Koi Manicure

Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Dive Deeper over Diamond Cosmetics Oh Tiff, Diamond Cosmetics Midnight Blue, acrylic paint used to paint koi

Abstract Leopard Print

Diamond Cosmetics Orange Blush, OPI Alpine Snow and OPI Fly.

Neon Hearts

I really love the neon trend this season (and have always loved neons!) so when I saw this design I knew I had to try it. Mine is a bit more neon than the original.

 I used OPI Alpine Snow for the base, then China Glaze Celtic Sun on top. The pink is love & beauty Fuschia. I painted a little white heart with acrylic paint and then added chartreuse glitter. The colors are a lot brighter in person, almost glowing. This is one of my favorite looks so far!

And a mini haul:

MAC lipsticks in Quick Sizzle and Naughty Saute, Dior palette in Garden Pastels (441). 

Yay for spring colors!

Yellow and Pink Hearts

Whew, been so busy with school lately! I've mostly been doing plain manis but with Valentine's Day coming up I wanted to do at least a couple of fun ones. Here's what I'm wearing today:

Messy, I know; I was rushing. The base is Orly Winter Wonderland, then I did 3D acrylic hearts and some heart-shaped glitter.

Hope everyone has some nice plans for V Day, significant other or not!

NYE Mani

This mani is a bit beaten up and there's some purple from my hair dye but this is what I wore for New Year's Eve 2011:

Gray base is Catrice London's Weather Forecast, silver glitter is Misa Dance Fever, tips are Etude House WH004. I was thinking about changing it for NYE but I didn't end up having enough time. Oh well.

Sephora currently has an offer of an extra 20% off sale items so I just couldn't help myself! Plus I needed to pick up the Nicki Minaj for OPI collection of course.

Tokidoki Pittura Brush Set 24 Karat Edition, Paperself lashes in Deer & Butterfly and Peacock, Urban Decay 24/7 Shadow Pencil Stash, and Nicki Minaj for OPI polishes in Super Bass Shatter, Fly, Did It On Em, Pink Friday, Save Me, and Metallic 4 Life. I love Nicki Minaj and I'm so excited to try out the polishes!

Did you do any damage for New Year's?

Black and Gold Snowflake Mani

Yikes, it's been over a month! Been so busy with finals and the holiday celebrations have begun already. Here's my current mani:

I copied the design from one of my favorite nail blogs, Mini Nail Blog. She did a much better job of course, but I am really happy with the result! I love the conventional snowflakes with the unconventional color scheme. I used American Apparel Hassid as the black base, the white is Chanel Pearl Drop, and gold acrylic paint for the designs. 

Of course, with all the holiday shopping, I had to buy a few things of my own!

This was my Urban Decay haul from actually a while back. I bought two lipsticks in Jilted and Lovechild and they came with the free deluxe lipstick cap! I also bought liquid liners in Radium and Ecstasy, a green matte shadow, an olive green pigment, the Urban Bride set, and some Urban Defense tinted moisturizer. Can't resist a sale!

I bought this OCC Lip Tar set in Nearly Neon on Black Friday. The colors are Harlot, Hoochie, Queen, Beta, and Anime. It also includes their lip brush.

More of my growing lip obsession! I bought Hourglass lipstick in Fever, Nars lipsticks in Red Lizard and Schiap, and MUFE lipstick in #9. I also bought the UD 24/7 Shadow blending brush and used some of my Sephora Beauty Insider points for a deluxe sample of Laura Mercier tinted moisturizer and NARS primer. I also found some NYX matte lipstick in Shocking Pink (not from Sephora), which is supposed to be very similar to MAC Candy Yum Yum (which I missed out on).

Hope everyone is having a nice holiday and gets the stuff they want!

Ghost Mani and Some Shopping!

I've been so busy lately with midterms and papers, whew! Finally have a little time to post.

This mani is a bit late for Halloween but I wanted to share anyway:

This was inspired by a design by Asami. I used China Glaze Frostbite, Sinful Colors black nail art striper polish, and white acrylic paint. My ghosts aren't as good as hers but you get the idea. I added the little gems for a little extra sparkle. Happy belated Halloween!

So what is better for all the school stress than a little retail shopping? Or a lot, actually...

The new Hello Kitty x Tokidoki collection is too cute! I couldn't resist. 

More shopping hauls to come later. Can't resist the sales!

Candy Corn Mani

Whew, can't believe it's been so long since I posted! Things were pretty hectic for a while with midterms and papers but it's a bit calmer for now. I actually did another mani with spiderwebs but I forgot to take pictures and it didn't turn out quite the way I had hoped anyway, so here's my second Halloween-themed mani:

Yum, candy corn! One of everyone's favorite candies, I'm sure! 

This one's easy to do. I started out with MAC Vestral White as a base, then used Zoya Sienna for the orange, and Milani Yellow Whiz for the tips. It was a bit too many coats though, so next time I'd recommend doing the entire nail orange and then adding the white and yellow on top. 

Of course, I just had to buy some candy corn for the picture and ended up eating almost the entire bag.

Hello Kitty French

I did my friend Sara's nails recently. The design was her idea, she wanted pink polish with a Hello Kitty French tip accent (with a pink bow). I wish I had been able to make it a bit neater but I think it's pretty cute overall!

I used Hello Kitty for MAC Something About Pink and Vestral White.

Who doesn't love some Hello Kitty? ^^

Dodgers French

They were giving out Dodgers Hello Kitty plushes a couple weeks ago so I had to go, of course. I did my sister's nails for the game.

It was a collaboration between us, both the design and the work. She did the lettering, I did everything else. The blue tips were done with Blue from Love & Beauty (Forever 21) and red glitter heart was done with Milani Red Sparkle. The letters were done with acrylic paint and we added some jewels and I did a 3D acrylic blue bow. She added Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure and an iridescent glitter polish on top for some extra sparkle.

Go Dodgers! :)

Purple Tips and Lunula (with Bling and Bow!)

Finally, I had some time to do some proper nail art! Here was my inspiration:

Unfortunately, I still need quite a bit of practice when it comes to doing ruffles. Here are some of my practice attempts:

Getting there, but definitely not there yet. So, I decided to tweak the design a bit. I started out with Orly Bonder base coat and then, alternating tips and lunulas, did two coats of Essie Lilacism and Catrice Plum Play With Me (less red IRL).

Then I added rhinestones, a tiny pop ball chain, and a couple acrylic bows:

Ta-da! My bows still need a bit of work but I'm happy with the look overall. Obviously not the same as the picture but I still think it's super cute and got lots of compliments! Now I'm all ready for the weekend.

Navy/Pink with Hearts

Blah, been so busy with school lately! I'm a full-time student x2 so I don't have as much time to do my nails. I'm trying to make some time, though. It's a hobby of mine and I do it to relax. I did find out that my esthetician class allows pretty much anything on your nails as long as the polish isn't chipped and your nails are short, yay! 

Anyway, here's what I've had on my nails recently, first pic is from a magazine. Please ignore the tip wear, these were taken a couple days after I did my nails (oh, and a couple pieces of glitter are missing!).

I tried using the little gold bullion beads but it was too difficult, the beads and glue were getting everywhere. It would have been a lot easier to use a tiny pop ball chain but I don't have one (yet). So, I thought some hex glitter would be a pretty good substitute. Also, in the magazine it looks like they used both pink and a peachy color, but I thought it would be a little too random-looking. It ends up looking pretty random anyway but I actually got lots of compliments (I think people like hearts!). The navy blue jelly is Nfu-oh 119, the pink is Essie Neo Whimsical. I do really like the contrast of the navy and pink, I'll have to keep that in mind.

Black and White Op Art Mani

I recently started school and I thought it would be fun to do something special for the first day. Here is the design I wanted to try:

Op art! It kind of reminds me of one of those Escher poster you see in every dorm room (including mine back in the day). I've wanted to do this one for a while now and it's not as hard as it looks! If you look closely, basically every nail is painted in three sections. To get started, I did one coat of base coat and then taped off the first sections:

Next, I painted them either white or black:

I then added the stripes, pulled off the tape, then taped off the second sections:

Again, I painted a white base and then added stripes. For the second section, you have to be careful not to paint over the first section too much, as the tape only protects the tips of the nails, not the part that has already been painted.

Peel off the tape:

No need to tape off the third section, just be careful not to paint over the second sections:

Add stripes:

This is what is looks like after some clean-up:

I don't have any pyramid studs so I finished it off with clear and black square rhinestones instead. They're unnecessary though, I think I'll skip them next time. Add some top coat and you're done! Here's the finished product:

I used American Apparel Hassid for the big black sections and MAC Vestral White and Sinful Colors Time Off (their black striper polish) for the stripes. I wouldn't recommend either of these. If you can, choose a one-coat white (I've heard Sally Hansen Whirlwind White from the Insta-Dri line is good) and my own striper brush. I found that the one that came with the Sinful Colors polish was really messy. The polish itself was also a bit thick, it might have been easier to use acrylic paint instead. I know better for the next time I do it but I still think it's pretty cool!

Mint Green Jewels

I was in the mood to do something fun so I decided to try this mani:

I simplified it a little bit because my nails are so much shorter than the ones in the picture, but I like the results!

First, I painted my nails with Revlon Minted as the base. Then, I used a small brush to paint an outline with Diamond Cosmetics Party Hearty. It's a rose gold as opposed to the regular gold in the picture, but I think it works well enough. Lastly, I added the rhinestones and bullion beads. It's actually not as complicated as it looks! Gluing on the beads/stones takes a little bit of time but it's so much easier and faster than, say, painting a floral print. I love the placement of the stones but I think my favorite part is actually the gold outline, I like the way it frames the mint green. As I've said before, I love doing manis with lots of rhinestones because it looks ornate but isn't a lot of work. You can obviously experiment with different colors and placements as well of course. If you're intimidated by nail art, try something easy and sparkly!

3D Rose

I really like 3D acrylic nail art but I need a LOT more practice so I don't do it very often. Every once in a while though, I like to just sit down and practice a bit. This is the result of my last practice session.

Here is my 3D acrylic rose with flower and leaf rhinestones. The peach color is Essie Van D'Go and the white is MAC Vestral White. It actually took me about a good hour to make two decent roses, haha. Honestly, I'm not super happy with the overall design (I think the rhinestones are a bit much) but I'm pretty proud of the flower! Now if only I could do it on the first try...

Glitter Bindhi Mani

I saw this design in a magazine and it really caught my eye:

I love the way it looks like a beautiful, intricate bindhi design, so sparkly, feminine, and elegant. It also didn't look too hard (no time-consuming florals!) so I thought I'd try it out.

Here are the polishes I used:

Top row L to R: Milani Blue Flash, Color Club Take Me To Your Chateau, OPI Last Friday Night
Bottom row: no-name fuchsia glitter polish from Transdesign, Essie Splash of Grenadine, OPI Teenage Dream

First step was to paint little crescents with the glitter polishes, then shape them while the polish is still wet. I used a popsicle stick but an orange stick would be ideal.

Next, I painted French tips with the cream colors. I did this freehand but you can always use sticker guides of course.

Then, I added the sheer glitter toppers. As you can see the tips got a bit smeared so I would advise that you kind of pat the glitter on the tips rather than paint them on. This will minimize the smearing.

Last step was to add the pearls and rhinestones and a thick layer of topcoat:

After I had finished I realized I should have used a slightly darker blue but I still love the results! Rhinestone designs are a fairly easy way to make seemingly ornate designs without much effort. If you're not sure what you want I recommend buying one of the multi-sets on ebay for cheap. Born Pretty Store also has a whole kit you can buy with various rhinestones, orange sticks, dotting tools, and nail glue (link is my referral link).

If you're looking for nail art that is fairly easy but impressive, try this one!