Beachy Gradient

Do you see the ocean?  When ever I ask my husband what my mani reminds me of he never has the right answer.  Waves crashing on a sandy beach is the right answer.

I’ve never lived anywhere near a beach and I’m afraid of deep water, but sitting on a warm beach, listening to the waves crash sounds fantastic!

Sometimes I just start looking through my polishes and figure out what to do with my nails.  This was one of those days and this was the result.  An oceany, beachy gradient.  My deep ocean color is OPI Yodel Me On My Cell.  The lighter water color OPI Sea Ya Later Sailor.  My beach is a combo of Jordana Chiffon and Icing Glimmer.

Cherries Nails

One of my favorite things about summer time is cherries.  I love cherries; especially Bing!  I had an idea to do a cherry mani a while ago.  I was needing some inspiration today, so I went to my “To Do” list and decided to bust this one out.

It was actually pretty simple, just took some time.  I’m sorta bugged that my ring finger looks a bit like an apple rather than a close up cherry.  I guess, if you took a close up picture of a cherry, it would look like an apple though.  This mani just makes me happy.  They’re cheery cherries!  🙂

I started with NYX Girls White as my base.  It’s a really thin white.  It took four coats to get descent coverage.  The only plus to a super thin formula like that is that I didn’t get any bubbles in those four coats.  My cherries are China Glaze Velvet Bow and OPI Black Cherry Chutney.  My polka dots are China Glaze Starboard and the stems are a mix of Starboard and Finger Paints Sketchy Character.  I topped it all off with Poshé.

Twinsie Tuesday: Holographic Polish

Tuesday!  Totally feels like a Monday because yesterday was a holiday that felt like a weekend.  I love long weekends.  I had a great Memorial Day and I hope the rest of you did too.

Today we’re all showcasing holographic polishes.  I’ve been holding on to a beauty for a while and I’m glad I did so that I can show it to you today.  I give you Glitter Gal 10 to Midnight.

I’d had been eyeballing this polish for a while and just couldn’t take it anymore.  I wish it was a bigger bottle; it’s just a mini.  I layered this over CND Asphalt which is a dark grey with a blue undertone.

I took several dozen pictures with different lighting settings on my camera and actually under different lighting sources.  It was dark when I did this, so there are no sun pictures.  The first three, above, are incandescent lighting.  Below, are all fluorescent.

Look at that bottle shot!  You can see every color of the rainbow in that bottle!  I love it!

Isn’t that gorgeous!  I haven’t had a chance to see this in the sunlight yet, but I’m sure it will be spectacular!

Be sure the check out all the other holos today:

Amanda of Amandalandish
Anna of Going to the Showing
Anne of Grape Fizz Nails
Ashley of Art Evolve
Brandi of The Collegiate Nail
Chelsea of Nailed Blog
ChiChi of I’m Just Me…ChiChi
Cordia of Srsly Swatched
Jenn of All That is Gorgeous
Jenna of I’m Still Thinking
Katherine of Haul of Fame
Marisa of Polish Obsession
Meredith of Polish and Charms
Nory of Fierce Make Up and Nails
Sarah of See Sarah Swatch
Tara of Polishy of Truth

Memorial Day Nails

These were better looking in my imagination. Actually executed, they are pretty busy.

I think if I’d done fat red and white stripes, it would’ve looked better.  I’m not real happy with it, but it’s still pretty patriotic looking.

I used Color Club Reddy or Not (my best, truest red), Jordana Smooth Blue and Sinful Colors Snow Me White.  Happy Memorial Day to all my U.S. readers!

Zebra Water Marble

If I told you this water marble was done with out any tape or polish remover of any kind, would you believe me?  Well, believe it people!

I did a Zebra water marble many months ago and have been wanting to try something like this ever since.  I felt like black and white was a little too predictable and stark.  I went with Jordana Chiffon and Zoya Petra.  Petra is actually a dark, dusty purple, but looks brown on top of the tan Chiffon.  I like the way it looks, but definitely think purple would look better.  Does this look like a zebra to you?  I see a zebra’s back.  They have a “spine” of stripes that runs up their back that other stripes come off of.  I love this design.  I find myself looking at it a lot.  It looks very sophisticated to me.  I think it’s the color combo.

Back to the no tape thing, have you heard of using tape in conjunction with Vaseline to make clean up easier?  Well how about using Vaseline instead of tape?  I actually used Aquaphor ointment rather than Vaseline.  I slathered my finger in it.  I got it as close to my nail as I could without actually touching my nail.  That way when I dipped my finger in the polish water, the polish didn’t stick to my skin and I could just wipe it away with a cotton swab.

Around my cuticle, while the polish was still wet, I ran my shish kabob skewer (as opposed to a toothpick) all around the edge pulling the excess polish out as I went.  I know, that probably doesn’t make much sense.  I did a video here that shows the technique.  And there you go, you’re fingers will be greasy, but there’s a tape free, polish remover free water marble.

Try it and let me know what you think!