Tag Archives: brown

Manicure Monday: Matte Gold Sparkles

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Here is another great manicure ruined by cheap top coat.

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It started so well. I used two coats of this very dark, very opaque OPI shade called We’ll Always Have Paris. It looked purplish in the fluorescent supermarket lights, and when I got home with it, it was like a deep brown. It still looks purple in direct sunlight, but it’s brown enough that it worked for my purpose this week. I’m still not entirely sure what color it even is, and I’ll admit it I just bought it for it’s name, because I’m kind of obsessed with France. I love these dark, vampy colors, though. They remind me of middle school, when I wasn’t allowed to wear black nail polish (or black lipstick, or dye my hair black), but I could get away with just about any other dark color. As a result, I wore lots of of dark purples and silvers and browns to get the same effect. I still love how it makes my nails look.

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The notch on the ring finger is from picking at dried polish around the cuticle. Entirely my fault.

The gold sparkles are As Gold as It Gets by Essie. This is one of the first Essies I ever bought myself, way back around Christmas when I’d gotten some money, and I had to walk the whole mile to Walgreens to get a bottle of acetone because the nearer store was out. While I was there, I checked out the nail polish. I’d come all that way, right? I didn’t yet own any Essie polishes, I had money rolling around in my pocket, I splurged and bought as many as I could carry. I spent literally every cent I had on Essie polishes and acetone. Anyway, I love the Essie LuxEffects line, and I like this one in particular. It gives any color an iridescent warmth and a unique finish, one that’s different from gold leaf or glitter. Adding the matte top coat to it guarantees you can see every piece of gold.

OPI's We'll Always Have Paris, Essie's As Gold as It Gets, Revlon's matte top coat

OPI’s We’ll Always Have Paris, Essie’s As Gold as It Gets, Revlon’s matte top coat

Somehow, I don’t know how this happened, the top coat completely smudged my tips. Somehow, it ate through three layers of polish, even though I’d given it ample time to dry so as to avoid this. I am so mad at myself for using up all my Seche Vite. I think I’m going to just buy one of those mega large bottles and be done with it.

Manicure Monday: Purple and Neutral Curves with Rhinestones

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I went a little overboard last week. I finally got the nail art accessories I bought on Amazon; they shipped from China and took ages to get here. I’m thinking about buying more, though. I got like ten rolls of striping tape, tons of rhinestones and pearls, and fimo sticks for about seven dollars, including shipping. This could be either the best thing or the worst thing to happen to my weekly manicure.

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The middle finger’s stone is supposed to be a bow, but whenever I see it, I think about mitosis. I might spend too much time doing science.

When I started with this one, I’d tested it on my white mannequin hand. The white base color had given me a greater contrast between the light colors. It looks fine when light is directly on it, but in a room that’s not so well lit, it’s hard to tell them apart. That’s where the rhinestones came in. That, and I couldn’t not use them.

Urban Decay's Sidecar and Smog, Sinful Colors' Bali Mist

Urban Decay’s Sidecar and Smog, Sinful Colors’ Bali Mist

I used Urban Decay’s Naked lacquer set a few months ago, and I still feel a little guilty about having bought it. I’m a huge fan of Urban Decay and their Naked palettes, so adding the lacquer set to my collection was a no-brainer. Of course, when I got it, I was disappointed to find that they were all mini bottles, and that I’d spent almost thirty dollars on mini bottles. I mean, I’m glad I have them, I love all the colors, and a quick search on Sephora.com reveals they’re out of stock, but I’m still a little mad at myself for spending that much. That said, Sidecar is my new favorite neutral. I started with two coats of it before I added all the other nonsense, and part of me wishes I’d just left it on. It’s so understated, but still so shimmery and soft.

Also, that quick search on Sephora.com revealed that Urban Decay has a couple of nail colors that aren’t part of the Naked brand. I think I need them.

Manicure Monday: Pink and Brown Flakie Gradient Thing

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This wasn’t the manicure I had planned when I started. I wanted a water marble with this pink and a pastel yellow, Julep’s Blake. I used two coats of it, and got one hand marbled, and then completely ran out of the yellow.  It was about half full from the last water marble I did, and the Julep bottles are so small that I’ll go through half a bottle without realizing it. I’m a little miffed I only got two manicures from that one bottle. So there I was, one hand finished, one not, no other pastel yellow polish to use instead. I tried a neon yellow, and it just turned everything orange. I gave up and started over. I dug around in my bag for hours, looking for something I hadn’t used yet. I saw the Moon Candy in there and said “Hey, why not?”.

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I liked the brown and pink gradient on its own, and at first, I was hesitant to add the flakie glitter. It reminded me of this ridiculous ice cream my boyfriend ate when he lived here that was chocolate and cherry and even had these heart-shaped chocolates with cherry filling. It’s excellent break-up ice cream. Anyway, so I was thinking about that, and I almost used heart glitter instead of the flakies, but I’m glad I didn’t. I like the way it came out. Also, something completely new to me is using both kinds of gradients together. I’d either do a color gradient or a glitter gradient, but never both at the same time. I like the dimension I get from doing both.

 

Sinful Colors' Soul Mate, Revlon Moon Candy in Universe

Sinful Colors’ Soul Mate, Revlon Moon Candy in Universe

On an unrelated note, this manicure survived mowing the lawn right after being finished. I thought I’d chip at least one, for sure, but nothing happened. I have failed twice at mowing my own lawn, first because the mower ran out of gas and I didn’t realize it, and the second time because it started breathing smoke. At least my manicure is intact.

Even nice nails make dirty hands look good.

Even nice nails make dirty hands look good.

Manicure Monday: Brown and Orange Tips on Yellow

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I don’t like these.

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I had this yellow, and I didn’t really know what to do with it. I didn’t want to do another gradient right away, and I didn’t feel like trying dots or anything. My original plan was to use the French manicure guides, but I didn’t have enough after last week’s manicure, so I used tape.

Rhinestones! The ring finger is a heart shape, the thumb is a diamond.

Rhinestones! The ring finger is a heart shape, the thumb is a diamond.

I was kind of in a rush with this. I had people over this weekend, and they had car trouble and had to stay over an extra day, so I hurried to get them done. I made kind of a mess, and I made the mistake of using polishes that weren’t very opaque. I put thick coats of polish on, and it kind of migrated away from the tips and left me with some weird discolorations and stringy bits the tape lifted. The tape also pulled up some of the orange pieces, hence the rhinestones.  Finally, I didn’t wait long enough to apply the top coat, so some smudging occurred.  Basically, these nails are like the sad yellow markers from our childhoods that met the black marker a few too many times. They definitely looked better in my head, and could have turned out better if I had been able to take my time with them.

Bubbles and smudges and all kinds of sadness.

Bubbles and smudges and all kinds of sadness.

I love the color combination, though. It just came together very easily, and it wasn’t until yesterday when I saw this pillow in my living room that had been crocheted or knitted by someone’s grandmother using the same colors. I wonder if I was subconsciously influenced by it.

Bonder, Quick Canary, Orange Smoothie, Under Your Spell, Out the Door

Bonder, Quick Canary, Orange Smoothie, Under Your Spell, Out the Door

This is the first time I ever used Wet ‘n Wild polishes, and they have this really wide brush that wasn’t suitable for detail work like this. I bet they get really nice coverage in different situations, but I don’t think I’ll use them again for this purpose. I put on a lot of top coat to smooth down the rhinestones, and it almost feels like Seche Vite again. I miss it.

Manicure Monday: White, Brown, and Orange Dot Gradient

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After last week’s accidental Italian food manicure, I knew one thing was true. I probably couldn’t do much worse than pizza nails, and if I did, I would really have to screw up for that to happen. I was in a tricky spot, though. After seeing many of the nail artists on Reddit doing designs with dots, I wanted to try one. I wanted this magnificent waterfall of polka dots cascading down my little nails. After searching for tutorials, I found a tutorial from Chalkboard Nails and followed it as well as I could.  It’s not quite there, but it’s not bad for my first attempt.

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It kind of looks like animal spots, now that I think of it.

These are some of the saddest looking bottles of polish I have. The Claire’s polish doesn’t have a name, but it’s chunky and thick and even though there’s some light glitter in the bottle that doesn’t apply well to the nail, making it bumpy and coarse instead. The old Maybelline polish was an outlet store find about eight years ago; I can’t believe I even still have it. Wait, yes, I can, because I use everything until I lose it. The orange/yellow LA Colors is part of my paint your nails so you don’t go crazy shopping binge. It’s kind of watery, kind of uneven, but it looks nice against the white. I was worried it wouldn’t show up well at all.

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I always feel weird using Orly and Seche Vite with these old and cheap polishes. It’s having Dom Perignon with my Big Mac. Earlier manicures with that white polish were never successful; it would always slough off in flakes like dandruff by the second or third day. Of course, that was before I discovered that there was a purpose for top coat after all.