There are a few different competing styles going on with these nails (flowers, spirals, leafy things), but with their rich, hothouse-inspired palette, the overall effect is pure Bollywood. All I’m missing is a woman in a gorgeous sari dancing in a sun dappled field as she sings a 12 and a half minute-long ode to her lost cow. Or husband? Things tend to get a little lost in translation when I’m blinded by all that colourful flashiness.
Existentialist query on par with “If a tree falls in the forest” and “If a bear poops in the woods”: Can it be considered a glitter if it doesn’t, you know, glitter?
These nails, my entry in the fourth and final week of the February N.A.I.L. Challenge for the theme of glitter, feature a polish I’ve turned to time and time again, Candy Lacquer’s matte Licorice Allsorts. It’s the first indie polish I ever purchased, and I’ve found uses for it in favourite foodie designs ranging from sprinkled frosting to watermelons to actual licorice allsorts. Here, against a backdrop of pale grey shot through with pink shimmer, Essence’s Grey-t to be Here, it takes on a splatter-like effect that’s a little bit sweet, a little bit punk and a whole lot something I’ll absolutely have to try again.
I did these nails, your fairly standard galaxy design, days ago and have been sitting on the photos ever since, trying – in vain! – to come up with something witty and punny to say about interstellar clouds, ionized space gas and gravitational collapse. In the end, it’s rather hard to make jokes about such topics when you know absolutely nothing about the field of astronomy (the fact that I almost wrote that as “astrology” should tell you something about my grasp of the space-centric sciences.)
So with nothing clever to say about a gorgeous cosmic event I know oh so very little about (the Wiki page on nebulae alone makes my brain hurt), I’ll simply point out that these nails were a blast to do; a sponge painting-based technique well suited to nail art newbies and casual obsessives alike. Simply Google some high res photos of the universe beautifully collapsing in on itself and wait for inspiration to strike – I guarantee you won’t be waiting long.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been afraid of the ocean, or more specifically, the slimy, bitey critters that dwell beneath its surface. Any large bodies of water make me twitchy, actually, with tree-choked eastern Ontario lakes being the very least desirable of the bunch. I would never classify it as a phobia, however, as I live just a skipped stone’s throw from a major river, don’t mind boating and am generally fascinated with the very water-based creatures I’m terrified of (whaddup, IMAX shark movies?!); I just dislike the thought of being stung or eaten or – *shudder* – brushed against (and then stung and eaten.)
I’m also not so frightened of underwater beasties and the dark, shadowy worlds they inhabit that I can’t enjoy a bit of beach-themed nail art, which is where these nails come in. And that’s just how I like it – me, indoors, safe and sound and salt-free (ask my parents how much I whined about my “salt crust” after I once deigned to venture out into the ocean in about half a foot of water), enjoying the majesty of the big blue from a prettily polished and respectful distance. 😉
I keep thinking I’d love a bathroom decorated in this vibrant and striking rose motif, and then I remember the so-ugly-it-burns black and white and hot pink tiles a friend’s bathroom once possessed – an accurate enough word given that they were unholy – and I’m forced to have a rethink! Maybe one of those design ideas best left to your nails?
These nails, nothing more involved than Cirque’s Kaleidoscope rainbow glitter topper over OPI’s now-ubiquitous My Vampire is Buff, remind me of speckled candy jawbreakers. It’s a super cool effect for very little effort, particularly when the glitter is doing all the heavy lifting.
On an unrelated/related note, has anyone besides me and the friend I watched it with ever seen the movie Jawbreaker? It’s one of those lost ’90s movies – not a “new classic” like She’s All That or American Pie, but still enjoyable (?) in its own peculiar way. It starred Rose McGowan, Julie Benz (Darla, for all you Buffy and Angel fans), some other girl I can’t remember and a very nasty Judy Greer in what was probably one of her first roles. I haven’t seen it in years because it’s really not that good, but it’s worth a watch if a) you’d like to see someone choke to death on a giant jawbreaker or b) you’re down with a totally random and highly squicky sex scene between Rose McGowan and her then fiancé, Marilyn Manson. It’s just as pervy and gross as you’d expect it to be, to the power of, like, 20.
Oh, but there’s this one scene that has since been copied in about 20 different young adult-oriented movies where the girls of the super bitch clique are strutting down the halls of their high school while the lesser beings they’re forced to matriculate with leap out of the way in fear and awe. It’s an awesome scene, but still maybe not enough to make up for the rest!
Here in eastern Ontario we’ve suffered through approximately 9 billion (give or take) snowstorms, ice storms and slush storms this winter, all creating minor bits of chaos throughout the city and casting a pall of bumminess across just about everything we do. So imagine my surprise when I woke up this morning to mild(er) temperatures and that whiff of defrosting dog poo (you know the smell) that signals that spring might actually be just around the corner. Or perhaps the next corner. Then take a left, hang a right, go down the stairs and spring will be behind the door dead ahead, I promise.
So with an added spring(time) in my step, and looking for a gradient-based submission for the third week of the February N.A.I.L. Challenge, I did these almost-seasonal nails, although with their rich colour palette and eye-searing holographic glitter, I think I may have bypassed spring entirely and jumped straight to summer. Tomay-toe, toma-toe, right?
Oh crap. A dispatch from the enemy (translation: The Weather Network) tells me that my city is expected to receive about 12 solid hours of freezing rain, starting tonight! Sigh. Looks like I’ll be in need of more “No, really, will this winter ever end?” manis, and stat.
Every lacquerista worth her acetone has at least one bottle of polish that for reasons that aren’t entirely clear to her, she never, ever uses. It’s not that it’s an ugly colour or of poor consistency or otherwise unusable; it just manages to somehow avoid detection, time and time again. The base of these nails, China Glaze’s shimmery purple Full Spectrum, is that polish for me. And I really don’t know why, as it’s lovely, packed full of gorgeous rainbow glitter and provides the perfect backdrop for some nail art, in this case a couple of fingers’ worth of high shine turquoise chevrons.
B-A-N-A-N-A-S! The fact that I have a category of nail art entirely devoted to food and candy-themed nails suggests that I’ve done more than my fair share of sweets ‘n stuff-type manicures, but I think these wee little sprinkle-topped banana split sundaes (and one of my father’s preferred desserts) are my favourites. It’s just an added bonus that as the base colour I used Models Own scented polish in Blueberry Muffin, which doesn’t smell a bit like blueberries, but gives these nails a fun and fruity scent just the same.
Now if only I hadn’t top coated an errant cat fur onto my thumb, we’d be all set! Huh, a cat fur in my mani – must be a day ending in Y. You hear me, pussycat and polish lovers; I know you hear me. So many manis ruined by one floating fur. 😦
If you grew up in the ’80s or early to mid-’90s, you know in the world of irregularly shaped comic books, Garfield was the shit. First published in 1978, Garfield, a Jim Davis creation, tells the story of a fat orange tabby cat named Garfield who loves lasagna and napping and either outright hates or has a great deal of disdain for, amongst other things, diets, Mondays, his “owner” John and his frenemy and roommate, Odie the dog.
Here, amidst a water marble that could use some serious, serious work (it was easy enough to do, but in the harsh light of iPhotography, it kind of looks like butt!) I paid homage to one of Garfield’s bigger life annoyances, Nermal, the so-called “World’s Cutest Kitten.” And he is! He’s an adorable little grey tabby kitten and everyone loves him, except, of course, for Garfield. And I really can’t say I blame the guy; too much Nermal can start to grate on one’s nerves. Which is why for these nails I’ve confined his aggravating adorableness to my ring finger. Can’t let Garfield get jealous, and I ALWAYS side with the chubby cats. 🙂
Finger Candy 