31 Day Challenge, Day Eighteen: Half-moons

I want to start off by saying I love half-moon designs. I also want to point out that I love this combo, it just shouts: "WELCOME TO SUMMER!" ^_^

The colors I used are China Glaze: "Lemon Fizz" and "Peachy Keen".

I simply adore everything about China Glaze polishes, they are long lasting and super easy with applying. 

I tried out a new top coat, :( R.I.P. Seche Vite, Julep Freedom Polymer Top Coat. It's super shiny, fast drying and I'm going on day three with no chips! 

31 Day Challenge, Day Thirteen: Animal Print

My first time free-hand butterflies, a step-by-step guide....

1) One coat of this fabulous orange
2) Saran Wrap
3) Using the saran wrap technique I put on one coat of a lovely pink shade
4) Ta-Da!

First time trying but I like the effect

31 Day Challenge, Day Two: Orange

So I finally did half moons, and I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the result. It's clean and classy and leaves enough wiggle room for you to throw in a little extra something. For this design I used regular paper reinforcements (Which I own in clear but would def recommend using white so you can actually see what you are doing), China Glaze- "Peachy Keen", Nail Tape (For my ring fingers) and Studs; along with my fabulous Julep- Ingrid.

Have I told you recently how much I enjoy being a Julep Maven?! I'm only about three months in, but getting two polishes monthly that has great color and brush quality along with free products for manis and pedis- how can you pass that up!? Take the quiz, it'll tell you what kind of maven you are, and then you can be well on your way for have your only personal care package waiting for you at home on a monthly basis.

Any-hoo, back to Day Two:

Thanks for reading!

Tape Me Up

I decided to start if the new year with some tape manicures, LOVE tape manis! The first was actually inspired by my boyfriend, who although he makes fun of nail obsession he does ask me questions that force me to see my colors differently- sometimes less is more. My second look is inspired by packapunchpolish, I just LOVED this manicure the moment I saw it.

Look #1
What I used:

Essie- "Angora Cardi"
Nails Inc. - "Black Taxi"

Look #2

What I Used:

"High Hopes", "Grape Pop", "Four Leaf Clover", "Heli-Yum", & OPI- "Havana Dreams"
the Glitter used but not shown is OPI- "Spark-Tacular! Top Coat"

Using nail tape to create the boxes and then fill them in randomly did take time, but it was definitely worth it!

A lil Tape Goes a Long Way.

So today's entry I wanted to dedicate to tape manicures. When I first purchased my nail tape I didn't think much of it except that it would look pretty, so I focused on designs like
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unfortunately this manicure didn't last too long as the tape started peeling off 2 days after I did my manicure!

So after some soul searching I started creating the more typical design you expect from tape manicures like this pic ------------>
And honestly this manicure did last MUCH longer.

Further along my journey I stumbled across Nailside Blog which helped open my eyes to this brilliant nail community. I was also inspired to recreate some of her designs.

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And lastly there are always blunders along the way. Usually nail tape peels away clean but I've found two things save me from particularly thick designs/polishes, an occasional coat of Seche Vite as I go and trying to make the tape color to the polish color as much as possible.

Thanks for reading!