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. 🙂

Ears to Sally!

Another set for my growing collection, this time a pair of much-coveted Sally ears from The Nightmare Before Christmas, with, as always, a bit of matching nail art.

And I’m including this cute photo of us with everybody’s favourite droid, BB-8, because he quite specifically chirped that he liked my ears.  Excellent taste, little droid, no idea you were a Tim Burton fan. 😉

Disney Girl Challenge: Patchwork Sally (Again)

Small administrative note: I posted these nails earlier on this afternoon, and owing to what I’m assuming was a glitch in publishing, they didn’t show up in the WordPress Reader or in any other meaningful way until about half an hour ago. So I’ve deleted the original post and replaced it with this exact copy, in the hopes the admin issues have sorted themselves out – with apologies to the folks who were kind enough to like this post as originally published.

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My goodness, does our girl Patchwork Sally have an affinity for the muted print or what? At one point whilst doing these nails, I think I had about 15 different polishes open and on the go. The lady’s got a busy, busy wardrobe.

I attempted a Sally design as part of my self-imposed Disney Girl Challenge very, very early on in my nail art-ing career, and I still think it remains a pretty decent effort.

I actually thought I had left that original effort glossy, but it turns out I had the foresight to matte it up even back then, because I really think all Nightmare Before Christmas manis should be in a hazy matte finish, don’t you? The one change to this updated Sally mani that I thought was sort of inspired, though, was my choice of holographic polishes, which take on a cool, textured look when topped with a matte topcoat. I thought that was a great choice for Sally’s cute, but totally burlap or itchy wool, sack dress.

On that somewhat related note, I’d like to sing the praises of my new matte topcoat of choice, Zoya’s Matte Velvet, which, as the name suggests, gives your manis a matte, velvety sort of look. I used to be quite loyal to Essie’s Matte About You, but as you’ll note in the older Sally manicure, it had the unfortunate habit of depositing tiny white flecks all over my hard work. So I tried out something a little new, and so far, I’m super pleased with Zoya’s topcoat – soft and satiny smooth.

Disney Girl Challenge: Miss Sally

While I’d never count myself as a member of the Disney Army (Disneyphiles, I believe they’re called), as I don’t worship at the altar of any and all things Disney (I save all my Mouse worship for my temple and future home, the Haunted Mansion in Orlando), I do love me some Disney, and I’m downright powerless in the face of one of their phenomenal animated flicks. When Pixar merged with the House of Mouse in 2006, they brought their stable of beautiful, delightful films with them, and my Blu-Ray player and wallet have been shouldering that burden ever since!

Of course, I’m not a fan of all of Disney, Pixar or Disney-Pixar’s offerings. Monsters University was about 45 minutes too long and lacked the warmth of the first movie (Squishy excepted, because he’s awesome), Cars 2 felt like a better than usual direct-to-DVD release and Up…I can barely talk about Up, because there is NOTHING that can make me cry as hard as the first 10 minutes of that movie. It sort of ruins my enjoyment of the very charming and gorgeous film that follows because I’m thereafter inconsolable. I’d seriously rather watch Marlin’s wife and kids from Nemo get repeatedly iced on a demented loop-o-rama than watch those first 10 minutes of Up, because they are HEARTBREAKING.

But as my husband can attest, I really love the majority of most of the Disney animated flicks, and one of my favourites is the movie that’s the inspiration for these nails, Cars. I wasn’t expecting to like Cars. In fact, I probably only saw it three or four years after it came out, because, like, talking cars, the American mid-west and Indy anything? No thanks!

But then I finally caved and watched it, and I’ve been feeling like an ass for neglecting it ever since, because it’s so charming and sweet, and oh lord, when that song starts playing about the death of small town America and all of Radiator Springs watches forlornly as the interstate passes them by…wuh oh, here come those waterworks again.

But to finally get to the point, 8,000 characters later, I did these nails as part of a super casual challenge I imposed on myself last year to capture the essence of the ladies of the Disneyverse in tiny lacquered form. So here I took a run at Sally (or Miss Sally, as Mater would say), a kicky little legal-minded Porsche who just happens to look pretty fabulous in my new periwinkle blue polish from Cirque.

Disney Girl Challenge: Sally

So the story goes, Tim Burton, director of such twisted classics as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands and The Nightmare Before Christmas, didn’t jive particularly well with the Disney powers that be during his tenure as an animator at the House of Mouse. I don’t think that’s too surprising, as every single thing about the guy, from the subjects he gravitated towards to his own personal style, was the complete opposite of all that Disney held near and dear.

So they showed him the door, wished him well and shelved his remaining projects, certainly not anticipating that some years later one of those projects, a creepy-sweet little stop motion picture called The Nightmare Before Christmas, would once again see the light of day, immediately becoming a much beloved cult classic for a generation of kids (and adults) looking for a bit of dark in their animated movies.

Today there’s not a bit of (legit) Nightmare merchandise that doesn’t come plastered with the Disney logo, so I think it’s fair to say time heals all wounds. It also helps that Tim Burton went on to direct one of top 10 highest grossing movies of all time under the Disney banner, 2010’s Alice in Wonderland. As AC/DC might say, money talks!

These are the third set of Nightmare-inspired nails I’ve done, this time with an emphasis on the pattern of Sally’s adorable patchwork dress.