You can't polish a turd....

Hello my darklings!

Sorry for my absence of late, I've been ridiculously busy lately, what with working and... working. Haha!

Another reason I've been away is I had a bit of a problem. As you may have known I had a tear in my right thumbnail below the quick, I'd been using pieces of tea bag as a silk wrap replacement, but the inevitable happened, I didn't buff it down quite as much as I thought I had and I snagged it, tearing across.

I hate having my nails mis-matched lengths. So I've been reduced to this...

I'm just kidding!

I really hope all of you can tell the difference between bitten and cut nails!

Okay back on topic... sort of... 

Here's what they REALLY look like!

My sad little thumb... :( 

You can see how stuffed up it is... 

No more pics of this until it grows out more!

My inpiration for this was partly all the cute pastels I kept seeing around easter, as well as having Nubar - Milk Chocolate Creme turn up. I'm not sure about using it for day-to-day polish, but boy, I'll use this guy for nail art for sure!

What I used:

Thumb and pinkies: Eyeko  - Lilac Polish(The only Eyeko so far that agreed with me! Yay!)

Forefinger: Franken

Middle: BYS - White

Ring: Eyeko - Vintage

Chocolate: Nubar - Milk Chocolate Creme

Rhinestones: Konad Nail Art Stones

Yay!

Oh and the title of this post is from me worried that chocolate would look more like... well... you get the picture.

My photography lecturer in Uni used to used the phrase "turd polishing" a lot. It means when you start with a piece of crap, you can spend ours and hours polishing and refining it, but in the end, it's still a piece of crap.

One day he was looking at what I was working on, shook his head and for the billionth time...

"You can't polish a turd"

Not missing a beat I looking him in the eye with a manic grin and said

"Maybe... but you can roll it in glitter!"

He was HORRIFIED.

Love,

Do not adjust your monitor...

Hi everyone!
I just had to be one of the first to show you these!
This is the Black Crackle set from BYS!

Sorry about the messy cleanup - using straight acetone wouldn't budge the crackle polish! I had to SCRUB it off with the brush, making it look a little messy. Next time I'll just be more careful with my application, not in the dark while watching TV!

I noticed I use a lot of black and white, looking back through my old posts I was suprised to see how long my nails have gotten! They've always been quite long, but this is by far the longest they've ever been! Here's a comparison photo...

Holey moley!

Though I love how long they are at the moment, they are starting to get awkward, not to mention feeling weak and "wobbly" - something I've never had before! So there may be a nubbin-isation in the near future...

Also, thanks again to the VERY lovely Jacie from You've Got Nail - what a sweetheart! It was so lovely to finally meet another nail blogger in person!
I also got a couple more from her - but you'll have to wait until I try them to find out what they are!

More posts lined up! I'm excited!
Also, don't forget to vote in my poll! After all, I want you to enjoy my blog as much as I do!

Love,

You're all too clever!

Hi everyone!
Yup... april fools!
I'm glad I didn't get many of you, did you really think I'd leave you all? No way!

ANYWAY I know I have been REALLY backed up with posts... please be patient with me as for the next week or so they might be a little al over the place...

First cab off the rank... my nails for the Obsidian Lace photoshoot! I know technically you've seen them in the other photos I posted but I don't know how many of you saw them (or saw how bony my wrists are or my freaky long hands! I'll wait here while you check.... back? Okay!)

I'm not going to post a billion shots of this one as it's simple and my application was a bit dodgy because I was in a rush. I used stargazer's white for the base, used reinforcements and painted over with colour club's after hours.

I'd love any ideas you may have for nails for future photoshoots! I'd like them to be mostly gothic style, preferably in monochrome colours.

Love,

Nail art... ...abstract impressionism is art, right?

Hello everyone.

Before you see these, I'm sorry.
I really, truly am.

I should only show you beautiful, gorgeously manicured nails.
I shouldn't show you this.

I shouldn't be laughing.

But seriously, if these guys had legs, i'd be telling them to RUN not walk to crazy town.

First off I'll let you know how this came about. I got three polishes from China Glaze's Ink collection. Being a MANIAC for purple I've known for ages that I had to get Flying Dragon. I also picked up Japanese Koi and Blue Sparrow.

Next, I wanted to do some nail art with these guys. Initially wanting to do something tattoo themed, the idea crumbled as I created these monstrosities...

     

Why on earth did I attempt something so ambitious? 

Because I wanted to. 

And I hoped it would have one of two results:

a) something AMAZING

b) something HILARIOUS.

Which do you think it was?

NB:
The first one is a BIRD.
Those are clouds.

The second one is a FISH.
Those are flowers in the water.
FLOWERS CAN FLOAT!

What I used:
BIRD:
Chi Chi - Mermaid
China Glaze - Blue Sparrow
Stargazer UV Nail Art Pen - UV Yellow
The Face Shop - BK901
Stargazer - White

FISH;
China Glaze - Blue Sparrow
China Glaze - Flying Dragon
China Glaze - Japanese Koi

Stargazer UV Nail Art Pen - UV Yellow

The Face Shop - BK901

Stargazer - White

Don't forget to enter my Giveaway!


Love,

Hello Kitty!

Hi everyone!
Everything's been a little mad here so yet again I didn't get to the shops, sorry!
You'll have to settle for a vault post where I went... insane....

Yes, that is a little hello kitty. On a toenail. A big toe-nail. A man big toe-nail.
There's a story behind this which i'm not going to go into.

The base for this one is Orly's Enchanted Forest with Fauxnad Hello Kitty using Colour Club's After Hours as stamping polish, the face is Stargazer White (from the "Gothic French" kit) the nose is The face Shop GLI11 and the bow is Stargazer nail Art Pen in UV Pink.

And yes, this is waaay sloppy, you all know I normally wouldn't post things this bad but for a Hello Kitty man-pedicure I had to make an exception!

My nail art needs a little work but mostly this is due to me trying to finish up and slap some seche on before Jai could complain. :)

Love,

ANOTHER PURPLE

Hello Ladies!

I have a serious problem. When I walk up to racks upon racks of stunning colours, I can never help myself.

I always get purple!

I knew what I was doing this time around at least - that's why I grabbed the mint green (and another still to come!)

I don't *quite* have another purple like this.

Its soft, but bright. It almost has a flash to it too...

Why does it say pedicure? Odd.

For some silly reason I didn't take any photos of the colour before I put some konad on.

I've been a little mad lately.

This is plate m62 with konad special polish.

I think I might go to the beauty supply place and see whats new!

I want to know, what colour can you never resist buying, even though you already have more of that colour than most others put together?

Love,

Awesome giveaways and valentines nails!

http://www.kraseybeauty.com/2010/01/giveaway-time-krasey-beautys-one-year.html
$1000 worth of AWESOME. Check this OUT!!!

Now for your main event of this morning (evening?)

First off we have me trying the technique to remove glitter nail polish from my Goobie Goober post using nail polish remover, cotton pads and foil. Except I didn't have any foil so I used cling-wrap! It didn't work as well because it was really hard to get the cling wrap to stick to itself because it was wet. Bleh.

Here's what I got, before:

during:

Yay! Tape!

and after:

Hahahaha wrinkly!

Not too bad - though it would have worked much better with foil, it was still much less of a nightmare than usual! The remaining glitters came off really easily and felt kind of "melty" and floppy.

Now for my latest manicure - I wanted to give the Konad another go. Unfortunately I only have one plate so it's going to look a bit familiar.

I added some red diamantes and little diamante hearts to my thumbs.

Then I decided this was altogether way too boring and not valentines inspired at all.
So I kept going...

Much nicer! the girl at the shop yesterday almost had a tiny conniption when she saw them!
What do you think?

Love,

Fail Of The Day!

Hello my lovelies!
I originally wasn't going to post this. I was so so unhappy with it.
But here goes...

I ADORE this purple. It's Cheri 110 "Sapphire" (?)
I picked it up at this amazing little nail shop near my house.

It wouldn't work.
In truth I was having a totally shit day, stressed and hungry and had been awake for 26 hours.
Ugh.
My hands just wouldn't stop shaking.

So as you can see in the last pic - it went all patchy and see through near my cuticles. I thought I might fix it with some konad to distract the attention - how wrong was I! I forgot to do a top coat before the konad and it went crazy streaky.

Also because I was being so neurotic - I didn't wait for each coat to dry before putting the next one on. So it ended up being this thick goopy mess and when I woke up in the morning it was a wreck! The polish had sludged out from under the rhinestones and the tips (not photographed) were shovelled up halfway down my nail! AAARRRGGGHHH! I took it all off immediately.

All of this was 100% my fault - the polish is normally lovely to work with and such a divine purple!

The next one will be so much better - I promise!

Also - do you want to see my fails? Or should I keep them to myself from now on?

Also - Painted Lady Fingers is having a great giveaway!

Check it out here.

Love,

Kitty's First Konad!

Hello lovelies!

I know I said I would find my disc yesterday (I did - I found it three hours ago) but that means - Konad piccies! Whee!

Please excuse my amateurish photos and streaky konad - but for a first go I'm quite proud!

I used The Face Shop black with white Konad Special Polish with Stargazer Clear Top Coat. I stuck some diamantes on and then threw some gobs of clear on the top - but as you can see it bubbled a bit.
Obviously I need to get some Seche Vite Top Coat... and not put such big globs on... haha! I used plate m62 for these.

And OH GOD it looks so much worse when you can see everything close up! My cuticles are horrid and please excuse the random fluff on EVERYTHING...

Let me know what you think! :)
Love,