Watercolor Nails and 40 Great Nail Art Ideas - Aqua or Turquoise

Hey everyone, today I'm showing you a completely new to me technique I tried out which was SUPER simple and the results were stunning. Also this had nothing to do with my 40 Great Nail Art Ideas prompt, I just decided to add to it for that – so more on that later.



First up let me show you how to watercolor with sharpies and rubbing alcohol.



What you will need to start with is a light colored base. Most bases I've seen online are white. We all know I cannot do without holo, so I chose ILNP Paper Route – a light grey almost white polish with holo shards in it!



Once you base is dry, pick out the colored permanent markers you plan to use. Then you can take a shot glass (or as I have here, mini red cups) and color the permanent marker on the bottom. You can also use tinfoil as a base too, make a tiny little bowl for yourself. Then take a dropper and drop in three to four drops of rubbing alcohol and use a paint brush to put strokes on your nail.





Keep adding colors until you're happy with it!



And when it's done you have a Monet-esque masterpiece! Now I knew my 40 Great Nail Art Ideas prompt was coming up, and I thought this base made a great aqua/turquoise base and my prompt for this was mermaid/scales – so I broke out some scale stamping and a mermaid decal I bought ages ago but hadn't used yet.



Ta-da! Instant mermaid nails!



I think the star of this whole look was the new watercolor method I learned, and it wasn't even part of my prompt! Next time I want to try a gradient look using watercolors! This was so easy and now the results are endless!

Now don't forget to visit all the other ladies sites in the inlinkz below for more great aqua/turquoise nail art ideas!


   

    An InLinkz Link-up
   

40 Great Nail Art Posts – Your Job

Well it's no secret what I do for a living here at Newsie Nail Novice, it's kinda integrated into the title of my blog! I'm a journalist, so of course I've accumulated stamping plates to showcase this!



A little bit more about me, I am a writer, more specifically an education journalist. I write about local schools happenings. I also do a number of other editorial duties (page layout, special section management, associate editor etc.), but first and foremost I'm writer. Which thankfully translates perfectly to the nails.



To begin with, I chose a lovely grey fun holo that has a name that I just couldn't refuse – ILNP Paper Route. How perfect is this polish for this prompt?!



For the center nail, I did a fun typewriter, which hails back to the old newspaper days (before my time). This is from MoYou London Scholar 02 plate stamped with B Polished Midnight in Death Valley.



For the rest of the nails, I used my favorite newspaper font stamp from Messy Mansion MM24 plate.



So that's it, nothing super complicated, but simple and to the point. Like most of my news stories. ;-)

Now don't forget to check out the rest of the ladies of this awesome prompt, can't wait to find out more about all of them in their posts below!


   

    An InLinkz Link-up
   

40 Nail Art Ideas – Halloween

Happy Halloween everyone! Today I've got a fun skittle look I've been rocking all week and boy do I just love how happy and fun this look is!



I went on Pinterest and picked my favorite of all the Halloween mani tutorials out there and combined them to create this look, with holo bases of course (holo ALL the things).



So I freehanded most of this, except for the witch stamp and jack-o-lantern face, both were from Winstonia W116 plate and stamped using my favorite black stamping polish B Polished Midnight in Death Valley. In fact all the black in this mani, including the freehand, is with this awesome polish. And an extra note for you, B Polished is having a sale right now, check out my last post for details.



So for the bases I used a bunch of fun holo polishes which I'll tell you about here. The thumb is a base of Smitten Polish Cauldron Bubble, with the moon freehanded with Literary Lacquers Curious Yellow*. The index finger base is Smitten Polish Oh the Hue-Manatee* and white stripes are freehand with KBShimmer Eyes White Open, the eyes are Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Universal Loner. The middle finger is a base of Smitten Polish Poach-Busters* (LE this month, so grab it while you can!). The ring finger is a base of Elevation Polish Aconcagua. The pinky finger is a base of ILNP Paper Route, a lovely almost white holo, perfect for the skull.

*denotes press samples





I really loved these nails, they were just different enough for me not to get bored and rock all week long! This is the most effort I put into Halloween this year for sure. We have a potluck at work today and I tried a Pinterest recipe that I think I kind of failed at but oh well. Oh and I had to show you the right hand attempt at this mani, just to keep it real and show you that not all nail art is easy. My freehand still has a long way to go!



So what are you doing for Halloween? We are headed to a coworker's house for the holiday, she lives in this wealthy enclave of town that is like THE place for Halloween. So we are going to bask in the fun, see the decorations and help pass out candy to 800 plus trick-or-treaters! Should be fun! Hope you all have a lovely holiday weekend!

Oh and don't forget to check out the other ladies of Crumpet's Nail Challenge, listed here in the inlinkz below. I'm sure they've come up with some truly creative and fun Halloween nails to browse!


   

    An InLinkz Link-up
   

ILNP 2015 Summer Collection Picks

Today I have four new polishes I recently got from ILNP during their summer collection preorder earlier this month! These beauties are stunners and I had so much fun photographing and playing with them. I expect to use them a ton in the future!



I got six polishes in all, but had to stop at one of them to create a nail art look because I was just so in love with the polish, you'll see what I mean later. So let's get to the swatches.









This stunner is ILNP Long Walks and I just knew this would be the first polish I would wear from my INLP haul. This is a gorgeous taupe colored polish with beautiful gold flecks and a subtle holographic finish. Most taupes don't work with my skin tone but I found this to be delightfully complex. It has a lavender lean to it which makes it work on my skin tone. I just loved this polish no matter when you looked at it, it was always looking a little different. Completely unique in my collection. The formula was superb, as are all my ILNP, and this was opaque in two coats.

Side note: I was wearing this polish the night my mom went to the hospital. The next day, as I was waiting in her hospital room by the window while she was in surgery, I distracted myself by checking out my polish in the light.









This is ILNP Paper Route, the minute I heard the name of this polish I knew I needed to have it just for the name alone (see my blog title if you don't get it). This is a gorgeous white holographic polish with fine holographic particles plus these beautiful holographic shards I haven't seen anywhere else. They are so beautiful and make this polish truly unique. The formula on this one was on the thicker side, but not difficult to work with. I used three coats for opacity, but most could probably get away with two.









This is the gorgeous ILNP Harbour Island and it is a beautifully bright teal jelly polish with the fine holographic shards similar to Paper Route. Because of all the reviews that said that this particular shade was on the sheerer side, I decided to layer it over Paper Route, and I thought the results were stunning. The slightly lighter background really made the teal pop. I just love this color, I can never get enough teal polish in my life. This was two coats, but on it's own I believe it needs more like three to four to avoid visible nail line. It is sheerer because of the jelly base.









And finally we have ILNP I See You. This is a beautiful champagne leaning nude polish that is such a lovely canvas for nail art. I saw it and said, I need to wear this longer than just a swatch, so this is where I stopped swatching the polishes I bought. This lovely champagne nude polish is SUPER holo in the sun and even in the shade. It has fine holographic finish with the same holographic shards as the previous polishes, really making it pop in the shade.









So I really liked seeing I See You and then Harbour Island together, so I broke out my Jolie Stamping Polish that reminded me most of the teal color of Harbour Island. The stamping polish is Jolie Polish Blue Turquoise Flower using plate Uber Chic 1-03 plate.

I'll add a few more shots of this look in the wild so you can see what it looks like outside in the sun and in the shade. The stamping can get lost because the holo in this is so stunning, but I think it is a subtle effect that I rather liked!





I just loved these polishes and after checking out I See You I know I'll probably eventually pick up some more polishes just like it from ILNP. So let's dish, which ILNP did you pick up or drool over? Have I added to your list?! Let me know in the comments!