Doll Nail Art Challenge #2

   A couple weeks ago, before all of the wedding stuff, I started a nail challenge for myself. It doesn't really have a name. I guess I should come up with one. But they're so hard! So it will probably forever be "that nail challenge/series about dolls." And I say challenge/series because I can't decide if it should be a challenge or a series! :)
   You might remember that the first design was based of the Turkish doll. This week my design is based off an Ethiopian doll! She's also from American Girl's Girls of Many Lands collection. She's from the mid-19th century (1849?). Her dress is simple, but very pretty.

   For my design I looked to her hems! And the rest of her dress. :) I did a combination of french tips and solid covering (I'm not sure what you would call it, other not-french-tips...). For the tips I copied a bit of the geometric design on her hemline. Than for my ring finger I made up a version of the design traveling down the middle of her dress.

    It didn't quite turn out as I had hoped. I had planned on having just the flower, but it looked so goofy and out of place! So I added in the red geometric design hoping it would make it fit better. It worked for the most part, but it's still not quite right. I think it's because the nail is nearly stark white next to somewhat darker colors, so it kind of sticks out. And not in a good way.  Oh well! It works good enough! :)

   You'll also have to pardon the state of my fingers; they're quite a bit more scuffed and warped than usual....  You'd never believe it, but I only painted these yesterday! And then I helped my dad paint a room in our house, so I scraped a bunch of polish off putting down painter's tape, and then what I didn't scrape off I got green paint on! My pinky was the worst on my right hand, so that's why you can't see it very well. You should be glad you can't see my left hand, though. It looks like my nails usually do near the end of the week!

   I start a job this week at a craft/fabric store (JoAnn Fabric and Crafts), so I'm super excited! I hope I won't be too tempted to spend my whole paycheck there!! :)

   Hope your week is wonderful!



Polishes:
   Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Cherry Red
   Sally Hansen Salon Manicure Butterscotch
   Stripe Rite White
   Essie Sugar Daddy
   Cover Girl Outlast Snow Storm
   Revlon Multi-Care Base+Top Coat

Curious Kittens

   I think I have created my all time favorite design!! I feel like I say that somewhat frequently, but this time it's totally and completely true. I won't keep you in suspense any longer, so here's my all-time favorite!

   Aren't they just so cute!? Cats are my absolute favorite (I am definitely a cat person, without question), and these are definitely my favorite cat design I have created, and maybe even seen, although I have seen some awesome ones. Like these. Or this one. And this one, which inspired the design. And lots of others. :)

   I made these for my Etsy store, so if you really like them, you could go buy them here! Or you can just go look at them. Or just look here. Whatever floats your boat! 

   I also made another set for Etsy, which you might recognize. It's a design I painted a couple weeks ago, based off of the Turkish doll. This set is available here, if you guys care to look. :)

   Hope you guys have a great weekend!

Finding Nemo in the Aquarium

    I'm going to the aquarium with my mom and cousin tomorrow! So, just like any normal person would do, I painted some characters form the Pixar movie Finding Nemo. :)
    From thumb to pinky, I painted Nemo, Peach, Squirt, Dory and Nigel.

   For those of you who haven't seen the movie, Nemo is a clown fish. He gets kidnapped (of sorts) and during his and his dad's journey some of the creatures they encounter are Peach, a starfish, Squirt, a turtle, Dory, a blue tang/surgeon fish, and Nigel, a pelican.
   For those that really like the design, I have them for sale on my Etsy store here!
  
   I'm a kind of distracted writer today.I recently started watching Call the Midwife, and I must admit, I'm hooked! I'm watching the second season right now, and I can't confirm or deny that I am paying more attention to it than my blogging! I guess I should probably stop now before I type something really stupid from 'multi tasking'...

  Hope your weekend is wonderful!

I Now Have A Sister!!

   So as you might know, last week was all about getting ready for my brother's wedding. I talked about it a little in this post and the one before it. The wedding was Saturday and everything went really well! No major mishaps, and no crazy brides/moms/grooms/anyone. And now I have a sister! Finally! :)

here's a wonderfully grainy picture I stole from facebook of the newlyweds :)

   Anyways, I don't really have any new nail designs for you guys yet (I've still got what remains of my bridesmaids nail design on), but I do have some nail-related stuff to show you all. Just because I can, I thought I'd show you guys how I packaged the other bridesmaids' fake nails. I'm a little proud of the packaging. Just a little. :)
   I conveniently had two of the small boxes I use for my Etsy store at home, so I spruced them up a little.

 
   I wish I could do this for my Etsy orders, but I think the flowers would come off or get ruined or something. To make the flowers, I cut of a length of a paper streamer, rolled it, then glued it (I used regular old Elmer's glue). Then I kind of did the same thing to make the leaves, except I left a corner un-rolled. I used water colors to make it green, but I'm sure just a green streamer would work too (I only had white). Then I used my trusty old Elmer's glue to glue everything to the box!
   Then, as a nice touch (I do include this in my Etsy orders), I wrote on some paper!

 
   Usually my Etsy orders say something boring like 'Thanks for the order!' But now I might do something more like this instead.... I used some sort of fancy border/hole punch I bought at Micheal's and then wrote on them with my colorful inks! (I don't think I've mentioned this before, but I love calligraphy/illuminations and inks and older looking calligraphy pens!)
    Then, underneath it all are the nails. They don't always get to the final location looking this neat, but I do try to keep them in order! 

   And that's about it! I don't usually use red boxes, because on my Etsy orders I use a ribbon that is a pretty teal-ish color that looks awful with the red. But red was what Hobby Lobby had, so red was what I got! And it looks fine with white flowers, so that worked out great. :)

   Well, that's about it for now. I should have another nail design sometime this week. I'm going to the aquarium with my cousin, so I think I'm going to make some fishy nails! I've made some Finding Nemo nails for my Etsy store, so I might do those since I haven't painted that on my actual nails yet. Or I might do something different, we'll see!

   Have a lovely day/night guys!

4th of July

   Happy 4th to all of my American readers! I hope you all have a good one. I'm not doing much this year, but my neighbors have been shooting off fireworks all week!

   In honor of Independence Day, I of course have to make some sort of nail design. I didn't want to make the usual flag nails or anything though, I wanted to do something a little different. So I researched American Revolutionary War uniforms and found on that would be easily recognizable (the background picture here on Colonial Williamsburg's website is perfect!). Then I added fireworks and, as a last resort (my creativity was running low this week), I added some flags. But they aren't the usual flags! I wanted to make some older looking flags, but I didn't have the right color red. So instead I just made two flags that were shaped in a way that we don't usually see.

  

   And my pointer finger's nail is left blank, because I was a mess that day and my creativity levels were really suffering... Oh well!
  
   I used very few colors this week and they're pretty easy to pick out, so I'll just list them today.
      Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Cherry Red
      Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Black Out
      Covergirl Outlast Snowstorm
      Maybelline Color Show Bold Gold
      Maybelline Color Show Fierce N Tangy
      L.A. Colors Color Craze In A Flash
      Stripe Rite White
      Revlon Multi-Care Base+Top Coat

Wedding Nails Part 2

   Surprise, surprise, I finished the first set of bridesmaids' nails! I'm really happy with them. Here are some pictures:

   My sister in law wanted something simple and refined, so this is what we came up with. For the basic french manicure, I used Essie Sugar Daddy and Covergirl Outlast Snowstorm. The flowers were also made with Snowstorm, as well as Maybelline Color Show Go Go Green and Nina Ultra Pro Tangerine Dream.
   These are also available on my Etsy shop here, if any of you are interested.

   Hope you guys like it!

   Here's a preview for tomorrow's 4th of July design:

Wedding Nails Part 1

   Hooray for weddings! My brother is getting married in a little over  a week and I am super excited! His fiance wants me to do her nails and the bridesmaids nails, so I am super pumped about that too. Right now, though, all I have to show you guys is my toe nail design for the wedding; I'm still working on the finger nails, but they should be done, well, they have to be done by next week, so I'll *hopefully* be able to show them to you guys sometime next week.
   My sister-in-law's favorite flower is a sunflower, so that's going to be one of her flowers, as well as goldenrods and daisies. While I didn't technically use any of those except the sunflower, I thought the little white flowers I painted were close enough to both goldenrods and daisies. :)

   I used Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Sheer Vanilla for the background (I used Covergirl Outlast Snowstorm as my base coat so that the Sheer Vanilla would show up), Sally Hansen Salon Manicure Butterscotch for the sunflowers, Finger Paints Sketchy Character for the middle of the sunflower, and Maybelline Color Show Go Go Green for the sunflower leaves. For the 'diasies' I used Covergirl Outlast snowstorm and Finger Paints Etch n Sketch for the leaves. Over it all I started out with my usual top coat (Revlon Multi-Care Base+Top Coat), but them later decided I like it better matte, so I used Essie Matte About You.

Hope you guys like it!