Finally Nekkid!

Ha! Made you look! Seriously, though, I have finally gotten most of the acrylic off my nails without endless filing (or popping them off like I usually do and suffering the aftermath for months until they grow out). I used the aluminum foil method, which resulted in me having robot fingers for the better part of an hour, but it worked like a charm.

I soaked a cotton ball in acetone polish remover (Zoya Remove + to be exact) and then applied the cotton to my nail and wrapped it tightly in foil to hold it in place. I left it on, one hand in a time, for about thirty minutes. When I took the foil off the acrylic had softened considerably and I was able to scrap it off with a metal cuticle pusher with minimal effort. I buffed the remainder off pretty quickly and my nails are back to being au naturale! If I had somebody else with me, I probably would've done both hands at once, but I couldn't figure out how to wrap my other hand with robot fingers. Also, I had something like 12 coats of polish on so it had to soak though that first before the acrylic was breached.

Something funny happened when I took the acrylic off. I realized that my nails weren't as 'short' as I thought they were. I have always wanted long nails and as a result I have worn acrylics off and on for years. But now that I have taken them off and am actually paying attention to my natural nails, I have realized that I really like them like this! I'm learning that keeping polish on them and keeping them decorated that I actually love them at my natural length. They aren't talons, but they aren't bitten down to the quick. They're long enough to do cute nail art yet short enough I can type easily at my day job. They don't get in the way of my texting abilities and they don't get in the way of important things like buttoning my jeans.

For this week's decoration, I finally broke open my new bottle of Essie's Mint Candy Apple. I painted the base with two coats and let it dry then before taping them off on the diagonal. I couldn't find my scotch tape, thanks to the mini who used it all up 'building' on a box he keeps in his room. I ended up using washi tape, and it worked really well. Its easy to tear and isn't as sticky as scotch tape so it came off easily. I painted the diagonal with a coat of grey then two coats of silver glitter. Once everything dried, I added some decals and top coat. I love the way it turned out, but it peeled off after a day. I blame the fresh nail bed and hurried prep. I didn't base coat like I should have, and I didn't let the other layers dry as completely as I should have before I put the top coat on and I think it made the whole thing less permanent.But, they were cute for a few days and I got lots of compliments!

Hope you guys have a great week!

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#NailFail

Finished - livable for now

 TOTALLY janked this one up, y'all, but I worked on it so long that I simply refuse to start over from scratch. But let me lead you through the agonizing process and show you how I managed to finally come out with something that I can live with - at least until Tuesday when I have time to fix it.

So, I saw this really awesome technique today on nailnerd.com and really wanted to try it. Also, I bought a bottle of Orly polish last weekend in this really pretty light grey (even though I know better) and I wanted to try it out. My plan was to use a bright yellow & pink and make a cross-hatch design over the grey. So I applied 2 coats of the base and while I was letting it dry, I painted some yellow and pink on a ziplock bag.

plastic bag with my 'transfers' waiting

Ignore the obvious humps from the leftover overlays

I let the polish dry for a while and decided I was ready to cut my cross hatch pieces and get to work. It didn't work. They cut ok, but then they all started sticking together and I couldn't get the polish off the baggie unless it was tacked onto another strip of polish at which time it just made a nasty mess.

So here I am with grey nail and really, really wanted some bright color on them.So, I broke out my washi tape (the mini had used all the scotch tape or I would have used it) and taped off my nails, leaving a triangle open on the tip. My idea was to do a yellow and pink chevron, but as happens frequently with my half-arsed plans, that was a bomb, too.

Just ewww

So, the first thing I thought when I started applying the yellow is that I should've put it down first instead of the grey. With the grey behind it, it really muted the bright, happiness of the color and gave it a bit of a baby-puke undertone. Then I had trouble lining the tape up on top of the yellow to get a nice even triangle so they look all wonky. As a last ditch attempt to save them I added a couple of coats of an iridescent glitter. It helped a bit, but you can't really tell in the picture. Yuck. I hate them.

Finally, after looking at the hot mess for about a half hour, I decided to try one of my new stamping plates out (Pueen Stamping Buffet 2014) and hopefully hide the most of the jankiness under a wild pattern.

I found a decently angular pattern and stamped over the mess with black. I topped it off with a coat of Seche Vete to seal it (until I get time to redo!) and called it done. Definitely not one of my favorites, but at least its something I can live with for a few days.

Tomorrow I'm going to visit my nieces and fully intend to use them as guinea pigs for more nail experiments.

Happy weekend everybody!

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Glitter!

It's pretty plain, but I have gotten more complements on this manicure than any of my fancy ones. I cut my acrylics down to my natural nail length and an planning to let them grow out instead of pulling them off like usual. I'm actually kind of loving this length, which is a surprise. They look much better painted than plain, which is how I use to keep them when they were this short. Maybe some bling is all I need to be happy with them. 

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New pretties

I have been itching to buy Essie's Mint Candy Apple, but have been holding off since I just bought a buttload of new polish. But, tonight I caved. And got a bottle of spaklies, too, in Sally Hansen's Snow Globe. Now I'm sitting at basketball practice with the mini and all but bouncing you get home and try them out.

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March 1 #NailArtMar, #Dotticure

So, I am trying to do this Instagram challenge things from Californails for March and I'm already a fail. I did the manicure but got so excited about posting to Instagram that I completely forgot to tag the challenge. Anyway, I'm putting it here for posterity.

I used my new stamping plates from Shany for the first time on my ring fingers and am happy with the way it turned out. My only complaint is that there aren't any full nail designs on the plates. That's not really Shany's fault; more my own for not really knowing what I was getting when I bought them. I currently have a couple of Pueen nail plates in my cart on Amazon, but haven't pushed the button to buy them yet. I'm wanting to make sure I am ordering the patterns I want because I have a feeling this is going to end up being a huge obsession for me and it's going to cost me a small fortune to feed.

Also, I used my new Shany polish. I don't know what color it is because the color stickers were all wonky when I got them. But its a really pretty pealized green so it seemed fitting for the first of March.

Now, with no further ado my #Dotticure for March 1.

It's not perfect, but I'm happy with the way the stamp came out. I had to play with it to figure out the exact pressure to use when scraping the plate and how fast I had to work to get the image on my nail. The other hand is a little less precise, but I'll spare you the details of that one.

Next, I want to figure out how to make my own decals, but I think I'll practice with stamping for a while before I jump into anything else.

Hope you enjoyed the stay and don't forget, NO NEKKID NAILS!

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