Today starts my much needed two week vacation from my overly frustrating and stressful job! I can't tell you how excited I am! Right now as you are reading this I am currently preparing to leave for Florida tomorrow morning! I will be gone for the whole week and plus some. I do have blog post planned for every other day until I get back. Plus I will be doing updates on my nails because I am going to be testing out some Sally Hansen Salon Effects Real Nail Polish Strips! I am planning on putting them on today so the updates will start tomorrow!
I decided to wear the Sally Hansen Nail Strips because it would be much easier then trying to decide what type of design or stamp to do, only to have it ruined a few days into my trip. Since I am only bringing a carry on with me I don't plan on packing any polish. Also it will be a great way to see if these really work, I've used them in the past but never got to keep them on long enough to see if they lasted the 10 day claim on the package!
So on to today's post. Today my nail art is inspired by my best friends tattoo she got about a month ago. My best friend who I also consider my sister is a new mom to a gorgeous 9 month old baby girl and she was going through a rough patch and getting her tattoo was a way of getting through it. I won't go into any details about since its no ones business, but the tattoo itself is gorgeous. It is a dandelion that has its seeds blowing away in the wind and turning into birds. It also has a saying on it but I'm more interested in the dandelion turning into birds. I too am actually considering getting a similar tattoo this year, no saying just the picture.
So since my amazing blogger friend Alaina over at The Little Canvas just happened to do a dandelion nail art post, I used her tutorial to get my dandelions perfect. If you haven't seen her picture by picture tutorials of some of the nail art she does you need to click the link above to check her out!
So I started with a base color from Colormates called Stormy Weather. Its the perfect blue-grey polish that has some shimmer to it, it was the perfect background for these dandelions.
Once the base was dry using my thin striper brush and Wet 'n' Wild's Black Crème I followed Alaina's steps to achieve the perfect dandelion stem, then with another nail art brush one that was more flat and shaped to a point I dipped that into Pure Ice Superstar a white polish and dabbed off the excess just like Alaina says to and created my fluff ball dandelion and the seeds that were drifting away.
Now to add in my own twist I went back to my black thin striper and dipped the tip into the black and created a few bird outlines for where the seeds turned into them and they were free to fly away!. Once they were all dry I added my top coat and I was done.
Please excuse the pink hue on my middle finger and on the end of my index, the polish I had on before was a very bright pink that stained a little.
Each picture has been taken in natural (cloudy) light with no flash. Out of all the free hand nail art I have done which is a quite a bit this is my favorite of all time! I seriously love this manicure so much I kept this on all weekend until today! This is also the first free hand that I have done that I didn't mess up using my non-dominant hand! My right actually looks like my left its unbelievable!
I hope you guys enjoyed this post and this nail art! If you want to recreate blowing dandelions don't forget to check out Alaina's blog which is linked up towards the beginning of the post!
So until I have an update on the nail strips or Wednesday when the next scheduled post goes live,
have a great day!
<3 Nicole
