What's on my nails today?

Hi everyone!

This week's theme is something I totally can't relate to... Insect! I'm a city girl through and through and the moment I see a bug, I turn into the most squeamish person you can imagine. I'm lucky to have a big strong guy living with me who defends me against the hordes of creepy-crawlies that seem to love our place as a new home. So for instance when I spot a spider, I scream and he patiently gets a glass and a piece of paper to catch the intruder and puts it outside in the yard (no, not killing it, that would be mean). You can imagine that I wasn't looking forward to creating one (or more) on my nails. Sure, butterflies are pretty and ladybugs are cute, but I didn't think of those at the time. Fortunately, I remembered a manicure I once saw, ages ago, that sort of indicated a bee without actually showing one. I couldn't find it so I don't even know if this looks like the original, but here's my interpretation of a bumblebee:

Hi everyone!


Another post in the My polish, your plate series. This week Michelle picked the polish and the plate was my choice. Michelle picked a glitter... I'll let that sink in for a while... a glitter! And of course the chosen polish has to be really present in the manicure we do with it so I had to step way out of my comfort zone and finally managed to create this:

Hi everyone!


The tenth installment of the 52 week nail art challenge 2020 is Beach. I grew up close to the North Sea and when I was a kid, we visited the beach quite often (it was only a 10-minute bike ride). The water wasn't turquoise but a murky greenish, grayish blue, and the sand wasn't pearly white but... well, sandy. That's the picture that pops into my mind when I think of the beach so that's what I tried to create on my nails, a wintery North Sea beach:

Hi everyone!


Another month has passed so it's Triad day again, the last Friday of the month where Juanita, Michelle and me take turns picking a manicure that is the inspiration for all three of us. This month was Michelle's turn and oh, boy, did she cheat!!! She chose this beautiful manicure by Emiline from Nail Polish Society... and the original was done using nail wraps! How can a girl do something similar? I actually checked and the exact same wraps are still for sale, but that would be cheating, right? Oh... wait...

But no, I decided to take the inspired-by route and used just nail polish and tools, and this is the result:

Hi everyone!


While swatching Hema Living Coral I realized how much I actually like coral and peach colored nails. So of course I had to play a little with some more pretty polishes in that color range :)

Hi everyone,


last Saturday my husband brought home a little gift to cheer me up: a pretty coral polish called Living Coral. The brand is called Hema, which is a general warehouse chain in the Netherlands (branching out to other European countries) that sells just about anything you can think of (baby clothes, house hold appliances, food, etc.) and that has quite an extensive beauty line that includes dozens of nail polish colors. The quality varies... a lot! Some are fast drying one coaters, others are patchy and streaky and never seem to dry, so let's see in what category the latest addition to my stash falls.

Hi everyone!


It feels like February has only just started but it's the last Friday of the month already so it's time for another episode of the Triad manicures, where Michelle, Juanita and myself take turns in picking a manicure that all of us use as inspiration for our own nails. So it may be a copy, something that looks like the original or something you can't even imagine has anything to do with the choice of the month (like black-n-white unicorns ;) but as long as it has been inspired by it, it's good :) My manicure definitely falls into the last category this month. Want to see what happened? Read on :)

Juanita picked a lovely, summer manicure with palm leaves and leopard spots by Tionna from Playful Polishes. I loved it at first sight! But... as all my polish and all my tools are still safely tucked away in storage (let's just say my dream kitchen has turned into a nightmare and we probably won't wake up until early May... if we're lucky) painting my nails is quite a challenge as I really have to plan what I want to do, make a list of anything and everything I need and ask my husband to get it for me (I don't even dare to go there as everything is stacked on top of everything else and he knows how to get to things safely but I would probably wreak havoc). Once I have everything, I have to find a relatively quiet place to sit down, play and take pictures. So at this moment, painting my nails isn't the fun, relaxing experience it used to be. But no way I was going to let J and M down, so I did all the planning and listing and asking and ended up with a rainbow of bright, happy colors in front of me. And I didn't feel it at all... not one spark of inspiration!

Life happened, time passed, and Valentine's Day came along, with all its displays of red and pink and roses, and I decided I would try a manicure with a white base, pale and a bit darker green for the leaves and red for the leopard spots that I wanted to replace with small roses. So the rainbow went back to storage and the chosen polishes returned with that miracle of patience that I'm married to. Except this time he picked the wrong ones... he picked a gorgeous red, but instead of greens he grabbed gray polishes. I figured I could try them and if I really didn't like it, a third trip would be in order... and this is the result:

Hi everyone,


yep, I've managed to drag myself away from all the real life stuff that has been keeping me uber busy to create a manicure inspired by this stunning design by Lou 'Urban Nail Art' that Juanita picked for us. I have to admit I actually thought about not posting my manicure as I totally didn't do the original any justice... but I've shown nail fails before and this probably won't be the last either ;)



I can almost hear you wondering what this has to do with the original inspiration. Well, more than you might think! Let me tell you: sparkly base (alright, mine isn't super sparkly as I don't have any of those fancy holo powders but it is very sparkly, so even my holo sparkle killing camera wasn't able to defeat this beauty), negative space floral image so the sparkly base actually becomes the color of the flowers, and reverse stamping to get the image on my nails. I just had to tone down the sparkles on my thumb, index and pinky because... you know, work and frowning managers.

Anyway, read on for the details!

Hi everyone,


the last Friday of the month means Michelle, Juanita and me get to play with colors again. This time Juanita chose the inspiration and she predicted she would get death threats... and I can't say I wasn't tempted! I mean, come on, spiders? For real? (in case you don't know, I totally am a city girl and I despise crawly creepy insects) So be warned if you want to check out the manicure that was the inspiration for my nails (that are way less scary ;)

Hi everyone!


I wanted something nice on my nails for Easter but I hit a total block... no inspiration at all! While trying to come up with something (and my mood deteriorating at an increasing rate in the process) I happened to look out the window at the rain falling from the cloudy sky and the total lack of anything even remotely close to spring and tadaa... the little cogs in my head FINALLY started turning! I decided to do a spring manicure but one inspired on the springtime we currently have: gray, gray and more gray, and some tulips thrown in for good measure as I live in Holland and we're famous for our tulips of course :)

Hi everyone!


When I was out shopping today I bought a couple of polishes and after I came home I just fiddled with them, making combinations on my desk to see what colors would look nice together. This is what happened.

indoors, no flash