31 Day Nail Art Challenge - Day 18: Half Moons

Tonight's post will be short and sweet! I'm exhausted and can't even believe that I'm still awake...I'm definitely not functioning on all cylinders so bear with me if I don't make sense through out this post ;) 

Today's challenge theme was Half Moons - a look I haven't tried before but has been on my list. I contemplated a few different designs for tonight and considered adding some stripes or patterns inside the half moon, but in the end, I did a really simple mani. 

Can't Find My Czechbook Striping

I think some of my favorite manis are striping based looks. They are just so clean and classy to me. And I love geometric shapes more than is probably normal so any time I get to make an interesting design using only lines, I'm immediately in love. 

I recently became the proud mother to OPI's Can't Find My Czechbook, which is a fabulous blue from their Euro Centrale Collection. LOOK AT THIS COLOR! unf. 

I love it. It's fabulous. Let's move one. 

As I've mentioned before, I finally bought a new bottle of OPI's My Boyfriend Scales Walls (yet another unhealthy obsession). I decided to whip out my striping tape and put my new bottles to use. 

OPI's Liquid Sand Collection and a battery charger for me!

I have been a bad blogger this week. I've been so worn out this week or busy with other random aspects of my life that I haven't gotten around to posting what I've been working on. I'm changing that now! 

Last Tuesday I got the mini set of Mariah Carey's Liquid Sand Collection! I've been intrigued by these since they were announced and I'm glad I've finally got my hands on them. The mini set came with 4 colors, all matte and in this liquid sand texture. These all applied amazingly easy, though I wasn't used to the drying time they required since I'm usually able to apply a fast dry top coat. I'll have to look into a mattifying fast dry top coat...hmm...

OPI's My Boyfriend Scales Walls...again...

Well, I'm officially obsessed with this color. Is it unreasonable to want to wear it every day for the rest of my life? I think that's entirely acceptable. It's just so pretty by itself...or under designs...or in the bottle...

Anyway, I had to use it again and here is the result :) I deviated a bit from my original plan with these, but I still like them. This were quick and simple with the aide of my trusty striping brush. 

My camera charger is MIA...

Do you know what my cell phone camera and a potato have in common? They both same the same quality photos!...and I'm only slightly exaggerating!

With my move a few months ago I somehow managed to misplace the battery charger for my Canon and I am so sad! I suppose I should be thankful that the two fully charged batteries that I did have lasted as long as they did, but I'm really not looking forward to buying a new charger (especially since the old one will turn up soon after). In the meantime, I'm going to search for a new camera app that will hopefully make better use of the alleged 8 megapixel camera that my phone has. The past few manis I did I've only taken photos with my phone, so bear with me on the quality and lack of pictures. I'm going to throw them all into this post and hopefully I'll have my camera up and running again soon! 

For this first mani, I was lacking a bit of inspiration and ended up making my boyfriend sift through my polishes and find some colors he wanted me to use. After much deliberation, he ended up choosing Butter London's Disco Biscuit and OPI's Gold Shatter. I've used Disco Biscuit before but the Gold Shatter was new to me. My mom actually surprised me with it when I was visiting home over the holidays when she found out that in all my collection, I did not have one shatter polish! She's kind of great :) 

OPI's My Boyfriend Scales Walls

My Boyfriend Scales Walls is a color I would in fact scale walls for. It's from OPI's Spiderman collection and I've been lusting after it for awhile because it's the perfect off-white that has a touch of grey in it. Just stunning. Here's a quick swatch of it! :)

I had to use 3 coats to get the opaqueness I wanted and there was a little bit of an issue with streaking, but those were both easily managed. I find the longer I wait between each coat the better but for this mani, inspiration struck at about 12:30 am...so naturally I rushed through each top coat...only to have o take more time to fix some goopiness. I need to remember to take my time and do it right the first time. 

Anywho, I ended up paring this lovely color with Sephora by OPI's Caught With My Khakis Down, which, lets face it, I would have bought for the name alone. The fact that it's a beautiful green (my favorite!) only adds to this polish. Here's the look. I used a striping brush 

Snowflakes for December!

I'm going to talk about winter again because, well, it's winter! But also because I'm going to be going to Costa Rica for 10 days starting on the 13th so I will be missing half of my favorite time of year being away! I found this nail art challenge on Instagram for the month of December and thought I would give it a go! 

Is it too early for a Christmas mani?

Autumn and Winter are by far my favorite time of the year. I love being able to bundle up on the couch next to the fire with my hot cocoa and a great book. Reading and nail painting are essentially tied for favorite things to do so don't make me choose! (Maybe I'll do some book reviews on here occasionally...hmm). Anyway! The past few days have finally begun to be gloomy and cold (only took to the end of November!..but that's what you get in California) and driving home after work with the sun already down and all the Christmas lights up really solidified the feeling that it is in fact winter! My favorite! 

I was feeling inspired by the time of year and landed on PRESENTS! Everyone loves to give and/or receive gifts and I've been slowly finding presents to give to friends and family so it seemed fitting. 

I used, YET AGAIN (sorry!) Sephora by OPI's Mr. Right Now because it is my all time favorite red and I am going to have to go buy more soon. My striping accents (you have no idea how many times I checked to make sure that didn't say stripping accents...) are Ulta's Concrete Evidence and a mini Sephora by OPI called Already Famous that came as part of their winter Tinsel Town Collection. 

Let sleeping nails lie? Pfft!

I am incapable of just letting things be. I like to tinker. I will change my phone background every few days because I'm bored with the current one. My blog background, style and layout will no doubt change several times in the coming months. The same happened with my nails tonight. It's a wonder I've been with the same guy for 7 years ;) 

Tonight, I was especially jonesing to paint my nails but I was still completely in love with my mani from last night. So I started browsing patterns online that I could possibly make work with what I already had going on. About 3 pages in and I came upon this one: 

Source: http://www.etsy.com/search_results.php?search_type=all&includes%5B0%5D=tags&search_query=navy+blue+pillows&page=1

I could have gone with a free hand attempt at this, but I wasn't really in the mood for the potential screwup that could occur and the fallout afterwards. So I went with taping instead. Still a pretty terrible idea! 

I ALMOST gave up on this pattern and had to get pretty innovative in order to make it happen, but here is the result. 

I even managed to get both thumbs!

Happy Polishing.

Blue ombre makes my heart happy!

I used to think I was strictly a red/pink polish kind of girl. However, Essie's Butler Please converted me to blues in two seconds flat. Lately whenever I see a blue polish I've been snapping it up and I finally have enough blues to attempt an ombre look.

Most ombre nails I see have the thumb painted white and then the chosen color gets progressively darker as you move toward the pinky. I'm not always a fan of white and in this case I felt like it would have been far too drastic a change to go from white to dark navy blue. Instead, I went with a blue to grey sort of ombre effect and I love it. I get to use Butler Please, as well ast my new Zoya Natty!

From the left:

Essie Butler Please

Kleancolor Neon Sapphire

Zoya Natty

Sally Hanse Gray by Gray

OPI I Have a Herring Problem

Electric blue with Butler Please all the way over to a shimmery/glittered out grey with I've got a Herring Problem. I wasn't sure I would like having the glitter mixed with all the cremes, but I think it adds some extra pizazz.

There are many color options for an ombre mani. I'm thinking as Thanksgiving nears I'll go with some oranges and reds for a fall look. 

Happy Polishing.

SOPI, gummified!

My obsession with matte polishes is I am sure unhealthy, but can you blame me?? It looks so amazing. Like gummies on my fingertips! One of my all time favorite reds is Sephora by OPI, Mr. Right Now and while this polish does not disappoint as a stand alone color, I absolutely LOVED it with a coat of Essie's Matte About You. So amazing and good enough to eat! 

I decided after the fact to add a little extra flair by striping across my ring finger with some Zoya Storm. I left the Zoya as is with no matte finish. 

Happy Polishing. 

I am Matte About YOU

I recently made what I would consider to be the BEST decision of my life. Okay, well my nail polish life? THAT'S A PRETTY BIG DEAL! I purchased Essie's "Matte About You" and I am in love and I don't care who knows it! I've always been a big fan of the flat matte look but until recently I had no idea that anything like this existed. I generally like to go for an understated look with my nails; nothing too flashy, but still something that's got some good energy to it. As shown in my first post, I'm trying the whole taping technique out and thoroughly enjoying it. I have been using basic scotch tape, though I've seen and heard of using masking tape as well (personally, the masking tape ended up bringing up the base polish I was using). I'm starting to get the hang of it and this is what I came up with.

The main polish is OPI "I Brake for Manicures." This color is pretty, but it's definitely hard to figure out exactly WHAT color it is. Depending on the lighting, it changes from a dark brown/grey/burgundy,  to a deep grey blue. I thought I was getting a deep navy when I ordered it, so I suppose be weary of that fact before buying. All in in all, I do like this color and while at first glance it seems black, it feels like a deep coffee brown. Yes, it's all about the feels!

 Happy Polishing!

Follow Me on Glitter V-Gaps

I've been painting/polishing/lacquering/loving my nails for as long as I can remember. My Mother used to paint my sister's and my nails on the weekends and we'd spend the rest of the week slowly chipping the polish off through our childhood activities. Apparently, making mud pies and being a kid are hard on polish. Who knew!?

I've since moved on from there and am slowly growing a new collection of polishes. I've also been strictly a one color kind of gal, but lately I've been expanding my horizons and realizing that I like adding a little pizazz to my nails. For the most part though, my manicures remain understated, with a little bit of a kick ;)

My first "real" nail art if you will, was a taping attempt at simple chevrons. Basically, I'm in LOVE with the polish and the look of these nails.

The Green is OPI "Don't Mess With OPI" from the Texas Spring/Summer 2011 Collection

And the lovely gunmetal/silver/glittery goodness is Nicole by OPI "Follow Me on Glitter" Kardashian Collection

Happy Polishing!