Vanity Fair Hollywood Cover Inspired Nails

I bought the latest Vanity Fair mag the other day. I just love the Hollywood fold out cover editions. The nails and polish are inspired by this beautiful cover.

I started off with Fing'rs California girl short length nails with black and floral design tips.

The length of these nails are so natural looking and comfortable. However, I'm all thumbs when it comes to applying them. They are so short and I can't grab them and put them on without getting air bubbles. Ugh! But I love the length and design so I came up with a solution. More on that in a moment.

As I said above, I got inspired by the Vanity Fair Hollywood edition magazine cover.  The actresses and their dresses are just gorgeous. I love the 1940's feel to the design of the dresses and cover. Rooney Mara's black bob is striking with her pale pink dress. And that's what gave me inspiration when I was faced with 8 fingers of air bubbles.

I took Confetti Dreamdate and added a layer over the nail beds, avoiding the floral design. Then with Wet n Wild Hallucinate, I covered the floral designs, avoiding the black tips as much as possible. By doing this the air bubbles are much less noticeable.

What do you think of my nails? Don't you just love the cover design? Where do you find inspiration?

Ruby Slippers and Gold

I've got a problem. I just don't know when to quit when I'm trying to make nail art. I add too much, hate it and have to start all over again. I'm also having a problem with using too much glitter. So much so that I'm nearly blind from it.

This time though, things worked out ok.

Polishes:

Cover Girl Ruby Dust, Kiss Nail Art Paint Black, Wet n Wild Clear top coat & Black, Sinful Colors Under 18 & All About You, LA Colors purple glitter (no name)

• I took a piece of cosmetic sponge and dabbed All About You all over my nails.
• Then I took Under 18 and did a half 
• side swipe.

• I decided to paint on more All About You from cuticle to tip. Kind of straight up.
• At this point I was itching to cover the whole thing with glitter, but I restrained myself.

• I added LA Colors glitter polish just to the pink area and did a black line with the striper. (And I was really leary of doing that. It seems of late, when I add some nail art paint, I immediately hate it. But this time I didn't mind it.)

• It still didn't look done to me, so I added the dots.
• And then I added a coat of Ruby Dust to the pink area. (Hey I'm restraining myself here by limiting the glitter to that area!)

• I used the clear top coat on the gold area, and called it done.

•  Still working on dotting with my left hand onto my right. Not as easy as it looks on those videos.

Let's see how long this mani last before I remove and start again!

Sometimes grocery shopping isn't all drudgery

I had to make a trip to the grocery store. I chose Albertsons because I wanted to get some expiration day or day old bread. I walked out of there with $85 worth of food and sundries, and fresh French bread for .99¢ with their store coupon. Amazing what one short trip to the store turns into.

One of the things I like to do when I get to Albertsons is go to their cosmetics department first thing and see what's on sale.  Today I hit a .59¢ Wet n Wild Wild Shine polish deal, and 40% off Kiss nails products.

I made a video to share with you all what I bought.

Sunshine French Tip Nails and Fimo Fruit Slices

I had another mani to post but when I looked at the finished nails, I decided to save it for Christmas.

Christmas???

Yep, Christmas. You'll just have to wait. ;p

(And hope I don't forget about it)

This mani is all sunshine and summer!

I started by selecting nails from this box.

Last night, not knowing what colors I was going to use exactly, I painted the nail tips, and filled in the rounded out middle with Sally Hansen Lavender Cloud.  I didn't use nail guides because I knew I would be sponging on the colors.

Today, these are the colors I chose:

LA Colors (no name) Ruby and Gold chunky Glitters, LA Colors, bright red and bright orange, Wet n Wild Sunny Side Up, Covergirl Ruby Dust, Confetti Pink Confetti, Sally Hansen Lavender Cloud, Rhinestones wheel

I sponged Sunny Side Up, half way down the nails, then bright orange, and then bright red.

After that all dried, I dabbed Pink Confetti on the lower section, then Ruby Dust on the rest of the nails to the tips. When that dried, I dabbed on the very tip, the LA Colors ruby glitter. Taking the LA colors chunky gold glitter, I dabbed it in 2 or 3 spots on the nails.

The bottom of the nails are still transparent.

After everything dried, I added pink or red fruits, and rhinestones.

Then a clear top coat to set everything in place and keep the fimo fruit from curling up.

Click on pic to see details

I really like how these turned out.  I'll probably wear them this weekend. Unless I decide on the other nails I'm working on. I'll post them tomorrow.

Do you fimo? :D

Japan Nail Art Inspired DOTS!

Many nights, when I can't sleep I surf the web for nail art inspiration. Could that be why I'm dreaming about nails now? Hmm...

I downloaded a free app that is basically a nail salon finder and nail art catalog. It's mostly in Japanese but I get the gist of it. The nail art in this catalog is amazing and wonderful. Many of the designs have something different going on, on several nails.  Not all of the nails are identical.

One day I woke up inspired by this and created these nails.

No nail is designed the same but the colors and dots coordinate them.

Polishes:

That's all, just 4 colors!

I painted the Kiss Oval Active Length full cover nails alternating Rimmel Cherry Fashion, and Wet n Wild Black.

I taped off the nails using Nailene French Tip Guides. On 2 of the nails, I didn't tape off. (Later on, you'll see I didn't dot the left hand pinky)

On some nails I painted Sally Hansen Lavender Cloud, or Cherry Passion or Black or it was already painted the color I wanted. The dots are done with a cut off end of q-tip. 

It's not rocket science so if some of the dots are messed up they'll be covered with the fruit pieces.

After I removed the tape, I started going around the fruit wheel.

I even got confused on what was up and what was down!

So the end result, after turning all the nails so the ovals face up, I got this:

I think it turned out ok anyway. 

The fruit pieces, although not Fimo Fruit, worked pretty well, except for a couple that disappeared under the clear polish. Once covered with clear polish the curling was minimal.

The wheel, however, gave me no end of frustration. 

It will only turn smoothly going left...for awhile...and then it has to go back from whence it came or it stops like a stubborn donkey.

On each nail I put rhinestones from Broadway Nail and Body Art Kit.

What do you think of my Dots nail art? Have I gone over the bend?

I'm still on the look out for the elusive 2 size ends nail dotter. 

Anyone have a suggestion?

ABSOLUTELY RANDOM:

Did anyone else watch the season finale of Game of Thrones on HBO? Holy CoW! And we have to wait almost a year for the next season??? WTF is up with that? Are you as sick as I am that they wait so long on these shows to start the next season? That's just not right.

Hope you all are having a great week!

Fimo Fruit Nail Art-Sangria!

Oh I hate internet connectivity problems. Second to car trouble. I hate it when I tried to refresh a page or write and post something and all I get is rotating axis of evil.

Hopefully, fingers crossed, this'll go through.

My first foray into fimo fruit nail art flibbertigibbet.

SANGRIA!

I'm not a big drinker. But when I go to Olive Garden, I enjoy a glass of their berry Sangria. This is my interpretation of glasses of sangria with fruit floating in them. I used Kiss Oval Active Length full cover nails. The bottom of the glasses are the oval tips. The gold ends "top" of the glasses sit next to the cuticles.

Polishes: Confetti 073 Purple Pizzazz, Revlon 760 Cherry Crush, Cover Girl 415 gold rush glitter, Wet n Wild Shine Black, LA Colors (no name) Ruby glitter, Confetti 093 Debutante, Confetti 089 Beach Dancing and CG Ruby Dust (forgot to add in pic)

After selecting sizes of nails, brush one coat of Debutante over entire nails. Let dry.

With flash

Without flash (closer to actual real life color)

Next, brush Beach Dancing on small edge of cosmetic sponge, and add several dabs 3/4 of the way up the nails from the oval tip to cuticle edge. Add a little more if it looks too light. Let dry.

 Dab Cover Girl Gold Rush Glitter over the Debutante only. Let dry.

Brush one stroke of Purple Pizzazz on the sides of the nails, next to Debutante.

On another section of the cosmetic sponge brush Cherry Crush and dab over Beach Dancing covering most from oval tip, but leave a little between gold area and some of Beach Dancing.

Add one stroke of Black on the tip end, followed immediately by one brush of Cherry Crush over it. Let dry.

Dab LA Colors Ruby glitter polish over the Cherry Crush. Add Cover Girl Ruby Dust over Beach Dancing (non-glittered area between Ruby Glitter and Gold Rush)

 Add fruit slices.

How to add fimo fruit:

1. Dab area on nail where you want to place fruit with clear polish.
2. Dip nail doter or orangewood stick into clear polish dab, then touch the fimo fruit slice.
3. Place fimo fruit on clear polish, and press down with orangewood stick. 
4. Immediately brush another coat of clear polish over the fruit slice so it does not curl up.
5. Let dry and add one or two coats of quick drying top coat over entire nail.

Wearer's POV

  So what do you think of my first fimo fruit nail art? Does it remind you of Sangria? My daughter thinks I should add a few rhinestones. Do you think I should or just leave it as is? Please let me know in the comments below.

Thanks for stopping by!

Nail Polish Collection and Storage

My nail polish collection was taking up too much space in the bathroom I share with my husband. He didn't mind it, but it was driving me crazy. I took all the polishes out, and will store them in my craft room. While I was moving everything, I figured it would be a good time to chronicle what I have.

Well, here's everything laid out on my craft table.

These are the Sephora, OPI for Sephora, Nicole for OPI, China Glazes, Essie, Ulta, Barielle polishes.

There are some Sally Hansen polish pens too. I didn't pay full price for any of them. The Essie was free when I signed up for something on Facebook.

Cover Girl glitters

I just love this brand, Confetti. It's exclusive to CVS I believe. If you google Confetti you'll read they were involved in a lawsuit. I haven't seen any new colors on the rack at my local CVS. They are just $1.99/pc. I usually pick up another color every time I go in. 

LA Colors: Some I found for $1 at the Dollar Store. A set of 7 I found at Marshalls for $5.99. Better than the Dollar Store!

Bought these at ULTA in the clearance section and sale rack.

Revlons

Sinful Colors from Walgreens

.69¢ sale Wet N Wild Shines from Walgreens

Wet n Wild Nail Pail colors (used CVS coupon on it)

Wet n Wild Craze (bought on clearance at Albertsons)

$1 at Dollar Tree and Big Lots

This was my first nail storage box. Scented drawer paper liners come in this box. I got it at Crabtree and Evelyn. I really liked it because it's narrow and fit on the ledge in the bathroom. I outgrew it though, and now I only use it for polishes that are separating. The only con about this other than size, was the fact I couldn't readily see the colors when I wanted to paint my nails.

I sort my polishes by color group, and then size. I still needed something narrow to fit on the ledge in the bathroom. One day at Big Lots, I found these small, clear Ball plastic food containers. I bought 3 thinking it would be enough. Yeah, right!

I eventually bought another container at a different Big Lots. It's not the same height. I store the very short bottles in there along with the nail pens.

I can quickly see what I need to grab.

But I have more polishes. Right now, I'm using the Wet n Wild Nail Pail colors a lot. So they live inside the pail. I didn't remove the cardboard insert inside so the polishes are very easy to reach.

Poilsh paints, glitters and polish remover in this box

This is where the polishes live now. It is not a huge collection compared to some, but it works for me. As soon as my daughter takes those books behind them to the Goodwill, I'll put my boxes of artificial nails behind them.  But that's for another day, and another blog post.

If you want to know the name of any of the colors, just ask.

How big is your collection? How do you store it? Are you happy with your polish storage solution?