As much as I love lots of color, I've never been into the Ugly Sweater trend. Please, don't hate me, OK? Maybe it helps to know that I do think they're quite fun on my nails!!
These were done as part of a Birthday Nail-Gram for another gal who also likes lots of colors, especially the pretty-ugly colors. She embraces the olive greens, the mustard yellows, the rusty browns, and the steely greys. It's not that these colors are ugly -- it's just they aren't the traditional colors most folks wear in nail polish. But...leave it to us nail polish addicts, right?
Here's the fun collage put together by our fantastic hostess Justine @beherenail for the Birthday girl, Delia @iamdeliasnails (you can see she is a Harry Potter, Dr. Who and Abraham Lincoln fan too).
Just look at all those gorgeous colors all together in loads of fun nail art!!
This is going to be a short & sweet post today....I'm a bit behind in things having just come through a rough pain episode. And, I'm thinking I might do some more short posts this month, as I have lots of holiday design ideas and I'd like to fit in as many as I can. Besides, we like it when we mix things up a bit - right?!
Design Details
For these nails, I started with a gel base of Perfect White by Madam Glam. I'm really loving this fast and fabulously dry medium as the base for nail art!!I also prepped the stamping nail decals on the Simply Neat Miracle Mat ahead of time. First, I put down a layer of top coat. Then I stamped the images. Lastly, I colored in the background using a nail art brush. You can see the final result which is the "underside" in the picture below.
And apparently, I am unable to stamp straight even on a flat surface! LOL -- Although, in my defense I was not using a clear stamper. Incidentally, I wasn't able to get the stripes straight on my nails either. However, I think I know some tricks to try next time; but, for now you can have a good chuckle at my tilting rows...
OK - back to how I did these....
Working one nail at a time, I gave the decals a surface to stick to by applying a thin coat of Yellow Stopper (it acts like a base coat in this scenario). I then peeled the decals up off of the mat with an orange stick and tweezer/grabbers (I need to find out the real name for them...but they're the ones with the long curved ends - like hockey pucks kind of...).
Trying to align the decals (hah!), I placed them onto my nails. After smoothing the decals over the surface, I trimmed off the edges. I think in future, I might try doing more trimming before applying to my nail in hopes of getting them placed better. All is then sealed in with a final application of top coat.
I was a bit rushed for time this day...so my edges aren't as clean and precise as I would have liked. But overall, they were colorful and fun to wear. (Thankfully, the finicky details that these close-up photos show aren't visible in "real life".)
Polish Palette
I actually enjoyed using non-traditional colors for this pattern much more than I thought I might. What do you think?In addition to the previously mentioned items, here's a list of the polishes/supplies I used:
- Background colors: Wasabi & Mistletoe (green), Sugar Plum Barry from Accounting (purple), Baby Shit (yellow), and Shittin' Bricks (red-brown).
These are all from In The Name Of Polish's Fall/Winter 2016 collection. (Highly recommended if you like intense colors and great quality polishes that water-marble wonderfully.)
***Enabler alert: At the time of this post, all four colors are still available. - Stamping polish: Light Gray #33 from Mundo de Unãs
- Stamping images: both from Christmas 01 plate from Uber Chic Beauty
I would love to hear what your thoughts are on these. They really were a cute (in an adult sort-of-way) design to have on my nails. I have previously done sweater like nails - in fact, my most visited post to date is Knitted Gnome Sweater, from way back in January of 2014. (I had such little nubby nails back then!!)
What kinds of holiday nail designs do you like? I wonder if you're thinking what I'm thinking. And, it would be fun to fulfill some requests...(hint, hint).
Thanks for visiting!!
Till Next Time,
Kimett
P.S. -- Speaking of winter...it really stinks how short the daylight hours are right now - eh? A lot of us nailies are missing the chance to take outdoor and/or indirect daylight photos. Originally when I scheduled this post, I had decided not to include these, but I changed my mind at the last minute because they are just so "Winter" -- which goes with the nail design theme.
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| Cold outside = Heat running inside, makes for dry air Morning ritual includes moisture for my sinuses, throat and nails. |
Also, it somewhat (if a little poorly) gives you an idea of what the nails look like while moving about the day, which I had hoped to get a picture of yesterday, but ran out of daylight. This and the photo below are poor quality as it was still dark when I got up this morning (my cell phone doesn't capture ambient light very well). You can see the across the street neighbor's purple lights from his Christmas tree shining in our front door window. Anyway, just a couple bonus photos to share I guess.
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| Here's a rare sighting of "Cindy" - just a clear coat on her nails right now. You can see a bit of time has passed, the cuticle oil has soaked in and some tea is missing. LOL |