31 day challenge - polka dots

I went with some Tour de France themed nail art - polka dots for the King of the Mountain! I used OPI's I Just Can't Cope-acabana and Celestial Cosmetic's Snow Clouds, stamped with Mundo de Unas Red and black using plates Born Pretty's BPL-006 for the dots, MJ's JR-29 for the text and Uber Chic's Hipster-01 for the bikes.

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Melbourne Cup nail art

The Melbourne Cup was just on, so I painted my nails in honour of the Race That Stops The Nation.

On my left hand I did the silks for Admire Rakti, the favourite. I used Essie's Bikini So Teeny and Butler Please, and some nail vinyls from Celestial Cosmetics.

Admire Rakti's silks (from Races)

On my right hand I painted Who Shot Thebarman's silks. I used Kleancolor's Boogie Nights for the orange and Celestial Cosmetic's Snow Clouds for the white dots, which I did using a dotting tool. It was strangely awkward to try and pose my right hand!

Who Shot Thebarman's silks (from Races)

In the end Who Shot Thebarman came third, but Admire Rakti came last and later died of a rare heart condition in his stall just after the race, so that was quite sad.

Portal chamber info icons nail art and Celestial Cosmetics Snow Clouds swatch

As I mentioned earlier, I went to PAX Australia at the beginning of the month, where I cosplayed as Chell from the video game Portal.

I was talking to Caitlin from Nerd With Nails and she mentioned that she'd also gone to PAX, and she'd painted her nails in an Animal Crossing manicure! Check it out, they look amazing.

So here's my PAX mani. In the game, each level starts with a sign that tells you what hazards you'll come across in the level (here's a picture of one). So for my manicure I put the chamber information icons onto my nails! Someone noticed them while admiring my costume and asked to take a picture of my nails as well as my costume - so happy people noticed!

I started by painting my nails white with Celestial Cosmetic's Snow Clouds, a really nice crisp white that goes on very smoothly. I did - I think it was three coats? But you could probably use two careful coats if you wanted. I put a swatch of it at the end of this post.

I then used some nail decals which I'd printed myself, and just stuck them on. This time I let them completely dry before applying topcoat and they hardly smeared - much better. 

 

L-R The cake is a lie, Place weighted cube on button, Use the portal to fling yourself, Sentry turret.

L-R: High-speed portal exit, Use the portal to fling yourself, Aerial faith plate, Sentry turret.

And here's one with my companion cube in the background! :D


To wrap things up, here's Snow Clouds on its own:

31 Day Challenge, Day 26 - Inspired By A Pattern

In a timely delivery, I got some nail mail from Celestial Cosmetics today. I was in desperate need of some new topcoat, as my bottle of HK Girl was down to the dregs, so I went to put in an order and was pleasantly surprised to see that they now sell nail vinyls! I picked up some medium chevrons, and after much deliberation I also got Carina, although there are so many lovely polishes there that it was hard to choose. When my package arrived today I was also delighted to see that I got a mini bottle of the September LE, a "turquoise green linear holographic". Very springlike. :) (If you like the shade, grab it quick! September's nearly over!)

So for the pattern today I busted out my new chevrons, grabbed Carina, and used another Australian indie polish, Picture Polish's Focus. (As an aside, how many great indie polish makers does Australia have? So many! How lucky are we?) Application for all three was excellent. The nail vinyls applied easily to the nail, were easy to reposition and to seal down, were easy to remove - A+ in general.

How good does it look? Ahh I love it!

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