Cute Easter Bunny Nails: Week 15 of the Year of Polish Challenge

I got home from the gym this morning and lamented my unpolished nails.  I had a little time before I had to take a shower and get ready for work so I sat down to paint my nails with one of my newest polishes, OPI's I Have a Herring Problem.  I love this color.  Its hard to tell because I painted over almost every nail with glitter but I Have a Herring Problem is a dark, slightly bluish grey with sparkles.  Its stunning by itself so I invite you to google its swatches from my fellow nail bloggers! 

After applying two coats of I Have a Herring Problem to base-coated nails, I applied one coat of Sally Hansen's Hard as Nails Rockstar Pink glitter polish.  I then free-handed this bunny in Sally Hansen's White On on my left ring finger nail and wrote the word "Easter" on my right ring finger nail.   This bunny is actually inspired by a bunny that Robin Moses did in this youtube tutorial!  Check it out because those nails are too cute to be believed! It may be hard to tell but I gave it some blue glitter eyes from a Milan Special FX teal glitter.  I filled in the lines with Ebony Hates Chris and filled in the nose and inner ears with Sephora's Techno Pink.  I covered all nails with a top coat and generous amounts of Julep's cuticle oil to prevent smudges while it dried.    These nails are some of my favorites!

Week 11 of the Year of Polish Challenge: Saint Patrick's Day Nails Two Ways

I love the trend of a different design on every nail and used all of my nail canvas for this week's Saint Patrick's Day Challenge.  The first set of nails below is generally free-handed with french tip designs on the thumb and pinkie nails.  The rainbow design is accomplished using a watercolor technique.  I also used some glitter nail art balls for the "gold."

 

 On these nails, almost everything is free-handed except for the background of the middle finger which was stamped from a design on Bundle Monster plate 214.  The rainbow effect was made with quick dabs of polish.  I painted my ring finger nail with Metallic Yellow and while still wet I dipped the nail into the gold steel nail art balls. 

 

I really like the 3d effect that using the steel nail art balls make as gold coins in the pot of gold and as my accent nail on the other set of nails.  I am very happy with my early and cute Saint Pat's Day nails!

Christmas Ribbon Candy Nails

Ive been playing a bit with marbling and dreamed up these nails while marbling on ziploc bags. 
In my quest for alternative Christmas nails (they can get pretty cheesy!) I thought that these nails would be a good but cheese-less design for the holidays!

Polishes Used:

Julep's Helena

Sally Hansen Hard as Nails The Real Teal

Revlon's Gold Coin

Julep's Fast Drying Topcoat

For these nails I simply painted my base coated nails with one half thick Real Teal and one half thick Helena.  Then using a stripper nail art brush, I painted a thin Gold Coin line down the middle of each nail.  I took a clean toothpick and quickly did swirls down the middle of the nail, dragging the gold polish into the teal and fuchsia polish.  I then waited for the nails to dry and applied a topcoat.

Pitfalls: 

Real Teal tend to dry very fast so you have to be faster or you end up with parts of the nail underneath showing!

Try to do the marbling in one fluid motion because if you try to go back, the design gets muddy.  Example is my index finger nail.

*Tips*

Since Real Teal tends to dry fast, I would recommend another greenish blue polish instead.  These nails would probably be excellent with some metallic green and red polish but again, I was looking for alternative holiday nails.  Let me know how it works for you!