31 Day Challenge, Day 29 - Inspired By The Supernatural

A nice quick easy manicure today: blackest night with a ghost accent nail. BooOooo0!

I painted my nails black (Relvon's Black Magic) and then stamped the white ghost on with plate BM-223. I passed over this li'l ghosty for the spooky Halloween nails I did earlier in the challenge because I wanted to keep it black and orange, so this haunting is overdue.

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31 Day Challenge, Day 28 - Inspired By A Flag

This challenge is a bit what? for me... inspired by a flag? I decided to do some freehand bunting, because bunting is nice and festive, and again, freehand practice.

I painted my nails white with Ulta3's Lily White, then used Butter London's Pillar Box Red, Essie's Butler Please (blue), and Face of Australia's Some Like It Hot (orange) for the flags. Ulta3's Midnight for the black rope.

I finished things off with OPI's Matte top coat - omg! So much better than my previous matte topcoat! One coat and done. I like the illustrated look matte coat gives.

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31 Day Challenge, Day 27 - Inspired By An Artwork

For this one I tried to imitate a painting by Barnett Newman called Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue?

Not quite the same scale as the painting! The proportions are not right, alas.

I painted my nails with Butter London's Pillar Box Red, then freehanded the stripes on with Essie's Butler Please and OPI's I Just Can't Cope-acabana. I thought about taping off the lines but wanted to practice freehanding stripes, because I want to get better at it.

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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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31 Day Challenge, Day 25 - Inspired By Fashion: Denim

Denim! Jeans are such a staple of the fashion world, and I was all set up for this challenge. Some time ago I bought Ciate's Denim Manicure kit, and I've been saving it for the right occasion. And not only is the theme for today "fashion", but tomorrow is a casual Friday. Perfect! (I always do my nails in the evening and wear them the next day.)

Ciate also fits the fashion rule in that you pay a premium for the brand name, unless you are like me and wait for it to pop up on Catch Of The Day. :D

The kit comes with a blue polish, Regatta, which quickly dries to a kind of semi-matte finish. It also has some water decal stitches, some nail studs, and some nail glue. Overall the kit was easy to use, with clear instructions, except for the nail glue. It had to be cut open and then had a tendency to go everywhere. I much prefer my other nail glue, which comes in a little bottle with a brush to paint it on. Much easier to control.

This kit was a lot of fun and I like the end result. Check it out!

(Note: the thumb is part of the picture on the packaging, not my own thumb!) 

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31 Day Challenge, Day 24 - Inspired By A Book, Treasure Island

Today's nails are inspired by the classic book Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, a tale of pirates and hidden treasure. I really like how these turned out!

I started by painting my nails with Revlon's Gold Coin, then used Cheeky plate CH49 to stamp the treasure chest, the skull and crossbone pattern, the cutlass pattern, and the ships. I stamped the palm tree from N.Nail plate "B26" (available from KKCentreHK, as far as I can tell, because I bought it in-store from a general beauty store). I finished by free-handing the "X marks the spot" and the dotted path to the treasure.

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31 Day Challenge, Day 23 - Inspired by A Movie, The Little Mermaid

I knew exactly where to turn for this challenge: to Disneyland! More specifically, to the nail polish set I bought when I went to Disneyland last year - the Wickedly Beautiful set. (I note that it's gone up $5 since I bought it, so I feel like I got a retrospective bargain.) Disney has a make-up range called Beautifully Disney, and one of the their nail polish sets is for the "wonderfully wicked ladies", or evil villains. There's Mistress of Evil (Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty), Midnight Hour (from Cinderella), Just One Bite (the Evil Queen from Snow White), and the polish I used, Diva of the Deep for Ursula (from The Little Mermaid).

Diva of the Deep is a lovely dark purple with a warm reddish shimmer through it. Application of the polish was excellent, although it dried with a rather dusty finish - a bit of topcoat fixed that right up.

Since this manicure is all about Ursula, I then stamped tentacles on using Bundle Monster plate BM-401, which is much better etched and was much easier to stamp with. I love Ursula and she certainly owns the stage with her tentacles!

And here are some shots of the whole collection and its packaging. Check out how cute the bottle tops are! They also lined up with the bottle so the image faces you along with the logo - great attention to detail.

L-R:  Midnight Hour, Diva of the Deep, Just One Bite, Mistress of Evil.

L-R: Mistress of Evil, Midnight Hour, Just One Bite, Diva of the Deep.

L-R:   Just One Bite, Midnight Hour, Diva of the Deep, Mistress of Evil.

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