Santa Claus is Comin' To Town

This one may be a ways towards the abominable side of the spectrum. I had a grand idea, and...well, it was executed. I'm so not good at straight lines.

For the 12 Days of Christmas Nail Art Challenge, the song I couldn't get out of my head was the Fred Astaire version of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town".

You're very welcome.

So I started with a base of Finger Paints Cerulean Seascape with a couple of coats of Darling Diva Ringer (it's a lot like Fantasy Fire! Lovely!) that I'd been wearing for a couple of days. It looked suitably wintry-night-ish. On my thumb, I overlaid a few coats of Sally Hansen CSM Runway Red-y and made a belt out of Sinful Colors Black on Black and the weird Style Essentials Gold. On my index, ring, and pinkie, I made houses out of Sally Hansen Mellow Yellow, L'oreal Park Ave Luncheon, and Sinful Colors' Savage, respectively. I added roofs in the gold, and dotted on windows and doors in black. My middle finger is supposedly Santa's beard -- it's a coat of Commander in Chic with White On saran-wrapped on top.

Does it look like a town? Like a beard? I think I have Santa's belly under control (though if it were black, it might look more like a pilgrim hat than a belted torso!)

It's a learning experience, and I'm having a ton of fun trying new things. I sometimes wish the actual results had any connection to what I'm picturing in my head, though!

Go see what the awesome things my fellow challengers did!

Baby's first watermarble

I tried watermarbling about four months ago, before I started taking pictures of manicures, with dollar store polish. It ... didn't work. At all. The polish immediately sank to the bottom of the cup or seemed to instantly dry on the surface of the water, and couldn't be manipulated in any way.

I'm older and wiser, now. I was sure I could do it. I've read every tutorial, seen every YouTube video, have a dramatically better stash...

But for some feeble-minded reason, I didn't use my awesome polishes. I tried with two Style Essentials unnamed polishes (I got a set of four at ROSS for $4) and one Finger Paints lacquer, Cerulean Seascape.

Guess what? It was a mess. While I used filtered room temperature water, the Style Essentials polishes didn't spread AT ALL, so even when I had a pretty design in the water, they were super thick and gloppy. I'm only really happy with my index finger.

On the good side, while this dried before my topcoat, I spent a while seeing what various polishes did in the water and I think I have a chance of a good result on my next effort. The Sally Girl stuff and Sally Hansen polishes seemed to behave well, the OPI cremes did okay, but the shimmers didn't spread at all. The L'oreal stuff seemed to play along nicely, too. I didn't try with any glitters or indies because it seems like a waste.

If you have any tips for a good watermarble, I'm all ears! I shall overcome the dread watermarble! And we will all rejoice! Someday.

Sparkly French Blue-ness

I'm working on a light box, as budget and time allow. And then I'll be like a REAL blogger. Me and Pinocchio, with our senses of inadequacy, make a great pair.

Anyway, I knew when I got Dandy Nails' Caught in the Crowd that I was in love and wanted to use it really soon, but I thought it needed to be over a deep blue for true perfection in manicuration. I hereby declare manicuration a word. Work with me. The deep blue came in the form of Finger Paints' Cerulean Seascape, which went on like a dream.

My original plan was to have "Caught in the Crowd" as a gradient going from bottom to top of the nail. It turned out to have a thicker base than I expected, and I didn't have sponges handy to do a gradient that way, so I ended up painting my thumbnails and then dabbing on french-ish tips on the rest of the nails. I really loved the effect.

A couple of things about Caught in the Crowd. It's got aqua and silver microglitter and small aqua hexes. It feels REALLY smooth to the touch, almost like a creme. I don't know how that was possible, but it was really lovely. I want more; it feels that good on the nail! Also, it wore like a champ. I painted my nails Friday night and took the pictures this afternoon. No chips, no tipwear, and I type for a living. No clean-up, either, and I know you can tell. I'll do better, I promise.

I'm trying to think of more ways to use Caught in the Crowd. And more ways to budget lots more Dandy Nails' polishes. Lovely.