Digits Design Series: I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Halloween! Design #5-FRANKENFINGERS; They're ALIVE!

As I've been looking on the web for inspiration for Halloween I've seen so many manicures based on Frankenstein (check it out for yourself, you'll see). I've been very anti doing any been there done that type of manicures, so I've stayed away from ol' Frankie.

Until today.

Not only because I've been uninspired and not thought of any good new ideas on my own, but because I was watching tv and a commercial came on for a special showing of a double feature for Frankenstein and Frankenstein's Bride coming to my area movie theater. 

Yahoo!

I haven't seen either of those movies in years, and suddenly I felt inspired. So, here they are my FRANKENFINGERS:

Right hand, which I always do too, BTW...

I used Funky Fingers "Ectoplasmic" (at least I think that's the name, some polish got on the end of the "asmic"), Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear "Black Out", LA Colors Art Deco in Silver, Claire's "Galaxy" (side note: major shrinkage with Galaxy which fortunately wasn't an issue with this design since I put it over black polish), the black nail art polish I got from 5 Below to fill in Frankie's hair and do his stitches, and Mash plate #38. 

They're a little stylized, which I love. I showed my nails to my kids when I was done (which I always do, to the point that now they ask "what are you going to do next?" after I've worn the same manicure for more than a day...oy!) and my oldest son says "Looks like it represents his creation too and all the electricity and stuff." and I was all "You get me! You really get me!". Ha ha :)

I'm really happy with them and will be wearing the heck out of them this week (until they start to chip, or course!).

Digits Design Series: I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Halloween! Design #4-Grave Danger

I must say, as much as I love, love, love Halloween, it has been getting more and more difficult for me to come up with some inspired designs. I don't know what's up with that. I think I'm mentally stuck in the box labeled "orange, black, green, and purple only". Limiting myself to the traditional Halloween colors seems to be dampening my creativity. And, of course, I'm seeing inspiration everywhere now for different (non-Halloween related) designs that I can't wait to try. But since I put forth this challenge for myself, I'm determined to see it through, creativity be damned.

So, without further a do, here's the latest of my creations. I contemplated doing the graveyard design on all of my fingers, but sometimes I feel repeating the same pattern on the entire hand can be a bit obnoxious looking (which reminds me I need to post a polka-dot mani I did a while back that was fun on day hour one then started to get the obnoxious vibe). I also really liked the all white look so I wanted to have the best of both worlds:

 

 

 Even though I feel I could have done more with this one, I really liked how it turned out. I did get pretty frustrated with my black striper brush and polish. It's some cheap stuff I got from 5 Below and gets gloopy quick (even with the polish thinner I bought especially for that polish) and the brush pretty much sucks. It has these random strands that are longer than the others and don't cooperate. The white polish is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White On.

I actually stamped some skulls and crossbones on my thumbs (which I purposely left out of the pictures since I broke BOTH of the nails...crap!) on the third day of this manicure (forgot to take pictures) just to see what it would look like and to get some practice with stamping. They came out...eh.

Digits Design Series:I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Halloween! Design #3-Spongy Hallow

So this was my first attempt at doing a gradient with a sponge. I used one of those wedge-shaped make-up sponges to sponge on some Sally Hansen X-treme Wear Black Out onto 3 coats of LA Colors orange (sorry, don't have the sticker name). Here are the results:

 
In the midst of the process

I wasn't crazy about how this one turned out. I guess for my first try at a gradient it wasn't too bad. But the color combination reminded me of this movie I once saw with a bird that had similar colored talons and I kept thinking of that when I would glance at my nails. My fingers also felt weirdly disconnected to my hands. I think it was the super brightness of the orange at the base of the nail (which doesn't show as accurately in the pictures) in contrast with the black tips.

Weird.

Polish Peel Appeal

I love to peel off my nail polish before using nail polish remover to finish the job. I kind of like the way it feels, the act of peeling it. Weird, I know (but I don't think I'm alone). I also like the fact that I use less nail polish remover that way and that the area around may nails doesn't get stained as much when removing darker polishes. 

The problem with peeling my polish, I've found, is that the edges of my thumbs which I use to pick at the edges of my polish to lift and peel start to get damaged by the constant picking ( I've been polishing/peeling my nails on average of every other day, which means a lot of picking). My thumb nails have chipped and cracked as a result. Not good for a nice looking manicure, obviously. 

I started thinking that I needed to use something else to start the pick and peel process (that sounds kind of gross) and save my thumb nails. Then I came across this tool at my local Wal-Mart:


 SENSATIONAL Gel Polish Removal Tool. That's the actual name but I do agree, it's sensational! I had to "borrow" this picture off the net since I threw away the original packaging before taking a picture of it, but here's the tool in person:




The shape actually remind me of a nail the way it curves. It works perfectly for my purposes. I learned I have to be careful pushing down too hard on my nail. The edges are sharp enough to actually dig into the nail itself and scrape at it. Here it is in action:



The polish can be peeled off in almost one entire piece (at least for that manicure), or can be started in one corner and manually peeled the rest of the way. I've used it several times since purchasing it (about a week and 5 manicures ago) and it still gets the (salvaged) thumbs up from me :)

Digits Design Series: I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Halloween! Design #2-Stars Over Stipes aka The Biggest, Messiest, Most Complicated Simple Manicure EVER!

So I wanted to do something really funky this time. A crazy kind of psychedelic halloween-themed manicure. I took out all my halloweeny colors, my new glow in the dark polish, and of course my black and got started. 

First I painted funky stripes on my ring finger and thumb. That was a gloopy kind of mess all in itself since those colors (except for purple) are polishes with striper brushes and are really thin polishes and STAIN EVERYTHING. Then I painted the other fingers one of each of the colors (again, kind of gloopy due to the thin polish). I covered them all in Seche Vite and a coat of glow polish. Here's how that turned out:



This was to be one of two-ish steps to this manicure which actually took almost two hours to complete with striping, layers, and drying time. My original intention was to stamp over them in black with star-cut outs so that the colors from underneath would show through as glow-in-the-dark multi-colored stars. Well that didn't work out at all. Turns out the black I used, my current favorite-Sally Hansen X-treme Wear Black Out, isn't the best for stamping. So the stars (or rather, star outlines) were faded and more a see through gray instead of an opaque black,so the stripes and bright colors were still visible underneath. Also, the layers under the Seche Vite on the orange pointer finger weren't completely dry, so as I stamped I got this nauseating orange polish bubble at the edge of the nail.Ugh.

I then decided to paint over the entire thing except for the ones that came out the darkest and the polish bubble which I removed completely before polishing black, as well as partially paint the middle finger on the left hand to keep the stars that came out the best. Results:


  
 Meh! 

The end result was ok, but if this had been the idea from the beginning I would have saved myself a lot of time and hassle. Oh, did I mention I hadn't even started on the other hand?!

 Yeah... the biggest, messiest, most complicated simple manicure EVER.

HALLOWEENIFIED!!!

I absolutely LOVE the month of October. The leaves are changing, the weather is cooling, and of course there's my most favoritist holiday, HALLOWEEN! The fun of costumes and parties and candy (especially the candy!) makes me oh so happy this time of year.

To celebrate, every manicure I do this month will be in honor of Halloween. I was going to post some of my manis from last month while I was MIA (just 'cause I didn't post 'em doesn't mean I didn't do 'em), but me excitement for the month is forcing me to post them out of order. I may post some back dated manis intermittently while I wear out the chosen Halloween mani, but I'll be deciding that on the fly in the future. I've got some really good one's too, like a camo one that was inspired by a camping trip my family and I took at the end of August, so stay tuned for that!

Now, on to...dat-da-da-dum! The first ever Digits Design Series: I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For HALLOWEEN!

The first design for this series I call Scary Starry Night. Well, it's actually not scary at all but I liked the name anyway.




 Here it is enlarged to make it a little easier to make out the design (and mistakes). A little blurred, but anyway.....


  This is a different take on one of the experimental manicures I did months back that  I knew I'd want to incorporate into a Halloween manicure. I used french manicure nail tip guides to (attempt to) keep my tip lines straight. 

Since I promised to get better at this, here are the "tools" used:
 
L-R:
LA Colors "Base Coat/Top Coat" as a base
NYC Quick Dry in Black (doesn't have a sticker with a name on it)
Claire's Cosmetic "Galaxy" over the black
LA Colors "Art Deco" in white
and my FAVORITE, MIRACULOUS, MAGICAL, SUPER-DUPER (can you tell I love this stuff) top coat: "Seche Vite"
NOT INCLUDED: Tip guides and black nail art polish with fine brush for touch-ups and stamping stuff, 'cause I forgot.

I thought it would be so awesome if the stars and moon could glow, so the next day I hit my local Wal-Mart and found:


I was so excited! It's actually a set I found in the Halloween section that also came with a black crackle polish. Unfortunately my excitement caused me to trash the packaging before I got a picture of it (I'm so bad at that....you'll see).

So here's what it looks like with the glow in the dark polish added in regular lighting:


And here it is in the dark:
 
Okay, say it with me-WoooOOooOOOh!In real life, they actually glowed pretty bright with the right light source to activate them. Unfortunately the glow fades pretty quickly, so it was a race from fingers to the light to steadying the hand to snapping the picture. The result is the blurred, slightly faded pic you see above.

So here are some lessons I learned with this manicure:
-Tip guides (like tape) should be removed soon after polish is applied or else it sticks and will pull up with the guide when removed. I had read that somewhere before but had to learn the hard way. Consequently I had to touch up the lines.
-Takes a lot of glow-in-the-dark polish to make it glow really well, so the manicure will be slightly lumpy if only applying to part of the design (vs one even coat).
-Glow-in-the-dark polish needs to be held close to the light to glow really well.
-The light on my cell phone worked better than the lights in my house to get a brighter glow (?)
-Glow-in-the-dark polish doesn't glow for very long. That was a disappointment at first until I feared it would keep me up at night (I like my room pitch black to sleep well).

I liked this design a lot and think I'll have to revisit it again in a remastered version. I'm such a fan of black polish and black tips in general, so be prepared for lots of that this month. 'Tis the season!

Stamp-eeed

Looking through some of the very inspirational nail blogs out there, I've discovered the wonderful world of nail stamping. What a concept. Instead of having to paint these intricate designs right onto the nail, use a stamp! I do love art and detail, but it gets really tricky when using the left hand to paint on the right. Despite the fact that I'm somewhat ambidexterous (I was born a lefty, forced into being a righty,  can only do certain things left-handed, and have pretty sloppy handwritting with either hand), I have issues painting my left hand. I like the idea of being able to make an equally neat (or not so neat) design on my right hand as on my left (what some in the mani blogosphere would call the "model hand").

So, my task became to find a nail stamping kit. I've seen and read mostly about the Konad sets online and was going to order one when my sister said she owned a stamping set. Well, what better way to practice than with a free set and cheap polish? I also came across a $10 set at some local store (can't remember where now) and couldn't pass it up. So, with my Dollar Store polishes and inherited stamping set I tryed a design on my experimental mani from days before.

I added the checker design to the tip of my already animal print nail. A cross between a taxi, a checkered flag, and a tiger. That finger looks fast, doesn't it? :)

Next I removed the polish from my right middle finger and did a purple tipped french with glitter and white heart design stamp. Also added moon and star stamp in silver to the ring finger. Reminds me of witches and Halloween, one of my favorite holidays. I will definitely be incorporating that look into a special mani in October.

This next one I was actually attempting to fade one color into the next (no stamping). I botched it big time, but morphed it into a swirl pattern which has turned into one of my favorite designs. I used two coats of pastel green and added a pink and purple polish that I swirled with a toothpick. Another must revisit design.

And because my other pinky was feeling left out, I added some pink sparkle to the tip. I really love black polish with any design, or even plain. Such a dark and sexy color.

In the near future I'll do a more cohesive mani where all fingers are the same or at least similar (maybe, lol) but for now I like different looks for different digits. Keeps it ineteresting.

The Begining: The How and The Why

People who know me know that I am in no way, shape, or form a "girly girl". I was the typical Tom boy growing up; played sports, fixed things with my dad, stayed out of the kitchen (unless it was time to eat), and things of that nature. Now as an adult, I'm a lot of things; a mom, a teacher, a gun girl (go GLOCK, woot woot!), but still not a girly girl. So how did I get into nail art?


Enter Pinterest. A friend of mine posted something on Facebook that was linked to her pinterest account. Those of you who are familiar with Pinterest know it's like going down the rabbit hole and it's hard to get back out. Somehow I came accross a picture of nail art. Now the concept of nail art isn't new to me. I've seen and heard of it before but it has never before caught my interest. However, this particular day I saw some really funky design that was created by the average "Josephine", and I was fascinated! Another of my childhood passions (and major in high school) was art. I've always been a fan of anything unique and creative, and this particular design of nail art hooked me. To me it was like wearable art...what a concept! So, I had to try it for myself.


That evening, after having spent hours on the net ooohhhing and aaahhhing over other peoples nail creations, I went out and bought some supplies and got started working on learning the art of nail art. Currently I'm about two weeks into it. My decision to blog about it comes more from the desire to have a catalogue of what I've created, where I started from, and note improvements, failures, discoveries, and the like. Admittedly, I have the awful habit of getting into something and be passionate about it for a few months, then let it die. We'll see where this new fascination of mine goes. In the mean time, I'll share some pictures of the very begining. Please keep in mind, I have no fancy equipment for taking pictures (and probably never will). I'm using my camera phone in whatever lighting is available, sometimes my hands are lotioned, sometimes not, I don't always clean my cuticles 100%, and I'm no hand model....

This is 2 coats of this bright green polish and a coat of silver crackle I found at 5 Below (I promise I'll get better at using correct names and such in the future). This was actually part of the small stash of polish  I already had. I did this before my trip to various stores in search of new polish. My sister (who has always been into having perfectly manicured nails, the ultra girly-girl and my total opposite) dubbed this mani "The Hulk".

This is the stash I bought at The Dollar Store. I'm working with a budget, don't judge. I couldn't get the picture to show correctly for the life of me so you'll have to tilt your head for this one (sorry).

 


Here are a few more items I pickec up at WalMart (there were some others I didn't get pics of).

Here's what I did with the new polishes. Left hand, right hand. I'm not a fan of these "poses". They look like agressive "monster hands" to me, lol!. These are a couple coats of each color without design or top coat.

My first attempts at some kind of design and trying out some other "poses" I've seen on the net, haha!



I kinda really like this pinky. It's a terrible, blurry pic. This polish is the L'Oreal something-having-to-do-with-sand-in-the-name polish (aigh!). A coat of the LA Colors sparkle and a top coat of N.Y.Co. It really is pretty in person.

That's all for now, I'll post more of what I did with this " experimental mani" in a future post. Ta-ta!