NEW 31 Day Challenge: Inspired by a Blogger

Today's theme was a tough one! I follow so many amazing bloggers, not to mention all of the amazing manis put forth by all of the ladies participating in this challenge! I had so many set aside for the recreate day, that I thought I would use one of them for today :)

I was inspired by this mani by Nails by Ms. Lizard, but I was in NO mood to do a watermarble at the moment. So, as this one is only inspired, I added my own take on it. I started with a coat of Revlon Top Speed Spirit (creme white) and stamped using Sinful Colors Black on Black and the watermarble-y design from RA plate 107. I then took a few striping polishes- Kiss Nail Art Bikini Pink and Beach Green, and Sinful Colors Me First, and painted over most of the white areas left beneath the stamping. It took me a few nails to get the hang of it, but I ended up loving it! I especially love my ring finger, and how the neon yellow at the tip looks like a heart :)

There you have it, dears! Inspired by the lovely Ms. Lizard- be sure to check out her mani, as well as the rest of the challengers in the links below!

NEW 31DC: Merge or Melt

Merge or Melt is another great prompt that is wide open to interpretation. Put simply, it is anything that causes your colors to merge, or melt together. Awesome! I thought I had this one in the bag!

I started with a beautiful grey gradient: base of Revlon Speed Dry Spirit (white), and then sponged on the gradient with Sinful Colors Cool Grey, NYC Sidewalkers and Sinful Colors Ardois. I loved this gradient so much that I promptly effed it up completely-

- with this mess! I tried to do a black, white and clear watermarble, so that my shades of grey would show through. Don't do this! I had moderate success using clear polish (Gelous) to watermarble with during my Christmas challenge, so I thought this would be easy peasy! I used Sinful Colors Snow Me White, Black on Black and Wet N Wild Clear, for the record. I gave up on the clear after three disastrous attempts on my index finger, and did a straight black and white watermarble. Which was . . . okay. I'm not incredibly proud of it, but every failure is a stepping stone to success, right? 

Does it look better at an angle? . . . not really. I did, however, learn three valuable lessons during this particular prompt. 

1. Don't get cocky! I've only attempted to watermarble twice, and they were both fairly successful, so I thought this one would be no problem. 

2. Quit while you're ahead. That gradient was simple, but I loved it. I did consider just leaving it, but as I did a plain gradient for the Color Opposites prompt, I felt I needed to jazz it up.

3. Don't watermarble with black polish. Just don't! I taped off my nails, I oiled up my cuticles with balm, and I still spent 45 minutes cleaning up. And my cuticles still look a mess. So I think I'll just avoid black from now one! (And red too, most likely.)

Check out the rest of the lovely challengers in the links below- hopefully they were more successful than I was today!

Top 12 Nail Art of 2012

I was only planning to do MY favorites and YOUR favorites Top 12 of 2012 lists, but as I was going through my posts, picking out your favorites based on view count, I noticed that some of my nail art posts have gotten a considerable amount of views! So I decided to throw together a post of your favorite nail art looks, based on post views, and here are the top 12! Click on the title of the picture to be taken to the original post. 

12. This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Watermarble. Tied for 12th place with 35 views. My first attempt at a watermarble, and I was pretty pleased with it!

12.5. 12 Days of Christmas Nail Art Challenge: Holiday Movie. Tied for last place with my watermarble- 35 views. This was a rather lazy attempt at showing the Griswold Family Christmas lights, and my first attempt at a glequin manicure. 

11. 12 Days of Christmas Nail Art Challenge: Christmas Trees. 36 Views. I really like this one, as it has more of a cohesive feel than many of my arty manis do.

10. 12 Days of Christmas Nail Art Challenge: Holiday Song. 38 views. Was TOTALLY at a loss for this one, so generic music symbols it is.

9. 12 Days of Christmas Nail Art Challenge: Candy Canes. 51 Views. My second ever watermarble. I've only ever done two of them, and they're both on this list- I must be doing something right, right?

8. This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Zombies. 58 Views. This was a bit of an abstract mani, but I loved it, and wore it for days, even though I hate the feeling of matte polish. 

7. The Zombicure! 64 views. The only true nail art I've shown that wasn't part of a challenge, and I still love it :)

6. This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Bats. 67 views. I love the shimmery white base on this one, and repeated it for one of my holiday manis. 

5. Back to School Waterslide Decals by Designer Piggies.  79 views. Also not part of a nail art challenge, but I didn't actually do the art on this one :) I loved these decals, but need more work on placing full coverage waterslides.

4. This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Gradient. 81 views. The only true gradient I've done. Not Halloween specific either!

3. This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Horror Movie. 84 views. I was, and still am, SO proud of the burnt flesh look I created on my Freddy Kreuger mani!

2. This Is Halloween Nail Art Challenge: Ghosts. 94 views. It's odd- I participated in 2 Halloween nail art challenges, but every one of the top nail art posts was from this challenge. Must have been more fellow challengers in this one :)

1. Easiest Nail Art Ever by Long Changed.  Your number one favorite, with 97 views. So easy vinyl nail art decals. Stick on and go!

Were any of these YOUR personal favorites? Is there a favorite of yours that didn't make the list? 

I've gotten behind this week, so you'll get a post-a-palooza over the next two days! Stay tuned for New Year's Eve mani ideas, your top 12 favorite polish and MY top 12 favorite polishes of the year!

12 Days of Christmas Challenge: Candy Canes

It's December 7th, which  means today's nail art prompt is Candy Canes! This is easily the prompt that I was most excited about, and I knew right off the bat what I was going to do!

I didn't want to go with the traditional red and white candy canes, so I softened up it with pastel pink and green with white! This is only my second attempt at watermarbling, and while my first attempt wasn't stellar, it wasn't half bad! I thought that watermarbling would create the perfect candy cane swirl look, so I gave it a go.

I started off with bases of Sinful Colors Pink Forever (thumb, middle, pinkie), Sinful Colors Exotic Green (index) and Sinful Colors Snow Me White (ring- and I don't know why I picked this white polish- I hate it!) I painted a coat of Merry Christmas, Baby from my own Holiday collection over all nails. Then . . . the dreaded watermarble! I used Revlon Minted (middle and pinkie) and Wet N Wild Tickled Pink (remaining fingers) swirled in the water with Gelous. Why Gelous? Because, somehow, I don't own a single clear polish that is NOT fast drying! As watermarbling already requires a certain amount of speed, there's no way Seche Vite or Out the Door would stay pliable long enough for me to swirl it in the water. But I'm happy to report that, in a pinch, Gelous watermarbles just fine.

And there's my thumb! The light pink doesn't show up great over the only slightly darker pink, but I think my thumb is my favorite! Or my middle finger, I like that one too :)

So what do you think? Peppermint-y, even though it's not classic candy cane? Be sure to check out all the other challengers' links below!

This Is Halloween Nail Art: Watermarble

I decided to join in on this challenge as soon as I came across the graphic. I have been getting more and more interested in nail art, and I'm a huge Halloween fan! This is also the first Halloween nail art challenge I saw that included watermarbling as on of the challenges! I've been wanting to try my hand at watermarbling pretty much forever, but I've always been a little scared to! I've seen so many other bloggers, most of whom are immensely talented, talking about how difficult it is to get it right! So I watched all the tutorials, read all the tips, and never got around to it, because I didn't want to fail at it! 

Having the watermarble as a part of this challenge was exactly what I needed to get off my ass and just try it already :) And it was rather daunting- clean up alone took me forever! I tried about 4 other color combinations before I finally found polishes that looked good together, marbled well (enough) AND fit a Halloween theme! But here is my finished product, and I'm happy to say: It doesn't completely suck. 

I started with a base of Bone from my own Zombie Collection. I wanted to use it in the marble as well, but it didn't really work out. So the marbling on top is: Sinful Colors Snow Me White, Let's Meet (shimmery yellow) and Cloud 9 (shimmery orange). I've heard shimmers aren't the best for watermarbling, but I didn't have creme shades that I liked enough for the candy corn look I ended up going for. They were a bit sheer, but overall I think it turned out alright! I especially like the almost citrus-y look on my middle finger :)

Ignore the few bits of polish that I missed on clean up: I guess I thought I did a better job than I did! Overall, I think I will return to watermarbling. It was a very cool effect, and not too difficult to do. 

Be sure to check out all the amazing other watermarbles for todays challenge!

Cheers, 

-Liz-