Christmas Manicure #4

December 24:

So I wore my gingerbread/candy cane manicure for 5 days this week! What is up with me keeping my manicures on for a long time now? It could do with the fact that I was knitting up a storm this week, I finished a sweater and some leg warmers. So finally, when I was all done with my crafting, I pulled out the polish and sat down to paint. This manicure is so simple because I am planning to do a more intricate manicure today in preparation for tomorrow! My sister is now sporting presents on her nails so I think I might do something like that.

This was just two coats of China Glaze's "Peace On Earth" (I love the name!). This is an olive green/gold that reminds me of fancy Christmas decorations, anyone else? I could have used only one coat with this polish, another super pigmented formula from China Glaze's Christmas collection, but I did two because that seemed better. Since I figured I would keep this one on for only a day I topped it with Out The Door instead of Seche Vite and I was promptly reminded of why I love OTD so much! Great top coat!

That is all I have for right now, who knows though, I might sneak one more post in before Christmas. If not, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Until next time,

Happy Painting!

The Nailventuress

Christmas Manicure #3

December 20:

5 days till Christmas! Anyways, yesterday was Mr. Nailventuress's Family's annual gingerbread decorating party. This is one of those things that I have only been doing for 4 years but I already consider it a locked in Christmas tradition. I help his mom bake gingerbread houses sometime before the party and then the day of we decorate, snack, and have lots of fun!

The first year we did a viking long house, the second and third I did jazzed up gingerbread houses and this year I found a picture of a Thomas Kinkade cottage and made that!

It only made sense to do a mani that would compliment this party. I had been thinking about a

gingerbread mani for days and I finally decided to do this. I started off two coats of Sally Hansen's Xtreme Nails "White On", OPI's "20 Candles on My Cake" and Essie's "Going Incognito". Then I poured some 20COMC and GI on my makeshift palette and drew on the candy cane stripes.

For the little gingerbread men I mixed Essie's "Mink Muffs" with WO to get a more gingerbread colored polish and then with my Essence styling pen I drew on gingerbread men. This was easy enough on my left hand but of course it was a bit harder to do on my right. They all came out alright though. Lastly, I added gumdrops to the gingerbread men. On my left hand I have Essie's "St. Lucia Lilac" and China Glaze's "Lemon Fizz" and on my right I have Essie's "Lapis of Luxury" and "Van d'go".

Everything was topped with Seche Vite and then the day of the party I put on China Glaze's peppermint cuticle oil to make all my nails smell like candy.

Here is the picture I was basing my house off of...

http://www.nonprints.com/UploadPic/Thomas%20Kinkade/big/Christmas%20Moonlight.jpg

And the actual house...

That's all for now! Any ideas for other Christmas manicures? I have 5 days, I have to fit in as many as I can..

Until next time,

Happy Painting!

The Nailventuress

Christmas Manicure #2

December 18:

Seeing as it is one week before Christmas I figure it is the perfect time to post about my second Christmas manicure of the season. This one was inspired by a snowglobe...though I don't get that effect so much when I look at my nails. Instead it looks like it is snowing at night on my nails. Basically a fun holiday manicure!

I used two coats of China Glaze's "Little Drummer Boy" as the base. This polish was extremely pigmented and would have been fine in one coat but I used two jut in case. Unfortunately the formula in this one sucks. It was kind of thick, though not gloopy, and was just hard to work

with...hence the uneven edges at the cuticles.

To add a snowy effect I decided I would have to use a glitter on top of LDB. At first I was going to use SOPI's "Flurry Up!", which is a silver hexagonal and small round glitter top coat, but that was too much for this manicure so instead I pulled out Wet and Wild's "Hallucinate/Hallucination". I bought this polish thinking it would be a good white/silver glitter for topping on polish but I didn't realize how awesome this glitter in this was. It is a mix of dark and light blue glitter along with clear/white glitter and silver and gold glitter. None of this is visible in the bottle, instead it just looks like a milky looking polish. When I swatched it over LDB I fell in love! It is so gorgeous and over a dark blue looked like snow! I used one coat and it dried smooth.

To complete the look I used two Cina Snowman appliques. This was my first time using Cina products and I was very impressed. They were easy to use, laid a lot flatter than I thought they would, and lasted while I had them on. I just now noticed I am missing two stones, one on each snowman, but it is not noticeable. Instead of leaving a round indent there is the silver backing so it looking like they were designed like that.

Overall I am very happy with how this turned out! It is too bad that I chipped it a lot today while Christmas shopping/wrapping, but I am making gingerbread houses tomorrow so I figure I need a new manicure for that.

Until next time,

Happy Painting!

The Nailventuress

First Chirstmas manicure!

December 4:

So I actually did this manicure during finals week to kick off the Christmas celebrations, but I haven't posted it until now. Good thing it is early December and not January when I am remembering it.

The reason why I am not posting another vacation manicure is that I still have on the Illamasqua Scarab mani. Can you believe it? I've lasted 5 days without one change to it, this is the beginning of a long and loving relationship. I am planning to get to Sephora sometime within the next few days and pick up a few new nail polishes, of course Illamasqua is on the list. From the feedback I got, I think Rampage is definitely one of them.

This manicure was pretty easy to do and looked great, though because of the glitter was a pain

to take off. I started off with two coats of Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear Hard as Nails "White On". After that dried I did one thick coat of China Glaze's "Party Hearty". The end result was a Christmas party on my nails. Perfect for those final hours of studying, right?

Apparently I had not used SH's Xtreme Wear polishes in a while because I forgot how awful the formula is. It was so runny that even though I liked the brush, there was no way to control the polish with it. It looked like milk running all over the nail. Eventually I worked out a system but it was still messy. On a more positive note, it was opaque in two coats which for a white is pretty good, and the dry time was fair.

The China Glaze glitter was great. It was not terrible to work with, the base was not too thick or thin, it was overall a great polish. Just when it came to taking it off I had issues because all the glitter seemed to grab at the cotton ball. I know I could try the foil method of removal but my nails beg me not to.

Up next I think I shall do a short post about the Illamasqua Scarab mani. Sometime today I will take off the polish and put on a fresh one, but for now I am still loving this manicure!

Until next time,

Happy Painting!

The Nailventuress