Teal Floral Gradient Stamping Nail Art

Good morning! I had another desire for gradient nails, but this time I decided to do the gradient under the stamping instead of as the stamping. I still stuck with a floral pattern though since I'm so smitten that it's spring!

For the gradient base, I used Essie Go Overboard, OPI Taylor Blue, and KBShimmer A Touch of Glass. I applied two coats of A Touch of Glass and then sponged the other colors over it to create the gradient. Once that was dry, I stamped the flower design over it using Gals plate GA11 and Konad white stamping polish.   

I really almost left it like this. It was so beautiful without the stamping and I worried that stamping over the gradient would ruin it, but I'm happy with how the design turned out. Gradients are my favorite! 

Happy Thanksgiving Feather Gradient Nail Art!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope you all have a wonderful day and eat tons of delicious food! I'll be at my parents' house all day doing just that. ;) I love me a good gradient and this autumn-inspired one has me drooling almost as much as the thought of pumpkin pie!

To create the gradient, I dug through my collection and found a light tan, a burnt orange, a red, and a darker berry red (I'm so sorry I don't remember exactly which ones I used!). I painted all my nails with the light tan and then painted stripes of each color onto a sponge and sponged them onto my nails. Once that was all dry, I stamped a feather image onto each nail with white polish and finished with top coat.

What are you wearing on your nails for Thanksgiving? Are you going Black Friday shopping? I hope everyone stays warm and safe out there, I know how nuts it can get!

Happy 4th of July Nail Art

After finishing up the 500 nail art designs for the book, I can't believe that I still had the desire to do my nails for the 4th of July, but I did! Things should be getting back to normal around here very soon and I hope you're as happy as I am about that!

So anyway, I was originally planning on doing a totally different design on each nail, but decided that I wanted them to be a bit more unified. I decided on stars and stripes for the ring and middle nails and a glitter gradient for the pinky and index nails. The white is Milani White on the Spot, red is Zoya Sooki (which photographed more orange than it looks in real life), and blue is China Glaze First Mate. The glitter for the gradient is Shimmer Nichole.

For my thumbs, I decided to do a red, white, and blue gradient with Shimmer Alice on top. The white got overwhelmed by the red and blue, but I still think it turned out pretty good.

I'll be spending my 4th of July with my family on my grandparents' property, enjoying delicious food, sun bathing, and watching our own personal fireworks show! Do you have any exciting plans for the day? 

Spongebob Squarepants Bikini Bottom Mani

Confession: I'm a giant child and I still watch Spongebob Squarepants by choice and I loooooove it (I know it's mindless garbage, don't judge me!). I've had the idea for this mani for a long time now and I finally just sat down and did it over the weekend. I'm really happy with how it turned out :D

I started out with two coats of Zoya Wednesday and sponged RBL Aqua Lily and CND Anchor Blue to make the underwater gradient. I freehanded the flowery shapes with a small nail art brush using China Glaze Lemon Fizz, Zoya Lotus, Shelby, and Arizona. My gradient looks smoother in person than in the photos, but that's really my only complaint with this one! 

Here is the image I looked at for inspiration (quality is crappy, sorry!):

Barry M Cobalt Blue

You guys know that I'm a sucker for blue, so it shouldn't shock you that I love this one! Katie from Harlow & Co. sent me Barry M Cobalt Blue to swatch and review for her, as well as a Layla holo that will be posted on Wednesday! Cobalt Blue is a gorgeous (you guessed it!) cobalt blue. It is absolutely stunning to look at and the application was great, too. I used two coats for the photos below.

Although Cobalt Blue was stunning on it's own, I quickly decided that I wanted to layer something over it to kick it up just one more notch. I ultimately decided to sponge a glitter gradient from my cuticles with OPI Absolutely Alice. SO glad I did... it was so beautiful!! I've had Absolutely Alice for a while now and haven't even worn it before this. I figured some sponging would be the perfect way to wear it but not use up a ton of the preciousssss.

*Product(s) in this post were provided by the company/retailer for an honest review*

Walt Disney World Series: Part 3

As I was flipping through all my photos from our trip to WDW for inspiration this week, I knew there was no way I could leave this one out. When we were in Epcot, my momma got the prettiest margarita I've ever seen from a booth in Mexico. It was called a Fiesta Margarita and it was made of three different layers of lime, mango, and strawberry margarita. It was so pretty, so I made a mani out of it! 

I started out with two coats of Zoya Purity for my base. I sponged Essie Navigate Her for the lime margarita, Essie Tart Deco and Finger Paints Circus Peanuts for the strawberry, and Finger Paints Lemon Sour for the mango. I'm kicking myself for not buying China Glaze Papaya Punch when it was on clearance at Ulta... it would have been perfect for the mango color! Anyway, I sponged more Purity on my tips and added China Glaze Luxe and Lush on top in an attempt to mimic salt.

And here's my lovely mother with her beverage! Aren't they beautiful? :) And yes, super observant readers, I did mess up the colored layers in my mani...

So how did you like my WDW Series week?? I loved it! I'm going to leave this series open-ended because I definitely think that I want to come back and do more of these inspiration manis!

Zoya Petra & Glitter

Here's a mani I did back in December... not sure why these photos are so awful, but I'm sure you can imagine how pretty it was. :) This is two coats of Zoya Petra with Wet 'n' Wild Color Icon Diamond in the Rough sponged near the cuticle. Diamond in the Rough was the only Color Icon glitter that I chose to pick up and after working with it, I'm glad I only bought one. Even after two thick coats of Seche Vite, it was still coarse to the touch! No me gusta.

These photos really aren't doing much for it, but I remember it being really gorgeous in person. My momma even wanted me to do this for her Christmas mani! 

Day 10: Green & Gold

Happy Monday everyone! Today is going to be a bit of a short post, but I have some better nail art on Wednesday and Friday to round off my holiday designs. For this mani, I used two coats of China Glaze Holly-Day, which I love! Holly-Day is a creamy evergreen that is actually just a smidge darker in person than in my photo. Two coats were all I needed for it to be even and perfect. I sponged some of Zoya Ivanka on my tips and added some big gold glitters from an unnamed polish by a brand called Black Poppy. I picked that one up at PacSun for super cheap! Hope you like! 

Day 8: Gifts w/Zoya Noel

I hope I'm not throwing you off with this horizontally oriented photo. :P I wasn't happy that the silver gift stamp blends in with the blue glitter in all of my photos, so this was the best way I could position it for your viewing pleasure. It stands out more in person, I promise. Anyway, for this mani I started out with two coats of Zoya Noel, which is amazing by the way. As you can see, Noel is a medium blue/aquamarine-y foil with tiny, tiny bits of silver in it. Icy and awesome. 

I sponged Milani Blue Flash on the tips and then sponged Sally Hansen Diamonds on top of that because it STILL wasn't sparkly enough. ;) Lasty, I stamped the gift with Orly Dazzle and topped it off with a light blue rhinestone. I wasn't really crazy about this one at first, but it has grown on me. I know I haven't given you guys a nice macro shot in a while, so here you go! Enjoy!

Neon/Gradient/Crack Mani

My lady-love, Jess, gets all the credit for suggesting this idea. She sent me a photo of something kind of like this and asked me to try it, so I did, of course. I used two coats of China Glaze Flip Flop Fantasy as the base, then sponged a neon orange Sally Girl polish over that (I know it's hard to see because my camera hates neons, but trust me, it's there), then sponged/painted CG In the Limelight and finally painted CG Turned Up Turquoise at the very tips. After that was all dry, I went to grab my bottle of OPI Black Shatter and realized that the damn thing had solidified since the last time I used it. After over half an hour (seriously!) of mixing/thinning/shaking later, I was finally able to get it to a usable consistency. Talk about disappointing.

On the plus side, my Black Shatter has never shattered as awesome as it did today. It turned out so cool that I'm even going to give you a photo of my right hand! I've been informed that adding a few drops of thinner to Black Shatter every so often will keep it from doing this again, let's hope that works!