NOTD: Hanukkah nails! (2/?)

Hello again and happy ongoing holiday! Today I made dreidel inspired nails, I painted each of the letters of the dreidel in acrylic paint over a brown/beige watermarble that is meant to evoke the look of a wood grain.

For reference, here is a dreidel:

The letters on the dreidel are as follows:

• נ (nun)- this stands for the word נס (nes), which means "miracle"
• ג (gimmel)- this stands for the word גדול (gadol), which means "great" or "big"
• ה (heh/hey)- this stands for the word היה (hayah), which means "occured" or "happened"
• ש\פ (shin or pey) which either stand for שם (sham), which means "there" or פה (po), which means "here". The usage of ש vs פ depends on whether you are celebrating inside or outside Israel,

Together, they stand for the prase "A great miracle occured here/there"

NOTD: Hanukkah nails! (1/?)

Happy Hanukkah everyone! I don't have anything super profound to say about this nail art, but it was surprisingly fun to do, and very easy! I was thinking about starting with only one lit candle and then adding a new one every day, but that would mean leaving this on for eight days, and if you know me at all, making me wear the same nail polish for even three days is cruel and unusual. Even if somehow a Hanukkah miracle occurred and it didn't have any chips or tip wear in that spam of time. I suppose it would be a seasonally appropriate miracle, but I'm not patient enough to test it out :D I have a few Hanukkah nail designs planned out, but I'm not committing to a full eight days of new nail art, so let's see how many I can manage!

NOTD: Coooooookkkkkkiiiiieeeeeee!!!

I think this might be the fastest turnaround I've ever done on a post, and that includes 31DC (I usually try to run a day or three early so that I have time to prepare posts). I painted my nails, photographed, and edited everything within a span of three hours for this post! I had originally done this design yesterday, but the photos were pretty terrible because of the overcast weather, and this morning I redid them because I had pretty bad tip wear.

I did these nails as part of a challenge posted in a Facebook nail art group I'm in, where the theme was "Matte + Glossy". I dunno what brought cookies to mind, but I decided to run with it! I made the base of the cookie matte, and then I added drops of glossy top coat over the chocolate chips, which also made them a little bit bumpy, adding even more realism! And then of course, I had to make a simple Cookie Monster accent :D

Polishes used:
Bourjois- In The Navy (blue base)
perfect Chic- Frost (cookie base)
Careline- Hot Chocolate (brown outline)
Superficially Colorful- Mud Slide (chocolate chips)
Ga-de- Whitest White
LeChat- Black Magic
Golden Rose matte top coat

NOTD: Flannel

I'm finally jumping on the flannel bandwagon! Since autumn rolled around we've been seeing lots of flannel and plaid inspired nails, so I thought I'd give them a try! I stamped over these with the musical plate from Vivid Lacquer, and then I added a little more detail with acrylic paint and a striping brush. To give it an extra soft look I topped it off with a matte top coat.

Polishes used:
Loka- unnamed green
Perfect Chic- Must Have (red)
Borjois- In The Navy (blue)
Golden Rose matte top coat

NOTD: Abstract Kitties + Pink

There's never a bad time to have cat themed nails. Never. Wedding? Kitties. Funeral? Kitties. Presidential inauguration? KITTIES. I don't have a whole lot to say about these nails besides KITTIES. I did them over a distressed pink brushstroke manicure, and I drew them with acrylic paint.

This was also my first time trying out the Poshe fast dry top coat. It came highly recommended, and I felt like trying something new, so I picked it up along with a bottle of Duri Rejuvacote. I've always defaulted to Seche Vite and OPI Nail Envy, so I'll see how these work out for me! For the time being I don't see a huge difference between dry time/durability/application, but I'm happy with them, b/c I was happy with what I was using before. If I begin to notice a difference I'll post about it!

Disclaimer: I basically drew these kitties from my brain, however my brain is very easily influenced by outside sources. So if you see a resemblance to something you've seen online before, odds are I subconsciously copied it from there, and I'll be happy to credit them if you let me know! Unfortunately off the top of my head I have no idea where I got any of these ideas.

NOTD: Gradient and squiggles

Well, I guess I'm not finishing 31DC this year. The timing was pretty terrible for me this time around, the end fell right smack on the build up to Icon this year, so it was amazing that I even got as far as I did!

Well, now it's time to go back to a semi-regular posting schedule. Here are some random squiggles on nails, inspired by this manicure from Heynicenails on tumblr! (and instagram, but I follow them on tumblr). I decided to do the doodly white shapes over a gradient instead of colorful skittles, but it's still similar enough to credit back to them.

Polishes used:
Ga-de Blue Angel (blue)
Ga-de Pool Party (mint green)
Ga-de Kiwi Delight (green)
White acrylic paint

#31DC2015 Day 28- Inspired by a Flag

I honestly wasn't feeling this challenge so much. I haven't in previous years, either, so I guess this category just doesn't do it for me. On the other hand, this did give me the opportunity finally to sneak in some Steven Universe! The flag I chose for this challenge is Rose Quartz's battle flag. I also tried a drag marble on my pinky that's vaguely inspired by Rose's shield, but... it's kinda meh

Polishes used:
WOW cosmetics- 436 (darker pink)
Sacara- 032 (lighter pink)
Acrylic paint

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 26- Inspired by a Pattern

Alternate post title: Leah discovers that it is Very Difficult to do hand poses with a mug

So I've actually kind of known what I wanted to do for this day since last year. About a day after the Pattern challenge last year, I walked into my work kitchen and facepalmed because we have these adorable mugs with hearts on them that would be PERFECT for this kind of thing.

I actually sent pictures of this mani sans mug to the R&D group chat at my work, challenging them to try and figure out where they recognize the pattern from. I don't think any of these guys had ever gotten excited over nail art before, but they have now! (followed by a lot of ppl casually commenting "why don't you do this for a living???")

And in case you're wondering, yes, I did have to steal this mug and bring it home with me in order to make sure I matched the colors well. No one noticed. I did bring it back I promise!

Here is the mug by itself (sitting, rather incriminatingly, in front of one of my nail polish shelves)

And here are the three least awkward attempts at me posting with said mug:

Polishes used:
Color club- French tip (white base)
Golden Rose Color Expert- 43 (light blue)
Ga-de- Blue Blood (navy blue)
Ga-de Candy Apple (red)
Laka- 85 (grey)
Chic- Crazy in Love (green)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 25- Inspired by Fashion

You know, I think this is the third time in this challenge where I freehanded something that I really should have used a stamping plate for. 2015, the year I was a complete masochist and picked out really difficult (for me) ideas for every. single. nail art challenge.

Side note: I was surprised that I didn't see a single nail art for Inside Out on day 23!! To be honest, the only reason why I didn't do Inside Out was because I thought it would be the obvious choice! Well... I'll do it next year. And with my luck, next year like half of the entries will be Inside Out :3

The fashion I was inspired by was Steampunk. You can't really tell so well under the gears, but I did a saran wrap mani of two different browns as a base, to give it a more antique and worn look. The gears were done with acrylic paint and a paintbrush, except for the clock face, which was nail polish. I tried it glossy first, but I ended up liking it WAY better matte. I'm pretty happy with this mani, but I'm SUPER pleased with how my middle finger came out!

Polishes used:

Orly- Golden Maharaja (darker brown shimmer)

L'oreal Paris- Mysterious Icon (lighter brown shimmer)

il makiage- Pearl Jam (clock face)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 24- Inspired by a Book

Comic books count, right? Comic books totally count. Anyway, I've wanted to do Kamala Khan themed nails since basically always. So here she is! (have you noticed that my descriptions have been getting shorter? Is this what burn out feels like?)

Polishes used:
Chic- Sweetheart (well... close enough) (beige)
Chic- Must Have (red)
Color Club- French tip (white)
Ga-de- Mellow Yellow (yellow)
Borjois- In the Navy (blue)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 23- Inspired by a Movie

This is a bit of a cheat, since I did these nails based off the TV show, not the horrible abomination they call a movie. I'm still in denial about that thing existing (THERE IS NO WAR IN BA SING SE)

Avatar: The Last Airbender: The cartoon, not the in-name-only """""""adaptation"""""""!

This post is going up suuuuper late, it was Yom Kippur today and I didn't feel comfortable posting even via a queue

Polishes used:
Pupa 745 (pinky)
Golden Rose Matte 16 (ring finger)
Lechat Majestic Green (middle finger)
Il Makiage Skinny Dipping (index finger)
Details are acrylic paint

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 22- Inspired by a song

Is it weird that I sincerely, without a trace of irony, love the song Manah Manah? Yeah? Well I don't care. Here, have Manamana nails.

Polishes used: Color Club French Tip (everything else is acrylic paint)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 18- Half Moons

I always forget that this day exists for some reason. Honestly, I'm not a huge fan, I'd much rather do a french tip than a half moon. But alas! I'm also not that great at them, weirdly enough. I don't have vinyls, so I'm stuck with freehand for these fellers. I'm okay with how they came out, mostly because the gluequins I stuck on the border between the two colors hides how sloppy the half moons actually are :D :D :D

Also! This is the first mani I have ever done using Zoya!!!!!! I picked up a few Zoyas in a destash recently, my first ever. They're virtually impossible to get here, so I'd been lemming that brand for years, and now I have some!

Polishes used:
Zoya- Dream (blue)
Impala- 099 (gold)



   

    An InLinkz Link-up
   

#31DC2015 Day 14- Floral Print

Aaaahhhh I am so proud of this one. I haven't worked with acrylic paints in a while (all my old ones dried up) so I was expecting my first attempt at art in such a long time to be a hot mess. But it actually came out pretty nice! I also got a kit that didn't have purple, so I had to mix the purple to match the gradient base myself, and I think I matched them pretty well.

Polishes Used:
Chic- Show biz (off white in gradient)
Golden Rose Color Expert- 66 (lavender in gradient)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 6- Violet

Ah well... we all gotta have nail fails sometimes. This idea seemed pretty cool in my head but upon execution... no. Just no. I might try to get this design right one day, revenge and all that, but this is not a good nail art (although I'd like to acknowledge that three years ago I'd consider this a success. Progress!)

Well... when you have to do a whole new nail art every day for a month, you're gonna have some fails. And because of the rapid pace, you gotta post what you have!

Polishes used:
Color Club- Disco Dress (darker purple cream)
Golden Rose Color Expert- 66 (light purple lines)
Chic- Dark Purple (glitter)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 4- Green

For green I immediately knew that I wanted to do a circuit board inspired mani, and because I'm a masochist I decided to freehand the design instead of stamping it. (also I couldn't find the stamping plate with the circuits so...)

Polishes Used:
ANNY- Paradise on Earth (green base)
Golden Rose Color Expert- 69 (gold stripes)
Golden Rose Color Expret- 43 (blue LED light accents)
Golden Rose Color Expert- 58 (silver accents)
LeChat- Black Magic (black accents)

An InLinkz Link-up

#31DC2015 Day 1- Red

IT BEGINS!!!! This is my third 31DC, so I should be an old hat at this by now. But lately I've been demonstrating a chronic inability to post more than once a week, so let's see if I survive this year! In 2013 I got to day 25, in 2014 I made it all the way through but not all of it made it to my instagram. My goal this year is to finish the whole challenge AND crosspost to instagram every day. Wish me luck!

Since this is a post-every-day kind of deal, I'm not going to wax poetic most days unless I have something specific to say about the mani. Probably for the best, really :)

Polishes used:
Essence- Do you speak love? (red cream)
Golden Rose- Color Expert #69 (gold)
Golden Rose- Jolly Jewels #121 (red glitter)

An InLinkz Link-up

NOTD: Goth skittles

Now isn't that a pair of words that you would not expect to see strung together. but that's the only way I can really describe this particular manicure. I was trying for a jet black holo look, but I ended up getting a gunmetal holo instead so I shrugged and added some red accents. Initially the stripes were the same color as the red hex glitter, but when I added topcoat they bled to a pale pink so I painted over them. And thus, I ended up with two different reds and a gunmetal grey, when all I really wanted was a black holo. Sigh. Still, I made lemonade and I think these came out pretty nice, if unexpected!

Polishes used:
Ga-De Black Swan (black base)
Beauty Care almost-black holo
Orly Smoulder

NOTD: Summery freehand geometric doodles

I haven't done a full manicure of just freehand painting (no stamps, tricks, striping tape, or any techniques) in a while, so it was time to do one! And since it's been crazy hot lately, it needed to be in bright, summery colors. I went into these nails with absolutely no plan in mind and I'm actually pretty pleased with how they turned out! I could have done better cleanup, but honestly the end result is so pretty that I didn't even mind my questionable cuticles. I kept this on for nearly a week, which for me is about a thousand years in nail polish time.

I also took pictures of my right hand, which is unusual! Obviously I couldn't draw anything nearly this precise with my non-dominant hand, so instead I used the same set of colors to do a striping tape thing with some spiraly things from eBay.

Polishes used:
Ga-de Purple Paradise
Ga-de Mint Green
Ga-de Peach Sorbet