I really don’t know why I find the most simple nail art techniques extremely challenging. I remember seeing The Nailasaurus’ gradient nail tutorial a million years ago and thinking that it looked fairly easy. I was excited to try it out…until I wasn’t. It turned out to be super difficult for me to get a decent gradient so I basically gave up…not to mention that it was crazy messy. Well, I think times have changed because I now feel more confident after implementing a few tricks. Today I decided to do an OPI purple gradient (yay to my favorite color!) with some stamping. This was also an idea I put into practice because purple is the color of the month over at the OPI Mad Love Facebook Group, and I wanted to create something fun for the group. So let’s start with the messfest! Continue reading “OPI Purple Gradient + Stamping”
Tag: Gradient
Stamping Saturdays #13
Hey good morning! I just rolled out of bed, and I remembered that I passed out in the middle of putting this post together last night so here I am blogging before breakfast. I don’t know what time you have to be at work in the morning, but I start at 5 am which means that I am up before 4 am during the week. When I get the chance to sleep in a little, it feels like I am cradled by clouds while angels gently sing me awake. I really wish I could be a morning person, but I will never be happy to wake up before 10 am so I’ll just have to deal with it like everyone else. After work yesterday I went polish shopping which is always a disaster waiting to happen because I want one of everything. Since I liked my first ibd polishes, I decided to pick up a few more to see if the quality is consistent. I ended up purchasing two searing neons that I then decided to use for my Stamping Saturdays mani.
This is ibd Peony Bouquet and ibd Starburst. They are even brighter in person if you can imagine that!
I decided to try another gradient now that I have some confidence in doing them. It didn’t turn out as smooth as I had hoped but it looks a lot better than my other efforts. I call this a radioactive sunset!
Lastly, I used this start pattern from Konad plate M84 and black special polish to bring it all together. At first I didn’t really like how this turned out, but now I’m really liking it!
What do you think of this mani? Do you have anything fun planned for this weekend? I don’t have any plans yet except maybe to go on a shopping binge since Sephora is having a 15% off sale. Someone please take my wallet away now! Anyway, I hope you like today’s mani and thanks a bunch for stopping by. Have a great day!
Loading InLinkz ...Father’s Day & My First Gradient Attempt
Today being Father’s Day, we took it upon ourselves to use that as an excuse to get together, watch movies and eat as if it were our last meal. My brother and sister-in-law came over and we just hung out all day with my parents. My other brother had to work so he missed out on the fun. Why does celebrating always have to involve being gluttons for my family? I don’t know why, but we ended up watching Rocky movies on Netflix…omg…how cheesy yet entertaining. Who doesn’t like an underdog movie anyway?
Since I was wearing a purple top today, I decided to finally try a gradient nail look. I had seen the Nailasaurus’ tutorial linked on Nicole’s page so I went to check it out again before starting. Well, I am a gradient loser and I have never been able to do it properly so I was excited at the prospect of finally being able to do a decent gradient. It didn’t quite turn out the way I hoped. I used a foundation sponge and it seemed to soak up tons of the polish and not leave any on my nails. I even tried wetting the sponge in hopes that it wouldn’t absorb so much nail polish but that didn’t work either. I wondered if it would work better if I used a different kind of sponge so I tried it with a foamy sponge and that seemed to work slightly better. I am still not really happy with the way this looks because Sammy from The Nailasaurus makes it looks gorgeous and effortless and mine just looks…botched? Anyway, here are some pics. I used OPI Do You Lilac It? for the lighter color and China Glaze Grape Pop for the darker tip color.
And this is what I HOPED it would look like:
So what do you think? Maybe I just need a little more practice before it looks the way I want it to. Thank you Sammy for the awesome tutorial and thanks to Nicole for blogging about it!
Oh, I have a question for all of you nail polish addicts out there: Are you at all worried about the health risks of the chemicals in nail polish and acetone? I try not to use pure acetone too much, but non-acetone removers just don’t work. Are you concerned at all? I know for most people it’s not a big deal, but for those of us who blog and change our polish like we change shoes, I feel this is an important question. I sometimes wonder if the concerns are completely overblown and you’d have to basically drink acetone in order to get sick from it. Anyway, I’d like to hear what you think so share away!
