Just some pictures of nail art really...

Hello hello!

Thought I'd share some images of nail art I did before and during Christmas but didn't get around to uploading until now. Over the past couple of weeks I've not really been in a very arty frame of mind - I still paint my nails religiously (at the moment I'm sporting Nails Inc Victoria, AGAIN) but I've been mainly wearing one colour and SHOCK HORROR absolutely no design, not even an accent nail or a bit of glitter. Nothing. Nada. Eeek! Despite the fact I bought the new Topshop nail art pen before Christmas, I've been all about the plain nails lately. Hopefully some of these designs will inspire me again.

Also, if you're a fan of the WAH Nails blog, you should check out the absolutely AMAZING Boom Nails - this girl has some ridiculous talent when it comes to nail art.

Enjoy!

I've spotted (hahaha) a lot of people wearing this lately and thought it was super cute so had to give it a go. Unlike a regular polka dot pattern, dalmatian spots have to vary in size and are a lot more haphazard - you'd think that'd be easier to do but I found it quite tricky! Colours used are Models Own Snow White and Barry M Peach Melba, then I used the Models Own x WAH Nails nail art pen for the black details.

Spots and stripes - pretty standard really. I used a striping brush for the stripes (duh) and the end of a hair grip for the dots. Colours used are Models Own Bloo Boo and Snow White.

I fancied going a bit OTT for our Christmas night out so used my absolute favourite Models Own Pink Punch, covered it with Models Own Juicy Jules for a bit of sparkle then decided to add some leopard spots as well using Models Own Snow White and the nail art pen for leopard spots. My Models Own pen is currently not working, (I think the nib is blocked) so I can't do any leopard designs for the time being... sniff...

Basically copied this design from WAH nails but used two shades of blue instead (H&M's Blue My Mind and U Must Have This). This looks a lot more complicated than it actually is - I started off painting my nails with GOSH Holographic for the silver stripe (I figured this wouldn't layer very well over the other polishes so thought It'd made sense to make it the base) then used a striping brush to create the zig zag shapes - easy!

Love is strange...

Eeeep! I feel like my blog's taken a bit of a back seat in the past few weeks and I really wish this wasn't the case! I've always said that one super power I'd love more than any other is the ability to stop time and this applies now more than ever as I'm ridiculously busy. If anyone knows where I can get myself a Bernard's Watch or even a Time-Turner, please let me know!

Anyway, I felt like getting a bit creative on Thursday night when I had a rare couple of hours to myself so I decided to jazz up my nails. I'm not sure whether you can tell, but the blue nails you can see in the photos are actually falsies. I never, ever wear false nails but as these ones are so short, I thought I'd give them a bash (they were actually given to me free along with some Eylure lashes at an event in New Look a couple of months back). They're Elegant Touch Limited Edition Matte Nails in Mint Green (although I really think they're more blue than green...)

Once I'd stuck the false nails on, I realised they looked a bit too plain on their own so I rooted out all of the decorative bits and pieces I bought on eBay ages ago and got a bit carried away with the nail glue. I'm sure I've mentioned her before but Selina from The Flying Saucer always has amazingly decorated 'kawaii'-style nails and these were very much inspired by her.

I wish I'd had the good sense to decorate the false nails before I stuck them on, as it all got quite fiddly (and gluey) and using your left hand to pick up tiny gems with tweezers is really bloody tricky! Gem Fatale had a really good Tuesday Tip a couple of weeks ago that suggested using a cotton bud with some sellotape around the end to hold a false nail in place while decorating/painting it and if I were going to do this again, I'd definitely use that method. Got there in the end though and I'm really pleased with how they turned out, plus I've had loads of compliments on them, which is always nice :)

The one thing I would say though is that they snag on everything! Every time I try to do my hair, one of the bows will catch in it and so paranoid that they're going to pop off! Selina, how on earth do you cope?!

[Elegant Touch Limited Edition Matte Nails in Mint Green, Glitter - Models Own Juicy Jules, bows, gems and flowers all available from this eBay seller]