"This is Halloween" Jack-o-Lanterns

It's the 4th challenge in the "This is Halloween" nail art challenge. Today's theme: Jack-o-lanterns!

Last year I remember seeing these completely unique and awesome Jack-o-lantern nails over at Nails by Kayla Shevonne. I went to her blog searching because I remember she had a tutorial for them. Well, I found said tutorial and decked my nails out.

Jack-o-Lanterns

I added CHINA GLAZE Ghoulish Glow to the cut out parts of the jack-o-lanterns, but I had one heck of a time capturing the glow. Here is the "best" (and I use that term loosely) photo of it.

Colors used:
   • base color - CHINA GLAZE Liquid Leather
   • base color glitter - CHINA GLAZE Skyscraper
   • Jack-o-lantern cut-out color - SALLY HANSEN XTREME WEAR Sun Kissed
   • Jack-o-lantern cut-out color - CHINA GLAZE Roguish Red
   • glowing top coat - CHINA GLAZE Ghoulish Glow
   • I used white and black acrylic paints as well to make the orange pop on top of the black and then to cover up any mistakes and add detail to the shapes

Kayla is extremely talented and artistic and this design and tutorial are both fantastic. I absolutely love how it turned out. This is the epitome of Halloween nails.

Thanks for popping in!

Horror Movie - Nightmare on Elm Street

Happy October, all. I am squeezing this in under the wire but I have decided to partake in my first Nail Art Challenge. I am going to be doing the "This is Halloween" Nail Art Challenge from Lacquer Dreams.

Day 1 is Horror Movies. My husband suggested Freddy Krueger so I went with Nightmare on Elm Street although I have never actually seen this film. I don't do too well with horror flicks!

Nightmare on Elm Street Inspired Nail Art

Freddy Kruger's nail slash marks

 Photo Inspiration:

Hopefully you get the look I was going for and this is unnecessary, but a quick explanation of my goal look: Thumb is inspired by Freddy Krueger's shirt, pointer and pinky are mimicking the hazy red and black background for the title and, of course, middle and ring are slashes left by his wicked claws.

Colors used:
   • CHINA GLAZE Stone Cold
   • CHINA GLAZE Velvet Bow
   • CHINA GLAZE Liquid Leather
   • ESSIE No Place Like Chrome

I achieved this look by using tape for the stripes on my thumb, dragging a safety pin dipped in No Place Like Chrome for the slashes on my middle and ring fingers and for the red and black look I had one coat of Velvet Bow topped in one coat Liquid Leather topped with a top coat then I did an "acid wash" effect by dragging an acetone soaked clean-up brush over it to reveal the base coat of Velvet Bow.

Here is what is upcoming in the rest of the challenge:

Liquid Leather

Today is another wet and gloomy day here in Virginia. I hope the sun peeks out sometime this week so I can wear my gorgeous Fast Track in the sunlight.

Today I have my black polish to show you. I have yet to try any other blacks although I wouldn't say I was necessarily attached to this one. China Glaze Liquid Leather is glossy and very pretty, opaque in 2 coats. It's clean and simple to apply with a nice formula even though it's a bit on the thin side. This was my base black under my Pac Man dotted mani.

taken indoors

my boy husky, Dpow, looking handsome in the background

taken outdoors, overcast light

Do you have a favorite, go-to black? 

Thanks for stopping by, ladies! See you next time.

Pac Man

Sarah over at Chalkboard Nails is hosting a nail art competition with a Dotting Tool theme. It is her first nail art contest and it's sponsored by InLinkz. I had a couple of different ideas of what I wanted to do, but after some debate and asking my husband for his opinion, I decided on a dotted Pac Man theme. I used a medium safety pin for the dotting.

First off, my inspiration photo for this mani:

photo is also a link to the original website

These are the colors I used in this mani:

Final nail art result:

waka waka

I apologize for the photo quality. It was dark and raining by the time I finished and the lighting in my house is less than flattering. I wanted to keep to the dotting tool theme, so instead of filling in my Pac Man and the ghosts, I left them spotted. I also added the cherries to my pinkie that Pac Man eats.

I hope you like it and if you haven't entered into Sarah's contest yet, you should! You can find the entry post here. Have a great evening! :-)

Santa is Coming to Town

Christmas is just around the corner and the big man is a'comin! Santa Claus has to be one of the most iconic figures associated with any holiday. So, in true Christmas spirit, I did full Santa nails! Unfortunately, I have to admit, they didn't turn out exactly as I was picturing. All in all though, it's still cute and festive enough.

I used the following colors topped w/ Seche Vite:
     • Zoya - Sooki
     • China Glaze - Liquid Leather
     • China Glaze - Go Pink
     • Finger Paints - Paper Máché
     • Essie - Allure

So yeah, my pointer got a bit mussed up because I had to clean up a major polish spill! Merry Christmas, ladies!

Red-Nosed Reindeer

To jazz up my Zoya Kennedy mani, I added a holiday decor to it. I free handed red-nosed reindeer using 2 art brushes. omg I love LOVE LOVE this mani!!! It's super festive and EVERYONE commented on it! I have to admit though, I am not the one who originally came up with this design. Sammy at The Nailasaurus is an amazing talented artist who came up with this, and many other, festive designs as part of her "12 days of Christmas" nails. I highly recommend you check out her blog.

I used the following colors in this mani:
         • China Glaze: Ring in the Red (noses)
         • Finger Paints: Paper Máché (eyes)
         • Zoya: Kennedy (base color)
         • China Glaze: IX (reindeer color)
         • China Glaze: Liquid Leather (reindeer outline)

As I said, I used art brushes to paint in the design. I found a pack of 4 different sized brushes from Michaels for around $4. If you are looking into getting a thin brush for detail work my advice is make sure you get a brush with strong bristles. If they're too flexible, your stroke will not be as fluid or precise. Also, do not try to dip your brush directly into your polish bottle, as this will most likely result in a huge excess of polish in a gloppy mess that is wasteful. Dab small amounts as needed onto some sort of smooth, non-porous surface. Same as recommended while using a dotting tool which is what I did the eyes with. Also, something to keep in mind while doing nail art is that you need to keep in mind whatever you design with your dominant hand will have to be replicated with your non-dominant hand, so don't go too detailed that you can't achieve a similar look on both hands.

Now on to how I painted this look. First I had my 2coat base color of Zoya Kennedy topped with Seche Vite. Then I used a fine brush to add the shape of the reindeer. Using my smallest brush I then outlined the shape in black then proceeded to fill in the extra details, eyes and noses.  I also used a thin coat of white before I painted on the red noses because Ring in the Red is a very thin polish that wouldn't have shown to it's fullest potential over a deep, dark brown. The design looked a bit rough at first, but after it FULLY dries, I topped again with Seche Vite and it gave it a smooth, glossy look. So if you are doing nail art with a fine brush and think it doesn't look smooth, don't worry because your top coat will help take care of that! (=

I hope you feel inspired to do some festive nail art of your own! Merry Christmas nailaholics!!