and a link to their blog.
2. Pass the award on to approximately 10-15 other blogs that you recently discovered, and think are great!
3. Contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

Here is who I'm nominating:

1. The Office Bride - Very cool blog if you're planning a wedding - especially during office hours! I wish it was around while I was planning my wedding so that my VP wouldn't sneer at me so much :S
2. Babbling Brooke - Super cool and creative, a mani out of embossing powder? Too cool.
3. Deez Nails - A fellow Canadian blogger who's frankened polishes will make you wish you paid attention to what colours combined make what in art class.
4. Getcha Nails Did - Awesome blog for some really cool swatches and polish combos!
5. Nail'd & Polish'd - Another great blog with some cool swatches and comparisons
6. Naive Nails - Guildedangel was one of my first followers and she has an awesome blog to boot!
7. Polish and Powder - Just hit a well deserved 100 followers!
8. Dainty Darling Digits - A new blog on the block and super cool
9. The Daily Nail - If you don't know about this nail art blog already I'd be mighty surprised!
10. Nails Etc - Another new blog on the block with some swatches etc

Holo at Ur Grrl Nails Did! - Daily Nail Contest Entry

Daily Nail recently hit 1000 followers and decided to do a contest to celebrate! The gist is to do some nail art inspired by one of her designs. Since a lot of my designs are already inspired by hers I thought I'd enter...plus look at those prizes, ESSIE!? YAY!.

This is my interpretation of her design Magical Footloose Attraction. I was waiting waiting waiting to use China Glaze's OMG that I ordered from Transdesign, and I also picked up Nubar's Holographic Glitter yesterday and wondered what they'd look like together. There's a pic of ChG OMG - not that this colour is even new to the nail bloggers but its new to me! SO HOLORIFIC!

So two coats of that then put the hologram glitter on top. It sort of took over the hologram from OMG on the bottom but it was SUPER dazzly!!! Then I used Nubar's Green Tea and Forest using Konad plate M66 for the bamboo. Then I freehanded a quick black design with a nail art pen and a coat of Seche Vite to seal the deal.

I like it! And I can't stop staring at the holo effect I'm getting. Ben just says it just looks sparkly but what does he know! Men.

Here it is with no flash just so you can see the sparkly-ness...kind of...although it doesn't come close to doing it justice!

Whoot! 10 Followers!!

Its all about the little hurdles right!? LOL Thank you to my 10 followers! I appreciate you :D

Mom-in-law nails did

Ben and I went to go visit his mom today in Kitchener and she was asking how I do my nails. I said with patience, a good idea and some liquor. Lol. No really.

So I did a quick mani on her with my new Nubars(!!) I had to travel out to Mississauga to get.

Base is Nubars midnight glory with GAP's Azalea for the pink flowers and for added sheen Nubar hologram glitter. The stems are Nubar Green Tea (no I didn't buy it for the name...ok yes I did) and Forest.

BTW, posting on the go is AWESOME. Nothing says "pfft, who needs a laptop?" like posting blogs directly from your iPhone.

Another awesome giveaway at Nail'd and Polish'd!

Check out Nail'd and Polish'd for another awesome giveaway featuring lots of goodies! Here is just a preview:
Check out Nail'd and Polish'd for the full contest details!!

Ouch! Scars Nails Did

This nail art was inspired by my friend Melanie who, two days ago while running to catch her Go train, face-planted into some concrete! She now has a wicked limp that's totally hot. So I thought I'd do some sort of busted up, bruised nails...but thought scars would look so much cooler! And it was super easy. So to make it a bit more challenging I tried frankening some polish again to get a skin tone. For the frankened fleshy pink I used China Glaze White on White with a dot of Opi's Thrill in Brazil, China Glaze Solar Power, and Sally Hansen's Emerald City. Mine came out a bit too pink for my liking, but the mixture was drying really fast so I had to cut my losses.


Then I just used some nail art pens in black and this really runny blood red that I never thought I'd get to use unless it was Halloween. I guess I was wrong! I think they turned out really rad! I even did a video tutorial with the BEST MUSIC EVER. Its a sweet mix between awesome and elevator music. You have to watch the tutorial just for it. Do it! I think I may use it for all of my tutorials that I do its so tutorialicious!

Note to self for future tutorials: choose a camera angle that shows your work instead of the back of your hand. Whatever I cut most of those parts out.

Another note: 4 hrs to upload a 2min YouTube video?!? Seriously!? Am I the only one that thinks that's completely ridiculous!? BAH.

Update: Here is Mel's cool scab!

eeweweewwwww

Office Nails Did pt. 3

Actually this week I actually AM working really hard :( Back to back meetings every day are NOT fun. Unless you have your iPhone, which I do...I should really download tetris, or you know...start paying attention in meetings...nah.)

Anyway today I had the lovely opportunity to work with Lee and Amber on their nails on lunch break.

Lee wanted something "vampy, glittery, gothy". Since to me goth is just black, I really didn't know what she was talking about. So I thought I'd try out something new and freehand!
I used my newly acquired China Glaze Ruby Pumps as a base (fan favorite I know) and then freehanded a black lace design with a striper pen on top. I then put some silver accent with another striper pen just to make it a bit more fancy. Sorry about the blurry closeup :( I hope she likes them! I've yet to do this with real lace, but that is coming up soon for my friend Nikki who is doing a swap for a fancy hat. WHERE'S MAH HAT NIKKI!?

Amber perused this blog in advance and really liked Stripey Stripey which is REALLY funny because I told her if I was going to pick a previous design for her I would have picked the same one! So I did Stripey Stripey's Brother - Matte Stripey. Base is Orly's Matte Vinyl, topped with a variety of nail art pens in different colours with a dot of Sally Hansen Disco Ball at the top corner. Then all of that is finished off with China Glaze Matte Magic topcoat to keep it all nice, matte, and in place (after she chipped some of it of course lol - nailmergency averted!!)




Can you believe I went a full day without nail polish on my nails today? Long story about why, but funny since because I haven't even been doing this long you would think I would remember what it was like to NOT have nail polish on...but I just don't! It feels so weird I will come home after web design class tonight and do something kinda funky so watch out for that!

Amazing giveaway at Babbling Brooke!!

Oh man, giveaways are the best! Especially ones with so many lovely goodies like the fab blogger Brooke is giving away!! Check out her blog for a contest ending Feb. 14th for some massive prizes!! I have my eyes on the ChG For Audrey and those argyle nails - RAD!

Babbling Brooke Giveaway

Here is what you can win:
















Go!! Go now!!! Babbling Brooke Giveaway

Ga Ga Nails Did

Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga Nails Ga Ga Ga Ga Nails Did Did Did Did. I wanted to put that into the titile field but it was just gonna make my URL too long! Here are my Lady Gaga inspired nails from this picture of her lightning makeup on the right.

So this is inspired from nails seen on the Daily Nail and although I LOVE stars, I've already had them on me a few times, so I decided to go with something a little different.

I used China Glaze's Solar Power as a base, and then layered two coats of Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear Disco Ball. Then I used Seche Vite Top coat to top it off. Daily Nails swears by Seche Vite, so I thought I'd try it out and I must say - its AMAZING. My nails were dry and good to go in less than 5 min. Usually I have to wait around...sometimes for longer than I'd like to admit not touching anything while waiting for my polish to dry. Anyway, then I cut thunderbolts out of painters tape and stuck them on my nails where I wanted, painted over those with Orly's Matte Vinyl and done!

But wait...why say it in mere words when I can say it in VIDEO. Yea I don't work in TV for nothing peeps. Behold my amazing editing skillz in youtube tutorial video excellence**.




**This is part of a experiment of sort that I'm exploring, after watching many ghetto nail tutorials on youtube I thought "hellz I can do that, where is my windows movie maker!?" et voila. LOL. Awesome.

Office Nails Did pt. 2

The lovely Mel wanted to try out my houndstooth Konad stamper so here it is over Opi's Happy Anniversary using Konad's special black polish. Snazzy. I'm dying to try this pattern too but on the matte!

Hungry Hungry Hippos Nails Did

Okay - to start it off I love love LOVE my new Orly Matte Couture Vinyl polish!! I know this polish has been around for a bit but its brand new to me in all ways - I've never owned a matte before OR an Orly and I must say I'm in love with it. Now I only wish that Orly would come out with some snazzier colours since they're all pretty plain, but whatever. The key to this polish is RIDGE FILLER!! Because if you dont use it the matte polish shows every bump and line you have on your nail.

Okay, so I asked my awesome facebook friends what I thought I should do for my next nail design and Holli said Hungry Hungry Hippos (shes a genius). So I had to try. I think they came out pretty rad. I decided to do something totally new for me which is freehand with a brush AND a matte look. I usually use a lot of nail art pens to get my forms but this time I used a brush (and some nail art pens...edging is hard!! :p ). So the base of this is Orly Matte Couture in Vinyl. The thumb is China Glaze solar with nail art pens for the edging and eyes, pointer is a no name green, middle is a no name orange and pinky is a no name pink (lol they came from Costco!). White balls are China Glaze white on white. Its all topped with China Glaze's Matte magic top coat which turns any glossy polish matte. Its pretty cool. It kinda makes me want to play the game real bad!

PS - I HAAAAAAATE this new blogger editor!!!! Placing pictures is just stupid! I'm switching back.

Office Nails Did

I like having my office ladies look good and what better way than to treat them to a little nail art?



Elif doesn't often get her nails did - in fact she says shes a chronic biter (bad Elif!), she's also not that girly so she says *cough* twilight reader *cough* so we thought we'd go with something a little dark and not super feminine. Opi's Linkin Park After Dark for the base topped with Konad stamping silver with M60 for the design.

Jenn likes to take advantage of my nail art so you'll probably see more and more of her in my blog as the days go by. She's also a chronic chipper. I dont know how you wear down nails after 2 days...USE A BASE COAT JENN! So she already had a champagne pink type colour on her nails that had tip wear so I sponged on Opi's Curry Up Don't Be Late to cover them and then stamped with Konad stamping black with M51 for the design. Came off as a pretty cool effect and actually brought out a lot of the silver tones in her original polish.

We're so trendy!

Check out this link which points out everything we already knew - Nail art is trendy, hot and super in.

Way to be follower's world...way to be followers.

TrendCentral - Nail Art

Purple People Eater Nails Did

I was dying to try my China Glaze purples I bought a couple of weeks ago but never actually got a chance to use and now I actually really love how these turned out. I cant stop staring at them!! OOOoooooh. I used China Glaze Purple Panic, 2 coats for the base and then Coconut Kiss sponged on to make a gradient effect inspired by The Daily Nail. Then I used Liquid Leather to Konad the design over it with M63 plate. I also used a gold glitter pen to add a little something something to the swirls.






Thanks to Kim for the tip to use Q-tips to clean the Konad stamps!! OMG such a life saver. Last time I did the stamping I had to redo several nails but this time I did them all in one try! ONE TRY. Just as I was beginning to think that I'd never get the hang of it. Now I lay in wait for my Konad special polish to arrive to see if it makes a difference. I'm waiting in earnest to use the special black on the argyle design *so excited*!!