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: Marbly accents

This notd was unabashedly inspired by this mani from @lovelylittlelacquers on Instagram. It's not quite a 1:1 copy, but it's close enough that I should credit her for the inspo. I just fell in love with the color combo and marble pattern and had to try it out for myself!

This almost ended really sadly, because the first day I wore this it was terribly dusty outside, to the point where the lighting was too orange to get good photos. There's only so much you can salvage with color correction! (see my floral mani from 31DC2015 for another tragic example). The second day was still dusty, but it cleared up a bit in the afternoon, which is good because by day 3 I usually have enough tipwear that I don't feel comfortable blogging about it. I'd have made an exception for this mani but I'm glad I didn't have to!

Polishes used:
Perfect Chic Sinful Tops collection: Dark Purple (glitter accents)
Ga-de- Whitest White
Ga-de- Sicilian Orange
Ga-de- Endless Plum

Swatched: OPI Pretty Penne + Red Fingers & Mistletoes

Hi everyone, it's been a while!

I accidentally got overzealous on nail trimming recently and I now have pretty short nails, but I swatched a couple of new OPI polishes while my nails were still at post-31DC length, so here they are!

Pretty Penne

Shade

Sunlight

I saw this swatched by Swatch And Learn a while ago, and ironically, even though she wasn't all that impressed by it, I was so taken with her swatches that I picked it up the next chance I got. And I absolutely stand by that impulse buy :D I love it! It's a little sheer, needing 2-3 coats for opacity, but it's very easy to control and I really love the color. I can't quite quantify it- the first word that comes to mind is 'copper', but it's also kinda gold and kinda silver.

Red Fingers and Mistletoes

Sunlight

Shade

What is it with polishes called Mistletoe? I love Orly's Meet Me Under the Mistletoe and I absolutely adore this one, too- I picked it up in a destash sale and I had no idea what I was getting, but I am glad I did. This is a jelly, so it also takes 2-3 coats to opacity. Even then, there's a liiiiiitle bit of VNL in direct sunlight, but it's not a big deal. I love how rich and jewel like this is.