LSG Gets Nailed Black Out Challenge

If you're a Ravelry user you probably know about LSG. It's a no holds barred group where bad language and being awesome to one another is the creed. There's an offshoor group called LSG Gets Nailed for the nail polish obsessed knitters and hookers (crocheters). This month there's a challenge on to get us to use a little black. I've always been a little stand offish with black so I'm giving it a go.

Challenge #1
The Rorschach Test
Give me a mani that uses black to enhance or accent your look. Black lace or Pinstripes? Get your nads on! This is a great way to ease into black. I want to be seeing Rorschach all over your fingers.

So here's my attempt

NYC (Australia by The Heat Group) Metal

Konads Special Stamping Polish in Black

Seche Vitae (am addicted to the glassy look)

Happy Australia Day

It's the anniversary of Europeans landing in Australia and traditionally the day we celebrate our nation. Personally I can think of some much more sensitive days than this one. Australia's first inhabitants, Aboriginals, call this day Invasion Day. It's the anniversary of the day they lost their country and the beginning of genocide, hardship, plagues and starvation. Today I am taking the time today to acknowledge the traditional owners of the country from where I am writing, the Burramattagal people of the Dharug language group. I would like to show my respect and acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land, of elders past and present, of the land on which I live and from where I write.

For more information about traditional owners in the Sydney area visit Barani, a site that explains it all really well.

Political sensibilities aside I love my country and consider myself fortunate to be a daughter of the antipodes. Although I really wish Australia Day were on another day I still want to celebrate my country. So how do I celebrate things? I put it on my nails so I can look at it while I'm knitting.

My Supplies- (from left to right) Seche Vitae (best top coat ever despite the dreadful chemicals), NYC Silver Sparkle, BYS Red and White Nail Art Polishes, OPI -Yoga Ta Love this Colour, tiny silver metal balls for the smallest star in the southern cross, tiny diamantes for the bigger stars and BYS Silver Nail Art Polish, a fine but firm brush for making the stars on the flag and a skewer for picking up the bling. I also used NYC Mushroom over my Seche base as an opaque neutral. The OPI is a little transparent.

The Union Jack (the flag of Great Britain which is a whole bunch of flags united) in the corner of the Aussie flag was done using the BYS Red and White Nail Arts. I painted the white section first (St Andrew's flag representing Scotland) starting with the cross in the middle then adding the diagonals. I added the red diagonals next (St Patrick's flag for Ireland) being careful to leave the white frame for the cross in the middle which represents St George's flag (England). Then I added the middle of St George's cross in red.

The seven pointed federation star, which represents our six states and The Australian Capital Territory, was made by placing a big dot of white below the Union Jack then using the stiff bristled brush to smudge out the points. Next I put the stars of Southern Cross, our famous constellation visible anywhere in Oz. These were also smudged dots, the main four stars should have seven points with the smaller star having only five but I just went for star-like.

Next step was to add the Southern Cross to my ring fingers using BYS Silver Nail Art Polish. I smudged out some points with my stuff bristled flat brush, coated all nails thinly with NYC Silver Sparkle Added the bling to the southern cross then topped with Seche.

Happy Australia Day everybody! We're celebrating Australia's multi cultural heritage by having croissants for breakfast. We're out of Vegemite so it will have to be with jam. We'll be having Chinese take away for dinner to celebrate the contribution of the Chinese people during the gold rush days. There's iced lemon myrtle tea, which is a bush tucker flavour, and Japanese mochi cakes for afternoon tea (no significance for mochi cakes- we just really like them). Lunch will involve meat pies and lamingtons -fair dinkum Aussie tucker.

Pink Wednesday- Vintage (almost) Polish

The nice thing about nail polish is that it can last for years. The base in this Wedesday Pink mani is at least 15 years old. I bought it sometime in the early 90s. I know not where. It's sparkly- almost in the same way that the more recent holos are sparkly. I compared it to some holos and it wasn't far off. Everything old is new again!

The stamp is a Bundle Monster plate. I didn't write it down and seeing as I am a cushion for a rather large kitty right now I won't be getting up to get my stamping kit to look at the number. It's from the second set released on Amazon. The white is a Konad special stamping polish.


Happy Pink Wednesday.

The Funky French Attack

• I have a bit of a backlog of mani pics so I'm posting this lot in a batch. This is my Funky French Collection. I discovered BYS Nail Art polishes. They have this wonderful long brush that practically paints the stripe itself. This lead to a mini Funky French Obsession.

First we had the teal mani. All colours are BYS plain colours range. There were no names on the bottom of the bottles.

• Seen here with my Sweet Libertine lip balm. They have THE BEST range of mineral eyeshadow in the world. I have over one hundred and fifty of their overshadows. They're that good. It stays where you put it all day. Even if you happen to be running around on a melting hot day. I apply mine using a brush, mixing the eyeshadow with a tiny drop of water in the lid. The colours are a little brighter when applied wet and have longer staying power. They also make stunning eyeliners.

Sweet Libertine gives out samples if you send a stamped self addressed envelope. If you're a mineral makeup newb don't bother with the samples. I highly recommend jumping in and getting one of their really reasonably priced beginner's sets to start you off. And don't forget to grab a mineral veil while you're there. If you're a mineral foundation person they're great for balancing out those too yellow colours that are a problem with some mineral brands. On those days when I'm wearing a conventional foundation I use a mineral veil to set the foundation and extend it's longevity. It goes without saying that Sweet Libertine is my hands down favourite mineral veil. There are rumours that Sweet Libertine might have a foundation in development. I can't wait.

And back on topic

• Funky French #2- Flirting with a Dotting Tool

• The pink is a BYS scented. I think it's Floral. This time I taped off the top, painted a BYS black stripe across then ripped off the tape before it dried.

• After drying add a stripe of BYS Striping Polish in White and another in Chrome Silver.
• My pointer was done using a medium sized dotting tool.
• The dot feature on my ring finger used the second smallest tool.

Funky French #3 NYC all the way!

At this point I had discovered NYC by The Heat Group. They also make Ultra3. Both use the same formula. They are cheap and cheerful. They stay chip free on me much longer than OPI ever did. If you use the NYC Top Coat and remember to wrap the nail edge wear rarely happens.

The Purple colour is Purple Monkey the tip is Polka Dot- very sheer but shines up nicely over an opaque colour. The strip is my trusty BYS Chrome Striping Polish.

I used the usual tape and paint technique to get my tips straight.

So there you have it. My Funky French Phase. Up next is the Crackle Crack Up.

The Turkish Delight Easter Egg Mani

This one is over a year old. I was going through old pics on my iPhone and thought I'd update with some of these old shots.

When I did this I had just gotten an OPI haul from Ebay. Both colours are OPI. Pamploma Purple and Glitzerland.

I didn't mean to make a copy of a Cadbury's Turkish Delight Easter Egg wrapper. I didn't even pick up on it until a couple of days of looking at it and thinking it looked very familiar. Then it hit me. I'd recreated my favourite type of Easter egg's wrapper. The Derp- I have it.

No wonder The Husbear had been making cracks about my delicious nails.

Colour Change Daisy Fest

My love for glittery nail polishes boarders on unreasonable. If it glitters and I have cash it's going to end up coming home with me. If you throw temperature colour change into the mix there will be squeeing and it will definitely be coming home with me. I get hours of amusement out of colour changers. I love watching the colour change through the day. You never know whether it will be the warm temperature or cool colour or even better a gradient like in the picture on the lower left. This mani features BYS Moods in Blue. I don't know if I'm more in love with the sky blue cool temperature colour (pictured over there on the left) or the palest ice it becomes when it's warm (pictured below right).

There was something about this blue that just said DAISIES. These decals have been languishing in my nail stamping plates box for a couple of years now. They came in a Hello Kitty show bag. I've never been a fan of decals because they often peel off so I prefer to paint or stamp images onto my nails. This time I put the decal onto not quite dry top coat, let it dry then put another coat on top. They stayed on for about four days. The polish needed daily topping off where it wore around the edges of my nails despite them being wrapped. BYS has great staying power on the nail bed but the edges usually need a lot of maintainance.

<- Gradient effect

Multi Coloured Dotty Mani (with a How To)

I had to nubbinise my nails yet again last week. They were splitting because I wasn't giving them time off at all and the base coat I was using was not so great. I've switched to BYS's base coat which is fantastic and surprisingly cheap at $5. BYS's polishes are generally great value. You can get all sorts of special effects like crackle, scented, colour change, holo glitters, neons, UV glows and jellies all for $5 each and their range of plain colours makes me vibrate with glee.

It's hard to do a mani that makes nubbins look good so I went with one of my favourite looks, POLKA DOTS. I have a serious affection for the spots. I prefer to make them myself rather than stamp because I just can't find a good white for stamping. I think I'm going to have to cave in and pay a small fortune for a genuine Konad stamping polishes in white, black, gold and silver.

A mani that takes this amount of time requires sound prep for longevity. There's nothing more annoying than taking an hour to pretty up your nails only to wake up the next day to chips or having it look a mess because of sloppy edges. Good prep really only takes a couple of minutes plus drying time.

Nail Prep 101 (The less mess method)

1. Rub all around your nails with cuticle oil or petroleum jelly. This step makes polish overspill really easy to clean off.
2. Swab each nail with nail polish remover. I prefer acetone free for this step. Do not use one that claims to add oils or vitamins or any other extra fruit salad. The point of this step is to remove any surface oils and overspill from the goop you just wiped around your nails. Wait a couple of minutes after this step to make sure all of the remover has dried off your nails.
3. Apply Base coat and let it dry thoroughly. Properly dry base coat makes the coloured polish adhere to your nails a little better.

Dotty Mani Step by Step

1. Gather your tools. Bundle Monster Plate #14, assorted nail polishes in colours you adore, a dotting tool, your stamping tools, top coat, base coat and white stamping polish for the dots.
2. Paint each nail a different colour. Two coats as needed, letting it dry completely between coats.
3. Put a generous drop of white stamping polish on the corner of your stamping plate holder. Dip the dotting tool into the polish and put three dots at the base of the nail replenishing the paint between dots. Offset the second row between the first and the third row between the second. Let the dots dry before doing the dots on the other hand. I always do my dominant hand first. I smudge less nails that way.
4. Rose print nail- follow your normal stamping procedure using the rose stamp. Stamp in random places all over your chosen rose nail. Let dry then do the other hand.
5. Rose with leaves- Thumb. Still using the rose stamp place a rose a little off centre on your thumb nail. Put a dollop of green polish on your plate holder dip the dotting tool in, dot your nail then drag slightly to create a leaf shape. Place the leaves around the rose. Let dry before doing the other hand.
6. Two colour cup cake. Using the cup cake stamp on BM#14 plate put a small dollop of brownish polish on the bottom of the cup cake and a dollop of your chosen frosting colour on the top. When dragging the scraper across the design be very careful to go horizontally across the cup cake so as not to mix the colours. Stamp in the usual way.
7. When everything is dry apply top coat, clean up your edges by wiping off the petroleum jelly and admire your handiwork.

To keep the mani looking fresh apply a thin layer of top coat once a day. This should get you almost a week out of your MANI. Don't forget to wrap the nail each time. Wrapping is when you drag the brush across the top of the nail while trying not to paint the top of your finger. It's the key to stopping chipping.