Lazy Person Nail Art (n_n)

        So today's post is going to be really short, since I was too lazy to remove Sally Hansen Grape Going! last night. I didn't want to leave it the same either though, so I used some of this mountain of nail art stuff and made a little spring-y nail look for myself.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

    So this was really easy to do and took all of like three minutes. I just used some decals from God knows where...maybe Rite Aid, and a fimo butterfly. I wish I had done some sort of stamping on the background and it's a bit late for spring nails, but overall, I like it! 

Oh yeah, unrelated to this polish, but I wanted to let you guys know that I'm going to be extending my Lady of the Lake Giveaway for an additional three days. I won't be able to get to the post office over the weekend anyway, so I figured why not. The new end date will be June 20, 2011, so if you'd like to enter that, you have a little more time. 

And that's all I've got for today! Thanks for reading!

Earth Week Day 2: Orly Enchanted Forest

            Okay, no chit chat today...I'm a little pressed for time. So without further ado, behold...Enchanted Forest!!

Enchanted Forest is a deep, muted, blue-based green creme. 

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

    This is a really lovely color! I think that the name is slightly misleading, because when I look at this on my nails, I think more this:

than this:

I don't know why...I know that enchanted forests can be dark and deep, but I don't know...this color just makes me feel all evil inside. But it's a good feeling. ^_^

I will say that I did not like the formula on this...I think Orly polishes just hate my guts or something, because this was pretty streaky. It was fully opaque in two coats, but I had to use one more, and two more on certain fingers just to even up the streaks. But that said, everything was rich and creamy in the end and it didn't bubble,  so I guess all is forgiven.

After everything dried up, I decided to use some flower decals that I got from Five Below. 

Natural light, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Out of boredom, I matte-ified this with one coat of Essie Matte About You. It interestingly came out the EXACT color of one of those green chalkboards from middle and elementary school. Brought back some memories man.

Lastly, the tip for today is: Change your lightbulbs from incandescent to fluorescent! They use less energy without sacrificing light, which is a twofold blessing. Less energy use means less strain on the Earth as well as a nice drop in your electricity bill.  And it's very easy to make the switch, because fluorescent bulbs are sold everywhere, for as little as one dollar. Just remember to call your local recycling/garbage disposal place to see how to dispose of the incandescent bulbs safely. They contain lead, so you can't just chuck em in the trash.

And that's all for today! 

NOTD: Capri Coral + Konad

           I decided to keep Capri Coral on for another day, because I really like this color. But I didn't want to wear it the same way, so I konaded over it. 
   

I used the circled pattern on the Konad M20 plate. 

I double stamped the flowers on, side by side. It still looked a little naked, so I put a rhinestone in the center of each one. Then I sealed it all over with Poshe, and that was it.

   I used Wet n Wild Black Creme to stamp on the flowers, and of course, Borghese Capri Coral was the base color. In retrospect, I should not have put the rhinestones in there, but that's okay. It looks good enough to wear for today.

NOTD: Puppy Love

           This design was inspired by the wonderful girls in my dorm, who fight with and scream at their boyfriends at all hours of the night. 

      I used the puppy and the flower design in the center from this fauxnad plate. I need to take some good stock photos of these plates for future reference.

This looked much better in my mind's eye. I promise.

Close up of accent nail. I almost used the little hysterical girl from my fauxnad B11 plate, but then I decided that I'd rather have a cute, silent doggy/whatever this thingy is instead.

     The base polish is three coats of Orly Iron Butterfly. I stamped the flowers with Sally Hansen Celeb City, and the puppy was created with Brucci Snow White. The little heart came from a packet of decals from Rite Aid. Like I said earlier, this looked so much better in my mind, and I really should have only stamped the flowers on my nail once, but it's cute enough to wear for today. 

     My real problem is that I couldn't find any polishes in my stash that would work with the plates and show up against Iron Butterfly. This is why I need some chromes and holos from China Glaze.  Or some real, actual Konad paints. ^_^; Anyway, I may try this again with more compatible colors and less flowers. 

    Also, in the course of doing this, I had to use a shiny topcoat over Iron Butterfly, so I snapped a few pics. I'm usually a big proponent of wearing mattes as mattes, but this one looks way too good shiny. It really brings out the color...when Iron Butterfly is matte, the shimmer makes it look dark grey at times. But with the topcoat, it maintains its blackness.

Natural light, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Natural light, soft flash. 

And that's all!

NOTD: Milani Digital + Konad

           Technically, this should be NOTPFD (Nail of the Past Two Days) because that's how long I've been wearing this mani. It's Milani Digital, stamped with one of the designs from Konad plate M20, and then I put some rhinestone decals on it to finish up. I'm about to remove it, but before I do, I wanted to post some pictures to remember it by.

This is the plate and pattern (circled) that I used.

And this was my inspiration image. The end result wasn't like that, but it was what gave me the idea to do this particular design. 

This is how all my nails were supposed to look. I double-stamped the flowers onto the middle of my nail with Wet n Wild Black Creme. I tried to use Brucci Plain Black at first. It showed up, but was way too light. The Wet n Wild worked so much better. And please excuse the bald spot at the tip of my nail...it was the acetone. 

Sadly, the rest of my nails didn't come out as planned. I was trying to just get it done, so I ended up with more of a random floral pattern. And on my pinky, I got barely any pattern at all. Smh!

After I was done with that, I got bored. I had some rhinestone decals (I swear, I had them already!) so I decided to use those in the center of the flowers. There are some flowers that don't have rhinestone centers, but I needed to conserve, so I only put two stones on each finger.

I think this one shows the end result best. It's in sunlight, no flash.

This was just to show the holo effect.

     I sealed the whole thing over with two coats of Poshe, and that was the end of it! 

     Although I'm not fully happy with the stamping job that I did, it was nice enough to wear out. I figured that from a distance, no one would notice. And I was right! I actually got lots of compliments on this mani, especially when the holo-ness would come out. A girl in my class even accused me of wearing fake nails...she didn't believe that they were mine until she practically had her nose pressed against them. See boys and girls...that's what we call a certified hater. smh!

   Anywho, I'm probably going to keep this one in my back pocket to use again, once my konad skills are more honed and I can get the flowers on to my satisfaction. 

And that's all for today! ^_^