#52weeknailchallenge: negative space

I always wonder about negative space prompts... Are we using a stamping plate like Lina totally negative or are we leaving bare nail for everyone to see? I mean if you a true polish lover, you will have stained nails and generally steer clear of showing naked nails. Anyway, let me show you what I did.

I started with two coats of Pahlish dark mark on my thumb, index and pinky.

On my middle and ring finger I have a coat of OPI int'l crime caper. This is a super sheer polish with a great shimmer.

I then added some decals and that's done.

What do you think? I kinda like how this turned out.

I was wearing a patch on my index nail as it had a tear and when I removed the polish, dark mark actually stained the patch. So I had my very own dark mark!

Thanks for reading!

#52weeknailchallenge: negative space

And just like that there's only two weeks left of this challenge. I'm kinda sad it's come to an end, but! Did you know that the new one is ready to go?? Ren over at @polish_portfolio with the help of B (@becauseishop) out did themselves and I may have already started...

Anyway on to negative space. I started with three coats of Ulta3 emerald inten-city on my thumb and index finger. On my pinky I have two coats of Ulta3 gold rush fever and two coats of Tip Top perfect look on my middle and ring finger.

The flowers came from BP-L015 and stamped with Nicole Diary white. I then only coloured the flowers in half way with emerald inten-city and gold rush fever. I then top coated and added a matte top coat.

I left the gold shiny as it already looks matte.

I really like how this turned out. What do you think?

#52weeknailchallenge: negative space

So I have realized that I am terrible at explaining things... Here I am randomly doing this 52 week challenge and you have no idea what it is, where or how? So here's a link that will take you to Michelle's blog and she explains it all.

There. Explanation done. Anyway for this prompt, the negative space prompt, I took some inspiration from this mani done by Paulina. I started with two coats of a polish that was gifted to me, it has no name, no number, just HD on the bottle, on my thumb and pinky. On my index, middle and ring finger I stamped using plate BC-10 that was sent to me by Cherry Blossom Store and essence stampy polish white.

I top coated as I was going to use striping tape. I then taped off sections of my nails and used the same HD polish to fill in the blanks.

Top coat over that and then added a square stud to my middle finger. It bothered BF slightly as the stud was off centre, but hey it's not that easy placing it.

So I really like it, but I'm a little iffy about it too. What do you think?

Thanks for stopping by!!

Rosey escapades

I didn't have anything specific in mind when I started this mani. It kinda just flowed. I started with two coats of piCture pOlish Escapades on my middle finger, thumb and pinky. On my index and ring finger I have a coat of Essence Absolute Pure. I wanted a negative space look, but without a coat of polish my nails feel to thin.

The roses is from hehe 068. On my index and ring finger I stamped with Essence stampy polish in black and on my middle finger I stamped with Essence stampy polish in white. I topcoated my index and ring fingers and once it was dry used V vinyls to create the negative space.

I kinda wish that the black was a bit darker and maybe I shouldn't have stamped the white, but oh well. I liked this mani.

What do you think? I really like Escapades. It's a beautiful colour.

Thanks for stopping by!

Green Christmas

I've been meaning to post this since Monday, but I've been been a bit busy. Cleaning up and so forth. I've also had to shorten my nails as the normal culprit started tearing again and that was with a patch. At least I have some length, but you'll only see them next year.

Anyway, I wanted to do a green mani, but I couldn't think of an appropriate green that felt christmassy. And then I remembered Michelle gifted me some awesome greens for my bday. And Nubar Conserve was perfect for what I had in mind.

I used Tip Top Miraculous Results for my base as it has a milky effect and not just a clear base. On my thumb and pinky I have two coats of Conserve. I could have gotten away with just one, but bald patches. On my index and ring finger I used these half circle vinyl things from TwinkledT and placed the round side against my cuticle and the straight side was exactly halfway through my nail. Perfect size :)

For I middle finger I just used striping tape for the negative space. Then I used some loose glitter from BPS for the lines.

I loved how this turned out. So elegant, LoL. What to you think?

Thanks for reading.

Negative space and Tahiti

I hope everyone had a good weekend! Mine has been too short. Today's mani is totally inspired by jewsie_nails. I initially downloaded the pic from FaceBook and thank goodness there was a watermark, otherwise I wouldn't be able to credit her.

I started with 2 coats of Ulta3 Tahiti on all my nails. I got these polishes from BF's mom as a Xmas present. On my middle finger there is a bit of a negative space, for this I used a 'V' vinyl I got from We heart nail art. I added a silver square stud I got with my order of polishes from Parental Advisory Polish.

On my ring finger I used zig zag vinyls from Llarowe, but they are also available from We heart nail art. I top coated Tahiti before I added the vinyls and then one coat of SC Snow me White.

I was going to leave it as is, but I decided to add a matte top coat to my middle and ring fingers. Tahiti was so bright, it was hard to miss. Made me feel like everyone was looking at my nails! Guess that's the point right?

Thanks for reading!

Fishnet stockings

I have a real short post for today, I've been meaning to do a post over the weekend, but we had some friends over on Saturday and I was called in to work on Sunday. I would have worked Saturday too, but I put my foot down and said no. I would have been an absolute train wreck if I did!

Anyway, I was wearing this mani over the weekend. I think I finally have a handle on my stamping. It's not 100% yet, but I'm working on it.

I started with my base and did french tips with Tip Top Black Forest. Once that was dry I stamped with Charlie (Revlon) Sexy Samba, it's a black polish I bought years ago... Now I use it for art and stamping as Black Forest is too sheer. I used the top left image on BPS M79 plate. I added some glitter to the mix, just placing it on the bigger dots. Top coated and Voila!

It really reminds me of fishnet stockings. My colleagues looooved this mani, they even want to grow their nails now for me to do this for them!

I also have another mani I wanna share with you. (Okay this post may be longer than what I thought.) BF's colleague asked him about two or three weeks ago, if I would do his wife's nails. I said I would, as it's practice for me and I get to try out some new techniques (yeah right), or that's the case with my mother.

This picture was taken by the Colleague. From what I understand he does part time photography. Very nice. I used Tip Top Gold Mine, Black Forest and Indulgence.

Let me know what you think. Does my mani remind you of fishnet stockings or am I crazy? And what to you think of the guest mani?

Jazzberry Blue is the Cat's Whiskers

As I'm sure you've noticed, I've changed the look of my blog a bit (more like a lot). So please let me know what you think. Drop me a comment, email or find me on FaceBook.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I cut my nails. So for the moment I have little stumps, but I did this mani last weekend and was actually wearing it when I made that horrible decision to cut.

My colleague bought me an early Christmas present. When we had discussed what we each wanted I was heavily hinting at a new purse, as my current one is growing to be a little tatty. So she surprised me early!!

And it's soooo pretty, don't you think?

Obviously I wanted to try and do a mani that looks similar... And this is what I ended up with. I started off with two coats of Tip Top Cat's Whiskers on all my nails except my ring finger. I taped my ring finger using striping tape. I painted the middle piece using Tip Top Jazzberry Blue and the remaining with Cat's Whiskers. Got some negative space going there ;)

Both these polishes have a beautiful shimmer to it. I loved wearing it even if it was only for 2 days.

What do you think? Is Jazzberry Blue really the Cat's Whiskers?

Freaky things and Nail Art Competition

My goodness, it feels like this is way overdue. I was planning on doing a post last weekend for my mani that I did with Tip Top black forest and glow in the dark decals I got from BPS. I also did some dots with Essence glow in the dark top coat, but alas, BF went and bought Diablo III: Reaper of Souls.

Does that not make you want to play it? This is the reason why there was no post last weekend, my plan was to do the post Sunday, instead we ended up playing the whole day. Eventually started to realise it was getting late when we had to put the light on.

Let me share the mani with you (I did share it on my Facebook page)....

I actually got a "nice" from BF, never before have I gotten that! His only problem was that the stars are all sharp edges and the dots are round edges and it doesn't go... And I was like whatever. Anyhoo, what do you guys think? Let me know ;)

On to the reason for todays post. Tip Top Nails South Africa has a nail art competition at the moment, which ends tomorrow. You have to get a man in your life to choose 3 colours and do an accent nail with those colours. And take a beautiful picture. So obviously I asked BF and he gave some colours, some ideas, changed his mind, changed his mind again and then he had me google some things... Like this very creepy Green bottle blue tarantula.

Suuuuure, to certain people it might be pretty, but not this people. Ugh not a big fan of big blue and orange spiders, imagine finding that in your house! Besides this little wonder he had me look for a vampire squid, by this point I was starting to think WTF??

Little creepy right? And lastly he had me look for this...

Now this I can live with. Its so bright and pretty :) This is a poison dart frog, one of many. Theres even one named after a strawberry.

So finally I have my 3 colours and a workable idea. I used sunkissed, black forest and jazzberry blue. I have another yellow, not too sure what the name is right now, but I settled for sunkissed as it also has a shimmer like jazzberry blue.

And as you can see my top coat smeared my spots :( I hate it when that happens. I was very tempted to redo it, but I thought screw it. In retrospect I should probably have waited a little longer before I top coated. Too late now.

The other part of the competion was to take a pretty picture with the art, so this is my picture that I submitted to the competition.

What do you think? BF said to me it turned out better than what he thought. Probably because of what he had in mind...

Let me know what you think or like my Facebook page Sarcastic by Nature.