Daffodil Days

Hey space turtles! Back to blog catch up as we've been away again this weekend. This nail art was done for April's Glam Nails Challenge on Instagram - this time the theme is daffodils. I really love this daffodil image from Mo You London's Flower Power 26 stamping plate so it was the perfect candidate for this look. 

I started with a base of cream on my two middle nails and electric blue on the others (colours listed below the pictures). For the daffodil nails I created decals using my Uber Mat. I chose some reflective glitters for the daffodils and am really pleased with how they came out, even if you can't really see the sparkle that much in the pictures. I finished the look with a glossy top coat.

Colours used: Blueprint - ILNP, Cream Soda - Barry M, Black Stamping Polish - Dance Legend, Shell We Dance - Painted Polish, Catch Sun Rays - Painted Polish

A Floral Tribute

Hey space turtles! Having been struggling to find time for blogging lately but glad to finally have some time to be sharing these with you. Hoping for some time to do some more nail art today too. It was a strange week when I did these. The death of the Queen was announced while I was on holiday and once back there was a period of mourning leading up to the funeral. I used a newspaper article on the topic for the background print here and added flowers over the top using the advanced stamping technique.

I hadn't used the newspaper technique for a while but it was easier than I remembered. The print hasn't come out very clearly but I don't think it would take much practise to perfect it. I used my Uber Mat to make flower decals with Mo You London's Botanical 13 stamping plate and placed them over the top. The pictures below show the look shiny and matte but I think I like it matte best.

Colours used: Vintage Tee - Nails Inc, Black Stamping Polish - Dance Legend, Cream Soda - Barry Mm, Acai Smoothie - Barry M, Wardour Street - Nails Inc

Daisy Daisy Daisy

Aloha! Some very Spring themed nail art to share today. This look has been on my nails for just over a week now. It's been a busy time and my blogging has been lagging behind a bit! There's even been less nail art but I'm looking forward to doing my nails again this weekend. 

This is a look I'd been meaning to try for a while, with a couple of Cirque Colors newish sheer polishes which I purchased recently. I started of three coats of sheer polish on each nail - using a different colour for each hand. Next I used white stamping Polish and Mo You London's Festive 58 stamping plate to add the daisies. It was a little time consuming as I was using the same image so many times but worth it I think! I then used a dotting tool to add the yellow pollen, and finished the look with a glossy topcoat.

I'm enjoying this look, it's very Spring/Summery and goes with a lot of things. I also wore it for my friends beautiful wedding in an orchard in Herefordshire. It was very fitting for the scenery and the lovely weather and will remind me of it when I look at the pictures :)

Colours used: Peach Jelly - Cirque Colors, Haze Jelly - Cirque Colors, White Stamping Polish - Rainbow Connection, Notting Hill Carnival - Nails Inc

A Dandelion Silhouette

Hello again! More Glam Nails Challenge nail art to share today. I really had no idea what to do for this theme but I couldn't just miss the one prompt for the whole month! The prompt is dandelions, and I have no dandelion images on my many stamping plates, so had to give some freehand a go. Fortunately they are pretty simple, but I'm not well practised in freehand!

I started with a base of white on my middle two nails and pale purple on the others. I then used a small thin nail art brush to paint on the dandelion and stray seeds in black. I'm not well experienced at this so had to tidy the stem up a bit after, but I think it kind of works in a kind of 'meant to be messy' kind of way! I took inspiration from various looks I saw online and tried to keep it as simple as possible. I then added a layer of shimmery 'unicorn skin' topper over the purple nails, and finally added a matte top coat to finish off.

I quite like these, they're not my favourite I've done but I think they're quite cute and Spring like! There have been a couple of times though where for a split second out of the corner of my eye I've mistaken the dandelion for a spider - not ideal! :D

Colours used: Wardour Street - Nails Inc, Floral Street - Nails Inc, Lady In Black - OPI, Cosmic Unicorn Skin - Holo Taco

April showers and April flowers!

Hey! Back again with another glam nails challenge prompt just in time before the end of the day. Today's prompt is April Showers. I decided to add flowers to make it an 'April showers bring May flowers' theme. I did end up with it a bit more flower heavy than planned but I think it works.

I started with a colour changing base as I think this works well for a weather themed look. This was very much a make it up as I go along look so I made a selection of decals on my Uber Mat using the advanced stamping technique. I then applied these to my nails, and they were a little bigger than I'd anticipated! I then used Uber Chic's Forecasting Glam stamping plate to add a raincloud on my thumb and some raindrops around the flowers on my other nails.

I'm happy with how they turned out, however as I said they are a bit more flower heavy than planned!

Colours used: Luna - Cirque Colors, Black Stamping Polish - Dance Legend, White Stamping Polish - Rainbow Connection, Cream Soda - Barry M, Notting Hill Carnival - Nails Inc, Berry Ice Cream - Barry M

Bridesmaid Nails!

Hey everyone - happy Friday! Today I have some very special nail art to show you. It's special as it's the nail art I did to go with my bridesmaid dress for my best friends wedding last week! It was a truly magical day and I loved being a part of it! The only thing I would have changed would be to make it go on for longer, but I was pretty tired by the next day! The bridesmaid dresses were a sort of lilac shade, full length with lace at the top and a flowing skirt. I carried white flowers (which you can see in the bottom left picture below) which is why I decided to go for white rose accent nails. I also chose roses as I was wearing Rose Quartz from Cirque Colors - it's not my usual sort of colour but it is rather lovely!

After a base of three coats of Rose Quartz, I applied the decals I'd made on my Uber Mat, you can see how to do this here. I used the Mo You London Flower Power 03 stamping plate for the roses. When applying to my thumb nails I cut the decals in half first to spread the roses out a bit, as the images are designed for shorter nails than mine. I finished off with a glossy top coat, which I topped up again the evening before the wedding, as I did do these a few days before, in order to focus on doing the brides nails the night before!

I'm really pleased with how these turned out, as I've said before they're not my usual kind of look, but I think they worked well for the occasion and went nicely with my dress. I was originally planning on doing something more holographic (Soft Focus from ILNP) but I think Rose Quartz turned out to be the perfect wedding shade, as it's subtle but still sparkly! It was on my mind as I was excited about the new Cirque Colors Facets shades (mine arrived yesterday - will be reviewing them on the blog!), so thank you to Cirque Colors for releasing new polishes at such a convenient time!
Colours used: Rose Quartz - Cirque Colors, Black Stamping Polish - Rainbow Connection, White Stamping Polish - Emily de Molly, Someday ILNP

Cirque Colors Vice 2019 - Floral Nail Art

Hey everyone! Got some special nail art to share today as it's what I wore to my bestie's hen do! I wanted something bright and summery to wear and had just got my hands on Cirque Color's Vice 2019 collection which was perfect! I've been tempted by the Vice collections for the last few years but this year I finally gave in. It's a really good selection of colours and they are insanely bright! Great formula too. I can't wait to try out some more of them as a base colour, particularly Game Over which is the bright red.

To start with I painted all my nails with Rehab, which is one of the less neon polishes in the collection but still gloriously bright! I could totally see myself sat on a beach with this shade on my nails. I liked the idea of having mostly bright blue (it's kind of blurple but you can't see that in the pics) with some delicate flowers in the corners. What I ended up with wasn't as dainty as I had planned (I was going to cut the decals I made down originally) but I loved it anyway!

For this design I made decals on my Uber Mat, you know the drill! You can see how here. For all the flower images I used the Mo You London Floral 03 plate. The only thing I would possibly change is having only the little finger flower in coral, I think I should have included some coral on another nail too so it all fits together better. Overall though I loved these, and then hen do was fabulous!
Colours used: Rehab - Cirque Colors, Game Over - Cirque Colors, High Roller - Cirque Colors, Miami Dade - Cirque Colors, Vitamin D - Cirque Colors, Electric Daisy - Cirque Colors, Midnight Mischief - Painted Polish by Lexi

Fata Morgana Flower Nails

Good evening nail people! Tonight I'm sharing some spring nails from a couple of weeks ago. Where is the time going?!  I saw a picture of Cirque Colors Fata Morgana on Instagram and as I haven't worn it for a while thought I'd give it a go with some Spring flowers. I used the Mo You London Flower Power 23 plate for the images.

For this design as per usual I used the advanced stamping technique with my Uber Mat! You can see how here. I like these but wasn't massively feeling them at the time. They're nice enough I just think I must have been in the mood for something brighter! (now have bright safari nail art so looking forward to sharing that with you!
Colours used: Fata Morgana - Cirque Colors, White Stamping Polish - Emily de Molly, Taos - Cirque Colors, Wildflower - Cirque Colors, Notting Hill Carnival - Nails Inc, Gold Digger - Barry M

Spring/Summer Garden Nails

I am sooo behind with this! We're over half way through May and this is my first blog post! Here is some nail art I did a few weeks ago now. I haven't been painting my nails as much in general as I'm busy at work and have been doing some things around the house plus some time away. This nail art was done with the purposes of trying out some little stick on bird cages, and reminds me of seeing family friends for the Fleet Half Marathon. The thermal nail polish definitely stayed on it's cold colour while we were out watching the runners!

I started with a layer of blue thermal polish, and then used my Uber Mat to create some floral decals. You can see how here. I used the Flower Power 03 plate from Mo You London. One I had placed the decals, I stuck down some bird cage decorations and then applied a little more top coat over them to stick them down. I found the bird cages didn't work great with my nails, especially as I chose my most curved finger nails to stick them on! They were sticking out a lot at the edges. It worked a little better on my thumb nails as they're wider and flatter.

I loved using another thermal nail polish, and I think this blue one is particularly good!  Overall pretty pleased with this design, but probably won't place the bird cages there again.
Colours used: Blue Beard - Femme Fatale, Midnight Mischief - Painted Polish by Lexi, Alpine Snow - OPI, Pink Lemonade - Barry M, Surfboard - Barry M, Notting Hill Carnival - Nails Inc, Key Lime - Barry M, Berry Ice Cream - Barry M

Blue Floral Mothers Day Nails

Hello everyone! Some Spring nail art today to try and coax the Spring weather out from it's hiding place. Given that these are from Mothers Day weekend I don't think it's working! I took inspiration from Instagram for this design, though unfortunately I can't remember who from. I wore these on Mothers Day which I think was quite fitting as my Mums favourite colour is blue.

For the base colour I used King Tut's Gem from Jessica Polish, which was a Christmas present from my boyfriend. It was great to finally use it, I like the way the super subtle shimmer makes the blue even brighter. For the floral images I used Mo You London's Flower Power 03 stamping plate. I kept it simple and used black for the outline, filling in the images only with white. I used my Uber Mat to make the decals, you can see how here. I like how these turned out, and all though I'm not done with dark wintery colours yet it was good to change it up a bit!
Colours used: King Tut's Gem - Jessica, Midnight Mischief - Painted Polish, White Knight - Mo You London

Stamping Sunday: Flowers and glittery space

Hi everyone! Happy Sunday! I'm coming to the end of a week off so feeling pretty chilled, but unfortunately I think I'm getting a poorly timed cold... Today I have my holiday nails from Cornwall to show you. They weren't meant to be my holiday nails, but due to lack of time I have now had this on for just over 2 weeks, and still do! Not like me at all, but it will be the same story for the next month or so, so I'm just hoping I will have enough to stop my blog looking to sparse! 

For this nail art I took inspiration from Instagram. Unfortunately I can no longer find who it was, despite trawling through loads of my liked photos! So if anyone knows please comment so I can credit them. They had done some silver glitter over bare nails and then added pale purple flowers. I decided to to the same with some advanced stamping using my Uber Mat, and Mo You London Flower Power 03 Plate. You can see how to advanced stamp here.

For the glitter I used two different silvers, to end up with a little bit thicker coverage than the Instagram design, as I just couldn't resist the glitter! I started with an old Barry M limited edition of holo glitter particles in a clear base, and some mixed size glitter in a clear base, polishes are listed below the pictures. In conclusion I like this nail art - which is good considering how long I've been wearing it!

Colours used: Boots Limited Addition 343 - Barry M, Diamond Glitter - Barry M, Midnight Mischief - Painted Polish, Key Lime - Barry M, Wardour Street - Nails Inc

Floral storybook nails - attempt one

Happy Friday everyone! Bit of a nail fail to show you today, but documenting it anyway so I can link back to it when I eventually get round to an improved version! I tried newspaper print nails years ago when I was just getting into nail art and it was a great success, but this time worked less well. I used  a page from an old book as I thought it would be rather nice to use book text, but I think because the pages were thick and the ink so well dried after however many years that it didn't transfer very well. Next time I will use pieces of newspaper of magazine as the pages are more pliable and the ink is fresher.

I wanted a romantic storybook sort of look so used my Flower Power 03 stamping plate from Mo You London. This part of the design  I do like and it was the first time I used that particular plate so good to see the images in action! I used the advanced stamping technique for the flower images, you can see how here.

So watch this space for attempt two...eventually! I'll include a tutorial once I've mastered it again.
Colours used: Miscellaneous - Missguided, Midnight Mischief - Painted Polish, White Knight - Mo You London, Pink Lemonade - Barry M, Key Lime - Barry M, Seven Dials - Nails Inc