Beginners Tutorial - Super cute pink and fushia dotty French Manicure

Hi everyone!

Lately my color choices have been all about orange and green, and my best friend complained because she hates these colors :-D

So I decided to get back to the basics and do something cute and that doesn't take too long.

For this mani, you will need

• a base coat
• a background color (I used Sally Hansen Xtreme wear Bubblegum Pink #470)
• a colors for your dots (I used Wet n Wild Fastdry FuchsiaRama #232C)
• a top coat
• a dotting tool

If you don't own a dotting tool, I highly recomment you check out The Beauty Department's article about her DIY dotting tool. She uses a pen or pencil, an eraser and a pin. Very smart! Besides, her nail arts are super pretty.

Most polishes work fine for dots. However, some cheap polishes (and I have a lot of those!) are too fluid for dots. Consequently I usually test whatever polish I wanna use before starting my mani. Plus, if you're not too used to using your dotting tool, its a nice way to train. I usually use a magazine cover to do my tests, ideally white so my polish color is not too altered:

Then, I apply two coats of my background color to have enough opacity. When it's dry, I put a couple of drops of polish on my magazine cover to create a big color spot. And then, I dip my dotting tool in the drop, and I start dotting! If I make a mistake, I keep a wooden stick or a toothpick close to me to correct whatever is wrong.

 

Et voila! Of course if you have longer nail you can make more dotted lines and it will look even prettier!

 

 

As usual, a picture with the sun light at my window:

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Splatter Mani

After several weeks of growing my nails, I've reluctantly had to cut them. My two thumb nails were torn since a couple of weeks, and my repair attempts with glue polish and fake nails glue couldn't last forever. So I figured I would cut them very short and give them an other chance to grow without breaking this time!

I wanted to do a splatter manicure since a while, and since my nails are too short for a French Mani I figured this would be the right time. Plus, a trashy mani like this makes less noticeable the fact that my thumb nails are all irregular and ugly!

I used Sally Hansen Smooth and Perfect in Fog #01 as my background color. The polishes of this collection are really pretty. They have a kind of "fluffy" or "cloudy" finish that I like a lot. Fog is a subtle grey which looks clean and elegant. the splatters were made with a straw and a toothpick with Sinful Colors Dream on #113 (a neon fushia-purple that I love!!) and Santee Vikini-Green #M60. 

For those of you who would like to purchase Dream on, please note that it is matte, which can be surprising (or at least it was for me at first).

For once I will show you both hands, as each nail is really different.

Here is my left hand:

And my right hand:

I love the variety of effects you can get with this technique, athough the finish I like best is the one I got on my left thumb an index:

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Santee Neon Sapphire #M30A Swatch

Just a really quick mani after removing my Orange and Grey French Manicure.

I used Santee Neon Sapphire #M30A and used Jordana Red of Hearts #674 as a top coat. Red of hearts is a transparent polish with thin red glitters and red heart-shaped glitters. I used one of the hearts on the corner of my ring finger.
I was kind of in a rush so I only took pictures the next day, while I was in the plane to Cincinnati to visit Jeff from the SuperFriends blog.

The little heart ;)

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Neon Orange and Grey + Holo glitters French Manicure

My other favorite color of the season, other than green, is orange. I found a really pretty Neon orange during my last shopping session and decided to use it for my next French Manicure.

Here are the polishes I used, under the careful supervision of Charlie, my recently adopted cat:

 

Other than my base coat and top coat, I used:

• Santee Beach Yellow #M57A, a very pretty neon orange (and not yellow!!!). Santee polishes are extremely cheap with a large choice of color, but they're full of toxic components... I guess you can't ask for much with a $2 polish...
• Confetti Lonsesome Dove #002, a light grey
• Claire's Disco, a transparent polish with chunky holographic glitters

 I applied one coat of base coat (of course!) and then of the Orange, but I quickly realized that it was super transparent... (eww)

   

 Therefore I applied a couple of coats of White, then 3 coats of Orange (yes, you counted right, that makes a total of 7 coats so far...). Now that's orange! 

 

 An then, finally, I applied a coat (maybe 2?) of Grey on the tips using French Manicure stickers and 2 coats of yhe Claire's Holo Glitters polish and Ta-Da! I was super happy of the result! My only problem was that after so many coats, the polish at the base of the nail was super irregular and didn't look as clean as I would have want it to. But well. 

   

 

 And with natural sun light: 

 

 The tip was so thick that it looked like my nails were fake, lol! You really don't want to know how long it took me to take it off 4 days later... But i any case, I think Charlie liked it!

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Chelly #16 Swatch and glittery accent nail

I have done various manicures in the past couple of weeks but I have been too busy to post! Fortunately I now take pictures of all my manis so at least I can post them at a later date.

I went on a mini polish shopping spree a few weeks ago and now I'm trying to try all my new acquisitions ;)

The first one I tried was Chelly Shade #16 (very poetic name, right?). It is an very nice Emerald Green. I was in a rush so I did nothing fancy. I just applied a couple of coats of Jordana Silver Jewel #176 on my ring finger.
I like the result a lot... for some reason I've been totally addicted to green lately!

In the sunlight in my apartment: 

In the Miami exterior sunlight:

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First Watermarble manicure

Here are the nail polishes that I used for my very first Water Marble Manicure : 

• Base and Top Coat : Orly Nail Defense
• Sinful Colors Twilight #M971
• Confetti Fruit Smoothie #023
• Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme wear Black Out #370

I prepped my nails with one coat of Orly and 2 coats of Twilight. Then, following the instructions posted on various Water Marble Youtube tutorials I started my nail art. Here is the final result!!
It's kind of sloppy... but it's my very first so be gentle ;)

PS : due to some weird bug, this post is not my first Watermarble in the list... please excuse the weirdness :D

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Neon Pink and Coral French manicure

Hi everyone!
This week I wanted to try something a bit different from what I usually do, so I decided to try doing my first home-made french manicure!

For this manicure I used the following colors :

• Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear Coral Reef #405
• Sally Girl Mini  Neon Pink
• Kiss Nail Art Paint Silver Glitter #SPA10

Here a swacth of Sally Hansen's Coral Reef,  which is a very pretty Coral. I know Corals are really trendy at the moment, and they're a shade that I really like. This one looks like a light pink in the bottle, but once applied to the nails it really seems to change color depending on the light, and gets really pretty orange accents.
I applied two coats.

 

 

Then I used stickers to build my French Manicure. I chose to make Neon pink tips with a line of silver glitter with a thin brush: 

   

 

Here is a picture I took at my pool to show you how Coral Reef can really get orange accents with the sunlight. I love it!

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