31 Day Nail Art Challenge, Day 13, Animal Print

Since I have been doing a lot of muted polishes lately, I decided that I should do a brighter color that was out of my comfort zone on this challenge. For my base I used two coats of my Migi Nail Art Pen's pink and then did leopard spots using Migi's black and Sally Hansen's Xtreme Wear Celeb City. I did the leopard nails using this wonderful tutorial by Chalkboard Nails. Her nails are seriously so amazing, I highly recommend you check her out and follow her, she's one of my biggest inspirations. For added flair, I topped the manicure with Pure Ice's Don't You Wish. I love this glitter polish because the pieces are so tiny, it's a subtle glitter polish that really shines with the light. Overall, I really liked this manicure, and it definitely brought me out of my comfort zone. I love leopard print, and I think I'll venture out and use brighter polishes with it more often!

Pink/Taupe Forever21 NOTD

Today I wanted to properly try out two new-ish polishes I picked up at the mall at Forever 21. I layered their "Crystal Pink Polish" over "A Touch of Taupe". 

picture from forever21.com

I work at a place that requires "muted" nail polish so when I saw this creamy nude I just had to have it! I was pleasantly surprised that the nail polish went on pretty opaque on the first coat. I used a second coat just to even some parts out (I'm still not perfect at application D:) but I think it's a good, muted polish to have in any nail collection.

picture from forever21.com

I am fairly new and unexperienced with larger glitter polishes so I got sort of frustrated when I was trying to deal with Crystal Pink. It has various sizes of what I would call shards of pink, metallic glitter. I had to do some working to get it on the nail without going over the sides and I had to work around with the brush to get it to spread easier, (I feel the base may have been a little thick, but that's just personal opinion), but once it was on, I felt it was worth it.

Here is a blurred picture to properly show the shine Crystal Pink gives off when it's on. I personally feel this is a great duo, and at only $2.80 a bottle, I can't complain. Forever 21 has a ridiculous amount of cute nail polishes and I highly suggest you go check them out :).

Pink Love Mani (My FIRST post!)

I totally meant to start working on my first blog post MUCH earlier but I got distracted by some really wonderful giveaways on Facebook! Better late than never! Well to start off, here is a little bit about my nail adventures. I started slightly dabbling in nail art a few years ago when I received a Konad Nail Art Stamping Kit. Throughout the years I have enjoyed doing my nails, but never really tried advanced nail art, and I certainly never thought about the different types of nail polishes out there. Recently, however, I discovered some beautiful nail art blogs and I have been inspired to try my hand, (no pun intended :p), at nail art and swatching different polish brands I try out :). So, for my very first post, is perhaps the manicure I have been most proud of! A cute, extremely simple manicure using probably the neatest trick I've learned. 

I used a shimmery, metallic pink nail polish I received from a kit at Walmart (the brand is named The Color Workshop, there is no specific name for the color) on all my fingers except my accent nail. On the accent nail I used Revlon Top Speed Sheer Cotton. Then, for the heart, I used a neat trick I once saw on Tumblr. I used a cheap ($1.00 pack for four assorted sheets) temporary tattoo to apply the heart to my nail. You apply it the exact same way you would to your skin! (Just cut out the tattoo you want, remove the clear plastic, carefully place face first on nail, wet the back paper with a damp cloth, remove the backing, and voilà !) See! How easy was that? :D

On a scale of one to ten I would give both of these polishes about a 5. The pink is not very opaque (you can see the line on my thumb in the picture), but applies very well and has a pretty metallic shimmer. For the Revlon polish, it was semi-opaque and applied okay, but I do not think it dried at "top speed" as it claims.

I sincerely hope you enjoyed my first blog post and I look forward to sharing my nail adventures with everyone who visits Stars Over Diamonds!