Nail Art Society!!!

Well, the first week of the semester is at an end. One down, fourteen to go!

But, today was exciting. When I got home I found my August Nail Art Society bag in the mail! :D Very exciting. Nail Art Society is a monthly subscription service for nail art goodies. You pay a small fee, and each month they send you a bag full of fun things! NAS, as it's referred to on Facebook, recently went through an overhaul. They took a couple months off, and oh boy, was it worth it! Here's my review of the August bag. I'm personally subscribed to NAS, and am simply offering my honest opinion.

The bag is a shiny purple bubble mailer. It's so bright and cheerful, I just smiled when I saw it in the mailbox. 

And here we are! ORLY paints! There are two brochures outlining the Orly line, a postcard featuring a NAS guru, a tutorial postcard, water decals, stickers, and four Orly paints.

Here's the tutorial, giving some ideas on how to use the items in the bag.

These Orly paints are special. They are water based paints! This is very exciting, because if you're doing a design, and you mess up, it's MUCH easier to remove than regular nail polish. I got white, silver, black, and a very vibrant blue.

It is blue...my camera here made it look purple. Sorry about that. They each have a striper brush, which is also great.

I also got one pack of butterfly nail stickers, and one pack of water decals. They're both butterfly themed, and just gorgeous.

So, the bag was well worth the subscription fee, which is $9.95/mo plus about $5 shipping. They send you a confirmation email when your bag is shipped, so you get to stalk the tracking.

I'll be the first to admit...I'm not very good at free hand designs. But with these Orly striper paints, I'm excited to try. 

Guaranteed nail mail each month for me! So fun. :D

Until next time,

Becks

Adventures in Stamping Sunday Challenge

It's Sunday! I spent most of the day wrecked with sinus issues, so things could have been better. Fall semester also begins tomorrow (although I have Mondays off), so today is very bittersweet. But, in the nail art world, for those who enjoy stamping, Sunday is also challenge day!

Adventures in Stamping is the facebook group that started it all for me.  I learned everything I know about stamping from the amazing talented people over there. Every Sunday a poll is posted for us to vote on possible themes. The voting closes on Wednesday, and then Sunday we post our challenge manis. I've gotten so much inspiration from browsing through all the photos posted in AiS. 

This weeks challenge is 'stamp over a nude base. This was my final mani.

My base is a metallic sandy color. The brand is Kleancolor, and the color is 42 Sandstone. Kleancolors smell terrible, but they're great polish and you can get them very cheap online, often less than $2 a bottle including shipping. Here's a bottle shot, and you can see the color on my nails.

I stamped with a couple different images from the Pueen Love Elements collections. I used two images, both found on #33.

I stamped with an extremely vivid green from my favorite stamping polish maker, Mundo de Uñas. Her stamping polishes are thick and extremely opaque. Many of her stamping polish stamp wonderfully over black. Bonus, they're SO affordable! This is her stamping polish no. 8, Esmeralda

Isn't this fun? I know the base looks more gold in the photo, but in person it's just a shimmery neutral color, with a vivid pop of green. For some added shimmer, I topped the whole mani off with Oh, Baby, by Pure Ice. I like to think of it as my poor-man's holographic topcoat.

Summer is definitely coming to an end, although I don't think the heat is going without a fight. I'm going to miss my free time, but I'm so ready to be done with school. One more year!

Until next time,

Becks

Stamping Plate Giveaway from SpellbindingNails

When I first started getting into nail art, one of the first blogs I stumbled upon was by the fantastic Sarah of SpellbindingNails. She's hosting a giveaway for some stamping plates from MoYou. If you'd like a chance to win 6 plates from the collection of your choice, just do the entries on her rafflecopter! 

SpellbindingNails MoYou London Giveaway

*Click Here to View the Plate Collections*

Summer Water Marble

So, friends, I thought I'd give doing a nail art tutorial a shot. I've had a lot of people ask me 'how do you do that?'

You'll want to gather the following items

Base coat, a light polish for your base color, 2-3 polishes with which to create your water marble, top coat, tape, toothpicks or dotting tool, small cup with room temperature water, paper towels, and whatever items you use to clean up the polish around your nail. I use a small glass cup, cotton swabs, and a cheap cosmetic brush to get close to the nail bed. My favorite is the E.L.F. Professional Concealer Brush. You can get one of these brushes at Target for $1!

Apply your base coat, and then apply your color. I chose white, as it would make the colors I chose for my water marble really pop. I chose three polishes from China Glaze- That's Shore Bright, Too Yacht to Handle, and Sun of a Peach.

Apply tape surrounding your nail, to help with clean up in the end. There are lots of other methods other than tape, however this is my favorite.

When you're ready to begin, line up your polishes near your cup of room temperature water, on the paper towel. The water needs to be room temperature so the drops of water spread the way you want them to.

Alternating polishes, create your bulls-eye.

Using your toothpick or dotting tool, lightly drag the tip across the bulls-eye, creating the effect you're looking for. Quickly clean off the polish off your toothpick or dotting tool in between each drag. You'll want to keep the end sharp and gunk-free. Make sure you don't play with the polish too much...I've found that if you play around with the design too much, the colors tend to get muddy. Here, less is more!

When you've gotten a design you like, position your nail over the section you want. Dip your nail into the water, making sure to completely submerge your nail. Keeping your nail in the water, lightly blow on the remaining polish that's on top of the water. Spin your toothpick between your fingers while in the water to pick up the leftover polish. When the surface of the water is mostly clear, pull your finger out of the water.

There it is! The image is on my nail and the tape. You can see the polish swirled around the toothpick and barely any polish is left on the water.

Here's my water marble. You want to let it dry a bit before you take the tape off, to avoid any boo-boos.

See how much the tape helped? Barely any clean up left to do. Since there wasn't much of a mess, I just used my ELF brush and cleaned up.

Add your super shiny, quick dry topcoat, and you're good to go! (If you have questions about top coats and base coats, leave a comment and I'll tell you my preferences.)

Isn't this great? I just love water marbles. Each nail is different. And I think these colors go great together. It's a perfect way to end the summer.

I hope you enjoyed my first nail art tutorial! Any requests? 

Until next time,

Becks