The Space Cats Have Landed

Hey space turtles! Today instead of space turtles we have space cats! I wasn't sure what to do for the Glam Nails Challenge prompt of 'space ship' but then I rediscovered this space ship in the desert image on Mo You London's Sci-Fi 10 stamping plate. I decided to pair it with cat images for a 'the space cats have landed' theme.

I started with base coat and two layers of purple nail polish, followed by a layer of magnetic silver polish. I made decals for the planets on my thumbnail and the desert scene on my ring fingernail. I added dangling moon/star/planet images in silver on two of my nails and then added some black cat images, finishing off with a glossy top coat. I got the placement of the cat face logo on my index fingernail all wrong which was annoying! I also think with hindsight I should have made a decal for that one too and added a bit of colour. Despite that I do really like this look and think it's good fun!

Colours used: Purple (name not known) - Mark, Platinum Diamond - Fun Lacquer, Black Stamping Polish - Dance Legend, Foil Effect in Silver - Barry M, Counting Candles - Painted Polish, TBC - Painted Polish, TBC - ILNP

Return of the Space Turtles!

Hey space turtles! Perhaps that's how I should address people now? Sometimes I call you nail people but perhaps you are space turtles? A few years ago I was inspired by Kim Joy on the Great British Bake Off to try some space turtle themed nails (after one of her many adorable bakes). While I loved the theme they didn't come out that well, so when Turtle came up as a Glam Nails Challenge prompt I decided to give it a go again but with different techniques.

I started off with two coats of Emily de Molly's magnetic polish Seventh Seal, which I ADORE! It's so beautiful, it looks even better in real life. Once dry I layered up turtle images from Mo You London's Atlantis 02 stamping plate and Uber Chic's Just Beachy stamping plate. I started with white so the turtles would stand out against the darker background. I finished up with some little stars and moons from Mo You London's Atlantis 04 stamping plate in silver. I finished the look with a glossy top coat.

So I love these! I keep looking at them, especially in bright lighting where the base colour really shifts. I like them so much better than my previous attempt and it has many of the components I love in a nail look (blue, ocean themed, cute, space themed etc). Maybe there will be a third set of space turtles :)
Colours used: Seventh Seal - Emily de Molly, White Stamping Polish - Rainbow Connection, Key Lime - Barry M, Watermelon - Barry M, Black Stamping Polish - Dance Legend

Flakies in Space

Hellooo! I hope you're having an enjoyable weekend. I was at a wedding yesterday and had a wonderful time! Today I am sleepy but still need to do some DIY this afternoon. Wish I had another day of weekend! I will share my wedding guest nails at some point but today I'm sharing some previous nail art which was inspired by Alina's Nail Place on Instagram. She made this gorgeous space flakies look and I was please to have the same stamping plate and Unicorn Skins so I could re-create the look!

I started with two coats of black nail polish (colours listed below pictures). I then chose four of Holo Taco's Unicorn Skin polishes and dabbed them onto each nail for the below effect. Really straightforward - no sponging required.  Once dry I used white stamping polish to add space themed images from Mo You London's Sci-Fi 10 stamping plate, finishing off the look with a glossy top coat.

Really pleased with these, I love how the different colours of flakies catch the light. I did mess up some of the stars a little but I don't think it's too obvious. The rocket image is may favorite.

Colours used: Lady In Black - OPI, Cosmic Unicorn Skin, Aurora Unicorn Skin, Galactic Unicorn Skin, Solar Unicorn Skin - All Holo Taco, White Stamping Polish - Dance Legend

Planetary Nails

Hey everyone! Hope you're having a good week :) I'm feeling pleased with myself as we've done some gardening and I'm enjoying the difference it made. My partners parents came to help us which made a big difference and was fun too! So todays nail art is for the Glam Nails Challenge again, and it's late...again. I have a good excuse this time though in that my 1st dose of the Covid vaccine got in the way (felt absolutely fine - just a bit tired). I had so many different planet nail ideas in my head, and this is what I ended up with!

I started with a black base with one coat of sparkly silver (colours listed below pictures). I then used the Mo You London Sci Fi 10 plate for the planets. I started by using white stamping polish to add circles for the planets, so that the colours would stand out more against the black background. I then used a variety of colours to stamp over the circles. Finally I used gold and silver metallic polish to add the outlines/patterns to the planets. The only exception to this is the ringed planet on my thumb (which I'm considering to be Saturn) where I used the advanced stamping technique to create a decal (still added over a white circle). I think this one is my fave, especially when the sparkly orange shines through in bright lights! I have a real thing for orange polish at the moment.

Overall I'm pretty pleased with these and would definitely like to try planet nails again with some different colours and styles.

Colours used: Lady In Black - OPI, Diamond Glitter - Barry M, White Stamping Polish - Rainbow Connection, If You've Got It Haunt It - Uber Chic Beauty, Indigo Ink - Nail Paint Palette London, King Tut's Gem - Jessica Polish, Pixie Parade - Tonic Polish, Prima Donna - Jessica Polish, Foil Effect in Gold - Barry M, Foil Effect in Silver - Barry M

A Galaxy Far Away...

Evening all, hope your weekend has been good and not to strange! (Looking back that will probably seem like a really strange way to start this blog post haha!) So this nail look was inspired by someone on Instagram and unfortunately I have gone and forgotten who it was! Will come back to update this if I remember. They did black nails instead of blue I think but the colours in the middle are similar as is the image.

So I started with a white base on my middle two fingernails on each hand, and ILNP's Night Drive on all other nails. This was an untried nail polish for me and I love the way it sparkles! It has quite an intense holo flare under bright light. Over the white polish I used three different shades of polish which I'd mixed with a little nail polish remover on some foil, before dabbing onto my nails with a nail art brush. I do like the way it came out in the end but I'm not sure it worked as well as it has done for me previously. I possibly didn't use enough nail polish remover.

Finally, I used black stamping polish and an image from my Mo You London Sc-Fi 10 plate over the colourful nails, followed by a matte top coat. On my other nails I used a regular shiny top coat. I really enjoyed wearing these and kept them on for the whole week. Thank you to the unnamed Instagram inspiration!
Colours used: Night Drive - ILNP, Floral Street - Nails Inc, Cobalt Blue - Barry M, Cyan Blue - Barry M, Holland Park - Nails Inc

Spaced Out Nail Art

Hey everyone! More nail art catch up tonight, this time in the form of some space themed nails. This is an idea I had in my head for some time, I thought metallic purple would work well with my Mo You London Sci-Fi 10 plate. I used a mixture of techniques, with a little bit of layered stamping and a variety of styles of image.

For all apart from my little finger I used advanced stamping, even if I was just filling in a few small patches of colour. I used my faithful old Uber Mat for this, creating decals which I coloured in with dotting tools. I'm still so glad I discovered advanced stamping, it still requires some skill but allows me to get an effect I just couldn't on my own. Much more detail and intricacy!

Overall pleased with the look, and it reminds me of having family friends over. I always enjoy being able to associate memories with my nail art! Definitely looking forward to doing more nail art with this stamping plate, in particular using the little cats in space helmets.
Colours used: Hi Fi - ILNP, Floral Street - Nails Inc, Midnight Mischief - Painted Polish, Foil Effect in Gold - Barry M, Foil Effect in Silver - Barry M, Copper Mine - Barry M

Space Turtles! Inspired by The Great British Bake Off

Hi everyone and happy Sunday! Today I'm sharing some nail art I based on my favourite creation so far on this years Great British Bake Off. This is the first year I have watched it (shock, horror!) and I'm really enjoying it. Kim Joy is my favourite to win as I love the beautiful things she creates and the themes. My favourite theme was the 'space turtle' cake she made earlier in the series.

These didn't really turn our how I had intended, unlike Kim Joy's wonderful cake, but they're still cute! I might try again with a different colour scheme another time. I started with an off white base on all nails, and then applied a couple of coats of Barry M's Electric Eel on three fingernails, and Butterflyfish on my ring finger and thumb nails. On the brighter blue nails I used the Kelli Marissa Bundlemonster and some gold nail polish to add some space images. I don't think I chose these colours very well as it doesn't really show up!

On my ringer fingernail I used a turtle decal and some dark green nail polish for the turtle shapes. I stuck the centre of the decals on my thumbs rather than using more stencils as it saves the others for another time. On the turtles I used a couple of different glitters (colours listed below the pictures) to continue the galaxy theme. I used tiny pieces of sponge for this as I hope to create a galaxy look but it was a bit too fiddly so I just ended up with very sparkly turtles!

So these didn't really come out as I'd hoped, and as I'm now onto Halloween nails I don't think I'll have time to try again before the Bake Off ends, but they were still cute and I liked wearing Electric Eel for the first time.
Colours used: Cream Soda - Barry M, Butterfly Fish - Barry M, Electric Eel - Barry M, Catwalk Queen - Barry M, Diamond Glitter - Barry M, Hang Up The Heels - Essie, Foil Effect in Gold - Barry M

Into Space - Metallic Space Wonderland Nails

Hello nail world! Got some lovely and easy galaxy nails to show you today, with one of Fun Lacquers magnetic polishes. They have been out for a while but I was finally tempted to try a couple and they are really lovely. I bought the Fun Lacquer magnet to go with them and it is surprisingly powerful! For this nail art I used one layer of black and two layers of magnetic polish (Fun Lacquers Believe).

After applying my second layer of magnetic polish I held the magnet over it for a few seconds to move the colours around (one nail at a time!). This was a bit of a mistake as when I was later watching videos about these it turns out you're meant to hold the magnets over for 15-30 seconds, which makes a lot of sense as I wasn't getting the same effect as I was seeing in pictures (doh!). However I was getting some of that colour shifting magic (just with softer lines) so I do still like the result!

Once dry I used my Bundle Monster space themed Kelli Marissa collaboration plate. It's such a good plate for galaxy mani's, I love the scattered star images which I chose for this nail art. I stamped the images in metallic silver, and on my ring finger and thumb nails put some holographic silver over the top. The holo wasn't very obvious but was perhaps a little more shiny under bright lights. Overall I'm pleased with how this turned out and looking forward to playing with the magnetic polishes some more!
Colours used: Lady In Black - OPI, Believe - Fun Lacquer, Rain On Me - Barry M, Harp On It - Color Club