Spring nails

 

Spring nails

 

Although we're back at rain again.

We've had some Spring days in the past week.

 

 

Time for a Spring nail art!

It's sun I'm wishing for :D

 

Polishes used:
- China Glaze 818 Snow
- Bourjois 26 Blue no blues
- Kiko 268
- Kiko 311
- Maybelline 250 Deep Violet
 

Day 247) Butterfly and flower nail art

Catrice has a new limited edition: Eve in Bloom
A fall collection with an ode to flowers.

I love the colors!
Single and also in combination with eachother.
And look how cute the lid is!





Let's swatch shall we:

Catrice Eve in Bloom - C01 Bloomynous

(Has a little shimmer)

Catrice Eve in Bloom - C02 Floralilac

(Has a little shimmer)

Catrice Eve in Bloom - C03 Bed of flowers

Catrice Eve in Bloom - C04 Rosebuddy

Catrice Eve in Bloom - C05 Blossom you, blossom me










As always brush and nail polish make it easy to apply.
Two coats is enough for a good coverage.
My favorites are #1 Bloomynous and #5 Blossom you, blossom me;
The off-white with the golden shimmer gives it a very classy look. Perfect color for weddingnails or a classy going-to-work color.
Blossom you, blossom me is a beautiful pinky peach. Not as out there as red or pink but a color to be seen. Gorgeous!

My nail art had to contain some kind of flower...of course.
After removing ten attempts of making something beautiful I had to acknowledge that this is that kind of day again; nothing works. And well...
This is what I ended up with:

Nevertheless, I've got to say that this is a beautiful limited edition. Perfect for the transition of summer to fall.

Day 236) Scrapbook nail art

I never did any scrapbooking...well let's say not on purpose anyway.

But I've seen scrapbook art that's truly art and I really like that.

 

Today's nail art is inspired by scrapbooking.

I used different techniques and products and tried to keep it pretty instead of a mess ;-D.

Day 190) Nail art holo glitter with flower stamp

Last week I bought a nail polish here in Portugal that I have to share with you lovely ladies, because it's just that beautiful!
I bought it at the Douglas store (perfumery) for €2,- (which is 2,57 USD).
It's a kind of holo glitter.
In the dark it might look like a plain grey but when you're in direct (sun)light it will take your breath away!
Here is my best picture at night:

Flormar Supershine Perfect Polish - P046 (2 coats)

Can you see what I'm raving about???!!!

Today has been a day of shopping and going out for dinner.
It is almost midnight so I want to do an easy nail art.
Luckily I found a stamping set here for €8,99 (11,56 USD).

Kand stamping kit

This kit contains:
-Stamping polish (black, white and red)
-Image plates
-Scraper
-Remover pads
-Stamp
-Stamp with scraper
-Remover pen

I used the following image plate:

Kand image plate M38

 



The exotic flower (the one with the scratches), is the image I used.

The picture isn't doing the polish any justice, but believe me when I say: It is beautiful!!

Day 166) Gradient with holographic designs (elegant nails)

Hi lovelies,

In addition to the black&white and ombre/gradient nails of the past days I came up with today's nail art.
I really like this nail art and keep looking at it; it's elegant, feminine and a little mysterious because of the holo.
Interested?!
There is a short step-by-step:

Step 1: Make a gradient 
I chose for greys and white
Material:

*Essence Vintage District - 04 Get arty
*Catrice Natural Nail Lacquer
  Limited Edition NEONaturals -
  C05 Have A Good Day
*ICI Paris XL - Only You - White French
*Sponge









You can apply a white polish first to get opacity at once, but I don't think this is really necessary.
Put the sponge onto your nail to estimate the size of your nails; you do want all 3 of the colors on your nail and not just 2 or even empty spaces.
Now apply, with the size of your nails in mind, the 3 nail polishes onto the sponge.
The sponge might absorb some nail polish in the beginning, so keep this in mind while applying and repeat if you don't think it's enough.

Now, place the sponge onto your nail (white on the tip) and roll it over the surface of the nail (horizontal).
At least a few times so that the colors nicely blend.
Repeat this step for the other nails. Depending on the absorption of the sponge you'll have to apply the 3 nail polishes again. Not happy with the opacity? Sponge the nails again.

As you can see, you'll have some cleaning to do.

Putting tape on fingers and cuticles can help!

After cleaning I applied a topcoat.

Step 2: Make designs of your choice on the gradiënt nails (use a popping color like red, purple)

Material:



*Catrice Ultimate Nail Lacquer - 39 Black To The Routes
*China Glaze Holographic - 1171 Infra Red 81159
*Striper brush

I chose to do more elegant designs: flower, butterfly, heart, bow and feather.

Day 155) Floral nail art

Definitely an off-day!

After putting on 3 different nail art designs which I didn't like I ended up with this one, which I also don't like.

However the conclusion is that I have an off-day and on this kind of days I should just quit because nothing will satisfy myself.

Posting nothing would mean ending my challenge, so that's not an option.

So lets get it over with and tomorrow is a new day!

Catrice Ultimate Nail Lacquer - 02 Pimp My Shrimp

Day 142) Nail art leaded glass

"Where do you get your ideas from?" Is a question asked many times.
My secret...
When I have nothing to do I'm just looking through images on Google images. Sometimes of nail arts, but most of the times I'm looking at not nail related images.
When I see an image that I like I immediately try to see this on my nails and decide if it is within my reach.
For today's nail art my theme is leaded glass.
I think this nail art is more for the advanced nail arter and it also is time-consuming, so keep that in mind.

Step-by-step:
 Step 1) Choose an image of leaded glass that you like and use it as your model

Step 2) I started by painting the color areas and left some space between them where the lines have to come. Of course you can also start with the lines if this is easier for you.

Step 3) My reason for not starting with the lines is that I want the color areas to look like stained glass.

In this step I applied a matte topcoat to achieve this effect.

Unfortunately it didn't show well in the picture (so there is no picture of this step), but believe me when I say there's a big difference between the glossy and the matte in real life.

Step 4) Now that you have a matte finish I applied black glossy lines to accomplish the 'lead' look. Silver is another great option, but I was afraid it wouldn't show well in the picture. By the way, the black presents a nice contrast to the other colors.

Done!

I love them!

Day 136) Dotted nails Rainbow

The weather is terrible in The Netherlands.
Nothing but rain, rain and more rain.
Time to compensate these dark days with of course a multicolored nail art: a rainbowy nail art to be precise.

Today I don't have a step-by-step.
I used a white nail polish as background for my nail art.
And for the artistic part I used only a dottingtool and a lot of nail polish colors ;-D

Some extra info that might be useful:
-On the ring finger I did an outline of rainbow dots
-On the pinky I placed dots that I pulled with my dottingtool into a teardrop shape. The pulling of dot into teardrop shape can also be done by using a wooden stick or something like that.

Hope you like it!

Day 131) Velvet nails neon

Today was a busy day and I'm so tired.
The last thing that I want to think about are my nails.
But a challenge is a challenge and I don't like to give up!

However, I did choose to do a simple nail art.
Something that's easy to do and doesn't need much explanation.
So, I took out the velvet again.

The velvet I have is in neon colors and also has a fine glitter. Perfect for summer I think.
The colors I used are:
-Neon pink
-Neon blue
-Neon orange
-Neon green

One nail is in pink, one in blue, one in orange and one in green. I chose to do an accent nail on the ring finger with the 4 colors combined into a flower.
As glue for the velvet I use a cheap topcoat. For the flower I used a dottingtool to apply the topcoat.

Instructions for velvet nails are very simple:
* It's recommended to paint your nails in the same colour as your velvet. When you don't hit every spot of the nail it doesn't show that well.
I have to admit I used a light yellow colour as my base. You can tell this isn't the same as my neons but I didn't want to have the extra work of painting my nails in different colors.
* Use the wet nail polish as a glue or apply a clear coat for glue
* Apply the velvet. Just drop it on the nail and remove the surplus velvet by blowing or careful brushing

When you're combining colors on one nail. Work with one colour at the time.

See you tomorrow hopefully with more energy!

Day 129) Flower nail art summer

Flower nail arts are timeless.
Just change your design or colors a little bit and your flower nail art will do just fine at any occasion or time of the year.
Today's flower nail art is for summer nails but you can do them for spring as well of course.
The design is not very complicated and I have a step-by-step.

1) After the basecoat (of course), Paint your nails in a yellow colour

Essence Colour & Go - 137 Wanna be your sunshine

2) Use a striper brush and a purple colour to paint some flowers on your nails.
    (I've made a bigger one on the left and a smaller one on the right, but it all depends on the size
    of your nails)

Essence Colour & Go - 133 Oh my glitter!

How to make these simple flowers:
The arrows show the movements I've made with the striper brush. The numbers determine the order.
Grote bloem = big flower                             Kleine bloem = small flower
For the bigger one you start with the outer lines of the flower petal (1, 2 and 3) and then colour it in (4).
For the smaller one start with a dot (1) and then pull the polish to the centre of the flower (2).

3) With green you make the stem and stem leaves. An easier version would be some green dots placed around the flowers

Catrice Ultimate Nail Lacquer Limited Edition Neo Geisha - C05 Planet Tokyo

4) Make the centre of the flowers orange

Miss Cop Vernis POP FLUO - No 02 (orange)

5) Use a pink colour to make smaller flower petals within your purple ones. Again this all depends on the size. I only did this for the bigger flowers.

Essence Colour & Go - 107 Naughty and pink!

6) Let it dry for a little while and then apply a topcoat

Essie - Good to go

ALL DONE!

Have fun with it!

Day 120) Nail art dry flowers

I had a great Queensday!
First we watched some tv on which they showed the abdication of Princess Beatrix:

and the investiture of King Willem-Alexander:

To be there in person (which means watch it on the big screen in Amsterdam) is almost impossible because of the crowd and it's much better to watch it on tv anyway.
Then we went to Breda which is the capital city of my province.
The Netherlands has become a country of individuals but at days like these we are all one!
It was a huge orange crowd, not just in Amsterdam but all over the Netherlands.
With people drinking, dancing, laughing and making new friends.
I love this!
It was already very late when we came home but for my challenge I still had to do a nail art...aaaarrrrgggghhhh.
I looked for something easy and...found it: Dry flowers

Dry flowers:

Dry flowers are mostly used for gel and acrylic nails but in my opinion you can use them for nail art on natural nails just as well.

I do recommend you only use the more flatter ones because they stick better, look prettier and don't get damaged that easily.






Usage:
1) Give your nails a basecoat (for a natural look) or paint them in the desired colour.
    You can already use this coat as a glue for your dry flowers but I prefer that let this coat dry.
2) Give your nails a clear coat and use this as glue for your dry flowers.
3) Put the dry flowers on the desired place of your nails.
4) Finish it with a topcoat.
Done!

Too simple for you??
You can always pimp it up by adding some material.
I pimped my nails by using a glitter topcoat and some beads.
I prefer simplicity but hey, we are all different.

The glitter topcoat I used is:
Essence nail art special effect! topper - Nr. 16 Cool breeze

I used this glitter topcoat as glue for my beads.

Which look do you prefer? The simple one or the pimped version?
Let me know!

Day 112) Nail Earth Day

Day 98) Bee nail art

Day 95) Bridal nails

Day 78) Water decals

Day 71) Nail art aquarel flowers

Day 54) Essence nail art magnet pen

Day 33) One stroke flowers