Ragdoll

Hi there, friends!  Wonder of wonders, this is a blog post, and I have apparently NOT disappeared!  With apologies for my unintended absence, I’ll simply note that I’ve been hard at work on some renovations and upgrades to my apartment AND deep into the always fun (but also always stressful) preparation stage for our next trip to Disney, which I’m somehow only now appreciating is coming up at the end of THIS WEEK!  Holy cats, I’ve got so much to do.

But first, nails!  This is a glitter polish I made last year that was inspired by Sally of The Nightmare Before Christmas.  Here I’ve paired it alongside A England’s Whispering Waves, a deep, bruisey purple-tinged turquoise that really takes Sally’s look to the next level.  Speaking of, I’ve got to get working on MY look if I’m going to meet Miss Sally this coming weekend, which is a distinct possibility; can’t be slacking on the character meet and greets with one of my all time favourites. 🙂

Hammy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving, Canadian friends!  As has become my holiday tradition, here is a festive manicure featuring my favourite – and most successful – homemade polish, Hawaiian Ham (so named after those alarming, 1950s-style ham casseroles topped with pineapple rings and maraschino cherries.)  I made up a bottle for some American friends recently, substituting the yellow, pineapple-y glitter for a red-tinged bronze, and renamed this shade Canadian Bacon. 😉

But speaking of rings on the Thanksgiving dinner table, here’s a fun, older mani of mine in which I honoured that most Canadian of festive foodstuffs, the uncut – very important, that – ringed log of cranberry sauce.  Just shoot it straight out of the can and onto a fussy little garnish dish!  The polish I used here was KB Shimmer’s Leaf of Faith; I think it looks like extra chunky cranberry jelly.  Hope you all have a delicious one!

DIY Jack and Sally

I thought rather suddenly to myself late last night, “I think I’ll make some nail polish.” That’s a thing people do, right, just randomly decide to make their own nail polish at 11 p.m. on a Friday?  I hope so, because that’s certainly what *I* was doing at that late hour, and it seemed pretty normal to me!

And here are the results of my midnight hour machinations, two Nightmare Before Christmas-inspired glitter bombs in the colours of skeleton and ragdoll paramours Jack and Sally.

Of the two, Sally is the far more successful polish in terms of stability and ease of application – these photos show two brushed/dabbed-on coats, and I didn’t have to fish about for the larger heart-shaped glitters one bit. Plus I think the glitter mix in Sally – inspired by her patchwork dress, asphyxiated-looking countenance and poker straight red hair – is just perfection, an unusual combination of bronze, turquoise, rose, purple, red and black hexes dotted with tiny satin hearts.  I layered this lovely new creation here over Enchanted Polish’s mystery lacquer for July 2015, a dusty grey-blue holo that looks like Sally’s…skin?  Does she have skin or fabric?  Hmm, best not linger on that question too long!

And then there was the vernis terrible, Jack, an infuriatingly unsuccessful venture into the less-is-more approach to do-it-yourself nail polish.  I think the inspiration for this guy is pretty clear – Jack’s black and white pinstripes, with a smattering of the Christmas bric-a-brac whose secrets Jack longs to crack.  You’d just never know that hidden amid the depths of that simple black and white glitter polish is actually quite a lot of bric-a-brac – glittery snowflakes, colourful baubles, candy canes, snowmen and even a few good sized Christmas trees.  The lightweight black and white glitter – made up of a mix of two identically-sized satin matte glitters – simultaneously covers up AND provides little to no support for the larger shapes, which sank to the bottom resolutely, and there they be.  I had to embark on a major fishing expedition to snag these very few glitters.  There was also far, far too much base in this polish – it rained down onto my work area in huge, glittery blobs, even after I had repeatedly wiped off the brush on the rim of the bottle. Jack is languishing at the bottom of my garbage can right now, so annoyed was I with his insolence. 😉  Here I layered Jack over another Enchanted mystery lacquer, this time May 2017, a dark and stormy blue that looks like the skies above both Christmas and Halloween Towns.

Fall Fun Series: Thanksgiving Ham

Today’s prompt in the Fall Fun Series calls for the participants to share their Thanksgiving plans.  But I have a triple whammy going against my particular Thanksgiving plans in that 1) I’m Canadian, so my Thanksgiving is long since past, 2) I’m Canadian, so my Thanksgivings are more functional than traditional and 3) I’m Canadian, so this morning I woke up to THIS:

Which means that Fall is now naught but a memory, and we are firmly in the winter of our discontent (oh no, run!)

But to my American blogger friends, I wish you a wonderful week in the lead-up to the big day, and Thanksgivings free of family drama, travel woes and salmonella.

Which is actually NEVER an issue when you limit your Thanksgiving meats to your manicures!  And no, I’m not going the Full Gaga on you here – just making a super awkward transition to talking about this polish, Hawaiian Ham, a homemade creation I widgeted together years ago specifically with those unidentifiable Thanksgiving (or Christmas, or Easter) ham casseroles in mind.  You know the casserole I’m talking about – the one your father’s great-great aunt has been making since the late 1950s, an abomination of a Good Housekeeping throwback containing ham, pineapple, maraschino cherries and three kinds of processed cheese?  Still, it’s gotta beat Aunt Bethany’s lime-and-cat food Jello mold!

And so on this Thanksgiving, American friends, this Ham (manicure) is for you.  I hope you have wonderful holidays, all.

Hammy

There’s still a few hours left on Thanksgiving here in Canada, and my nails are looking at some second helpings with this fun, hammy design (featuring my favourite homemade polish, Hawaiian Ham, so named because it reminds me of one of those horrid 1950s ham casseroles covered in pineapple rings and maraschino cherries.)  I even added some little cloves to my lacquered hams, because they looked a little bare without.  Cute and yummy!

Blue Belle

Hey, I made this polish!  Okay, obviously not Mega, the silver ILNP holo. That lacquer is a thing of beauty, and worth every cent of its rather elevated price tag.  But the blue glitter polish?  That’s mine!

One of only a small handful of personal use polishes I made nearly three years ago now, its name is I Blue It, and I was super pleased to see that even after all this time, and despite its DIY DNA, it’s still a pretty awesome lacquer.  A chunky glitter, yes, so a pain in the butt to remove, just like all glitter polishes.  Ain’t nuffin to be done about that.  But I Blue It has maintained its not-too-thick, not-too-thin consistency, and continues to apply smoothly and evenly.  I Blue It’s colour has also remained consistent over the years, the slightly dusky blue jelly base untouched by colour bleed from its white and black glitters. All the props to solvent resistant glitter for that – you can’t make a homemade polish without it.

And all the props to me for this cute manicure that’s all tied up with a couple of turquoise bows.  I hadn’t planned on doing a second manicure yesterday, but with the sun out in its full, holo-blazing glory and these two polishes next up on deck, how could I not? 🙂

Hamming It Up

This polish, Hawaiian Ham, my first – and so far best – homemade creation is the lacquer equivalent of a snuggly security blanket.  Its mix of pink, brown, copper and marigold-hued glitter is warm and homey-looking, and its name conjures up fond memories of holiday meals past.  I can also always count on adoring whatever manicure Hawaiian Ham touches, but then again, I’m rather biased.  The Ham just completes me.

It may also be because I’m still in total awe of the fact that I made a nail polish.  And not just A nail polish either, but one that’s pretty, applies nicely and has remained goop-free and colourfast for two years now. Like, that’s some advanced DIY-ing right there! Looking forward to trying my hand at some glittery presents for friends and family this year; if they turn out half as well as Hawaiian Ham, I’ll be a happy little polish maker indeed.

 

 

Vanilla Coke-Glazed Ham

That sounds so delightfully nutty; I can hardly believe it’s a real thing (along with other 1950s-style “miracle foods” such as mayonnaise chocolate cake and aspic anything.) For the Vanilla Coke logo on my two middle fingers, I used a couple of wonderfully fitting polishes from last year’s Coca-Cola Collection by OPI, classic Coca-Cola Red and cream-coloured You’re so Vain-illa, while my remaining fingers sport three coats of Vain-illa topped with one coat of my favourite homemade glitter polish, Hawaiian Ham.

That the Ham, my first attempt at making homemade polish, turned out so well has come as a completely delightful surprise. I wasn’t expecting the glitter mix to blend so nicely, I wasn’t *really* expecting the suspension base to actually suspend anything and I certainly never thought that nearly two years to the date of its creation, it would still be performing beautifully (no glitter curling, no colour bleed.) And that’s saying nothing of the wordplay possibilities that exist when you’re dealing with a polish with “ham” in its name! I actually wanted to paint a bone-in ham on my thumb, but then held back at the very last second – that seemed like an excessive amount of nail art theming for one hand. 😉

I Love You Beary Much

Because teddy bears need love come Valentine’s Day, too, here’s a much loved bear surrounded by wee hearts that comes straight from the heart – literally, because I made this glitter polish! All nail art bears should be so lucky, Valentine’s Day or no, to be sharing space with one of my favourite homemade creations, Sweet Weege! Every one of the handful of polishes I’ve made are a labour of love (and sometimes accidental chemical fume inhalation), which seems quite befitting V-Day (the lovin’, that is, not the huffin’…although on that point, I guess it all depends on how your Valentine’s Day goes, right?) Beary nice! 😉

Ham Sandwich

What do you get when you combine a jelly sandwich manicure and my favourite (and best) homemade polish, Hawaiian Ham? A ham sandwich! Ba-dum-ching! Thank you, thank you, I’ll be here all week. Don’t forget to tip your waiter, and please try the ham.

Note: This lame joke was made possible through the combination of Hawaiian Ham, an ultra sheer pink polish that I made loaded with red, pink, yellow, brown and copper glitters, and Mentality Nail Polish’s Coral glazing polish. I particularly love how the slight shimmer of the glaze adds a ton of subtle visual interest to this standard jelly sandwich mani. Sweet (or salty)!