GOT Polish - Dots

Hi Goddesses

Today's GOT Polish Challenge is dots, and I almost ducked out, because I feel dots is all I ever seem to do these days!  However, a polish got stuck in my head, so here we are :)

The base is Barry M Prickly Pear.  It's one of their Gelly polishes and a gorgeous lilac, and I just don't know how I've worn it so little.  I remember buying it and being confident it would become my most used lilac .... no.

It is gorgeous, albeit insanely glossy, which is why this mani is matte.  I find glossy polishes look lovely with patterns in real life, but they look awful when you photograph them - behold -

I then added large dots with KIKO 329 Pale Grey, and once it was dry, added smaller Prickly Pear dots on top of those.

It looked a little threadbare, so I then added some super small dots with the KIKO to even up the spacing.

A quick coat of OPI Matte Top Coat and ta-dah.   I was really happy with these - they look like sherberts!

Digit-al Dozen DOES Black and White - Layered Dots

Hi Goddesses

And welcome to the end of Digit-al Dozen Week.  It's been a strange theme, this one.  Whilst I'm really chuffed that it forced me to focus on the pattern, I can't really say that I LOVE anything I've done.

I'm also proud that unlike some of my friends, cough cough, I haven't used any other colours - until day, when I went wiiiiiiiild and pulled out a grey lol (KIKO 329).  

This also happens to be the first mani I did - as told by the unbroken ring finger nail lol.   My aim here was to do some cool layering, and it more or less works.

I got over ambitious on the middle nail, and thought my dots would look great over a gradient - turns out, not so much.

I love the randomness of this mani, and I can't wait to try it in other colours for a future DD theme.

I hope you've enjoyed this week, and that you're also taking time to check out the official DD blog HERE.   Just look at some of the things we've covered in the last few weeks - 
How To .... Tape Manis
ALL The Stamping Plates
A Dozen Easy Nail Art Patterns
A Dozen Nail Art Tools


Seriously, it's a whoppingly good read :)

The Digit-al Dozen Does It All Again - Love and Heartbreak

Hi Goddesses

Ooooh it feels strange to be doing this on a Saturday!  I almost forgot - oops.

Today's theme is Love and Heartbreak, and although I see GREAT manis from others on this theme, I always feel I struggle to be original.  However, I think I have been, this time.   Not only that, it's symbolic too.

I couldn't decide which end of the spectrum I wanted to do - love, or heartbreak - and as I was musing about it, I realised that all too often in life, love has a life cycle.  We fall in and out of love all the time, so this is the life cycle of love - from the first bloom, to the lonely death.

For my colours, I chose all KIKO 

* 329 Pale Grey - to denote apathy, or a blank canvas

* 642 Hot Pink Sugar Matt - for flirting, and the first bloom of love

* 238 Martha Red - passion

* 244 Dark Plum Red - when love turns sour, withers and dies

I got symbolic with my hearts, too.  The love multiplies between the index and middle fingers, and then starts to tumble - first with the giddy freefall of passion, and then with love or love / hate out of control, until finally, on the pinkie, it plummets to its death.

Wow, seriously the DEEPEST mani I've ever done lol - enjoy!  xx

Tri Polish Challenge Day 4 - Noodles!

Hi Goddesses

Today I have some super easy and super lazy nail art for you, which I’ve called Noodles.  Sarah from Chalkboard Nails did something similar HERE, but much better, obvs :)

I used KIKO 329 Pale Grey as my base and then used a thin nail art brush to do my wiggly lines.  Hint: in all forms of life, whether you’re using a pencil, a whiteboard marker or a polish brush – if you don’t think you can do it straight, deliberately do it wiggly!  Own those wiggly lines lol.

I started with the more dominant Barry M Blood Orange from the base of the nail, wiggling out to the tips.   Originally I planned thicker lines, but I liked how the colour tapered out towards the edge.   When I picked up the KIKO 339 Cornflower, I deliberately started at the edge, and worked my way back up to the root of the nail.

What I didn’t anticipate, was that the lines would blur together, and I’d end up with smudges and lilac bits.  Not that I didn’t like the effect, I did, but it wasn’t what I was aiming for, so for the remainder of the nails I used TC between colours.

And ta da!  This is so simple.   I’d like to do this in bolder colours actually – I think this is a really easy look for when you don’t want plain nails, but you haven’t got much time.

Enjoy xx

Tri Polish Challenge - 2 Attempts at Day 2!

Hi Goddesses

I got off to quite the false start with this month’s Tri Polish Challenge, and today you get 2 versions of the same mani.   Basically, I used the wrong polishes, so had to start all over again.  Booooo!

Originally I picked Barry M Blood Orange, Butter London Smog and OPI Give Me The Moon!   As you’ll see, the gorgeous shimmery qualities of GMTM just don’t translate well into nail art, and it was a real struggle to see what I’d done with it.

So this is the first version, with the wishy washy looking grey and super large dots, which aren’t nearly perfect enough.  I still haven’t figured out how to do these properly.  I swooshed my largest dotting tool around a bit, but as you can see, the edges are very uneven.

I then added some smaller dots (but still large lol) inside, and joined the dots together with lines.  However, I used a dotting tool instead of a brush, and I didn’t like that it looked like more dots.

Siiiiigh, so back to the drawing board and a change of polishes.  Barry M kept his place but now we have KIKO 329 and 339, which are more opaque than the polishes they replaced.

I redid pretty much the same design, but decided not to supersize the dots – I think this was a wise decision!

I used my smallest nail art brush to connect the dots, and I don’t understand how I did that well on the blue base, but like a toddler on the red base!  Oh well, sometimes a mani is just not meant to be!

Enjoy xx :)