Showing posts with label pink. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pink. Show all posts

Friday, 10 January 2014

One Year Blogiversary: Then and Now!

Hey everyone! Today I have a "then and now" post for my one year blogiversary to share!

I saw this awesome idea on Lindsey of Wondrously Polished's lovely blog (link to her post here)! It was hard to find anything very interesting that I did in the first few months of blogging because unlike Lindsey, I wasn't very good when I started my blog, and because of that I didn't try any advanced nail art. My picture quality is the biggest difference I see in these pictures, what do you guys think is my biggest improvement?

For this first mani I remember thinking all of the colours were too bright and intense for a watercolour look, and even when I redid them the other day I thought I should have made the colours even less intense. The funny thing was, rather than thinning the polishes out, I decided to sponge them on the first time I did these. It was like I was trying to do a design that involves a certain technique but I decided to use another technique and still call it the original design… I'm strange sometimes :P.


Here is the link to the post this first picture is from if you're interested! I used to write a lot less in my posts and write even more awkwardly than I do now haha! These are from January 2013 and while wearing these and before writing up the post, I picked up my first bottle of pure acetone for cleanup!


Here is my recent reattempt at this look! I used all of the same polishes as in the other post (American Apparel California Trooper, Essie Cute as a Button, Essie Bikini so Teeny, Revlon Mint Gelato, and Revlon Lemon Meringue) as well as a sheer white polish on top (Essie Waltz) to achieve a more pastel and watercolour-like look!


What do you guys think about the new version of these? To me they look like a blurred floral or houndstooth pattern!



The other mani I decided to redo for this post was a black to neon gradient look. Here is the original post from February 2013! There is a cute story behind these nails because my boyfriend at the time (and current one, we're still dating) told me in detail exactly how I should do these nails and which colour to do on each nail! I just painted a black base and asked him what I should do and this is exactly what he said, down to the ring finger orange accent nail :).



I remember noticing that if you just sponged on a neon colour once or twice it looked like a dark version of the colour, so it really isn't difficult to make a smooth gradient with sheerer polishes like neons. I'm not sure why I didn't think that was as important as it was at the time haha, live and learn!


I almost used the exact same polishes as I did last time for this, but I switched out the Orly black for a more opaque (one-coater!) black; Revlon Espresso. The rest of the polishes are the same, American Apparel Neon YellowAmerican Apparel Neon Green, and China Glaze Sun Worshipper! I also switched top coats to a 3-free one because that's really important to me, and as I've said many times I use Essie Good to Go!


I totally screwed up the colour scheme here as you can probably tell, I got distracted watching a crazy movie! What do you guys think of this version of this mani?



Thank you so much for reading guys! I hope I can keep improving and doing posts like this every year! I also hope you've all had a lovely first week back at school and work! =)

Monday, 30 December 2013

Floral Brocade Nail Art Created Using MrCandiipants' Tutorial!

Hey everyone! Today I have a quick post of some floral brocade nail art to share!

This design is directly copied from Candace of MrCandiipants by following her tutorial here! It's such a lovely design and she's so darn creative for coming up with it!

Floral Brocade Nail Art

I started off this mani with two coats of the lovely Black Sheep Lacquer Jump In The Fire, a thermal polish with gorgeous shimmer! You can see it in it's warmer/normal state in a few of these pictures where it turns a medium pink colour.

Floral Brocade Nail Art

Earlier today I mentioned on my Instagram that I was going to do some New Year's nail art today, but I just couldn't shake the idea of using this thermal polish and I decided I didn't care about being festive :P. It's quite impressive how much and how quickly this polish changes in colour, so I'll insert a little Instagram video of it here!

Floral Brocade Nail Art

For some reason my hands were very cold for most of these pictures, which is fine by me because I love this polish in it's cold state! 

Floral Brocade Nail Art

Floral Brocade Nail Art

Floral Brocade Nail Art

Floral Brocade Nail Art

Here is my right hand! I think it came out approximately as good as my left, which is super exciting! It was also warmer than my left hand ever was while I was taking pictures for some odd reason :P.

Thanks so much for reading everyone! Are you guys doing anything for New Year's Eve? We're having a little party and I'm excited to dress up! :)

Friday, 6 December 2013

Born Pretty Store Flower Water Decal Review and a Gradient!

Hey guys! Today I have some flower-covered gradient nails to share! I will also be reviewing the floral water decals seen here from Born Pretty Store!

Sorry about posting these late guys, I was crashing while editing the pictures so I decided to write it up this morning instead. I try really hard to post every three days but sometimes life (for me, school) gets in the way! I've been exhausted for the last week or so and I'm so glad today's the last day of school! Anything exciting happening in your guys' lives? Let me know!

A bunch of people from Will Paint Nails For Food's Beginner Blogger's Bootcamp Group Critique commented on my last post saying that my fingers were blurry and that it was a bit distracting, and I had seriously never noticed! When I saw my pictures after that, I realized I looked like some weird alien without any lines or wrinkles on my fingers haha! I increased the depth of field before taking these pictures and I think you can see some detail on my fingers now, what do you guys think? :)

For these nails I started with one coat of Essie Mesmerize, painted on NYX Girls Inkheart and Revlon Espresso, and then patted on mixtures of the two colours where they met! I think the gradient looks better and smoother in person, so I'm excited to improve on my gradient skills so they look good in pictures too! Lindsay from Wondrously Polished always does literally perfect gradients (they look like the ones you can make in a photo editing program) and often puts nail art on top, so these nails were definitely inspired by her! I really think it's an amazing and beautiful idea to use a gradient as a background for nail art rather than a plain creme!

As for the decals (link here, they're the BLE422 ones), I was completely silly at first and applied one like a tattoo, and of course the design was upside down and all black and white (see my left hand's thumbnail). I asked my boyfriend if he thought it'd be possible to slide them off and on to the nail so the designs would show, and he ended up trying it for me and it worked! I just wetted a reasonably soft brush (my cleanup brush), let the decal soak in water for 15-20 seconds and slid it off of the paper carefully and onto my nail! You can move them around once they're on your nail for a period of time (especially if you wet your nail first) so you certainly don't have to get the perfect placement right away! I decided to place two decals on top of each other on some nails and I think they look really nice layered! I accidentally crumpled and folded one up, and I was still able to flatten it back out and put it on my nail which really impressed me! The only negative thing I have to say about these is still totally avoidable; top coat can smudge the decals a bit but as long as you apply it carefully (as you would on top of nail art) they won't smudge! I was being very careless when applying my topcoat because I didn't think they would smudge, and they still hardly did! :)

Off-topic, but do you guys think I should spread my text out between the pictures so it's not a huge block of text and then a huge block of pictures? I think I'll start doing that so let me know if you'd prefer I didn't!

Onto the nails!

Blue Gradient Nails

Here's the gradient I started with as a base!

Blue Gradient Nails

Blue Gradient Nails with Flowers

Blue Gradient Nails with Flowers

Blue Gradient Nails with Flowers

Blue Gradient Nails with Flowers

Blue Gradient Nails with Flowers

Blue Gradient Nails with Flowers

My right hand!

If you're looking for any other nail art stuff Born Pretty Store is a good place to check! Here's my coupon for 10% off!


Thanks so much for reading everyone! Have any plans for the weekend? I'll be studying for the three back-to-back finals I have coming up and finishing a biochemistry assignment! :)

Saturday, 19 October 2013

Four New Black Sheep Lacquer Duochromes: Blue-Yea, Blink, Forbidden Fruit and Zaftig Zombie!

Hello everyone! Today I have four lovely new duochromes (or multichromes, a few of them shine four or more different colours in my eyes) from Black Sheep Lacquer to share!*

I swatched each polish at one coat over black, at one coat on their own and at two or three coats for full opacity (and no top coat)! No formula issues, these were a pleasure to work with as usual!

Based on how these polishes look over black, I think these polishes would be absolutely perfect for a galaxy mani! I think I'll do one with these polishes pretty soon!

Also, I apologize for my short nails in the Forbidden Fruit and Zaftig Zombie over black swatches! These swatches took me quite a while to do and I filed my nails down before Erin and I decided I should swatch those two over black as well! I'm so glad I did, these would all be so awesome as topcoats and look so freaking cool and pretty over black specifically!

Get ready to be bombarded with (36) pictures! I apologize in advance!

Orly Liquid Vinyl

My black undies for the swatches over black! Two coats of Orly Liquid Vinyl!

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- one coat

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Blue-Yea

Blue-Yea- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink
Blink- one coat over black


Blink- one coat

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Blink

Blink- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit


Forbidden Fruit- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit


Forbidden Fruit- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit


Forbidden Fruit- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit

Forbidden Fruit- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit

Forbidden Fruit- one coat

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit

Forbidden Fruit- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit

Forbidden Fruit- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit

Forbidden Fruit- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Forbidden Fruit

Forbidden Fruit- three coats

Black Sheep Lacquer Zaftig Zombie

Zaftig Zombie- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Zaftig Zombie

Zaftig Zombie- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Zaftig Zombie

Zaftig Zombie- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Zaftig Zombie

Zaftig Zombie- one coat over black

Black Sheep Lacquer Zaftig Zombie

Zaftig Zombie- one coat

Black Sheep Lacquer Zaftig Zombie

Zaftig Zombie- two coats


Zaftig Zombie- two coats


Zaftig Zombie- two coats


Zaftig Zombie- two coats


Thank you so much for reading! Let me know which one is your favourite in the comments! Have a lovely weekend!

*These products were sent to me for swatches