Nail Trainer

So my nail trainer hand came today, yay!, I'm so excited.

I ordered my Nail Trainer Hand directly from their website. I shopped around and did not find it at a better price anywhere. I chose the kit that had all the extras, called the Jumbo Kit.
My Nail Trainer Hand kit contained:
The Nail Trainer Hand with fingertips and nails in place
2 packages of replacement nails (100 ct each)
2 packages of nail extension tips
1 bottle of Nail Trainer tip adhesive
1 bottle of gel prep & nail residue remover
1 bottle of primer for acrylic practice
Essential Techniques Progress Cards

I have been watching videos of people using their trainer hand and I knew I wanted one. With shipping my trainer hand was $209. I saw one on ebay but it was used and it had none of the supplies you'd need to train, not a savings.
The nails on the hand are a good size, not tiny and unrealistic at all. The fingers move and it seems it will be easy to work with. I can clamp it down and don't have to worry about it moving around. This kit came with everything I need so I won't have to wait to get started.

 I have been doing most of my nail art practicing on myself, not the best idea when you have other things to do and your nails are always wet. It seems that every few days I'm changing the way my nails look.

I am anxious to get to practicing my nail art on my Nail Trainer Hand and give my nails a rest, okay maybe just a short rest.

Product Review

Hey everyone, I have been doing a lot of nail art recently. Some things turned out good, some not so good.
I have found that some of the products I have been using are awesome and some, well not so awesome. and possibly contributed to some of my nail art flopping. If you are in the market for some great products and wonder what others might think well I'm here to tell you what I think!

Let's start with nail polish:
I find myself on a budget so I'm always looking for good deals but some of the polish I bought may just get tossed in the garbage so they weren't a great deal after all.

L.A. Colors- I bought this particular brand of nail polish in a pack of 5 for around $6 in my local grocery store. There was one color in the pack that I needed for a beach scene I was going to paint on my nails. The brush was very small, short and skinny, and very plastic like, the polish thin and needed several coats to get good coverage. Stayed tack for too long. I used the clear that came in this pack also and it left bubbles around the cuticle area. I will definitely not buy this brand again.

Wet N Wild- I picked up just a bottle of the clear in this case and was very disappointed. Selling for only .97 cents I thought it was a steal. Again a very thin brush and the polish did nothing to help seal my nail art.

Nina Ultra Pro- I buy these at Sally's Beauty Supply and they are the least expensive polish they carry at $3.99. I always watch for their sales and stock up. This polish has a very wide brush that is soft and more natural feeling. Excellent coverage, vibrant colors, and dries quickly. This is one of my favorites.

Kleancolor- I get these through ebay since I can't find these local. I got a lot of 70 full size bottles for $68. This was a great price and I was very excited to see what I'd get. I was not disappointed. A huge array of colors, crèmes, glitters, and metallics. The brush is thin but long enough to still get good coverage, the coats go on smooth and the polish dries in a short amount of time. I was happy with this polish, and the price, well it could not have been better.

China Glaze- This polish is sold many places and even though the price is better than OPI it can still be pricey for around $5-$7 a bottle. I watch for coupons and sales. China Glaze has very good coverage, the brush is thin but not too much that it affects how it goes on. You can usually find a good array of colors also. I buy these when I find a good sale.

China Glaze Magnetix- I bought these on ebay because I could not find them locally and I had some of their magnets. I got a lot of  6 for $11.70, a great price. The colors from one magnetic nail polish brand to the other are very similar and that is too bad because I would love to have more colors. I like this brand and have been very pleased with how it works.

Princessa- I bought these strictly for the Glow in the Dark colors. Again another great ebay bargain. I got a lot of 24 bottles for $29.99 I never see this brand locally. This polish dries very quickly, but it DOES glow in the dark and in the color that it is not just that white glow. This does not work for water marble because it dries too quickly but it is such a fun polish. I painted my toes and later that night when laying in bed in the dark spotted orange glowing things under the covers only to discover it was my toes. So much fun to use.

Nabi Magnetic Nail Polish- Another ebay bargain at a lot of 12 for $14.99. This polish is so much fun. Excellent coverage and the magnetic properties do work. The polish dries quick and if it dries too much the magnetic effect won't work. I polish the nail and before replacing the cap on the bottle use the magnet, it only takes a few seconds. The closer you put the magnet to the nail the better the design will come out. The magnet is in the cap so you don't worry about losing it. I tried a magnet from China Glaze and it did not work, go figure.

Now a couple of my favorite tools and one not so favorite.

Nailene SensatioNail Gel remover tool- Oh my gosh how did I do nail art before discovering this tool. At a mere $4 I should have bought several in case I lose one because I can't live without it. Before when trying to remove my nail art or even just nail polish that was sealed with a UV gel topcoat over my acrylic nails was a long hard process. I did so much sanding that I usually had to rebuild the acrylic. Soaking the gel off was not possible because it would also dissolve my nails. I saw this tool in Walmart, thought why not, and voila, success! First I use a cotton ball saturated in pure acetone, swipe over the polish several times and then using the tool, with it's spoon like end the polish and any nail art comes off like hot butter. Love, love, love this tool!

Beauty Pro Curette Nail Cleaner- I bought this at Sally's Beauty Supply at about $7. I typically don't spend that much on a tool like this but I hate having anything under my nails and usually end up searching for a toothpick or bobby pin to clean under my nails when its not feasible to scrub with a brush and soap. I love this tool, it even gets that bit of stained acrylic you end up having way down under the nail so close to the skin. I need a couple more of these for sure.

ASP Manicure Saver Cotton Claw -I have a love hate relationship with this tool. Yes it does keep my nails from getting messed up, I love that, but because so much of the cotton ball is clamped in the claw what's left is not adequate for good polish removal, and that I hate. I spend a whole lot of time trying to get nail polish off of my toenails using this tool. Save the money, grab your cotton balls, polish remover and hit up your hubby, or a friend and ask them to help you get that polish off. 30 minutes of scrubbing this tool over my nails is way too long and I have other things to do. Nail art awaits and I am wasting precious time trying to get this tool to work for me. 

Well I hope this sheds some light on some products for you. Save some money in some cases, spend a little more where you need to. Happy shopping. Enjoy your art!

Nail Art Society Shout out

I'm back with another shout out!
This one goes to the Nail Art Society. I received my box in record time, everything was packed neatly and securely.

 I was so excited to get to see what it contained. My box had a beautiful crème baby blue shade of nail polish by Jessica called Surfer Boyz N' Berry, 2 tiny white bows, a silver nail charm, a white nail art pen from Sally Hansen, 2 silver rings, nail wraps/stickers from the Creme Shop, and a pair of cuticle scissors.

 

The enclosed idea card gave me inspiration so I went to work on my nails.

I'm normally not real into blue but this shade really spoke to me and when I applied it to my nails I was very excited. I had also received a shipment of magnetic nail polish I got from ebay so I decided to use the silver and combine them for a great look. So here's what I did:

Step 1: Using the blue that came in my box I painted 3 nails of my left hand: ring, middle and thumb, 4 fingers of my right hand: ring, middle, index and thumb.

Step 2: With a beautiful sparkly blue called Holo Blue from Kleancolor that I just got off ebay I painted the index finger and pinky of my left hand, and painted over the existing blue of my middle finger of my left hand and over the index finger and middle finger of my right hand.

Step 3: I applied Nabi magnetic silver to the nail tip only of my pinky finger of my left hand. Follow instructions of your magnetic nail polish. I followed mine and slight lines appeared on my pinky nail tip. I then painted my entire pinky nail of my right hand and again followed instructions and lines appeared over my whole nail.

Step 4: I applied the beautiful silver sticker/wraps to the tip only of the thumb nail of my left hand, and to the center of my ring finger nail of my right hand cuticle to tip.

Step 5: Using blue micro beads I had in my supplies I applied brush on nail glue to the edge of my nail tip of my ring finger of my left hand and dipped the nail into the beads, I did the same thing to my index finger on my right hand, only this one I made wider.

Step 5: Using brush on nail glue I applied the 2 bows that were in my Nail Art Society Box to the tip of my ring finger left hand, and thumb right hand.

Step 6: Now that everything is in place I used my UV gel top coat on all my nails and cured them using my lamp.

Note: I did use the white nail art pen from Sally Hansen that came in my Nail Art Society box on my toes!!

I hope you can get a little inspiration from my choices for my nail designs. There are so many possibilities.

 

Square Hue Shout Out

Got home today and I'm so excited, 2 boxes came for me, both from Square Hue I received the Passport Collection Rio, and the Passport Collection Maui.
When I signed up such a short time ago I received a coupon code to receive a free box so I got May and June's collections.

The Maui Collection consisting of three beautiful colors :
 Leblon Shimmer a lovely shimmery green
 Ipanema Micro Glitter a wonderful golden shade with tiny flecks of glitter
Copacabana Glitter a gorgeous blue shade with large flecks of glitter

 Leblon

 

The Maui Collection consists of:

Wailea Hi Gloss Crème a lovely golden tan

Ka'ahumanu Micro Glitter a beautiful kind of turquoise with tiny flecks of glitter

Ala Moana Satin another beautiful turquoise shade.

 

Wailea

6 gorgeous shades of color, 3 in each box.

The Maui Collection is the 1st ever SquareHue "Readers Choice" Box. I can't wait to use these beautiful colors.

SquareHue is donating to stop human trafficking. Help save lives and get some awesomely beautiful nail polish too. Click on the link and check it out.

http://www.squarehue.com/

 

 

 

 

Shout out!

I am so excited, I got my first box from Julep yesterday. It came really fast, I think I joined at just the right time.

I was so psyched to open it. And I was not disappointed!

My Maven style profile "Bombshell". I received 2 full size nail polishes and Freedom Top Coat. and 2 small sanding blocks. It came all packaged with a 50% off coupon, a booklet telling about the different style profiles, a little welcome card that reads, "Find out who you are and do it on purpose." a quote from Dolly Parton. All packaged with scrunchy shredded paper to ensure everything was cushioned nicely.

I am very excited, and I cant wait to get my next box. They give you the opportunity to invite friends and get your next box free. The box usually runs $24.95 a month, free shipping, but you get your first box free, and you have the option of cancelling anytime you want.
So I am now officially a Julep Maven, and you can be too.
http://www.julep.com/maven.html

Shout Out Time

Hey everyone today I want to give a big shout out to Sally's beauty supply and a product they carry called Ibd 5 second brush on gel resin. This product is very low priced at around $3.50. The bottle is very small but you don't need much.
I discovered this product because even though I do my own Nail Art I don't do my own nails because I'm just learning and my daughter wanted a set of nails. I found that if I glued on the nail tips and apply several coats of this product, allowing 10~15 minutes drying time between coats (I learned this the hard way) you can build up a nice beautiful nail. I decided to do my toes first and opted to put a white tip on the big toe and paint the white on to the others. I wanted to make sure I knew how to do it correctly before using it on my daughter. I love the way my big toe came out. I did my daughter's nails and they came out beautiful. The process is fairly simple. Glue on the tip of your choice, use a polar block to lightly sand over the edge that is glued to nail bed, shape the nail as desired, clean off dust particles, brush gel resin onto each nail, dry 10 minutes or so, repeat coats of gel resin until you have 3 to 4, drying thoroughly between each. Use your polar block to lightly sand over each entire nail. Top with favorite top coat.
I topped my toe off with some little flowers and sealed it with UV gel.
A few warnings: Fumes, this stuff is strong, don't breathe in the fumes. If you plan to go swimming for several hours, wait til you get home to do a set of nails, (Also learned this the hard way).
All in all, I'm very happy with this product and plan to keep using it.

So I'm back with a nail art tutorial. I wanted to create something pretty in green for church this coming Sunday. Our music director aka the Pastor's wife chooses colors and all of the choir and praise and worship team wear that color. So green is typically not a favorite color of mine and I definitely didn't want a solid green nail or anything like that. So I decided to opt for a bit of green, not too much. So here goes.
Materials needed: Scrap paper to make clean up easier
                             Acrylic paints (I use Oumaxi) in green and white
                             A fan brush
                             A very small lining brush
                             Tiny beads (micro beads or caviar beads) in gold
                              UV gel top coat
                              UV gel curing lamp
                               Polar block (white sanding block)
                               Dotting tool
                               Nail glue
Okay so I just got my nails done. I don't do them myself because #1 I'm just learning and #2 I'm so not able to use my left hand to do my right hand. Um, yeah! So I have a French tip in white. This leaves me with endless possibilities in my nail art.

So the Oumaxi paints come in a variety of colors and I have a set of basic colors. They were not too expensive and I got mine on ebay. So I use the dark green and the lighter brighter green and white.
I slightly sanded off the UV gel topcoat that I had on my nails when I left the salon using a polar block. Make sure your nails is clean and you dust it free of particles. I then use a dehydrator. I used the fan brush to brush a bit of dark green to each nail tip.

I then using the same fan brush lightly brush a bit of brighter green on top of that. This paint dries fairly quickly especially using such a light coat. Then taking the white and a very tiny lining brush I draw little scroll designs all over the green tip. There is no perfect way to do this. and because I have kind of a shaky hand when I've had too much caffeine mine aren't perfect by any means. Fill the area with big ones or small ones or a mix of both.

Once this is done using the dotting tool get a bit of glue and put a bit inside of one of your little scrolls, anywhere on the nail is fine. Using the same dotting tool dot it into your glue, into the beads and then place them on the nail where you've placed the dot of glue inside of one of your scrolls. Don't get too much glue on your dotting tool, not only will you pick up way too many beads you will also find that the beads will bleed color onto your design.
                             

Once you have done each nail or as many nails as you want to have beads on you will want to seal your work.

Take your UV gel and drip some right onto the beads without touching them with the brush. Now carefully brush the rest of the nail with gel. Now that you have each nail sealed with UV gel cure it with your lamp.

You're done! Note: You have the option to clean up the edge where you brushed on the green but I left it.

 

Nail Art Tutorial Using Airbrush,  Fimo Canes and Tape

I love trying new things with my nails and they usually don't stay the same for too many days in a row.
Today I took three of my favorite methods and combined them, of course they are all my favorite so who are we kidding.

Materials needed: Airbrush with paint of your desired color
                             Skinny tape
                             Fimo canes in bow shape
                             Nail glue
                             Regular top coat
                             UV gel top coat & curing lamp

Step 1 Start with clean dry nails making sure they are free of oils and dust.

Step 2 Put your tape in place on each nail. I did one at an angle, and one straight across on the tip.

Step 3 Airbrush your favorite color on to each nail, making sure you get them covered good.  I used red. You'll want to remove the tape now and put a light coat of a clear top coat.

Step 4 After slicing your fimo canes use a drop of nail glue to place each bow at the point where your two lines meet at a point now that you have removed the tape.

Step 5 Now that you have your fimo slices glued in place top your entire nail including the fimo slice with a coat of UV gel. Try to make sure you get this smooth as it will affect the over all look of your nails. Cure your UV gel with a curing lamp. Wash the excess paint from over spray off of your fingers.

 

I love this look, I hope you will too!

Hey everyone, hope everyone is having a great week.

Today I'm going to talk about one of my favorite forms of nail art, airbrushing! I used to have my nails airbrushed at my local salon but for some reason they stopped airbrushing. So for many years I haven't had it done. Living in a small town there aren't too many salons offering this service, so I purchased my own airbrush.

There are a lot of airbrushes to choose from on the market so pick carefully if you decide to get one. I bought mine on ebay after doing a lot of comparing between different brands. The airbrush I purchased had several attachments, two hoses, cleaning tools, and a pack of primary color paints. I paid just over $100. You will want to do some comparing of your own to get what is right for you.

When you airbrush your nails you'll want to have some items on hand.
*Plenty of newspaper to lay over your work area.
*Paper towels for clean up
*Water for clean up
*Cotton balls and or q-tips and fingernail polish remover for clean up of fingers from over spray
*Paint colors of your choice
*Airbrush, parts and accessories
*Stencils if you have them
*Base coat in color of choice
*Top coat sealer

Okay so once you're ready my advice is to practice on something to get the design down you want. There are so many different ways you can make designs on your nails.
I was playing around with mine and came up with a design that I call Hunger Games. It was really easy and the pictures will be posted below.
Step 1. I sealed my nail with a clear coat.
Step 2. I sprayed the entire nail with primary yellow
Step 3. For a gradient effect I sprayed just the bottom edge with primary red
Step 4. I actually mixed red and yellow together, stirred it with a toothpick and using a stencil that resembled flames placed it at the tip of my nail and sprayed.
Voila, a Hunger Games themed fingernail.

Be creative when using your airbrush. Here are some ideas:

*Use painters tape and a decorative hole punch to create designs on your nails. Just punch a design into your tape, place the tape on your nail where you want it and spray with a color choice.
*Use lace to create a totally cool effect. Place the lace on your fingernail, spray with color choice.
*Use striping tape. Start with a base coat in color of choice and when it is completely dry place striping tape in desired positions and spray with color of choice. The possibilities are endless with this one.

The main thing I can tell you is: Shop around for the best price, if you want to own an airbrush, but make sure you get good quality equipment. Watch some tutorials on youtube if you want to know how to hook it all up (That's what I did). And practice, practice, practice. But, enjoy yourself!