Nail Art A-Go-Go, Day 27: Pointillism

Hello polish lovers!

Last post of the night, and the shortest, because I am tired and fighting a bad headache.

For the Pointillism prompt I decided, of course, to use my dotting tools.  I did not want to do anything representative, and so went to the basics and did overlapping dots.

I started with a base of 2 coats of Barry M Papaya(can you tell I want summer to come already?).

I then used a small dotting tool and SHID Lightening to dot all over my nails.

I repeated with SHID Lickety-Split Lime leaving an area bare.

And again with SHID Mint Sprint, moving out slightly again.

And lastly with Barielle Shades Girls Night Out, moving out again.

I then topped with SV(because I learned my lesson last time).

That is all for today(finally).

I will be back tomorrow with my final installment of this challenge, Art Nouveau.

Until then, polish happy!

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Art A-Go-Go, Day 26: Graffiti

Hello polish lovers!

I am back with my next challenge mani, Graffiti.

When I thought about this prompt I immediately thought of the type of graffiti that was shown in the documentary, Exit Through the Gift Shop, as apposed to tagging and spray painting.  When I watched that documentary I immediately fell in love with the work of a street artist using the name Space Invader.  Most of Space Invader's work is tile work depicting classic 8-bit arcade game characters, like the space invaders, Pac-Man, the Pac-Man ghosts, and others.  I knew I would not be able to recreate the 8-bit look with polish(although small square studs would have worked, Ah hindsight, always 20/20), so I attempted to capture more the feeling of his work.

I started with a base of 2 coats OPI Lost on Lombard, a brick red crelly.  I only have the mini's from this collection, San Francisco Fall 2013.

Once this was dry I got out BM422 for the brick pattern and Kleancolor Black(I did not use Konad because I wanted the stamp to look more like a shadow and so did not want the lines too opaque).  I then started in with my dotting tool a small striping brush and the following colours:  SHID(Sally Hansen Insta-Dri) Blue-Away, Cobalt Blue, Kleancolor Black, Grass Green, Sinful Colors Snow Me White and Barry M Blood Orange and Key Lime.

Unfortunately I did not use SV but my Nubar Top Coat and did not wait quite long enough for the polish to dry to stop it from smudging.

That is all for this post but I will be back soon with Pointillism.  The last post for today.

Until then, polish happy!

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Art A-Go-Go, Day 25: Watercolours

Hello polish lovers!

Today I have 3 posts for you...then I will be caught up with the Challenge...just in time for it to end.  That's right, tomorrow is the last day of the current challenge so let us begin.

I will start off by saying I made 4 attempts to finish this mani in time for it to be posted on the correct day, the first looked horrible...not even a fail but just ugly.  The second was going ok until I attempted to clean up and destroyed it with an inopportune sneeze.  The third was my fault as I was now frustrated and did not wait long enough before attempting my gradient and ended up removing most of my base coat.  The fourth is the one I will show you, still not 100% happy but at least it is not a fail.

I will not show you the base alone, I have shown it before, Sinful Colors Snow Me White.  Actually one of my favourite whites as it is almost opaque in 1 coat.  I use 2 to ensure no streaks.

Once this was dry(this time) I got out my trusty sponge and some Barry M polishes: Papaya, Grapefruit and Turquoise, and created a gradient.

I was attempting to recreate the look of one of the first techniques they teach you when you are learning how to paint with watercolors and that is to keep a pool of colour on you page and slowly add another colour to create a slow transition.  I have to say, using a sponge is easier(as long as you wait long enough).

Photo taken with flash

Once this was dry I used OPI Matte Top Coat to make it look more like paint and less like polish.  I used white as a base instead of Papaya because I wanted the colour to look slightly translucent, as true watercolor does.  This is also why I used mostly Barry M Gelly's, although Turquoise is not a jelly and it was the most translucent(and also the most difficult to work with).

That is all for this post but I will be back shortly with Graffiti and Pointillism.

Until then, polish happy!

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Art A-Go-Go, Day 20: Pop Culture

Hello polish lovers!

I know this is late but you are going to be getting 3 posts tonight so I am caught up for the new week.

Thursday's prompt was Pop Culture and I immediately thought about Pop Art, which is an art movement that was heavily influenced by Pop Culture.  So for my mani I decided to go for comic book nails.

I started with 2 coats of China Glaze Electric Pineapple, a bright chartreuse yellow.  Once this dried I got out my stamping plates and Barry M Greenberry.

My thumb and pinkie are from MoYou London Pro Collection 07 and the rest of my nails are from a MASH set, I don't know why MASH has their lettering on their plates backwards, you end up with them backwards on your nails as well which looks weird.

Anyway that is all for this post but I will be back as soon as I edit the rest of my pics for the next 2 prompts.

Until then, polish happy!

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Art A-Go-Go, Day 19: Game Night

Hello polish lovers!

Today I have my Game Night nails for you.  So in my house game night is either Scrabble or Trivial Pursuit.  Since we played both of those games on Family Day, they were particularly fresh in my mind.

I chose Trivial Pursuit nails for this prompt.

I chose China Glaze First Mate for my main colour, since it is similar to the background of the game board, and a 1 coater, and I am still in love with it.  My ring finger is 3 coats of China Glaze Oxygen a cream jelly formula.

Once this was dry I added striping tape to create my pie piece shapes and used OPI Pink Friday, Barry M Turquoise, OPI Need Sunglasses?, Orly Prince Charming, Barielle Shades Central Park and Color Club Wham! Pow! to fill in the different categories of questions.  I went with the original colours as apposed to the new ones, the have replaced brown with purple now.

That is all for today but I will be back tomorrow with my Pop Culture nails.

Until then, polish happy!

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Art A-Go-Go, Day 9: Inner Geek...Doctor Who!

Hello polish lovers!

I took today's prompt to mean what makes you geek out or what do you fangirl about, and for me, that's Doctor Who.  I love Doctor Who, although I have to say I took a break when Tennant regenerated into Smith, but Smith won me over, and has since become my favourite Doctor, although Tennant is still the prettiest.  Although I have seen Doctor Who enemy nails in the past, I only looked at Google images of photos of the actual villains for these nails and any similarity is not intentional.

So for today's prompt I decided to go with some of my favourite Doctor Who villains... because we wouldn't need a Doctor if there were no villains around.  All nails have a base of 1 coat of OPI Black Onyx.

On my pinkie nail I have done an Adipose...probably the cutest problem the Doctor has ever had to face(and it reminds me of the Tribels from the Star Trek universe).  Who's a cute little fat alien(literally)?  An Adipose is.  I used OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls and a black striper to create.

On my ring nail I have a Dalek, the Doctor's worst enemy...the destroyer of Gallifrey.  I used Nubar Sunset Matte, Essie Go
od as Gold and a black striper to create.

My middle nail is a Cyberman, a machine with a human brain...but lacking humanity.  I used Essie No Place Like Chrome and a black striper to create.

And on my index nail I have The Silence...originally confessors created by the Papal Mainframe, a splinter cell tries to kill the doctor on more than one occasion, no one remembers them once they are no longer in site, but definitely one of the creepiest enemies....along with the Weeping Angels.  I used Barry M Lychee, a black striper, and Color Club Silver Lake with a detail brush to create.

I, of course, had to Matte this(because I have a problem).  I wonder how many other participants chose Doctor Who for their Inner Geek nails.

That is all for now, but I will be back tomorrow with my Night Sky nails.

Until then, polish happy!

New Year's Eve Nails

Hello polish lovers!

So apparently this post was supposed to go up yesterday( slap my wrist! Bad Blogger!).  This was totally my own fault as I was trying to get everything together for my trip and to make matters worse I somehow managed to pinch a nerve in my back so all I wanted to do was lay down and apply heat.  Anyway, this will be my last post before I go away on my vacation!  So excited!  I will try to have a post ready for the 13th or 14th, even if it is just a haul, because we know I am not going to turn down the chance to get polish.

Today I have my New Years Eve mani for you, and I will also share The Grinch nails that I mentioned in my last post, because they are awesome and I put way too much effort into them to let them go to waste.

I started my NYE mani by trying 2 of the polishes I got in the Formula X for Sephora set I got from my brother for Christmas.  I chose White Matter and Dark Matter(which is which is pretty self explanatory).  Once this dried I stamped black over white and white over black using my Konad polishes and Pueen plate PUEEN24.

I was going for a black tie looking NYE mani, like you would wear to a fancy dress party...I think it was a bit of a miss.  For some reason the stamp did not transfer cleanly.  I probably didn't clean it off enough after each stamp, but here is the finished product.

On a side note, this was my first time using the Formula X polishes and I have to say, I was impressed with the formula, the white was opaque in 2 coats and the black was opaque in just one!  Unfortunately I am thinking this is one of the polish lines where you need to buy their base and top coat because I didn't even go 24 hours before this started chipping off 3 fingers!  Strangely, none of the chips so far has occurred on my dominant hand, so as a test I will leave it on and see if it starts chipping tomorrow.

Now onto a mani I am super proud of.

I love this!  the base for The Grinch is Barry M Key Lime while be silver base is Wet n' Wild Fantasy Makers, Once Upon a Time.  The rest of The Grinch is various Art Club stripers.  No acrylic paint was used.  I was quite impressed with myself.

This lasted without chipping for more than 4 days...I wonder if the CND top coat I used had anything to do with it...I smell a Top Coat test in the future!

Anyway, that is it for now...I will be back in 2 weeks...maybe with some Caribbean photo's to share.

Until then, polish happy!

33DC Day 24: Colour I Own the Most Of

Hello polish lovers!

So as I wrote on Wednesday I finally figured out a way to fix my photo compression on Blogger!  Unfortunately, the only way that I was able to do this was to switch to a Google+ account:(  So from now one any replies to comments will be with my name, Sandra Barry, and not Petite & Polish because Google will not allow me to change my name to the blog name.  The upside is that my photos will again look the high quality, colour accurate(as much as my camera will allow) and none fuzzy!

And now, on to the Challenge.  For day 24 we were to create a mani using the colour of polish we have the most of.  For me it really is a toss up between green and blue, so I decided to use both.  I started with a base of 2 coats of Barry M's Turquoise, which is really more bright blue, it has very little green in the formula.

I topped this with SV and once it was dry I added a gradient of Turquoise and Sally Hansen Diamond Strength  in Garter Toss, which is, I think, an even lighter mint green then Essie's Mint Candy Apple, I may have to do a comparison of my mints, that would be fun.

Again, I added SV and let dry before I began my stamping.  For my stamping I used Klean Color Metallic Jungle(don't ask me why it is jungle when it is blue, it should be Metallic Ocean!) and GALS GA33 plate for the image.

I really like how well all the Klean Color Metallics stamp and I would love to get more of them, since the only ones I have are a mini set I found at Winners(win for me!).  I thought the metallic added a bit of shine and sparkle to an otherwise creme mani.

That is all for now but I will be back on Sunday with my next Falling for Nail Art mani, the theme is Baked Goods, and I didn't stamp!  Although I do have an apple pie image and a doughnut image!  I restrained myself and the next mani if freehand.

Until then, polish happy!

33DC Day 15: Animals

Hello polish lovers!

Today I have my 33DC Animal nails to share with you.  I really liked these nails and will probably end up doing them again.

I started with a base of Barry M's Blue Moon, a light blue with a faint blue shimmer that does not translate on the nail, good formula, self levels in 2 coats.  I coated with SV and let dry before I did my first layer of stamping.  I stamped the lines to look like grass using Bundle Monster plate BM319 and Sally Hanson 's Insta-Dri in Lickety-Split Lime.  I then let that dry and stamped over top using GALS plates 27, 32, 45, and 46 with Konad Black for the animals.

I really loved how crisp this is.  What is really funny is I could never get those animal images to stamp clearly before.  I don't know if it is because I am more practiced now of because of the stamping polish(before I was just trying to use regular polish) but I am really pleased with these.

That is all for today but I think tomorrow I will post my first impressions and review of the Sally Hanson's Triple Shine(I got 2 from my local Walmart and felt the need to share).

Until tomorrow, polish happy!

Crisp Colour and Stamping

Hello, polish lovers!

Today I want to share with you the mani that I am currently rockin'(not literally rockin' because I am feeling pretty laid back, but metaphorically rockin' because they are awesome and I am totally in love with them).  I started with a base of 2 coats of Barry M Gelly Hi-Shine polish in Greenberry.  I totally fell in love with this polish!  It was pretty much a 1 coat-er but, as I have said before, I am a habitual 2 coat-er.  Greenberry is a bright, fresh, almost neon green with a hint of blue that is really unique. (Sorry I didn't take a photo before I did the stamping but I did wear this alone for a day before I stamped over top)

The stamp is Pueen plate 45 from the Love set.  I stamped using Konad Special Black and I love how crisp the stamping turned out.  As usual I topped with SV.

Tomorrow I will probably be changing my polish again, its also Canadian Thanksgiving so we will be having lots of turkey and pie(mmmmm...pie).  I do have an apple pie stamp but I think that may be going too far.

I will be back tomorrow with my post for the next day of the Falling for Nail Art Challenge, which is Cloudy Skies.

Until then, polish happy!