Vibrant Sunset

 I love painting clouds and gradients, so of course sunsets are a ton of fun. My friend Muse suggested the theme, so of course I had to tackle it!

 I knew I wanted to do a blue-to-orange gradient, but I wanted it to have a softer tone. So rather than sponging over a bright white base, I used the slightly more subdued cream OPI Don't Bossa Nova Me Around (also, it was still on my desk from yesterday). Next, I used a cosmetic sponge and built up a gradient using Color Club Hydrangea Kiss (soft blue), Rimmel Reggae Splash (Peach), and China Glaze Life Preserver (Orange). I added the sun on my middle nail using a halo of OPI I Just Can't Cope-acabana, which is a great yellow, and a little China Glaze White on White. I decided to orient my thumb sideways so that I could line it up to show the full landscape!

 To make the clouds, I first started with a medium-sized pointed brush and small amounts of Icing Purple Haze, a medium purple. I then darkened the upper edge of each cloud with Sinful Colors Mesmerize, a darker, cooler purple. I used a little Rimmel Reggae Splash on the underside of the clouds to lighten them. After that, I used a toothpick and some more of the white and yellow polish to outline and highlight the edges of the clouds, leading more to the 'backlit' look.

As a final touch, I used China Glaze Liquid Leather to add a black horizon across each nail. I also added a little tree and a windmill, because windmills at sunset make beautiful photographs!

Colors Used:

OPI Don't Bossa Nova Me Around (base underneath gradient)

Color Club Hydrangea Kiss

Rimmel Reggae Splash

China Glaze Life Preserver

OPI I Just Can't Cope-acabana

China Glaze White on White

Icing Purple Haze

Sinful Colors Mesmerize

China Glaze Liquid Leather

(Trying out doing group bottle shots, let me know what you think!)

Quite Quilted

 Quilted nails are fun! I don't know who pioneered this idea, but it's definitely eye-catching! I do still need to practice my line spacing, but it's not too noticeable.

 I started with OPI Pepe's Purple Passion on each nail save my ring nail. On that nail, I used OPI Don't Bossa Nova Me Around, a nice light cream tone. I wanted to experiment and see how this would look over stamping, so I used more Purple Passion and Bundle Monster plate BM-312.

 I then mattified everying. While that was drying, I used a floss pick to add the quilted lines to each nail. It's such a fun effect! I decided to bling it up a little with some gold glitter placed at the line intersections.

Colors Used:

OPI Pepe's Purple Passion

OPI Don't Bossa Nova Me Around

Watermelons

 I really like how these turned out! Watermelons have such a fun color scheme. I even managed to wear pink without feeling too girly today.

 I began with the perfect watermelon-y color, ORLY Butterflies. It is an amazing jelly polish, very pigmented while still having that translucent squishy jelly appearance. I added teeny black microbeads and layered a little more jelly over the top to give it a fun 3D seeded look. I took a porous sponge and a teeny amount of NYC Pinstripe White to add a little texture to the appearance of the watermelon.

 On my index and pinkie nail, I used Sinful Colors Curry Up and Revlon Emerald City to paint watermelon rinds. I then added a hint of white to the tip of each pink nail, followed by a line of greens to represent the edge of the rind.

Colors Used:

ORLY Butterflies

 NYC Pinstripe White

 Sinful Colors Curry Up

Revlon Emerald City

One Stroke Iris

Finally decided to try one stroke painting! I don't think I did too badly for my first try, though I will definitely have to practice more! I tried to paint bearded iris flowers, as those are by far my favorite flower.

 I started with three coats of OPI Samoan Sand, as it's a really good nude tone on me. The iris flowers were painted with white and purple acrylic paint and a chisel-tip brush. I used a touch of yellow at the center of each 'fall' petal to represent the fuzzy beard. I thought about doing multimedia nails with flocking powder, but figured that would make it lose some of the delicacy of one-stroke.

 I touched up the tips of the flowers with a thin line of white, to make them pop a little more. Lastly, I used Zoya Hudson on my ring nail to accent. It was fortunately almost a perfect match to the purple acrylic paint! I also had fun adding some bling, because I have quite a few nail gems that I need to use!

 Even my dominant hand turned out okay!

Colors Used:

 OPI Samoan Sand

Purple, white, green, and yellow acrylic craft paint

Zoya Hudson

Foil Fun!

 I happened upon a lovely foil kit in TJ Maxx the other day, and of course I had to get it! I was excited to get another bottle of foil glue, as mine is getting rather gloopy and I just hadn't gotten around to ordering more on Amazon. However, this kit had a hidden gem! In addition to lovely foils, and quite a large quantity of each color, this kit came with a topcoat that WORKS for foils!

 On my left hand I used the included topcoat as a protectant before adding a layer of Seche Vite. On my right hand I experimented with other products to see if I had anything that would not pull, wrinkle, or drag out the foil. On my pinkie I tried OPI Nail Strengthener, as I'd heard some people had success with non-topcoat products. No dice there, it really started to pull the color away.  On my ring nail I tried Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Clearly Quick to see if a thinner topcoat would sort of work. That was really disastrous, with tons of wrinkling! On the remaining nails, I sort of did okay with NYC Demon Glow, which is a UV Active topcoat. Still, those were nowhere near as smooth as the cheapo top coat nails on my left hand!

 These two photos really highlight the difference! The top photo, my left hand, has the cheap topcoat and significantly less wrinkling.

 Oh, and to accent the purty purty foil, I added some fun star glitter to my ring nails.

 Here's the bottle of generic-looking foil top coat. It has absolutely no smell, but is the consistency of regular nail polish. I checked the box, and it lists the ingredients as water, glycerin, cellulose gum, and a host of cosmetic preservatives. So now I'm totally tempted to experiment with mixing my own water-glycerin combos to see if I can recreate the results!

Rainbowflakes!

 Today I decided to just enjoy a polish that was begging to be tried, and I held off doing much in the way of embellishments. I love it!

 First off, I wanted to try a polish that Garnet of The Nail Rainbow had gifted me. OPI Ink is a wonderfully shifty dark purple that moves from a warm to cool purple depending on the lighting. I knew I wanted to try a dark base today, but I wanted something with a little more life than flat black. This worked amazingly well!

 The magical flakie topper is Dance Legend 603, and it is like a broken rainbow in a bottle. I only used one coat on each nail to get a huge splash of color! I have seen photos where people used more than one coat for more of a full coverage mosaic, but I was in love with the more scattered effect. These flakes shift from orange and blue all the way to green and yellow, and just look amazing.

I did decide to throw in a long diamond stud as an accent, and for a little extra fun I changed it from standard gold to a bright orange by painting it with a little ORLY What's the Password?

Colors Used:

OPI Ink

Dance Legend 603

ORLY What's the Password?

Magnetic Memorial

 Time to play with some magnetic polish! I wanted to have fun with more Memorial Day nails, while also experimenting with magnets. I don't have any magnetic polish I would truly call 'red', but this reddish purple did the job fairly well! It rather reminds me of those 'country style' or 'rustic' more subdued color schemes.

 I began by using a base coat of China Glaze White on White. I knew I would be using tape, so I wanted to wait until it was as dry as possible. I then placed two pieces of striping tape side by side to make the stripe wider. Next, I painted over it with two coats of Sinful Colors Captivate Me. On the second coat, I used a magnet to apply a diagonal stripe effect. It still showed up well after the tape was removed! China Glaze Sparks Will Fly was used over the bottom fourth of the nail, and I used the same magnet to add more effect. The magnet was easy to align, and using the same one did make it seem more cohesive.

 I decided to leave my middle and ring nails as one solid coat of each magnetic polish. I absolutely adore Captivate Me. It reacts amazingly well to the magnet, and has a brilliant holo glitter that really shines in the darker patches. Sparks Will Fly doesn't show the magnetic pattern as crisply, but it had a wonderful formula.

Lastly, I did my thumbs as half-and-half of each magnetic polish split by a line of white. I had some metal star brads that weren't intended for nail art, but I cut off the spines and sanded the edges, and it worked perfectly!

Colors Used:

China Glaze White on White

Sinful Colors Captivate Me

China Glaze Sparks Will Fly