Christmas Challenge - Tinsel

Happy Christmas Eve! Can you believe it's Christmas tomorrow? The time has gone by so quickly I can't believe it's already here!










So for my staff christmas party I wore this homemade glitter polish and I thought it reminded me of the red and green tinsel I used to have and would decorate EVERYTHING with it. With my move from England I have yet to locate the tinsel but decided to use it for todays challenge! The polish is SO sparkly it was hard to photograph.

At first I was going to just keep it as it was but decided to try adding some tree green around the tinsel to give it more of a tinsel shape and feel. Normally I would have painted the green on first I just really didn't want to go through the hassle of taking off the glitter polish (which incidently came off pretty easily) to just put it back on again.

Elves - Christmas Challenge

So this was a tough one for me! My first idea was to take an image of elves from the computer, print it off small and transfer it with rubbing alcohol. This did not work for me - even a little bit! I had the print out sitting on my nails for a good long while and nothing. I've no idea why, I've googled around and see comments about the whole transfer not working but not even a tiny bit of ink from that paper transferred to my nail! Perhaps it's just my printer and it would work with a magazine or something.. will have to try it out some time!

But onto plan B and this is what happened. Excuse the mess there are a few mistakes but as I wasn't keeping them on I was too lazy to clean them up! By coinicidence all the polishes used were Sally Hansen.

I can't believe it's almost the end! Only two more challenges left!

12 Days of Christmas - Wreath

So I wasn't sure I'd enjoy wearing this out so did it quickly before another manicure. I am actually reasonably pleased with the result and it may be something I will replicate later in the week.

I used an off white with a pinkish shimmer that I mixed myself as a base and with a dotting tool and Barry M's #284 dotted on a green circle onto each nail. I used Konad Special polish in red and a bundle monster stamping plate to stamp a ribbon on each wreath. I think it's cute - although totally simple!

12 Days of Christmas - Ornaments

Wohoo, so I am finally a little ahead on these challenges I am writing this post and queueing it up a whole 3 days early!

I used Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in 'Ivy League' for the base and stamped on ornaments with Konad black and red special polish. I added a bit of Sephora 'I'm a Rich Girl' for the tips of the ornmanets.

They actually turned out nicer than I was expecting so this may be a look I replicate. Although I think I'd like smaller ornaments on some sort of tree branch.. There's just so many chrismassy ideas and so few days left!

Halloween Nails

So I actually did a few halloween manicures over the October weeks and I have to say I am so impressed with the bundle monster halloween images. The children at my preschool were very enamoured with the stamps and we made up lots of stories about witches, spooky houses and pumpkins!

First, not necessarily halloweeny but I used Sally Girl 'You Glow Girl' as a base to get a spooky glow was my first attempt at striping tape. Upon the glow base (of which I used four coats to try and get a prominent effect) I arranged striping tape and painted over with Sally Hansen 'Black Out'. I removed the tape and - voila! It turned out really well I think for my first try and it was exciting to see those little glow in the dark lines whenever I walked around in the dark! The glow wasn't amazing though I did keep holding my hands under the light on my phone to get a few seconds of 'wow'!




Next I used China Glaze Orange Knockout which is sooo bright! I added a layer of Nina Ultra Pro Opal Elegance for a shine and stamped on various halloween images with Konad black polish.

The next time I used Nina Ultra Pro Evening Sun for a darker look. I added a layer of Nina Ultra Pro holographic top coat and really liked how they twinkled when they caught the light. I decided I wanted black tips and used striping tape and carefully painted them out with Sally Hansen black out. Although it was a lot more fiddly using striping tape rather than scotch tape I much preferred it, the line was crisper, there was no leakage and I think I did a pretty good job! I added more stamps with the same BM plates using Black Konad polish to finish them off and make them spooktacular! (See what I did there!)




Finally for halloween day I changed them again (!) and used Barry M Spring Green as I needed a green to match my costume (I was a green crayon!). I used the same stamps over it and it looked.. okay. I much preferred the orange but like I said I was the GREEN crayon!






Really enjoyed the whole halloween manicures and wish I'd had more time to be a bit more adventurous!