Ice Cream Nails - Dessert - The Lazy 15

So here are today's Lazy Challenge nails, and on time for once!

I was between doing strawberry nails and these, but decided that ice cream is A far more fun dessert in my opinion. The look I've gone for is mint choc chip ice cream with chocolate sauce over the top!

I used Barry M 'Mint Green' for the base and No7 'Beanie' for the chocolate chips and sauce. I then dotted some bright acrylic paint colours over the top to look like hundreds and thousands. I used Seche Vite as a top coat.

This was my first attempt at doing drip nails and they aren't quite neat enough for me to be happy, I didn't have time to re-do them though and they were ok enough for me to post!

Here are the great nails from everyone else in the challenge:

Blue Floral Matte Nails - Feminine Nails - The Lazy 15

So, second post today in the name of catching up on the Lazy 15! Here are my feminine nails...

This is the 3rd or 4th time I've done this mani and every time I've not posted it as I've not been impressed with how the pictures have turned out but I LOVE the effect of these overall - I always get great complements on them...

The base coat is W7 (no name), and the flowers are from these nail foils. They are really easy to use - you just put on the adhesive and wait for around 6-8 minutes then rub the foils over the top. The adhesive can be bought from the same company, but I already have this one from Amazon which works great. 

Word to the wise - Seche Vite doesn't work here. The shrinkage problems mess up the foil underneath. I used a matte top coat from Rimmel for these.

Here are the other lovely people taking part in the challenge:

Pink Stripy Nails - Favourite Colour - Lazy 15

Ok, so I've been a very lazy challenger the last few days! I've missed Wednesday and Thursdays challenges so I've decided to post them both tonight, with the intention of carrying on as normal the next couple of days! It's really sinking in how hard it is to keep up with a challenge, when you have a lot going on. I've been particularly busy with work, and a few too many evenings out. I have a huge amount of respect for those who manage 30/31 days now!

So, here is day #6 - favourite colour. My favourite colour is pink, as anyone who knows me knows well! For my birthday this year the lovely people in my team at work actually threw me a pink party (I'll put you a picture in at the bottom of this post!)

The base colour is MUA 'Bright Plum' and I used a striping brush to add some stripes of Technic 'Magenta'. I then added some 'Glequins' from Born Pretty Store along the stripes. As always, this was topped off with Seche Vite.

Overall I'm happy with the effect - and it looked really good on camera which is a change!

Coming right up... Feminine nails but not before a picture of my pink party from earlier this year!

Autumn Leaf Nail Stamping Nail Art

Just a quick post today as I'm crazy busy... On Saturday I picked up another few Accessorize nail polishes (3 for 2 at Superdrug) so I was desperate to try them out, so most of the colours used in this mani are Accessorize...

The base colour is Ivory Lace and the leaves are a combination of 'Teal', 'Romance' 'Crystal' and Models Own 'Mushroom'. I used BM-313 for the stamping.

Galaxy Nails: The Lazy Challenge #4

So today's challenge is galaxy nails which is something I've never even attempted before.

I was seriously contemplating re-doing these from scratch and right up until I put top coat on them I really wasn't feeling it. However, after a couple of coats of Seche Vite I was feeling a lot more positive about it! I'm definitely going to try these again, but I think I'll practice getting the colours to look more galaxy-ish rather than blodges on the nail.

What I used:

I started off with Xtras Black polish and then used Models Own 'Thunder and Lightening' to give the starry glitter effect you can see (loving this polish) I then sponged on small amounts of Revlon 'Violet', Models Own   'Copper Pot', Sally Hansen 'Model Behaviour' and Sally Hansen 'French Tip White'.

Really keen to see how my fellow challengers have got on with this one!

Red and White Water Marble - The Lazy Challenge #4

Here is day #4 of the Lazy 15: Water Marble...

I've attempted a water marble before but found my results less than great so I've always abandoned it. This was no exception. I did this about 10 times (with lots of swearing involved) but in the end I had something I was semi-happy with. I used a base coat of Sally Hansen French White then marbled that combined with Technic 'Magenta'. The marble was finished off with a couple of coats of Seche Vite. I'm still not blown away with the result, at least compared to some that I've seen. However, I think this is the real beauty of doing a challenge - it definitely puts you out of your comfort zone!

I'm glad I persevered and I think the results looked much better in person than in the pictures - you should have seen some of my earlier results though ha ha!

Brown and Black Stamped Tips

I saw a similar example of this nail art on Pintrest a while ago, however I cannot for the life of me find it to show you... Anyway, I particularly liked this idea as I think brown is a great autumnal shade and the stamping looks very feminine...

I also tried to be a bit more creative with the top picture and I'm pretty impressed with how it turned out although it took me A LOT of pictures to get right. The brown I used is Rimmel 'At Ease' and as always I used MUA 'Black' for the stamping. I topped the look off with Seche Vite. The stamping plate I used was BM-214

Blue and Gold Dotty Nails - The Lazy Challenge #3

I love a good chunky ring and for challenge number 3 (dots) I couldn't resist taking some inspiration from this beauty I picked up at the weekend...

The base colour is No7 'Golden Pearl' and I actually used a pearl stone which I polished blue to match the other dots to give it a 3d effect. The blue dots are Collection 'Midnight' and the darker gold dots are Models Own 'Copper Pot'.  

The look is finished off with a top coat of Seche Vite. You can find the ring at New Look here... Overall, I think I'd do a better job of this if I tried again. I should have used black rather than blue, and I'd have done the base differently... 

Purple and Blue Matte Gradient - The Lazy 15 Challenge #2

Here is my post for day 2 of the Lazy 15 challenge, which is a gradient manicure.

I love the colour combination I've used and I think it goes together really well, but I'm not well enough practised at gradients as yet so you can see where there are a few bits of sponge stuck to the nail. I didn't get the best coverage either unfortunately. I finished it off with my Rimmel matte top coat...

I used Sally Hanson 'Model Behaviour' for the blue and Revlon 'Violet' for the purple gradient. So, just a short post today as I need to get my nails done for Wednesdays challenge as I'm out tomorrow night. I'm getting more organised but I'd definitely struggle with a 31 day challenge right now! :)

Vaseline 'Pink Bubbly' Inspired Pink and Black Manicure

A few weeks ago I picked up a tin of the limited edition 'Pink Bubbly' Vaseline and ever since I've been planning on doing a manicure to match - I love the classy combination of pink black and gold. Here is the result:

I'm really happy with the result! It was pretty easy to do and very cute... I used Revlon's 'Lilac Pastelle' as the base coat (it is slightly more lilac than pink, as the name suggests, but very close), then I used Xtras Shade 78 (black) for the tips. I then went over the bottom of the tips with my trusty striping tape...

Definitely one of my faves so far...

The Lazy 15: Tape Mani

Here is my first manicure for the Lazy 15, a great challenge set up by some of my fellow polishers across the pond! As it's my first challenge, I felt that this was perfect as it's not as intense as doing a mani every single day!

The first challenge is a tape mani. I've done several of these so I wanted to do something I've not done before. I have also been dying to use my purple glitter polish from Models Own, so this seemed to be an opportune time.

The colours used (from base to tip) are: Revlon 'Violet', Models Own 'Purple Haze' and MUA 'Shade 22'. The middle section was quite difficult to do as I had to tape off the top section which I'd done first, therefore I had to wait AGES for it to dry and even then I messed it up and had to start again. I ended up using my trust Seche Vite to speed things up... Also, as the glitter needed more than one layer to look good, and the fact that if I let it dry to apply other coats the tape removal would mess it up, I had to put it on REALLY thick. I was getting a bit concerned that I wouldn't be able to go to bed until 3 am and I would be sat waving my hands in the air... Luckily it didn't take as long as I thought.

Overall I'm really pleased with the results, the glitter is still a bit sparse but it looks good and I love the colour combination. I can't wait to see what my fellow challengers have done!! You can see everyone else who has joined below!

Bling Bling Sequin Manicure

Perusing Poundland this weekend (again!) I found a lovely set of glitters and sequins... I've been looking for some small round sequins for some time now, particularly since I heard of the upcoming launch of Ciate's sequin manicure, but most of what I see around are large sequins, the type with the hole in. These are more like tiny disks...

The pack came with 12 little bags of of 4 colours (pink, purple, orange and mixed) - 2 sequin bags of each colour and 1 'normal' glitter bag. I decided to try the mixed bag as it seems very similar to the 'Harlequin' Ciate version.

As you can see - the sequins are extremely similar to Ciate, as demonstrated on Kiss and Make Up. I don't think I've done the greatest job of it, as the sequins had a tendency to stick up, so the surface is VERY uneven. I used Technic 'Gardenia' as a base colour (2 coats) and then used Sally Hansen's 'Had as Wraps' and before it could dry, dipped the nail in the sequins. (as my bottle is quite old it's a bit goopy, so I thought that would be good for sticking the sequins to). I initially tried using a top coat but found that it made the nail look weird - almost like it had a slimy layer over the top, so I scrapped that idea.

Overall, I'm not hugely keen on this manicure from a distance it looks ok. but looking a bit closer makes it appear a bit 'messy' which I'm not keen on. I'm not sure what the glitter grip provided with the Ciate product is, so you may be able to get away with using this on top, but without being able to use my top coat, I don't think this will last too long. Ciate's promotional pictures are also a bit misleading - the sequins look much, much smaller, as you can see Grazia here.  This makes it look a lot neater...

I've also discovered that Nails Inc have launched 'Bling It On Rocks', as reviewed here on Sugar & Sparkle. I'm very keen to try this (or similar) as it looks more like chunky glitter than sequins, so the effect is classier (in my opinion). What do you think? Have you tried either product, or a similar version?