Wingfeather mani

Day 24 was "Inspired by a Book". I based my manicure on Andrew Peterson's On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, book one of the Wingfeather Saga. My oldest's best friend introduced us to this series of books, and we all have been enjoying them immensely! Andrew Peterson is a brilliant writer, in my humble mommy opinion. His books are beautifully written kids' fantasy novels that are just as entertaining for adults. They are super-clean without being cheesy, full of adventure and good v. evil clashes as well as ordinary human interaction made intriguing by his elegant style. Think I like 'em just a little?

Here is a summary of the story, and here is my nail art representation of it:

Index: Janner, the main main character, is a writer and Throne Warden responsible for the safety of his brother. I stamped BM's "love" image onto cream for this. Middle is Leeli, Janner's sister, blue for the sadness of being crippled by the enemy, vine's with lavender flowers for her crutch, and a musical note for her role as Song Maiden. Ring: Janner's brother Tink (Kalmar) is the young High King of Anniera and an artist, so here is a drawing of a tree with a calligraphy-style pen. My pinky is for Peet the Sockman, a homemade peach/nude polish topped with white and red stripes for the sock and a black V to represent the claws at the end of his arms. My thumb is symbolic of the powerful sea dragons.

And this hand: Cream with just the bottom portion of the "love" image for Oskar Reteep and his love of books/knowledge on my pinky. Ring: green and a muddy gold for the Fangs of Dang. Teal jelly and turquoise glitter sandwich stamped with waves for Janner's grandfather Podo, a salty old sailor. Index: royal blue with a (faint) crown for Janner's mother Nia, queen of the lost kingdom of Anniera. And lastly, cream with big pawprints for Leeli's pet and protector, Nugget.

 The sea dragon nail is my favorite. I love this Sinful Colors Kissy, an amazing teal loaded with turquoise glass flecks, topped with Color Club Worth the Risque, although the holo of this stamped image doesn't photograph well.

My least favorite is the "Nia nail". Kleancolor metallics are beautiful, but bleed/seep through any image stamped on them! The crown was originally gold, and I was so proud to get it centered well, but as soon as I topcoated, the crown faded. It's not a total loss, as I think the faded crown could represent the fact that Nia is queen of a country that no longer exists.

I need another break!

After all the work on my Willy Wonka nails, I was ready for another easy mani before I tackle "Inspired by a Book", because it's another one I'll be doing my darn hardest on for my kids. So, in between, using (again) a polish from one of my kiddos, here's the latest:

Sinful Colors Superstar topped with SillyLily New Year's Eve. Kinda reminds me of a wizards robe and conical hat. Check out the rainbow on that star on my index!

After two days, I thought it'd be interesting to see what it looked like matte. Even two coats of NYC Matte Me Crazy had a tough time covering all this shine! It seems even more like a velvety wizard's robe this way.

1/31 EDIT:  I had this on for four days before it started to chip! That's almost unheard of for me!

Wonka Nails!

Freehand nail art is generally above my pay grade, and there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell that anything I did was going to actually look like what it's supposed to represent. I was going to go really simple for Day 23: Inspired by a Movie. One of my favorite movies is Notting Hill, and I was going to use my delicious L'Oreal Notting Hill Blues and maybe just stamp some heart pattern over it.

But then I got to thinking how much my kids love Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, and how much more they'd enjoy seeing me represent it on my little canvases than they would some grown-ups' movie they don't know anything about. So, I busted my butt, painting non-stop for 1.5 hours to achieve this very amateur but very under-15-crowd-pleasing skittle mani:

left hand

right hand

Thumbs: an Oompa Loompa (w/ some serious glare!), and chubby Augustus Gloop, which may be my favorite for no better reason than I love how the hair and cheeks turned out!

 Left index and middle: Violet Beauregarde and a "bad egg" on the scale for Veruca Salt.

Left ring and pinky: Mike Teavee on Wonka Vision and Charlie Bucket burping his way down in the Bubble Room; I love that the holo showed up in both of these!

Right index and middle: you can see the lapels on Mr. Wonka's jacket, but the sun completely washed out his big lavender bowtie, and of course there's the edible teacup, and the chocolate waterfall. In retrospect, I should have texturized the grass, maybe with a reverse cling wrap and two shades of green?

Right ring and pinky: a sponged rainbow and BM-306 stamped image for all that CANDY, and the dorkiest representation ever of a famous golden ticket. I was trying to use a teeny strip from a catalog for words, and lined it up wrong so that all you get here is the measurement for a dadgum curtain!

These are nothing like all the amazing, lifelike portraits from so many nail artists out there, but I worked really hard and am pretty excited about these!

A Breather

Just one huge pic here of a super-simple mani I did as a breather/break in between "inspired by a song" and "...by a movie". I hadn't used my "party in a bottle" in a while, and I've been trying hard to work in a lot of the polishes the kids gave my for my bday and Christmas. Here it is over Mmmm Nails Gummi Bears, which is beautiful but not what I expected at all from the pics online. I thought it was going to be a hot watermelon pink with a green fleck, when it's really salmon with gold fleck. I wasn't really impressed with Mmmm Nails at all; I bought her blue flakie as a cheaper alternative to Zoya Maisie. Wish I'd gotten Maise, at least off eBay, because Zoya's shipping is RIDICULOUS! Anywho, the blue flakie is OK, although the flakes are a little smaller than I'd hoped for, and since I was paying shipping anyway, I got Gummi Bears and a topper of mixed star glitter in a peach-tinted base called Play Date. Still haven't used Play Date. Need to. I also wasn't crazy about the fact that the creator/seller doesn't describe each individual polish; that probably should have clued me in about buying Gummi Bears, but oh well.

Self-Made Mani

Day 22 is Inspired by a Song.  I picked "Self-Made Trap" by the 77s, my favorite band of all time. I could gush for hours—days, maybe—about Mike Roe's genius, the double-edged sharpness of his word play, and his versatile voice. But this is not a blog devoted to the 77s. (I do feel it only does them justice to point out that their music pulled me through a couple of the darkest times of my life and renewed my hope and faith in God in really miserable circumstances.)

The song I chose is "Self-Made Trap" from the Pray Naked album, about all the ways we refuse to give up our sin and the guilt we experience rather than allowing God to free us from our crap. I struggle with this in a million ways every day, and this song helps me to see the truth and feel comforted, as well, remembering that my experience is common to the human race.

So, on to the nails! I chose as my base color Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Grey Area partly for the pun on the fact that there are no grey areas when it comes to sin, and partly because the greyish-brownish-purplish color, while beautiful, is also sort of dreary and well represents the theme. I stamped my pinky with a netting pattern for "tight nets, I weave all I can get", painted lips (kinda wonky ones) and stamped a key on my ring finger and freehanded steel stripes on my middle for "I grip the bars, swallow up the key", stamped barbed wire in silver on my index for "It's like serving time when there's none left", and lastly, for the last line "The die is cast, the word is no", I painted dice—notice that the two dice on each thumb add up to seven!

Here are the lyrics straight off the 77s' website:

Self-Made Trap

from the album "Pray Naked" (Mike Roe/Mark Harmon) i'll beat the rap for a self-made trap get all tied up in endless crap quicksand, i planned pitfalls, i dig 'em all self-made rope and self-made binds i'm all wrapped up in a sour grape vine a human web, i've spun every thread tight nets, i weave all i can get a rats maze wouldn't faze brick walls, i'm enthralled self-made traps, self-made snares handicaps and wheelchairs drown myself in rain, freeze myself in snow help comes fast, pride goes slow could be free if i choose born to win, dying to lose self-made twine, hand-made chains i'm all bound up and self-contained jail cells, i build well lions dens, i got a yen land mines, i design avalanche, i wouldn't blanch self-made traps, self-made snares handicaps and wheelchairs drown myself in rain, freeze myself in snow help comes fast, pride goes slow could be free if i choose born to win, dying to lose the warden comes to set me free i grip the bars, swallow up the key it's like serving time when there's none left on a fast train nowhere but we're not there yet the scenery moves the train stands still dungeon dark, i'll quench every spark a hangman's noose, never leave 'em loose self-made traps, self-made locks combinations i forgot for guards and gates i await i'm a natural born inmate could be free if i choose born to win, dyin' to lose lust came fast, love left slow the die is cast, the word is no © 1992 Fools Of The World, LTD. (ASCAP)

Blue Inspire Me!

Day 21 of the challenge is Inspired by a Color. Of course, I had to choose blue! Olivia actually came up with this design, based on a crackle glass bead necklace she inherited from my sis during a jewelry clean-out. (My girls love when Aunt Kristy sends them her jewelry cast-offs; my sis has really cool taste in accessories!) Here's the necklace:

Olivia picked my favorite shade of blue, and her idea was for me to do a jelly sandwich with my one crackle polish. I frankened a jelly with a random bottle of clear topcoat that came free with something or other and my Revlon Colorstay Indigo Night. The resulting color leaned a little more aqua than I wanted, and I will probably go back and jack it up with a dab of Maybelline Color Show Sapphire Siren. Anyway, I applied one coat of my jelly, which was a teeny bit streaky; I knew the crackle would cover it. I was glad I'd done test runs on a couple fingers, because I'd only used my Salon Perfect silver crackle once ever, and I found this blog post with really great detailed tips that helped me improve the bigger crackle effect I was going for. I applied one more coat of jelly; again, the crackle effect disguised any streakiness even though it was under the blue, and I did try to be a bit careful with application, too. This homemade blue jelly does self-level pretty well. No kudos to me; I just got lucky with my clear polish formula. I topped with a coat of Mmmn Nails blue-to-purple flakie, which is uber-subtle on this mani, but lent itself to the general crackle glass effect.

Olivia was pretty excited that I used her idea and that it turned out so well!

Day 20 Doover: STILL Not a Water Marble!

Doover: (DUUUver) smooshing-together of the words "do over". My kids hate getting back school papers that I tell them are doovers. After the stamp "marbling" fiasco, I decided I'd give water marbling another try. Oh, it was horrible. The agony! The ugliness! The mess! I think I figured out what's up, though. I swear to goodness, I think it's my dehumidifier!!!! Going to test that theory out in a couple days; I raised the indoor humidity level from 40% to 50%. We'll see...

In the meantime, I removed my two coats of Pure Ice white and the gunk from trying to water marble three nails at 10 pm Saturday night. I NEVER start doing my nails after 9:30, but I started all over after 10 o'clock and did these needle marble nails:

sunlight

crummy indoor shot

right thumb, one of my faves

 I used CG Fly, Pure Ice Hot Tamale, Wet 'n' Wild Bijou Blue, and NYC Purple Pizzazz Frost, which is not a frost but is actually a gorgeous deep purple-to-blue duochrome. All but Fly are the ones I'd wanted to use for the water marble, but I think this was pretty nice, too.

Oh, and then, OUCH! This is what happened the next morning:

 My first break since doing the treatment outlined at Nail Care HQ (but my own mix made from her recipe).

Here's a majorly overexposed shot of my nail after I repaired it with nail glue and a piece of silk wrap. I don't mind having to nubbinize because of a broken nail, but this one was into the quick, and I need it to grow out enough that I can cut it and still keep my finger protected! As long as I was doing that, I figured I'd just leave it the length it is for now...

Stamp "Marbling"

I have a love/hate relationship with water marbling. Some of the first nail art I ever did was water marbling, and I loved it. But the prep of taping around my nails is a pain in the butt, as is cleanup whether or not one chooses to tape off areas. I've heard others say applying cuticle oil to the skin around the nail helps w/ cleanup, but I'd end up getting it on my nail, I'm sure. When I did my birthday/Xmas mash-up I stumbled onto the idea of applying lip balm around my nail and all over that section of my finger up to the knuckle. I still had cleanup to do right around the nail, but the rest of the marbling "leftovers" gooped up and pretty much just wiped off my finger!

My other issue with water marbling is that I seem to have a difficult time getting the drops of polish to spread effectively. I know all about room temperature water, distilled v. tap, how some polishes will work and others won't... I just keep having the first few rings spread beautifully, and the inner few NOT spreading. Maybe I need to drop from a little higher up?!?!

So, any-who, I decided to be a big, fat CHEATER for Day 20: Water Marble and use my BM-320 plate to stamp a marble-esque design. I just don't feel the love for this one. I didn't when I used it here, either. And what's up with the fact that I chose such a similar color scheme this time? Grrr.

This time around, it's Kleancolor Metallic Fuchsia over an unnamed freebie from SillyLily. It's a milky white (or pale, pale pink?) jelly polish with fuchsia and turquoise hexes and teenies and white shards. It's not my favorite, requiring 3 coats for the milkiness to disguise the stains on my nails sufficiently, but that's just a personal pref.

sunlight

My thumbnail isn't jagged; I think the dabbing to get glitter where I wanted it gunked up parts of the tip more than others.

flash (and horrendous glare on my thumb)

The combination of guilt over cheating and my unhappiness with this look makes me want to attempt real water marbling tonight. We'll see... I did end up wearing this for three days, because 1) I wasn't going anywhere that I cared who saw it, and 2) all my kids loved this one. Little weirdies.

Mission Accomplished: Pallet Table and Polish Rack

So, I finally got my pallet table put together. Three pallets, each 34" x  23", set end-to-end on their long sides, screwed down onto a piece of MDF we had up by the workshop and mounted on 6 Vika Adils legs from IKEA. We already had enough wood screws lying around, but I did have to spring for sanding pads for the sander and a tube of clear caulk for the nail indentations and cracks between boards on the pallets. So, the total was actually about $45. I rubbed homemade beeswax/olive oil polish into the wood to help protect it from spills and stains.

This table was perfect inside my head, industrial chic/upcycled goodness with plenty of under-the-table-top storage (something every mom of four fantasizes about!). In reality, the table wobbles with every touch, and the deep storage area means that everyone's legs are touching the underside of the table when they scoot their chairs in. I have my old table taken apart but not stored in the workshop yet, because I can't decide whether or not to keep this one. All the kids LOVE it (anything new, shiny or not!) and spousal unit doesn't really care either way. I may give in to the kids and keep it, inconveniences and all, or I may end up making this our picnic table.

I also made myself a new polish rack! Goodwill had these nifty little baskets (they look like some I've seen at Walmart, but SCLEOA donated these) for 50¢ apiece, so I bought twenty of them! I hung most of them from screws mounted on this pallet, and my sweet hubby tethered the pallet to a hook on the wall as an extra precaution, with the rack resting on my desk surface. I now have 174 polishes and am trying very hard to convince myself that it's enough. I still see nail art on the web and think, "I could do that, but I don't have seafoam creme, only shimmer..." or stuff like that. But I don't ever want to own more polishes than I can fit here, and I'm almost out of room already! I have a little leeway, since a couple of the baskets contain basics (cotton balls, aluminum foil, etc.) or embellishments like dried flowers, stickers, and jewels. I could move those and devote the rack to polishes only...

A Different View of the Galaxy

I've already done galaxy nails twice, once before I started the blog and for my 2nd post. I was tempted to skip it for Day 19, but then I got to thinking. Surely, I thought, there has to be some other take on galaxy nails besides the black base color, sponging, and glitter. I was also ready for a palette cleanser of sorts, i.e. I didn't use any glitter for this look, so my nails felt silky smooth for the first time in a few weeks.

I decided on a different view of the galaxy, one from here on Earth! Each of my nails is painted with a different shade of blue to represent the sky at different times of the day. I won't bother to list the various polishes or stamp plate #s for this one, 'cuz I'm being lazy.  Here's the flash:

...and sunlight.

 My pinky is a blue sky with the sun's rays.

Ring finger: overcast/cloudy

 My middle finger represents the first few stars to show up at sunset.

Index: the sky is a much deeper blue, with a beautiful crescent moon and stars.

 And last, my thumb was a much deeper navy in RL, with planets, stars, and comets all showing clearly.

Although the stamping didn't take the level of effort that a typical galaxy mani might, I was proud to come up with something "outside the box" that, IMO, fits the bill for a galaxy theme!

BFF mani

My BFF here in town, Sam, asked me to wear the silver holo polish I bought with the gift card she gave me for my bday. I was also dying to try my one and only color-shifting flakie, and it wasn't until after I combined the two polishes in one look that I remembered I'd gotten the flakie with a gift card from my other BFF, my SIL Christina in MN!

So, here's my BFF mani:
I used Color Club Worth the Risque on my index and thumb, and Revlon Colorstay Sapphire Siren topped with CG Luxe and Lush and a matte topcoat on middle, ring and pinky.

Lovely, lovely holo!

I could not stop staring at how gorgeous Luxe and Lush was through two coats of matte!

Half-Moon Mani? Yes, Please!

I've seen plenty of well-executed half-moon nail art/manicures, but I was never really that excited about the look. Until I did this mani for Day 18! I had almost complete coverage with one coat of Finger Paints Tiffany Imposter, which was surprising for such a light colored creme, and I knew any tiny bald spots would be hidden by my glitter topper. I used paper reinforcements as my guide/masking tool and applied one coat of NYC Prince Street (that I got in a combo pack with Flat Iron Green at the $ store—that's 50 cent nail polish, people!) and removed each reinforcement as soon as I coated each nail with purple shimmery goodness.  When that was dry, I coated the whole thing with SillyLily FAB3. I didn't even know those beautiful turquoise diamonds were in there until one showed up on my nail! It took one coat of Gelous and two coats of NYC Grand Central Station to smooth things enough so that the diamonds didn't snag on clothes, etc., but I can live with that!

flash

 

indirect natural light

sunlight

Wow!

Lucky Dragon

My sweet hubby sweetly sold the reading/back support pillow he'd gotten for my bday and let me use the money for indies instead! I had to find a way to make $20.50 stretch as far as possible. I found SillyLilyPolish on Etsy. She had some really great glitter mix polishes with fun names, her mini bottles were just $3, her shipping was great, and she had a deal running for a mystery surprise if you ordered $15+! I got 6 polishes plus my bonus surprise polish for exactly $20.50. Winning!


For Day 17: Glitter, I used Sinful Colors Slate and then topped it with a sponged gradient of Slate and SC Rise and Shine, a beautiful kelly-green-with-a-hint-of-blue matte shimmer. On top of that I used one coat of SillyLilyPolish Lucky Dragon. Lily's polishes are so glitter-loaded, and what I can see through the bottle never gives me a true picture; there's always at least one fun surprise: an unexpected color, an unusual shape, a holo I thought was just one color...  I'm picky about my glitter placement, so I did fish quite a few of the larger pieces off the brush with my smallest dotter and place them strategically. That's just the way I am. I don't do random very well. I didn't manage to find very many of the medium purple hexes, so they're kind of a bonus on a few of my nails.

I haven't been very lucky with my flash shots lately. I probably need to build a lightbox or something. Blah. I don't really care enough to do it, since these are just for my personal enjoyment.

natural light, shade-ish

sunlight

flash, w/ some stupid shadow—argh!