Summer Challenge 3: Island

Today is the third instalment of the challenge hosted by lady_flower123 over at her blog (check it out here), and the theme is 'island'.

I had a few ideas for this involving palm trees, sand etc., but I couldn't really come up with anything I could translate on to my nails.  So I cheated slightly.  I went for a British theme - Britain is an island after all...  And I wore them to a red, white a blue party that I went to on Saturday.

Anyhoo, here are the nails.

I used Collection 2000 French White, and 17 Risky Red and a blue that I've totally forgotten the name of...

I've seen some lovely skittle nail art on various blogs, so I really wanted to have a go at something like this.  I'm pretty pleased with the overall look, but I haaaate the gradient nail.  I should've just redone it as something else, but I felt I'd already committed to the gradient.  Oh well!

Happy Monday everyone :)

Summer Challenge 2: Sunset

Today is the second instalment in the summer challenge hosted by lady_flower123 (check out her blog here), and the theme is sunset.  I decided to try a gradient for my background, and then I drew in (my interpretation of...) the Liverpool skyline.

I used Rimmel Sunshine, Max Factor Bright Orange, 17 Risky Red and Barry M Bright Purple for the background (it seems all the purple ended up on my fingers rather than my nails) and a nail art pen for the silhouette.

Sorry for the late and brief post - I have a migraine and am too busy feeling sorry for myself.

Mermaid's Tears

I'm still wearing my sunflower nails, in some attempt to convince myself it really is summer, even if we haven't been able to see any blue sky through all the cloud for like a week.  So, today I've got one from the vault for you.

She's far from perfect, but I love her all the same.

The base colour for this is OPI Mermaid's Tears from the Pirates of the Caribbean collection.  It's a gorgeous colour and super shiny even without a topcoat (although obviously I used one anyway...).  My little mermaid was made up of loads of polishes, so if you want to know a particular one, just ask in the comments.

Happy Tuesday :)

Summer Challenge 1: Sunflowers

As I mentioned the other day, I'm taking part in a summer nail art challenge hosted by lady_flower123 over at The Polishaholic.  This is my first ever nail challenge, all very exciting.

So the first theme is sunflowers.  This design came out more or less as I'd pictured it in my head, other than the fact that in my head I have a lot more artistic talent than I actually do.  Anyhoo, here's what I did:

I used Collection 2000 French White and Ninja for the background.  The yellow is H&M Rising Sun that my lovely mum bought for me yesterday, the gold/brown is a nail art pen, and then I used a black sharpie for the detail.

I'm pretty happy with how these turned out :)  They possibly look more like buttercups than sunflowers, but they're all flowers...

Check out what the rest of the participants have produced over at lady_flower123's blog.

Mum's Nails

So here are my mum's nails for tonight.  She's wearing a navy dress with gold accessories, so I wanted to do something to go with that (not that my own nails ever coordinate with my outfits).

I used an old Special FX gold polish that I dug out of a desk drawer, and the accent nails are OPI Into The Night.  There's a little VNL on the gold nails here, but you really can't see that in person.  She's happy anyhoo :)