Gray and neon NOTD!

Happy Thursday, nail lovers! Today, a simple freehand manicure for you using Zoya Carey as my base color and China Glaze Flip Flop fantasy for accents.

Gorgeous Pink Gradient

Inspired by the gorgeous azaleas in bloom outside, I decided to do a pretty pink manicure. I started with China Glaze Strawberry Fields as my base and then sponged Zoya Rica on the tips.

Neon Valentines Day

I was really feeling China Glaze Shocking Pink for this Vday look. I knew I wanted some black designs on it so I free handed different designs on each finger. I carried my neon love down to my toes for some freehand hearts.

Tiffany Box Nails

As you may know by now, Pinterest is my crack! I am on it all the time, pinning awesome things. I have a whole board of nail inspiration, and whenever I have no idea what I want to do with my nails, I always go there for ideas. That is where today's manicure comes from. I saw this adorable Tiffany Box inspired mani a long time ago, and decided to recreate it and put my own spin on it.

Base color is China Glaze For Audrey, which is just the perfect Tiffany blue. I free-handed the bows with a white striper polish.  I think this would be a fun look for the holiday season in different colors, so I hope it inspires you! Let me know what you think!  And if you are on Pinterest, comment with a link to your board so I can follow you!

Halloween Week: Purple Sparkly Skull Nails!

Starting off a week of Halloween nails with my favorite of the five manicures I've done so far.  For some reason, I think purple is the best color of fall, so I have broken the tradition of typical Halloween colors, and done not one, but two manicures with purple as a base!  LOL!  I'm such a rebel.

Base color for this look is China Glaze Flying Dragon (Neon) The skull was stamped twice on each nail from Bundle Monster 211 stamp with konad white polish, and then I filled in the eyes with my dotting tool using Milani's Purple Gleam. 

Hope you like this fun non-traditional Halloween manicure!  I can't wait to show you what I else I've created!  XOXO

Hot Pink Zebra Nails

I must start out by saying that I am so sorry for my absence. I have just been sooooooooooooooo busy and I hate that I've neglected my little bloggy. I promise to make more time for you in the future! Ok, so now to today's Pink Wednesday manicure, holy hotness! I know this look has been done a zillion times before, but I don't care, these nails were SO MUCH FUN!  Srsly, if you have never done anything this bright and fierce on your nails before, DO IT!!!! DO IT NOW!!!! Here's the look:

 

Here's how to achieve this look:

1. Start out with a base of China Glaze Shocking Pink (neon) - a color very true to it's name ;)  I used 3 coats.
2. Then add a diagonal french using your favorite white, you may need 2 coats for full coverage.  You could tape this off for a clean line like I did in this manicure, but I didn't because I knew I would be going over the line with black.
3. Using a black striper (mine is from Art Club) draw a line where the white meets the pink.
4. Still using the black striper you can draw your zebra lines OR you can tape off your pink side and stamp the zebra print like I had on my zebra kisses konadicure.  I know konad, born pretty and bundle monster all have at least one zebra print design on their plates.
5. Let your design dry really good, and then top coat.  I used Seche Vite because it does a good job of not smearing the design.
6. (Optional) Before the top coat dries, add your rhinestones on the black line. 

Hope this tutorial helps you get some super fierce zebra print nails!  Holler if you are wearing pink nails today!  And Let me know in the comments if you'd rock this very bold look!
XOXO!
-Jen

Playing with Color Club Neon Stripers = Awesome Rainbow Crackle Manicure

WARNING PIC HEAVY POST!
Happy Tuesday, lovelies!  Today I have a really fun manicure for you.  On a recent trip to Ross I found a set of Color Club Neon Stripers.  They must be an old set because the ones listed on the website don't match my set.  So, I decided to play with the stripers by using each of the colors to draw diagonal lines. 

Nail blogger tip:  If a nail gets smeared, cover it with your thumb :P

My middle nail got smeared because I applied my clear coat before letting a touchup dry enough.  OOPS!

My thumb was my favorite nail.  The stripes came out perfect.  These colors worked well and were pretty opaque, but I did start with a white base nail before striping. 

After working so hard on my striped masterpiece of a manicure I didn't want to remove it right away to do another manicure, but I was ready for a change, so out came my black mesh crackle from china glaze!

How wicked is that?  I love the rainbow peaking out from the crackle.  Are you wondering if I was able to do the gorgeous lines on my right hand?  Well, shocker:  I didn't!  LOL!  I used my right hand with a white base to try out other looks using my nail stripers. 

And as you can see those styles were kind of all over the place!  But that's okay because crackle makes everything look cool!

So, that is my tip for the day for all you beginners out there who what to try stuff out:  GO TO TOWN!!!!  If worse comes to worse, throw some crackle over your messed up design and it will look SO COOL!!!! 

Hope you enjoyed my adventures with the Color Club nail stripers!  I must say my crackle polishes have really made for some really cool manicures in the past:  Here it is over some glitter, here it is saving a hideous peach color, here is is on a pink Wednesday, and here it is in a heart shape.  I think it's time to invest in some other crackle polishes beside black and gray.  Any recommendations for me?

Party Nails!

I am IN LOVE with this holo glitter from Claire's! When my future sister in law (Bevy) came home with it from a recent vacation, I very subtly reminded her about the importance of bringing back souvenirs for the family members who didn't get to go on vacation with you, and she promptly ran her little butt to Claire's to pick me up a bottle! LOL! Isn't she just the best? Don't worry, Bev, when I go on vacation in a few weeks, I'll be hitting up Ulta and bringing you home some goodies! :)

So here are some pics of me playing with "Glitter Top Coat" from Claire's. This really is a top coat, and I should have put on a more solid base coat, but I didn't which meant I had to do FOUR COATS to get full coverage!  OUCH!  It was a huge pain to remove, but ugh, how gorgeous is it under the crackle?

These felt like the perfect nails for a party!  On my other hand I mixed things up by just doing my tips with the crackle, which I didn't love as much.  The holo glitteriness of this polish is something I'll have to play with!  Can't wait to try it over other colors!  Crackle is Black Mesh by China Glaze, btw. 

NOTD: Playing with Bundle Monster

Simple little mani for you today. My bro was over on Sunday and he just has excellent taste in manicure ideas, so here is one that he picked for me. I started with a base coat of China Glaze Shower Together:

Then, I added a an image from a new Bundle Monster plate (223) using Rimmel Grey Matter

I really like how simple this manicure is and it's so great that the new Bundle Monster plates cover the whole nail!  It makes application so much easier.  I was also surprised how well Grey Matter stamped.  Add that to your list of regular polishes that stamp well.  Of course after I stamped it I thought about my Silver Sweep and how much more that would've stood out on this color, but that's okay, I'll just tuck it away for a future date ;)

Dolphin Nails

These nails would be perfect for a vacation.  They remind me of all the times I just sat on the beach watching the dolphins jump in the air. 

Base color is Zoya Yummy.  Tips are China Glaze Dorothy Who? Stamping was done with the Hello Kitty plate from Born Pretty using Zoya Ibiza.

What are your vacation plans this year?  I know I can't wait to hit the beach in August.  Have you done any great beach themed manicures lately?  I'd love to see them!  Just share the link in the comments!

Quick NOTD

Had to wear a very boring nude color to a business meeting last week.  I used my perfect nude Color Club's Nature's Way, which usually I love, but this time I started with a white as the base to save me some coats, but the white made my perfect nude super peachy, and peach is just not one of my favorite colors.  It was so ugly, I didn't even take a picture.  As soon as I got home from the meeting, I wanted to change that color as soon as possible, so I threw on my favorite crackle: China Glaze Cracked Concrete, and it turned my boring peach nails into a really cute manicure!  I think peach and gray are a super trendy combo.

What do you guys think?  While I was in the city for my meeting, I found this HUGE beauty store, and I just had to stop!  Turns out it was more a store for African American hair, but there was still a few nail displays to check out.

Here's what I came home with:

A Nail Repair kit, just in case of any breakies, some Acetone since it was a good price and I go through it so quick over here, some polish thinner because I didn't have any, OPI Stranger Tides (a huge lemming of mine ever since this collection came out), L.A. Colors Treasure Island, NYX Dreamy Glitter, and some loose glitter (I see this all the time in Robin Moses tutorials, and I can't wait to try it for myself)

So, that's a little adventure I went on this week.  I need a bumper sticker that says "Will Brake for Nail Polish" :D

NOTD: China Glaze Mosaic Nail Art

When I saw Liquid Jelly's tutorial on Mosaic Nails, I just fell in love and knew I HAD to try this! If you want to try it for yourself, check out her tutorial here. Here are the colors I chose for my mosaic manicure.

China Glaze Flying Dragon Neon, Showing Together and Purple Panic Neon, and I used this striper to make the white lines.  Here is the final product: 

At the end I added a coat of Fairy Dust to see how it would look, but I think it looks better without it. Have you tried this look yet? There are so many color combinations you can try with it.

China Glaze Four Leaf Clover with a Herringbone Design!

So, I'm kind of in love with China Glaze Four Leaf Clover. Around St. Patty's Day EVERYONE was using this color and it became such a lemming of mine. I wanted it so bad! So, when Sally had their free China Glaze promotion last month, I had to use it to get this gorgeous color, and let me tell you, it lived up to its reputation of a GORGEOUS Kelly Green.

Please forgive my crappy iphone pic of the swatch. I did this mani over at my mom's and was only able to grab a quick snapshot on my phone before I started stamping.

Here is my final manicure.  I used BM 201 plate for the herringbone pattern.  I really loved this manicure.  It felt so trendy to me!  Speaking of trendy, the same night I did this mani, I also reunited with my lover, Pippa, this time on my toes! :D

Something about yellow toes makes me soooooo happy!  BTW, check out my new ottoman from Homegoods, isn't it cute?  Homegoods is definitely a weakness of mine!  I always bring home the cutest decor stuff from there. 

A bit of warning on these vivid China Glaze colors: THEY STAIN!  I use a base coat all the time, and I only ever have trouble with my China Glaze colors staining my nails.  Does anyone else have problems with this brand and staining?  Do I really have to buy a CG base coat to wear their gorgeous colors?  Any tips for me on these, please tell me I'm not the only one that has this problem with China Glaze.  One time I accidentally wore Shower Together without a basecoat on my toes and I STILL have a little staining on my big toe from it.  Lesson learned, for sure.  Just wish there was a way to wear these colors without the staining.

Audrey's Jewels

For this manicure I started off with China Glaze For Audrey, which is a perfect Tiffany blue color. Then I stamped the necklace design from my big fat plate, and added some rhinestones as pendants to the necklace.

I couldn't decide between lots of rhinestones and just one.

What do you think?

It's a Pink Sparkle Crackle Wednesday! :)

I'm continuing to work my way through the stunning Color Club Starry Temptress collection today!  When I first saw Space Case and Ultra Astral together, I knew they would make a fantastic Pink Wednesday manicure!  Here's my starting line up for today's mani:

Left to Right: Color Club Starry Temptress Topcoat, China Glaze Black Mesh, Color Club Ultra Astral, Color Club Space Case.  Here is a swatch of Ultra Astral and Space Case:

These are such cute pinks!  I think they look really cute together.  And they were the perfect base for my CG Black Mesh Crackle.

This is my first time using black crackle, but I think I did pretty good.  I love the pink nail the best.  It looks like a stick finger shape on there!  The key to lots of crackle is definitely a super thin coat.  The picture above is with no top coat, so it is a bit matte, but once I added the Starry Temptress Topcoat and a coat of SV, this mani just shined!

Pretty cute, huh?  Hope you are having a fantastic pink Wednesday, lovelies!

Sparkle Raindrops

On a recent trip to Sally's I saw For Audrey right beside Shower Together in the China Glaze display, and knew they not only HAD to be mine, but that they would look perfect together!  So, here are the polishes I chose for today's manicure:

 From left to right: NYC 105A Starry Silver Glitter, China Glaze For Audrey, China Glaze Shower Together.

 Base coat is CG For Audrey, which is SUCH a gorgeous light blue.

Then I did something a little kooky!  Instead of the typical half-moon, I used CG Shower Together to make it into a cloud shape instead.

Then, I added this Starry Silver Glitter because I knew it had big chunks that will look like rain drops.  I really love this glitter.  It's really cute.

I wish all rain showers were this sparkly! :)  What do you guys think?

Cracked Concrete - First Crackle EVER!

So, today I have one last birthday present to share with you guys! My future sister in law Bev knows how much I love me some gray polish, so she got me my very first crackle polish for my birthday: China Glaze Cracked Concrete!

So, here's the deal. For the longest time I've kind of been anti-crackle polish. Maybe I just haven't seen enough color combinations that I've liked. Or maybe its just that crackle polishes remind me of chipped nails, which I really hate! But, my first crackle color combination has made me a believer.

Here is our starting line-up:

I used Zoya Dove as my base coat, and here is CG Cracked Concrete with it.

Here's my base coat.  Two coats of Zoya Dove.  Ok, omg, can we talk about how stunning Dove is?  I just love Zoya.  They just make the most beautiful polishes, and they always just look so good on. 

Here's Cracked Concrete over Dove.  The polish was pretty easy to work with.  In case you are a crackle n00b like me here's how it works:  you paint a single coat over your nail, and at first it looks like a regular thick layer of polish, but after a few seconds the magic happens!  You aren't limited to just using crackle over your whole nail.  I've seen people play with swirls, french tips, and even hearts!  I decided to play with it a bit and make hearts on a few nails because a lot of the manicures I've liked best with crackle polishes do hearts. 

Conclusion: I heart this crackle.  I got CG Black Crackle on its way to my house right now, and I can't wait to play more with these polishes.  I think the key to success is just pretty color combinations, and breaking out of the box and trying out different shapes and designs.

How do you feel about crackle polishes?  Any pretty color combinations I should try?  I know recently I LOVED Let Them Have Polish's blue crackle swatches, and Gotham Polish did OPI's silver shatter over Zoya Jules! 

P.S. I've been testing out taking pictures with a lamp at night.  Do you like how these turned out?  Any tips for nail pix when sunlight isn't always an option?