#31Nails2014: #2 Favorite color

Hello everyone!

I like very many colors, so to represent my favourite colors, I chose a multichrome nail polish that I've showed here on the blog before: Enchanted Polish 'Magical Mystery Tour'. I've used it for nail art several times. For Day 2 in Nails Magazine's 31 Days of Nail Art Challenge for January 2014 (31Nails2014), I've chosen to use this old photo:

Products used: Konad m51 & Enchanted Polish 'Magical Mystery Tour' & Konad: SP Black.

A click on the picture, or here, will take you to the blog post, where you can see lots of very different photos of this manicure. I've also used this multichrome polish for stamping nail art in this skittle, and this gradient. I've also written about this amazing nail polish and showed lots of photos of it on its own here.

This is my most photographed nail polish in 2013.

Lani

GOT Polish Challenge: PINK

Hello everyone!

The theme for day #1 in the GOT (Golden Oldie Thursdays) Polish Challenge, is PINK. It's run by the facebook group "Crumpet's Nail Tarts", and you can find information about it, and how to join in, on Debbie's blog; The Crumpet. I'll include a poster with all the themes below. What's special about this challenge, is that we have to use old nail polish! Yeay! At least one year old.

I got N°7 #70 Milan for Christmas about 4 years ago.

It came in a set together with the blackened blue Betty Blues, teal Totally Teal, vampy red Temptress, and a red nail polish called Rose Truffle:




I've used Milan several times, but never showed it here on the blog. Usually, I used it with a layer of holographic glitter over it, often on my toes. But this time I stamped over it and added glitter glue to the center of the flowers.

After a list of the products I've used, you'll find thumbnails with links to the other paticipants' pink nails.


The themes:



I like these themes, but I'm not sure if I can participate in this challenge in January, but I hope I can do more in February and March. What do you think about the GOT Challenge? Are you participating?


Products used:

IsaDora #600 Clear (as fast drying base coat)
N°7 Stay Perfect #70 Milan (pink)
Konad: SP Black (stamping polish)
MoYou London: Artist Collection #10 (stamping plate)
XL stamper
Stickles: Pink (glitter glue)
Dotting tool
Seche Vite (fast drying top coat)

I tried to only use products that are more than 1 year of age, but must have forgotten all about that when I saw my MoYou stamping plate...

This photo shows the stamping before top coat and before adding the glitter:

I'm surprised that so many are participating in this challenge. Just click on their thumbnails below, if you want to take a closer look. You can add your link with the Inlinkz on the end of any of our blogs.


Lani

Nails Magazine's 31 Days of Nail Art Challenge (#31Nails2014): #1 2014

Hello everyone!

I made this for Day #1 in Nails Magazine's 31 Days of Nail Art Challenge for January 2014. And you can see all the themes on the poster below, (after a few more photos). The theme for day 1 is 2014, and I hope you can read that on my nails too. Lol!

On my screen, the photos taken outside look a little too blue. In real life the color of the nail art looks more like you see it in the first photo and the photo below. I love these two polishes, and in my opinion they go really well together because of the glitter and the tiny glass flecks. (You can click on the photos to enlarge them.) The purple polish has blue, and the other one has white tiny glass flecks.

They are from the same Picture Polish collection, and I think I bought them in November 2013. Maybe I love them even more because they both are made by bloggers together with Picture Polish; the purple Imperial with The Swatchaholic, and Douceur with Tartofraises/ Cutenails. Just click on the links below to read their thoughts about their own collaboration polishes.

I was inspired by this tutorial made by Collette/ My Simple Little Pleasures, and how she used a needle to turn dots into hearts. After applying a third coat of Picture Polish: Douceur, while still wet, I put dots of Picture Polish: Imperial on one nail, and found my needle and used the drag marble technique to make each number. On the thumb I stamped the text from Messy Mansion MM02 with Konad SP: Violet Pearl, and then painted over the text with a brush dipped in Imperial. My pinkie nail is broken, so I had to use a fake nail here.

Click to enlarge

Because I found out about the challenge after it already had started, I don't know if I'll be able to make all the manicures during this month. But because we are allowed to use old photos, I have about 16 manis I can use. We are supposed to share each challenge mani on Instagram, but I have to figure out how that works first. I think I'll share every challenge day here on the blog, although it will be boring for those of you who have seen all my manis, but I think I'll just show the photo and link to the actual blog post. And we can also save time by making one mani for several challenge days.

For short, I'll use the suggested hashtag "#31Nails2014" as headline for my posts during the challenge.

Products used:

Picture Polish: Douceur by Tartofraises /Cutenails (nearly white pink)
Picture Polish: Imperial by The Swatchaholic (purple)
Needle
Dotting tool
Konad SP: Violet Pearl (purple)
XL stamper
Stamping plate: Messy Mansion: MM02
Small brush
Pallette

And now I hope to write one more blog post to catch up...

Are you participating in this challenge?


Lani

Fireworks

Happy New Year!!!

I hope you've all had a nice Christmas and New Year celebration, if you are celebrating. I've had two nice weeks on Gran Canaria, and I'm now back to snow and -11°C. I had planned to start the year with these fireworks nails, so here they are. The base is Viva la Diva: #160 Fireworks. For the stamped fireworks, I used Bundle Monster: BM-H14 and Konad: SP Psyche Pink. These photos are taken before I broke one nail on the left hand and one on the right...

I hope I'll be able to write more blog posts in 2014. In January, I think I'll participate in two challenges, so I'll probably have to prioritize them, and show you other things in February, like the Ciaté calendar I got, and the nail polish I bought abroad.

The GOT Polish Challenge is one of the challenges that I'm thinking about doing in 2014, because I can use my old and vintage nail polish. The other new challenge I want to try to participate in, is Nails Magazine's 31 Days of Nail Art Challenge, although it actually started in January 2014, and I first heard about it a week ago... But we are allowed to use pictures of old manis, so I guess it's still doable. So now I feel that I have too much to do... Lol.

What are your thoughts and nail polish plans for 2014?

Lani

Nail Polish Canada's 2013 HOLIDAY NAIL ART CHALLENGE WEEK 3 - Holiday Memories

Hello everyone!

This is my entry for week 3 in Nail Polish Canada's 2013 HOLIDAY NAIL ART CHALLENGE. This week, the challenge is Holiday Memories. And it's been interesting to read about my participant's memories. You can look at the other entries, and vote for your favourite nail art here.

When I was a child, dad always took me and my siblings and the dogs with him into the forest to find a Christmas tree. It was a long walk, but we had fun. Sometimes we found animal footprints and animal poo, and dad teached us which animals had been there. He always let one of the dogs carry the axe! :-) She held her head high, and looked very proud. We searched for the perfect tree. And then we "helped" dad carry/ drag it all the way home.


Products used: 
Nailstation: Gomme
Konad SP: Black
Konad SP: White
Stamping plates:
BM-H02 (forest)
MoYou London: Princess collection- 03 (dog)
HB23 (snowflakes)


I bought Nailstation Gomme after seeing it on Marias Nail Art and Polish Blog. It's a gorgeous pastel blue, and according to Norway Nails, it's cruelty-free!!! :-), 3- free, and French.

Lani

Nail Polish Canada's 2013 HOLIDAY NAIL ART CHALLENGE WEEK 2 - DECORATIONS

Tinsel & Christmas Ornaments


Hello everyone!

My new e-mail from Nail Polish Canada explained that: "This week's nail art challenge is DECORATIONS. Lights, trees, tinsel whatever your favorite holiday decorations are." My favourite Christmas decoration is a palm tree decorated with lights, but that was too difficult for me, so I tried to make tinsel and Christmas ornaments.

To vote for your favourite, and look at all the entries, click here. If you want to participate, you can see details and still register here.

What I did:

I started with the dark green sparkly textured nail polish; IsaDora #112 Emerald Crush, that I bought in October. It's opaque in two coats. This is what it looks like on it's own:

For the tinsel I used a silver holographic bar/ string glitter; IsaDora #861 Shanghai, that I bought on Friday. I put a little on my palette, not to get too much clear polish, and applied the glitter with a brush, and later a doting tool. Then I sealed the stripe of glitter with the clear polish. For my Christmas nails, tinsel is enough, but for the competition, I added a little more.

For the Christmas ornaments, I tried to make 3D circular shapes. This was not easy, so I had to do some clean up. They were made with one layer of Seche Vite, one with silver nail polish (only in the beginning), multipurpose glue, and finally I used a Q- tip to apply the holographic nail foil. (I have written about how to apply nail foil here.)

Products used:

IsaDora: #600 Clear
IsaDora: #112 Emerald Crush
IsaDora: # 861 Shanghai
Palette (a stamping plate)
Brush
Dotting tool
Seche Vite
H&M: Metallic Grey
Q- tip
N.NAIL Shiny Silver Nail Foil Transfer [NNAIL-E24] and glue -used here and here (10% KKCenterHk coupon code: Nailphotos by Lani)

If you want to participate, look at the other nail art entries, or vote for your favourite, use the links above.

I hope you are all doing well. I'm especially thinking about everyone affected by the wind/ hurricane in Europe. Have a nice weekend! :-)

Lani

Nail Polish Canada's 2013 HOLIDAY NAIL ART CHALLENGE WEEK 1 - SNOW

Hello everyone!

I was very surprised when Nail Polish Canada invited me to participate in their 2013 HOLIDAY NAIL ART CHALLENGE. It made me very happy! :-) I remember the beautiful manicures for last year's challenge, and and it's been very interesting to see what has been made so far this year. The challenge will run for three weeks (one mani per week). And we can participate one week or all three. The theme this first week is Snow, and we can make anything related to snow. This is my entry for week 1. As you hopefully can see, a snow fairy tried to make pink snow in her little Winter Wonderland on my nails. As usual, I have more photos of this manicure, and further down, you'll find a list of products, and I'll tell how I did this.

Although I can't win the prizes, (because I don't have a mailing address in Canada or the U.S.) you can vote for me. Just click here to vote for your favourite, or if you want to take a look at the other entries. If you want to join in, you can find all details and sign in here.

What I did:

1. I started with white nails. Then I made a pink- white gradient. I mixed pink and white nail polish on my palette (the back side of a stamping plate) with a dotting tool, and used a sponge.
2. For the layer of snow on the tips, I used the one stroke technique. I used pink and white acrylic craft paint for that, and a small angled brush. Usually I use fast drying top coat between layers, but this time I added a shimmer top coat first; one coat of IsaDora #769. (It shows IRL.)
3. Then I used different stamping plates, and a XL stamper for the fairy. For the snowflakes I used a Konad stamper most of the time, and white, pink and red Konad stamping polishes. And I made some dots from the fairy's wand.
4. The photos were taken inside. Because it was dark outside, I brought  a bag of snow to the kitchen, and made a little snow photo studio. I used an Ott- Lite, and held my hand in a shoe box with white sheets of paper inside. To not get everything wet, I placed a plastic bag under the snow. I've recently started taping pizza baking paper on the Ott- Lite, after seeing this photo tutorial on My Awesome Beauty. An Ott- Lite lamp is a good alternative, if you live in Canada or other places where there's little winter daylight.

After taking photos with Ott- lite yesterday, I had a chance to take photos in daylight this morning. The one taken in daylight is the first photo, and there you can see the shimmer better. But the gradient shows better on the other photos.

Products used:

IsaDora: #600 (base coat)
IsaDora: #603 Tip White
GOSH: #598 Bubble Gum (pink)
dotting tool
sponge
Acrylic craft paint: Titanium White (white), Rose (dark pink)
small angled brush
IsaDora: #769 Mother of Pearl
Seche Vite (fast drying top coat)
Konad stamping polish: Red, Psyche Pink, Pastel Pink, White
XL stamper
Konad stamper
lint roller (to remove polish from the stamper)
Stamping plates:
Fairy and snowflakes: MoYou London: Princess 07
Snowflakes:
MoYou London: Princess 02
MoYou London: Artist 04
HB-23
BM- 323
1 little bag of snow (for the photos)

I hope you liked these pink snow nails, and that you'll participate in this challenge too. I wonder what the next theme will be.

Lani