Rachaels Pandas

I've been neglecting my blog a bit this past week I do apologize. Ok, so one of my best friends likes pandas a lot and Sailor Moon to. I was planning on doing some Sailor Moon nails on her but my navy polish decided to commit suicide down the stairs so I had to come up with another idea for her so I decided on pandas.

Here they are

I was inspired by a panda nail tutorial done by Cutepolish on YouTube Here is the link for anyone interested. Shes Amazing.



Ok, so here are the products used


***DISCLAIMER***
I paid for all of these products on my own with my own money. I am in no way Sponsored by these companies nor did I receive these for free. I just use them because I like them best and for this tutorial.

base coat- Salon Sciences Fiberglass Network
WHITE- China Glaze White on White
BLACK- Revlon Black Lingerie
RED- China Glaze Rose Among Thorns
GLITTER- China Glaze Carnival Lights
top coat- Salon Sciences Instant Artificials
and
a paintbrush but you could use an open bobby pin as well

The first step to the pandas was to use a base coat. Since Rays nails are short, I only used one thin coat of base coat. I find that thicker coats of polish on short nails dont always end up well and tend to peel off easier especially if they are too short to seal the free edge. So, thinner coats will definitely be your friend if you have short nails.


Next step was to make a circular shape with the white polish. This is to make the pandas head. It doesnt have to be perfect because we still need to add the ears and (for the girl) a bow. As long as you can tell its a circle-ish shape, your good.


After the pandas head shape has been done and completely dries, the next step is to add the first layer of the eyes, the ears and the noses. We decided to make one of the pandas a girl so, we gave all of them black noses except for two, one on each hand. They got red noses.



After the first layer of the eyes dried, it was time to add the whites of the pandas eyes.


Then I added the bows for the red nose girl pandas.


After the design completely dried, I used a thin coat of my favorite top coat to protect the little pandas.


As always, AND if your nails are long enough, make sure that you put at least one coat of each polish on your free edges to protect your nail art. And put at least one thin coat of top coat on your nails if they are short. A good top coat will work wonders for you and your nail art.

Also, these are simply the colors I used because we were making traditional pandas. So, if you want to get creative and make different crazy colored pandas, feel free to do so. Art is in the eye of the beholder and nail art even more so because they are your nails. So if you LOVE the color purple and want the pandas to have purple eyes instead of black, go for it and more power to you! Your nails and your nail art should be what you love no matter what.

Leopard Number Two!!!

Ok so I decided to try something new with the blog and so I added pictures of what my nails looked like as i went a long. I hope it's not TOO much. So, here is my second attempt at leopard print and I think I am getting the hang of this... So here is the look


And from another view...

Video tutorial for this look!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTYQOIJKLmw


After my first attempt at leopard print (see "Fall and Leopard Print") I fell absolutely IN LOVE with it and decided to dedicate more nail space to it and came up with that.

Here are my products used


***DISCLAIMER***
I purchased all of these products with my own money and did not use them for the company I just honestly love these products and chose to use them with my own free will. My opinions are simply mine and not biased by the companies. And I am not sponsored by an of these companies.

Base coat- Salon Sciences Fiberglass Networks
NUDE- Sally Hansen Nail Growth Miracle in Innocent Nude
BLUE- Kiss Nail Art Paint in Soft Blue
PINK- Kiss Nail Art Paint in Beach Pink
SILVER Glitter- Sinful Colors Nail Art in Fashionista
LIGHT GREEN- China Glaze in Re-Fresh Mint
GOLD Glitter- Sinful Colors Nail Art in Flower Girl
BRIGHT GREEN Kiss Nail Art Paint in Beach Green
BROWN- Revlon in Hot For Chocolate
BLACK- Revlon in Black Lingerie
top coat- Salon Sciences Instant Artificials

Paint brush for the dots
A paper to use as a pallet

1. I applied my favorite base coat twice to clean nails.



After one coat...

After the second coat.

2. I applied one coat of the nude color because two of the Fiberglass Networks base coat is kind of opaque in its self. So, in my personal opinion one coat is enough.




3. I took the blue and pink polish and the piece of scrap paper and dropped big spots of polish on the paper so that I could use it as sort of a make shift artists pallet and took the paint brush and made small pink and blue dots all over my nails for the main big spots.

Here is what it looked like


4. Then I took the silver glitter and made a line separating the are with the spots from the area with just the nude shade of polish

Here is what it looked like


5. I took the light green and made dots with the scrap paper and paint brush in a "v" shape Which I outlined with the gold glitter. I did this on my ring fingers only.




6. With the lime green I decided to make zebra stripes in the space on my ring finger that was open. I had to go over it about three times to get it opaque enough.


7. Then I took my scrap paper and dropped some black for all of my nails EXCEPT my ring finger and used the pain brush to make little "c" like shapes around my nail as well as Random little tiny black dots. Then I took the brown polish to do the same thing with the brown polish because i figured that brown would look better against the green.


8. With my usual top coat and after all my nails had completely dried of course, I put two coats of my Instant Artificials top coat to seal and protect my design and my nails.


As always make sure to hit your free edges with at least one coat of each polish you use to help thicken your nails, protect them and to seal and protect your nail art!

That Super Bass

As many people have, I have joined the Nicki Minaj bandwagon recently. But thats only because I now understand her and her concept of her different personalities and that thats why she makes the different voices and faces and what not.

SO, that being said, I decided to honor Nicki with my Super Bass inspired nails.

Sooo here are my materials used. I know the pics bright, I'm sorry :/ and of COURSE I'll go into detail.


****PRODUCTS USED*****
**DISCLAIMER**
I paid for all of these products with MY OWN money. I am Not sponsored by these companies NOR did I receive them for free.

(Base Coat) Salon Sciences Fiberglass Network
(WHITE) China Glaze - White On White
(PINK) China Glaze - Rich & Famous
(NUDE) Sally Hansen - Innocent Nude
(PINK) Love My Nails - Rose Garden
(PINK STRIPER) Kiss Nail Art Paint - Beach Paint
(GREEN) Sinful Colors Professionals - Irish Green
(GLITTER) China Glaze - Carnival Lights
(Top Coat) Salon Sciences Instant Artificials
a paintbrush
a safety pin (be careful NOT to stab yourself please!)

1. Since my nails are long again, I am utilizing my base coat too keep them strong, long and healthy. For this I am using my Salon Sciences Fiberglass Network. Use two coats of this to give your nails the added strength of fiberglass. Be sure to get your free edge too!

2. When my base coat dried, I put down all of my base colors so that they had time to dry. On my thumbs, I put two coats of China Glaze White On White. On my pointer, middle and pinky fingers I put two coats of China Glaze Rich & Famous. On my ring fingers, I used just one coat of Sally Hansen Innocent Nude, on all your fingers except your ring fingers, make sure that you use two THIN coats not two thick coats.


3. Going back to the thumbs, which should have had time to dry by now (make sure they are 10000000% dry before moving on to this step!) I took my paint brush to use for the giraffe print. All that I did was dip the paint brush into the lighter pink, Love My Nails Rose Garden and start making random geometric shapes to resemble giraffe print. My advice, just make like rounded rectangle-ish shapes and then once you do that, add the rest of your shapes to fit around the rest. be sure to randomize it in shapes, placement and size for the best effect :)


4. On the ring fingers, I had to make splatter looking things to represent the part of the video when shes in the pink pool with the green wig splashing the pink water on the guy. I used my Beach Pink Kiss Nail Art to do the pink splatters which represented the water. Then I dipped my paintbrush in the Sinful Colors Irish Green to make the green splatters which represented her green wig. To add some color, I dipped the safety pin into the China Glaze Carnival Lights and just added some random dots of pink glitter to add some shine.


5. After all of this, add two coats of Salon Sciences Instant Artificials for that strong acrylic-like hold.


Make sure that all the free edges of the nails have been coated at least once with each product that you use to protect your design.