Friday 10 May 2013

Metallic nails - Gold



I decided to do this mani after realizing that the gold on my accent nails from my previous post lasted longer than the green i had paired it with. I had it on for about 4 days straight but had to repaint the green.

Anyway, i love this gold mani and i think i kept my nails looking all metallic for an entire week! 

Thursday 9 May 2013

Green & Gold

Here is another mani from the vaults...



I remember that i wanted to paint my nails gold and some other colour. I didn't know what that other colour was going to be so i went with my trusty 'Luron #86 - green'. It came out fine though i later felt that another colour combination would have been better. Anyway, what do you think? Yay or nay?

I also used B.O nail lacquer #2 - gold. I didn't use a top coat.

Tuesday 7 May 2013

Red nails

From the vaults :) I mentioned in my previous post that i liked how short my nails were, well, after this red mani, i have to say that am in love with short nails! 


I used my phone to take this pic so the photo doesn't do this mani any justice. BUT do you see how cute and neat they look? I honestly love this mani. What do you think?

There is something about red nails nowadays. I find them to be very classy. I used Charm Max #27 (no top coat).

Wednesday 24 April 2013

Green gradient

I've been wanting to do a proper gradient mani for a while now so this is what i did today...


The mint green (#104) usually comes off very sheer and so it needs several coats for opacy. I think i had to do the sponging step thrice.  


And i cut my nails really short. I like them this way for now. Kinda neat and cute.

Wednesday 17 April 2013

Hello

I can't believe how long i have gone without posting! I didn't get a chance to show you the final mani for the March Tri polish challenge. I'll post that pic here later.

Anyway, lately i have been rocking a 'nude' colour from Luron (#92). Its been rather gloomy due to this rain we are experiencing here in Kenya and i just wasn't feeling all the bright colours that are currently trending (in the West).





Today i tried to do something different and painted my nails a hot pink colour - also from Luron #109. It was okay but i actually see myself going for darker colours from now on. 



I seriously need to do something about my cuticles. And my nails have gotten so long!

Friday 29 March 2013

Gradient Polka Dot Nails

Still building up on my skittle mani.  I decided to add polka dots on top of my previous gradient mani for this look.



I really like the results. Its beautiful if i may say so myself. I used the same polish (Luron #) i used for the gradient to create the dots. Très simple.



Frosty Skittle graidient

I decided to give the gradient mani another shot after the 31 Day challenge: Day 10 gradient nails disaster. I just sponged Luron # (white) on top of my last mani. It still needs some work. I hadn't applied a top coat  which would have made a hell of a difference. Should have cleaned up too before posting but yea...i didn't. 




I love the frosty vibe it projects. I think it would be great for Winter. 

Skittle nails

HAPPY EASTER!!!
I currently don't have a camera in my possession (which is why i didn't post yesterdays' tri polish day 4 mani...but i'll post it some other time). Anyway, here is a pic i found on my desktop from last week i think. I modified it as shown in my next posts.



This is a more summery look. I thought the colours would be a little pale - pastel-like, which would be more in tune with the current season (Spring & Easter) but whatever, i'll try out the pastel mani some other time. 


Then again am in Kenya where we don't experience the four seasons. Right now we are getting into the long rains season. I should probably be rocking darker colours, the kind you would go for in Fall/Autumn.


I used B.O nail polishes purple #17, blue #04, green #12, pink #09 and from Luron yellow #110

Wednesday 27 March 2013

Interlocking dots

I decided to jazz up yesterday's mani by adding polka dots. 



I always go overboard with the dots but i think this turned out okay seeing that its the first time am trying this mani - came across it some time last week and thought it looked beautiful and a little interesting.


Tuesday 26 March 2013

The Tri polish challenge Day 3

Today i chose to use coral and green because i haven't used these two together before.



So...this is a horrible mani and i don't like the colour combination either.


Saran wrap nails



I have been itching to do this mani for a while now. I initially wanted to use a darker blue instead of pink with the hopes of achieving an acid washed-denim kind of look but my 'Charm max-blue' wasn't working out too great.  

Anyway, this was pretty easy to do. The blue base (B.O #04) is what i had on yesterday...didn't need to take it off, i just added a pink layer (B.O #09) and used cling film to get the above results. I sealed everything in with a top coat which also smoothed out the nail surface. 


You know how sometimes you want something so bad and once you get it you kind of lose interest in it? Well, thats how i feel about this mani. It looks good but its time for it to come off (lasted me half a day at least). Time to get back to The tri polish challenge.  I will post what i come up with later today.

Monday 25 March 2013

Monday blues

I personally think that this colour is too bright for a Monday (at least on me it is) but i was home all day, so i decided to just go with it.


I used B.O nail lacquer #04. The only other time i used this particular nail polish was in my vintage floral manicure.


Sunday 24 March 2013

Shimmery purple?

Here is what i had on my nails yesterday and today...



I love this nail polish (Luron #05) and its the same one i used in the 31 day challenge (day 6 violet nails). It looks different in that post because i used a different camera. It has this metallic or shimmery (or something) look that i just love.



You can see that the background is different here because i was just playing around with my camera trying to find a better place to be taking pictures. I took several pics since the purple kept showing up as blue!...in the second pic, my pinky nail looks purple and the rest of the nails....kinda blue. Anyway, i also figured out the macro settings so i will be putting up better quality pictures ::yay::

Thursday 21 March 2013

Tri Polish challenge Day 2

2 Tone - Colour Blocking




Two-tone manis are also trending this season so thats what i chose to do. This was a quick mani. I used tape to get that crisp demarcation line.

Wednesday 20 March 2013

The Tri-polish challenge Day 1

This months' set of colours are GreenPurple and Coral.

The 3 polishes i have chosen to use are: from B.O, Green #12 and Purple #17. From Luron,  Coral #103.




I am also allowed to use Black, White, Silver, Gold and Glitter toppers.








The challenge officially started yesterday but since i only found out about it an hour ago, i will post my first mani today. The second mani will be up tomorrow.

Without further ado lets get into it...


Sugar spun - Textured nails



I took this first pic indoors (poorly lit area). The purple kinda loos blue o_O. Took the next one (outside) after doing some cleaning...see the smudges?

I am in love with this mani! It has a 3D effect since i did not add a top coat and i think it looks yummy! I just wanted to lick it...and i did! Its my first time doing it and even though it takes a little longer to do,  the results are worth it. I keep touching my nails just to feel the texture! It has this fun vibe about it that just puts you in the partying mood lol! 

I can't wait to try it out again with other colour combinations! One thing i will do differently (in terms of application) is stretch the stringy polish further to make thinner lines so that it dries fast and doesn't smudge (hope that makes sense).  

Now i have use for my old (tacky) nail polishes that i had planned to throw away.

By the way textured nails are  trending this season and since i don't own any polish that will give my nails some sort of rough texture (other than my crackle nail polishes), this will have to do.

The Tri Polish Challenge

The Tri-polish challenge is a fun challenge by The Crumpet's Nail Tarts  over at the The Crumpet. Debbie clearly outlines the rules for this challenge here. Be sure to check out her blog for some awesome manis.

Here is just a run through of the rules:

1. Each month there will be a set of 3 colours to be used (stick to the same brand of polish for each colour throughout the month)

2. On each challenge day, use 2 at least 2 of the 3 nail polishes. You must also use all 3 at least once.


3. Feel free to use Black, White, Silver, Gold and Glitter toppers

4. Since there is no theme, find your own inspiration

5. There are 4 posts in the challenge, on the Tuesday and Thursday of the 3rd and 4th week of the month.


Can't wait to get started!

Saturday 16 March 2013

ST. Patrick's Day nails

So tomorrow is St. Patrick's day and i will spend at least 4 hours on the road. I wish i could get my hands on a bottle of Jameson Irish Whiskey...sigh!I won't be driving. Anyway, here is what i had on my nails today.



I know, i know. Hackneyed, but what says Irish better than a Shamrock? Colours used: Luron green #86 and Luron white #FT201.

Vintage Floral Nails

Once again i have been MIA. I will not bore you with any lame excuses so lets just get into the mani. 



I used Luron French manicure #FB213 (sheer) pink as my base then used a coral colour (Luron #103) for the roses. I used red polish (Luron #10) to create the petals which gave the flowers some depth. For the leaves, i simply used green (Luron #86). 



The colours in this second mani were inspired by what i wore on that day. I had on a black and green striped top and navy blue skinny jeans. I used a sky blue colour (B.O nail lacquer #04) for the flowers and a navy blue (Charm Max) for the petals. The leaves were the same green colour (B.O nail lacquer #12) as my other finger nails. The black is Dodwell #79. The flowers on my thumb nail got smudged a little. Overall, i loved this mani.

I did these a couple of weeks ago. I did the first one sometime last month and the other on the 1st of this month (got my hair done that day too). These are my first vintage floral manis. They look cute so i'll definitely do them again.

Side note: I have decided to be doing nail art only on my accent nails because i somehow feel overwhelmed when i do it on all my nails...I feel like its over the top. I have a lot of people looking at my nails and i think i should tone it down a notch.

Tuesday 26 February 2013

Valentines' hearts

I know valentines' day was almost 2 weeks ago but i have to show you what i had on my nails on that day



This is also not an original design from me - i need to work on my creativity or lack of it. Anyway,  I used Luron Nail polish (a french manicure sheer pink) # FB213 as my base, then drew one red heart on each nail, partially outlined it using black nail polish, and finally did the leopard print design using black and brown nail polish. I added a top coat as well. 

Polka dots!!!

Its been well over 3 weeks since i last posted anything but not to worry, i am back. Today i have more than one mani from the 'vaults' to share with you. I did not come up with these designs. 

The polka dots mani i did for the 31 day challenge was just too basic and i didn't really like it. I think i used way too many dots so this time round, this is what i did:




Obviously the first pic shows a neater manicure. I like the colours there. The second pic....i don't like. And thats all am going to say about that. 

Monday 4 February 2013

French Manicure - take 2

I have been loving the French mani i did for my previous post but decided to spice it up. This is what i came up with...



I just added some lace-y detail to the tips and i think i love this more than the plain french mani.

Friday 1 February 2013

French Manicure

Hi guys! I am so happy to be done with the 31 day challenge. After spotting colourful nails for so many days, i decided to go for a natural plain look. I say natural because my dear friend Patrick asked me last weekend if my nails were real! 

I wanted to rock bare nails for a while and when i did, i realized how long they had gotten (maybe that's what made them look fake). They didn't look good to me so i clipped & filed them (hadn't done that in about 5 weeks!!!).

Anyway,  I decided to do a french manicure instead and loved the outcome.



I have never rocked a french mani before, i've tried several times but it never looks right so i always end up taking it off immediately am done applying it, but this time round, i had it on all day. 

It may not look like much but for me it was good enough for the day. I love how glossy it looks, like gel nails or something. I simply used clear nail polish and my white stripper nail polish to achieve this.

One other thing i have noticed of late is that my nails are stronger than they were before i started the challenge. They don't break easily and i think this is because of applying nail polish daily...some claim to have nail hardeners, i guess they really do! I always doubted that...thought it was a marketing gimmick!

Thursday 31 January 2013

Day 31: Recreate your favourite challenge

Am not quite sure what Day 31 challenge is supposed to be about but here is what i chose to do...

Braided Nails



I used three colours to do this. I cleaned up afterwards.

Day 30: Inspired by a tutorial

NEWSPAPER NAILS


This was my first time doing this though i have wanted to do it for a long time. I saved it for the challenge and so here it is finally! I thought it would look really great but oh well, looks like i will be doing it again.

Day 29: Inspired by Supernatural

GHOSTS


I actually wanted to do 'flying saucers' and 'aliens' but somehow changed my mind and settled for ghosts. This was super easy! 

Day 28: Inspired by a flag

I was super lazy on this day and so i went for this...


The Japan flag. Am not even going say much about it.

Day 27: Inspired by Atrwork

Once again i'll put up multiple posts today. I finished doing the challenge and am so happy. It was beginning to get monotonous. After the day 31 post, i will share with you what i had on my nails yesterday so, read on...

Onto the mani. I did 'dripping paint' nail art.



 I decided not to do anything intricate because i feel that i have been churning out some horrible manis. Anyway, the wierd thing about this one is that the 'paint' seems to be dripping updwards o-O This was my first time doing this mani so next time i'll do it the other way. 

The purple colour i used on my little finger is the one i used in my previous (patchwork) mani (where it appeared blue in the pic)

Monday 28 January 2013

Day 26: Inspired by a pattern

Patchwork - that's what this pattern is called. 


This was actually time consuming, or maybe  it seemed to drag on forever because i was not in the mood to do my nails. I loved the outcome nonetheless and even got compliments! I think i did a pretty good job especially since this was my first attempt at a patchwork mani!

I used Dodwell #21 as my base & top coat,  Luron #109 (hot pink), Luron #110 (yellow), Luron #52 (black) and B.O #17 (purple). In this picture the purple came off as a blue and the pink doesn't quite look like hot pink. But you get the idea...you can use whichever colours you choose.

I absolutely love this mani and will be doing it again.

Day 25: Inspired by Fashion

I chose to do the 'Ikat' design which is something like this:



Am sure you've seen it before but just like me didn't know what its called. It has some sort of tribal-native-south american vibe to it. Kind of what you would see on a Mexican's Poncho. Anyway, here's what i came up with:


It looks like i used stickers but the design is pretty easy to do, especially since it shouldn't be perfect with crisp lines. The idea is to make pyramid or diamond shapes...i failed to do this. I think a different colour combination would have been better but here's what i did anyway.

Day 24: Inspired by a book

Here's what i did for today's challenge...



Here is my inspiration...



There wasn't much to this really and am glad!

I haven't really started reading this book but i have read other books by Jeffrey Archer and i absolutely love them! Am actually in the process of building a collection of his books.

Day 23: Inspired by a movie

My inspiration was the movie: "Thor" from 2011



I drew the 'hammer of Thor' on my thumb nail because that's like the symbol of Thor, if that makes sense. I didn't want to do anything complicated but i knew this mani would make sense.


I. Love. This. Movie!

And Chris Hemsworth...his eyes just draw you in.

 #Avengers 


Day 22: Inspired by a song

HEY SOUL SISTER ~ TRAIN



This is what i chose to represent on my nails. It didn't come to me easily, i had a few other options but chose this one because 1) i absolutely love 'Train' 2) I love 'Train' 3) i love this song! But i love 'Drops of Jupiter' more...On to the mani:




On my thumb nail, i used that greenish colour to represent the shirt worn by that guy at the beginning of the video. He wears sunglasses too which i added to this nail . On my pinky i drew one of the numerous arrows we see floating across the screen every now and then in the video. 

There you have it. My mani inspired by a song. 




Day 21: Inspired by a colour

Am back! I have been keeping up with the challenge but not posting, so today i will share with you what i had on my nails this past week. Lets get into it:

I picked the colour green as my inspiration to create an ombre effect that fades across my nails. 

For this i used 'Luron #113' which is a lime green nail polish. (Using a different camera - hence the difference in quality)




On my nails i have five different shades of green, four of which i created by mixing the green with black and  white accordingly. The colour on my middle finger is what my nail polish actually looks like. I love this manicure because it looks like some sort of transition from a milky-creamy green (which is what the colour on my thumb nail looks like) to the deep jungle green colour on my pinky finger. I had not applied a top coat here.

TIP: If you decided to do this mani, i suggest picking a light colour, that way it will still be visible after mixing it with black. If you go with a darker colour, there is a chance you'll end up with the colour black on one or two nails.


Wednesday 16 January 2013

Day 20: Water Marbled

I decided to use some pastel colours for today's challenge...


I first applied a single coat of white nail polish (Luron #FT201) then on top of that i applied a single coat of  sheer, almost champagne colour  (Zoe nail polish #101). This is actually what i used as a base for my animal print design.

I started off with my thumb nail (as usual), didn't like the colour combination so i decided to use white and a single pastel colour for the rest of the nails.

So, index (Luron #110), middle (Luron #112), ring finger (Luron #104) and pinky finger (Luron #103). I smudged almost all of them. Next time, i'll really take my time. Surprisingly i didn't have much clean up to do afterwards!

Tuesday 15 January 2013

Day 19: Galaxy nails

Today's challenge is about capturing the beauty of space on your nails. Here is my outcome...


For this, i used a number of nail polish colours hoping to attain a cosmic effect. I first applied a single coat of black nail polish (Dodwell Nail enamel #79), Then sponged on the following colours: Luron #108 (green), Charm Max Blue, Luron #109 (hot pink) and finally Luron #FT201 (white) in that particular order.



After i was done with the sponging step, i drew some white stars on my accent nails (which you can't see very well here) then applied a coat of fine glitter nail polish and sealed everything with a top coat. The mani may not look like much till you add glitter (and look at it from a distance). 

NB: I went overboard with the glitter. I think it would have looked more realistic if i had not used it on the sponged areas. Also adding just one holographic nail polish to the mix is an awesome idea especially if your going to be out in the sun.

There are so many variations of this spacey-mani using other different colour combinations so you can be sure i'll do it again.