Snowy Night Sky

It's a very rare day that my husband has any opinion about what I should put on my nails, but I give all of the credit to this manicure to him!

This is the finished product. He wanted something that would be blue and black, like a night sky, with snow falling. I think I got pretty close to his vision! Getting there was pretty messy though...

I started with a single coat of white. This is Formula X in White Matter, and you can see it's not an opaque one coater. But it was good enough to act as a base for what was to come.

Doing a gradient with black is CRAZY MESSY, everyone. Trust me. Use liquid palisade, or tape, or something. Don't be an idiot like me and let it get all over your fingers.

Because even after using way too much acetone to try and clean it up, it's still not actually tidy.
This gradient was done using Formula X Dark Matter and Omni.

Over the gradient, I added a coat of Formula X Wham! I had a little trouble with the bar glitters (what's new?), and actually pulled one off a little later because it was so annoying, but I love the look of it. I just really don't like bar glitter.

This all-Formula X manicure is actually what I wore to an interview at Sephora that went quite well, so thanks to my husband for such a fantastic idea. :)

Smooth Sailing Away

I'm usually much too lazy for nail art, but I've had a lot of free time lately so I'm trying to get better at it. So when my Portland bestie came over for Thursday morning mimosas & manis, I decided I'd be a little adventurous (possibly helped by the champagne!) and do a gradient. I've always done it the lazy way of only sponging on the second color, but it doesn't turn out as smoothly that way, so this time I actually dotted both colors and swirled them together to sponge. It turned out pretty fantastically if I do say so.

I started with one coat of Essie Smooth Sailing, then sponged a gradient of Smooth Sailing and Milani Sailing Away.

Over the gradient, I put a thin layer of Hard Candy's Black Tie Optional.

I ended up really loving this look! The gradient was subtle and that kept it feeling classy, but the glitter made it interesting. And it was so easy to do, I don't know why I'd been half-assing it this whole time. Never again!

Hello.

I haven't posted in forever and ever and ever. We moved, I went on vacation, I started teaching again, and blogging (or even doing my nails!) stopped being a priority. But I miss y'all, so I'm going to try again.
I'm blogging from my iPhone, but hopefully these are still alright photos. I'm pretty sure I will be a lot more likely to keep up if I don't have to deal with getting photos from my camera, editing, uploading, and all that jazz. I do that enough in my real life!

This is one perfect coat of Sinful Colors Rain Storm; I got it on sale for $1 and the formula is glorious. Then I did a sponge gradient from the cuticle with Sinful Colors Neptune (which I have posted about before). It was a great look that lasted all weekend; it even made it through the KU football game, and that's saying something (we really suck),

Welcome back!

OH MY GOSH.
HI.
HELLO.
I am still alive!

A billion million apologies for being gone for so so so so so so long!
I temporarily moved back to live with my parents in May so I could do a piano gig at the theatre there. I spent 5 weeks away from my husband & my students, which was not fun at all. I also spent 5 weeks playing piano, which is always really cool (I love that I am making a living using my music degree!!) but it was HELL on my nails. And my laptop died for a few days, and I misplaced my camera's battery charger, and etc etc etc.
Long story short, I was gone, and I would like to be back.

To be totally honest, I'm still not making any promises, though. I've spent the last month or two feeling not totally enthusiastic about my nails. It doesn't help that they're in terrible condition, but I've just been feeling bored. I think we've all been there, though, haven't we? Lately I've been trying to do a little more nail art as a way to get back into it and it has been so much fun! I keep it really simple, and it doesn't look great on my misshapen little nubs, but oh well! They'll grow out and I'll have been practicing.

PLUS, I just ordered Konad supplies this afternoon, so by next week I'll get to play with that! Super looking forward to it!

So as a hello again, here are some iPhone pictures from the last month. And yes, I've been so unenthused about my nails that these are most of the manicures I've taken pictures of in that whole time!

This is at the end of the second week. We had just gotten through rehearsals & opening weekend. My nails were so strong and healthy that they lasted that long! Then we started doing shows, and they all just fell to pieces...
This nail art is based on a dress I got that weekend. I'm not good at nail art, though.

 They're broken way past the quick. Not to mention how yellow they are... yuck.

The good thing about short nails: not having to worry about VNL! Elodie is a lovely jelly from Zoya, and I adore it, but on my longer nails I just couldn't handle the VNL. It looks lovely on my little nubs, though.

This was my birthday mani! A gradient with Zoya Wednesday & Zuza. It was pretty much awesome.

Here's my favorite! This gradient is using Orly Pure Porcelain as a base & China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy on top. It was so lovely! We stopped in at the jewelry store to get my ring cleaned & our favorite person there told me it looked like a professional did it. It lasted 5 days, and it had practically no tip wear and looked lovely, but then it just peeled off. :( I haven't had that happen since my nails used to be weak and peel-y and awful, so I think that's what causes it for me.

Now I'm rocking some blue & pink flowers that I'll hopefully show you in the next few days! I've been trying to be more active on twitter again, and it feels good to be here! I've missed you!

Nail Mail! Zoya Mira + Danii

My zoya promo finally got here! Yaay, nail mail! I've been on a serious no-buy due to a severe lack of budget in our household this month, so this is my first new polish since Christmas. I'm sure you all understand how freaking excited I am!

 As always with Zoya, the box came with swatches of their recent collections. This time, the True + Fleck collections & the Feel collection as well.

This is the first time I've gotten a box this size. My first order from them I got two of the 6-pack box (yep, I bought a lot!), and the second order they just wrapped them up in soft packing stuff.

And the pretties!! Mira & Danii.

Mira could be a one coater if you're really good at polishing your nails; I had a couple bald, draggy spots from where I was being impatient and not quite careful enough. But here she is at two, with no top coat: utter glossy perfection.

I want to enjoy Mira in all of her beauty, but I also didn't want Danii to feel left out, so I did an accent gradient with her. These two look really lovely together!

No top coat

OPI Natural nail top coat

And finally! Since we all know what Zoya Mira/OPI Funkey Dunkey looks like, I figured she's a good judge against what the purples in the True collection are like for those of us who aren't fortunate to own them already. As you can see, the True purples' bases are much warmer & grayer.

Mira is my first purple cream and I think I officially need to get myself more purples!

NYE!

I woke up this morning and could NOT decide what to wear on my nails! I knew I wanted to play with the Muppets glitters, but I couldn't decide which! So I did some quick skittles so I could see some combinations on first.

Here we have China Glaze Flyin' High under OPI Gone Gonzo, which is a perfect combo; Meep Meep Meep under Excuse Moi; Animalistic under Gettin' Miss Piggy With It; and Wocka Wocka, which was an afterthough, under CND Sheer 24K Sparkle. I fully expected to want to wear the pink combo, but once it was on my nails, I decided that it was actually my least favorite. Husband voted blue, but I'm wearing a blue dress this evening and I didn't want to be totally monochromatic. That left red. Animalistic was just too close to the reds I've been wearing lately, so I went with Wocka Wocka, which is just a little darker.

It's really pretty! Plus, this was one coat with practically zero clean up. Love!

Then I put Gettin' Miss Piggy With It over the tips. The two look absolutely fantastic together! After top coat, WW is rich & glowy, and GMPWI blends right on. My favorite glitter gradients are definitely when the two polishes match like this.

I am really excited to wear it this evening, and then in the next couple days I plan on putting Matte About You over it. Matte glitter is the best.

And a pretty picture in front of the Christmas tree.

I hope you have a happy and safe New Year's Eve!