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31 Day Nail Art Challenge — Day 6: Violet Nails

I love purple.

You have no idea how much I was looking forward to the violet prompt for the 31 Day Nail Art Challenge. Purple has always been my favorite color–I even had purple hair years ago! So I was super excited when Day 6 rolled around. The only hard part was trying to decide which polishes to use, and what design I wanted to try. After obsessively browsing my favorite nail art blogs for a couple of hours, I finally decided to go with Chalkboard Nails Distressed nails. It’s been on my to-try list for a while, but I’d never given it a go. I’m glad I did though! These turned out better than I imagined, and I had so many random compliments on them!

Violetnails

The polishes I used for this manicure were:

  • China Glaze’s What a Pansy — Purple Base & some strokes.
  • OPI’s  My Boyfriend Scales Walls — White base & some strokes.
  • Sally Hansen Complete Salon manicure in I love you — light purple strokes.
  • ACO by Ardene Forever Young — medium purple strokes.
  • Essence “Beauty Beats” collection in Baby, Baby, Ooooh — Darkest purple strokes.
  • Sally Hansen Diamond Flash top coat.

It’s hard to distinguish between the different shades of purple with just a picture, but on the nail in person it was striking. I feel like the darker purple base turned out better than the white base. I will definitely have to try this look again, with different colors. I also feel, it’s a nice (less messy) alternative to the paint splatter manicure–which I also want to try, but will definitely need more than a couple extra hours just for clean up.

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31 Day Nail Art Challenge — Day 5: Blue Nails.

My whole goal for starting this challenge was that I wanted to be able to branch out of my typical nail art go-to, and try new techniques I never have before. The truth is, I’m a bit of a perfectionist–I get scared doing things I’ve never done before because I don’t want to fail at it. The unfortunate part of that is that I miss out on some awesome manicures because I’m too fearful they won’t turn out.

I’ve always wanted to try a ruffian manicure. I love the look of half moon manicures, and this is similar except you leave a sliver of color near the cuticle. This is a good tutorial for how to do it. For mine, I went with blues as that was the prompt for that day. They’re not perfect, but I’m okay with that. With a little more practice, I could see this as an easy nail art option on those nights when I just don’t feel like doing a full mani.

bluenails

The Polishes used for this manicure were:

  • Sally Hansen Sugar Shimmer in Sugar Cloud –the light blue shimmer base. (I had to layer it over another light blue polish just because of the fact it was so sheer, it would have taken way too many coats to make it opaque.)
  • ACO by Ardene in Lagoon –the top color of my ruffian.
  • Stripe Rite Striping polish in black — the outline of my ruffian.
  • Sally Hansen Diamond Flash top coat.

Sorry for the dryness near my cuticles. Unfortunately, the extremely spaztastic weather of Nova Scotia is killing them, even with a ton of moisturizing and cuticle cream. I can’t wait for warmer days. My cuticles will be very happy.

Also featured: another Soy Latte from Second Cup. My coffee addition is only second to my nail polish addiction, and I don’t think I could live without either!

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31 Day Nail Art Challenge — Day 4: Green Nails.

I own a lot of green nail polish.

For some reason, I always seem to be drawn to either orange colors, or green colors, when browsing nail polish. So it means my stash has an abundance of these two colors even though–when it comes to green at least–I don’t wear it as a straight manicure often. When it came to the green prompt for the challenge, I couldn’t figure out what I should do! With St. Patrick’s Day over, I needed to come out with something that wouldn’t look like I was a couple weeks late.

So I grabbed my favorite green (which happens to actually be a LA Girl sand blast polish I got on an amazing clearance sale last summer) and tried to think of something pretty. I’m kind of in love with chevrons. I wish I could do them freehand near my cuticles, but I find I can only draw them nicely on my nail tips. I do love how these turned out–my freehand line drawing seems to be getting smoother which makes me a very happy girl! Even my roommate’s boyfriend commented on these, asking “Did you do those yourself!” I actually left them on for almost three days, just because I couldn’t stop looking at them.

greennails

The polishes I used were:

  • LA Girl Sand Blast polish in Green Island — my green base.
  • Stripe Rite striping polish in white.
  • Stripe Rite striping polish in black.
  • Sally Hansen Diamond Flash top coat.

Also featured: my favorite soy latte from Second Cup. I’m a Canadian girl, so I love me some Second Cup. Plus, the baristas at the one by where I work are just the friendliest. My boyfriend thinks I should get a job there, if only because I’m there pretty much everyday and with my love of coffee, it would be easy to sell it to others.

 

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31 Day Nail Art Challenge — Day 3: Yellow Nails.

For my third day of the 31 day nail art challenge, I went with simple nails. I love nail art, but sometimes I do have to go with something quick, if only because I don’t have the time to get super complex (or I run out of time). For this manicure, I used Sally Hansen’s Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear in “Mellow Yellow”.

yellowunedited

I kind of love this yellow. I’m usually more of a fan of softer yellows, but I like the brightness of “Mellow Yellow“. I’ve read online about the formula being touchy, and the application for me was a little streaky. This is three coats, and I found I had to wait for the previous ones to dry before adding another. Thankfully, adding my top coat seemed to balance everything out and I didn’t have any bald spots.

Everything was topped with Sally Hansen Diamond Flash top coat, and two layers of Quo by Orly Matte sparkle finish top coat in pink.

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31 Day Nail Art Challenge — Day 2: Orange nails.

Orange nail polish has to be one of my favorite colors. It’s kind of crazy, but I have to own at least fifty–actually probably more–different orange shades in my stash. So I knew finding a color for this prompt would be easy, I just wasn’t sure what design I wanted to do! After browsing pinterest for hours, I settled on a vintage inspire rose manicure. I didn’t copy it exactly, but I have to say I absolutely love how they turned out. They were the perfect spring nails (even if it doesn’t quite feel like spring right now.)

orangenails

The polishes I used were:

  • China Glaze’s Metro Pollen-tin — the light orange base, and the base of my roses.
  • China Glaze’s Thataway –the darker orange of the roses.
  • OPI’s My Boyfriend Scales Walls –the white base on my accent nails, and the polka dots.
  • Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear (which I don’t know the name of, but it’s one of my favorite green’s I own)– the darker green of the leaves.
  • ACO by Ardene brand in Techno Green — the lighter inner part of the leaves.

All topped with my trusty Sally Hansen Diamond Flash top coat.

All complimented with my favorite latte — I have a serious addition to the cinnamon swirl latte’s at Second Cup, which doesn’t help my healthy eating! (But a girl needs to treat herself once in a while. 😉