Sea Turtle Hatchling

Nothing to Disclose

Hello lovelies!

I know, I've neglected you. Things over the past weekend or so were very busy, lots of showing and in general lots going on. But I've got a post for you tonight, and another for you tomorrow!

Today, I have a turtle for you. Turtles are cute.

I did this little guy out of entirely acrylics, as part of a bestie twin nails endeavour with @rachelsequoia (if you have Instagram and are not following her, you are out of your bloomin' mind).

He turned out a lot more stern than my source image. Gah! Oh well.

Polishes used:

none!

acrylics in all sorts of colours

size 0 flat brush

tiny detail brush

I have a bootcamp in the morning so I'm off to hit the hay. And, seeing as I just finished watching Robot and Frank, I may also need a cathartic sob into my pillow. Such a good movie, but so sad, guys. And it summarizes nicely the differences between my boyfriend and I: at the end he chirps, "That was cute!" and I weep and state, "That was devastating!" LORDY. See it if you haven't.

Until tomorrow, my pretties, and remember to wear waterproof mascara when watching movies!

xo,

J.

Plaid and Roses

Nothing to Disclose

Did You Know: I have never done rose nail art before. How is this possible? Am I forgetting something? How did I go this long-- anyway.

Fixed that!

This look was done for a bestie triplets nail look with IG users @glitterfingers and @i_heart_nailart, both of whom are as lovely as they are skilled. I've already threatened to track @glitterfingers down in the UK to have her do my nails, holy jeez.

This is almost all polish, and more complex than it looks. Started with two coats of Tempest, followed by two coats of Iris (she is not showing up in these photos, but the added dimension of the mini-flakes is lovely in person). The solid stripes are Pelican Gray, the dark stripes are Recycle, the dots are Camelot. The roses are Mount Augustus with lines in Pic du Gar. The little leaves are Pastelchio with lines in Anna Maria. Only the black outlines of the roses are black acrylic paint.

We hope to be the nail art version of the Three Musketeers and do joint efforts every 2 weeks or so, and I cannot wait-- working with talented artists gets my creativity going like no other!

Polishes used:

Cult Nails - Tempest

Cirque - Iris

China Glaze - Pelican Gray, Recycle

A England - Camelot

Elevation Polish - Mount Augustus, Pic du Gar (shop will be reopening 31 July in the evening)

Lime Crime - Pastelchio

Contrary Polish - Anna Maria

Duri - Rejuvacote (base coat)

la couleur couture - 2013 (top coat)

black acrylic paint

detail brush

xo,

J.

Alphabet Soup

Nothing to Disclose

This will be a quick post -- on my way out the door, and my laptop is going to die! Aie aie aie!! This was an Instagram challenge, and I was assigned the letter W.

All acrylics on a base of Tempest. :) I wanted to go for a simple visual style, like those cards that they put up in kindergartens to help kids learn the alphabet. I hope I succeeded!

Polishes used:

Cult Nails - Tempest

Duri - Rejuvacote (base coat)

la couleur couture - 2013 (top coat)

acrylics paints

detail brush

I have neons on the horizon! Missy has been inspiring me!!

xo,

J.

Chalkboard Nails

Nothing to Disclose

... Not as in the extremely talented nail blogger. As in nails that are meant to look chalkboard-ish.

Doing chalkboard nails was the idea of one of my lovelies over on Instagram. I regrettably haven't run very far with it, but it's a fun look for when you're feeling lazy!

This look began with two coats of Camelot (best black ever), followed by some sponging of Marble for the dust effect, then Filthy Rich for the chalk holder along the bottom. Text is done with Tempest, and the whole is coated in two thick coats of Matte About You.

On the subject of which -- you notice the dots that are distinctly whiter and sharper than the sponging? Those are weird calcifications in Matte About You. Has this happened to anybody else? I have no idea what they're doing but I strongly disapprove. In this case, they sort of blend in, but I've had them nearly ruin a manicure before. Time to consult Missy's informative Iron Polish post on matte topcoats and get myself a butter LONDON matte topper, I think!

Can anybody guess what the equation is? Any maths nerds out there? Show yourselves, ain't no reason to hide! I'll write it below in white text, highlight it and read if you're hopeless at maths like me:

The theory of general relativity as formulated by our good friend Einstein. :)

Polishes used:

A England - Camelot

Spa Ritual - Marble

Quo by Orly - Filthy Rich

Cult Nails - Tempest

Nail Pattern Boldness - Glitter A-Peel (base coat)

Essie - Matte About You (top coat)

I have some seriously awesome posts coming up in the next few days -- a W-themed mani, and another crack at paisley print, so I hope you'll look forward to those!

xo,

J.

Tutorial: Jelly Watercolour Nails

Hello!

By popular demand over at Instagram, here is a rudimentary tutorial for the jelly watercolour nails I showed you last Saturday.

We begin with two coats of the base colour (I used Funny Bunny), followed by two generous coats of a thick quick-dry topcoat such as Seche Vite or Poshé. The topcoat is important, as it protects the base colour from bleeding during the watercolouring. The base colour doesn't need to be perfect (i.e. if you use a jelly like I did, don't worry too much about unevenness) because it will largely be covered up in the end. Wait until the topcoat is very dry, or else adding other polishes and/or acetone to it will cause it to behave strangely and perhaps go all sticky/mushy.

Gather all the jellies you want to use, plus a flat brush (I used my small one-stroke brush). The brush needs to have a good-sized flat surface but the shape of the tip doesn't matter.

This one stroke brush is stained from the love of projects past. And that sounds gross now that I've typed it.

Dab a few rounded spots of your first jelly colour onto your nail, then dip your brush in pure acetone and dab the side of the brush onto your jelly spots. This is important! Do not use the tip of the brush, you'll just dig into the jelly and cause bald spots. The key is to dab with the side of the bristles so that the acetone and the jelly polish mix and the resulting liquid can be 'dabbed around' the nail. This is hard to explain, but hopefully that gives you an idea!

I have my brush angled up here because I was trying to show the pale orange liquid that formed when the jelly polish and the acetone mixed. If you dab like this, you'll remove your entire spot from your nail, or else just maim it a lot!!

This is what I ended up with after dabbing around my orange spots:

Now I'll just show you before and after shots of each of the other colours of jellies. The process is the same for each.

Once you've gone through all of your jelly colours, wait until they are dry -- this shouldn't take very long, you won't have used much polish and the acetone will speed things up -- and then clean up your cuticles with an angled brush and acetone, topcoat your creation, and you're done!

Please let me know if you have any questions at all, I'll do my best to be helpful. :)

The list of the polishes I used is in my other post, right here.


J.