Bestie Twin Nails with @Nails_by_Charlie

Hey y'all! So @Nails_by_Charlie and I decided that we wanted to do Bestie Twin Nails together! I have been trying to find someone around the same "skill level" as I am, and willing to do some nails together for quite some time. But that was really difficult. Either everyone I came across was either way outta my league, or wasn't quite there yet. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't judge anyone on their "skill level", I just didn't want someone outta my league, because maybe they would want to do a really difficult design that I wouldn't be able to complete, and be proud of. Or...I would be the one choosing a design that someone who isn't quite up to my "skill level" yet, that may not be in their comfort zone. So trying to find someone with the same "skill level" was a challenge in itself! lmao.

 So you can imagine how excited I was when Charlie asked if I wanted to do them with her! Which, by the way, she is an amazing person! Be sure to follow her on Instagram, and check out her blog! So anywho, we exchanged a few ideas, and decided on a SUPER cute design by @Saraxbeara...and I think we did a pretty damn good job! See for yourself!

And here is our inspiration...

See! Pretty damn good, right!? lol.

I had so much fun doing these cute designs. I really hope to do more Bestie Twin Nails in the future! So if you're interested in joining me, please don't hesitate to contact me! I swear I don't bite! ;P

Nautical Pictorial...Kinda...?

Ok y'all! So I had EVERY intention on creating a pictorial with my Nautical mani I posted yesterday, and I remembered to start to take pictures in between what I was doing, but then...I forgot! :( I know! Terrible! I didn't realize that I had been forgetting to take the pictures until I was almost done with my bows! I worked so hard on the stripes, I didn't want to have to redo it all! So, I apologize for this weak pictorial. lmao. But here it is anyways!

Step 1: Apply 1-2 coats of a white base.

Step 2: Make sure your white base is COMPLETELY DRY before applying your tape. I used 7 pieces of tape, trying to get them all spread out evenly.

Step 3: Paint a layer of red over the tape. I had to do a kinda thick layer of red, because it didn't seem as opaque as I wanted.

Step 4: Work QUICKLY. Remove the tape before your top color (in my case, red) dries. If the polish dries, or gets tacky you may not get clean lines when pulling the tape up.

Again, I'm sorry for the lack of detail in this pictorial. I'll try to do better next time! lol. Paint on ladies!!!

Cherries Pictorial!

Woohoo! Pictorial time y'all! As I promised for my lack of posts this holiday weekend, I will be uploading as many manis, and pictorials as I can fit in this week! Today, I posted my 2 day late #fruity mani for #NailArtMay!

Step 1: Paint a navy blue onto your nail (I used 2 coats of Loaded Lacquer's Paradise Overdose).
Step 2: Create a white tip (the white base will help the colors pop over the dark base color).
Step 3: With a small dotting tool dipped in a white polish, place 2 small dots next to each other for the cherries. With a small nail art brush, paint a small upside down "v" to connect the cherries as their stem, and leaves at the top of the stems. Also, with the small dotting tool, place little white "stars" randomly between the cherries.
Step 4: Color!!! But make sure not to color your stars!
Step 5: I added a small white glare line to my cherries to make them look a little more real. Add top coat, and you're done!

I hope this helped y'all out! Feel free to ask any questions! Don't be scared if you think you won't be able to do this...practice makes progress y'all! You gotta start somewhere! So 1, 2, Paint!

Floral Pictorials - Black & White

Hey y'all! So while I was painting on my cute floral yin-yang nails, I decided to snap a few pics in between so I could post a pictorial. It's been a while since I have, so I really wanted to. I hope y'all enjoy! These pictorials are practically the same, the black just has an extra step. So let's start with that one.

Now, keep in mind, there were a lot of polishes used for this mani, each rose took 3 colors on their own (excluding the leaves). So, make sure to grab 3 different shades of pink (light, medium, dark), 3 shades of blue, and 3 shades of purple. To see all the colors I used in my mani, click here.

Step 1: Paint a single black coat of polish (since there will be a lot of roses on it, you don't really need much more than a thin coat).
Step 2: With white polish, create the shapes of the roses, including the leaves (this will make the colors pop better against the black base.
Step 3: After the white polish from the previous step dries, fill in the white roses with the medium shades you have.
Step 4: Take your dark shade of polishes, and start drawing the petals, and inner lines of the roses.
Step 5: Go back through the roses, but this time with your lightest shade of polishes, and start highlighting a few lines in your roses to make them look a little more realistic.
Step 6: *Not Shown* Apply top coat when finished!

Now the white base is practically the same...you just don't have to outline the roses with white polish...that would just be pointless(; I'll still type the directions out though, just in case some of y'all would like it.

Step 1: Paint a single coat of white on your nail (Again, since there will be a lot of roses on the nail, it really doesn't have to be completely opaque).

Step 2: Take your medium shades, and start creating your roses in random places (leave a little room for those leaves as well).

Step 3: Take your dark shade, and start lining the inside of your roses.

Step 4: Take your lightest shades of polish, and start to highlight some lines in your rose.

Step 5: Apply top coat, and you're finished!

Keep in mind y'all that your roses don't have to be perfectly circular, and anything! Mine definitely aren't, and neither are the real ones in nature! Practice makes progress, so don't give up! I hope these have helped y'all! Paint on lovies!

Loaded Lacquer - The Jiggles Collection (5/10)

Ok y'all! So I have FINALLY swatched the 5 Jiggles from Loaded Lacquer that I've had for a while. Things just kept coming up! But no more worries! I've got them right here for you!!! Let's begin, shall we!? Let me first start you off with one of my absolute favorites I have...

Acai Berry

This is the beautiful Acai Berry in 3 coats with NO top coat! These babies are so shiny/glossy on their own! And they are so long lasting!!! Seriously tho...I painted these last Wednesday afternoon (May 14th), snapped, and posted this pic on Thursday (15th), and as of today (May 19th), there are NO chips! NONE! How is that possible!? Especially without top coat!? It's like magic, y'all! But that's just 1 great things about this squishy jelly. It's so..."vampy"! Such a beautiful, deep, dark maroon-y color. Expect to see this as a base for some Buffy the Vampire Slayer nail art soon!

Coconut

Coconut!!! How absolutely stunning, and cleansing is this Jiggle!? This is just a simple, single coat with NO top coat! Look at that shine! I swear there's no top coat! If you don't believe me, go buy you some! I'll be so happy to prove you wrong! Coconut is really easy to build up to opacity. I apply about 3-4 thin coats when I want it to be opaque. This Jiggle is also really fun to make "jelly sammiches" with! This is the only Jiggle I've tried to make a jelly sammich with, and I was in love! I need to start experimenting with my other Jiggles, and glitters to see what I can come up with!

Toasted Marshmallow

I like to describe this Jiggle as "Love in a Bottle"! It is sooo gorgeous! 3 thin coats pictured with NO top coat again! I don't know how the amazing Heather (owner/creator of Loaded Lacquer) managed to make all of these so perfectly! It was so hard for me to get a good picture of all of these simply, because they were TOO glossy! haha. I kept getting a slight reflection of myself on my nails! Crazy!!!

Pomegranate

If this extremely glossy picture of Pomegranate doesn't convince you, then I don't know what would! 3 thin coats with NO top coat! I swear! This wasn't even taken in direct sunlight, because I couldn't capture it! TOO SHINY! How could that EVER be a bad thing!? ;P The only downfall for me with this polish is my VNL (visible nail lines). I've never been a big fan of showing off my VNL, solely for the fact that they're not all the same. Some go straight across, some curve. But with enough build up with this polish, they practically vanished! You just gotta make sure they're super clean! ;) Other than that, this polish is seriously the most perfect, squishy pink I have ever laid eyes on!!! Can you look away? Don't lie to me!

Island Punch

This bright, cheerful blue is called Island Punch! Only 2 coats for this one, and again...NO top coat! It may not be as glossy as the rest of them, but it's still super shiny! I was just able to hide some of it so you could actually see the color, and not be blinded! lol. Again, I absolutely love this squishy blue, but it has the same downfall as Pomegranate for me. VNL. But nothing says you don't have to have an undie for it, or anything. I'm just not a fan of my VNL, but that surely doesn't take away from my love for this gorgeous blue Jiggle!

Overall

I absolutely love The Jiggles! I hope I can get to the other 5 soon! These were my very first jelly polishes ever, and I was a little worried about the application process, since it was so new. But they were all so easy to apply. So easy that majority of my swatches are done on my Cinderella Hand! lol. So worth the buy in my book!

Heather's shop goes offline from time to time, because she's a badass, and gets a lot of orders, and sells out quick! Her online store found here, but it doesn't reopen until tomorrow (May 20th). Be sure to find her on instagram (@loadedlacquer), or on FB (/loadedlacquer) to stay updated on her shop, and polishes!

This Week With Loaded Lacquer

Tomorrow (May 20th) she will be restocking ALL polishes but Tiki Torched (from The Hula Girl Collection).

Tomorrow will be the LAST restock of 5 polishes! Once they're gone, they're gone! So be sure to check out, 40 Below, The Dog Ate My Homework, Cave of Skulls, Innocent Until Proven Guilty, and Foolish Hearts before your chance gets sold to the girl next door!

A custom polish she made for a wonderful nail enthusiast (@thepolishgeek on instagram) named "Loaded Geeks" will be open to the public!!! It is an amazing glitter bomb!!! Seriously...I may have to pick pocket my boyfriends wallet for this polish! hehe.

She's also got an AMAZING summer collection coming out at the end of this week (May 23rd, which happens to be mine, and Corbey's 2 year anniversary)! It's called The Summer Sushi Bar Collection, and let me tell you...IT IS SO STUNNING! You can find swatches/macros/photos when you visit her social networks, so be sure to check them out!!!

1, 2, Freddy's Coming For You...

So, as y'all know, a few weeks ago I created some Freddy Krueger/A Nightmare On Elm Street nail art for a friend who had requested them. She figured, if I could do it on my nails, I could do it to hers. So I did, I went on to paint my nails, and try to perfect this Freddy mani for her, and this is what I came up with...

Which, I fell in love with! I definitely could've done wayyy better on my Elm St. sign, but I had been working on them for so long, that I just gave up. haha. I knew I could do better on it if I was going to paint them again. Which I did for Brittney last Thursday, and this is how they turned out...

So cute! Her signs were definitely better than my original, and I was proud! She wanted these nails really badly, because not only is she a big fan of Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger), she was going to Comic Con in Dallas that upcoming Sunday to actually MEET Robert Englund IN PERSON! She wanted to show him her nails! HOW COOL, RIGHT!? haha. I honestly didn't think too too much about it, though. I figured she wouldn't be the only one with some cool themed nails, right? (Oh, and I also made her a small nail polish ring with Freddy's sweater stripes on it, which you will see pictured when you keep scrolling through.)

Well, she went to Comic Con, and a few hours later I see that I got tagged by her on FB. I figured it was some pics, or something, so I go, and look, and find this...

I'm assuming she meant *show* lol

I was all like, "WWWHHHAAATTT!?!?!?!?!?" I won't lie...I freaked out quite a bit! It was unbelievable! Robert Englund liked my nail art so much, he wanted a fan to return to show his wife!? If that isn't big news, I don't know what is!!!!!!

EVEN BETTER...Brittney is sooo awesome, she got pictures for me!!!!!!!!

Yes, I tagged the picture out the ass, but I didn't want someone else to try to steal my amazing news! lol. Paranoid much? But yea, so here Brittney is showing off her nails, and that nail polish ring I was telling you about earlier(; And how cool is it that Heather Langenkamp TOOK A PICTURE of MY nail art!? I've been scouring the internet, and social media to see if she has uploaded it. I wish so badly that I could've been there. I want to know what they would've said to me about my art. But since I couldn't be there, Brittney was awesome enough to document this huge accomplishment for me! I am so thankful!!!!!!

All in All

Paint on! Seriously! Do NOT get discouraged if you think you're "not good enough". I've had PLENTY of nail fails the past year I've been doing my nails, and it's only proved to make me a better artist. I've got an entire page dedicated to My Nail Fails to try to help motivate y'all, and to show you that you CAN get better! You just gotta practice loves! Practice makes progress!!!

My Giveaway WINNER!

It has been a LONG time coming! I think my giveaway lasted almost an entire month! But I reached 1.3K, and in the same day, hit 1.4K! And now I'm on the brink of hitting 1.5K! This is really exciting stuff! I am sooo grateful for all the wonderful ladies who entered! This giveaway couldn't have happened without y'all!

Below is a screen shot of the video I posted on instagram.

@jus_nailsnthings won!

Congratulations to @jus_nailsnthings for winning this huge prize package! And even though there were 4 different ways to enter my giveaway, she only had 1 entry. Talk about luck, right!? ;P

1 Year Nail Art Anniversary!

Hey y'all! So, even though my Nail Art Anniversary was the other day (May 11), I decided to write an entry about it here. I haven't written an actual entry, aside from giveaway, or yoga stuff in a while. Let's start off with my then & now pictures...

I have come a really long way in just a years time, wouldn't you agree? This just proves that ANYONE can get better with practice! As long as you stick with it, and actually apply yourself, you can be an amazing nail artist! Seriously, y'all! I have never gone to school for art, nails, or beauty anything (aside from the standard high school art class, or two)! Hell, I haven't even been to college! I graduated high school, then went into the Navy. I went to school to be an Electronic Technician. Yea...how did I go from ET to Nail Artist? PRACTICE! You can do it too!!! Take your time! Make a few mistakes! It's ok! Practice makes progress!

Do you see how proud I was of this nail? Is there really anything to be proud of? YES! Of course there is! I TRIED! I took the first step into bettering myself. That's all you have to do!

I know after seeing how I paint my nails now, and seeing that I have gotten better, these pictures seem silly, right? I won't lie, I kind of laugh when I look at them, just because I thought they looked so legit back then. lol. There's nothing wrong with knowing that you're not doing as well as you had hoped, or would like. Everyone will make a mistake, and have some nail fails. But we all do! You just have to learn to accept them, and be able to laugh at yourself for them. If you want someone to laugh at, go check out my entire page dedicated to all my terrible Nail Fails. If it'll show you that a great artist can start from anywhere, then laugh away darlings!

So all in all, don't be discouraged! It didn't take me an entire year to get this good at nail art. It did take a few months. But as long as you put real work into it, you won't be disappointed. Paint on my lovelies!

Giveaway Prize Package Revealed!

Ok y'all! So I woke up today to over 1.1K followers! So as promised, I am revealing the prize names! Keep in mind, I still plan on adding to this package! So, be sure to enter at least 1 of the 4 ways! Yes, there are FOUR (4) ways to enter my giveaway! See all the ways here! Less than 200 followers to go before it ends, so you better hurry! :)

These prizes are from my personal collection. They've all been swatched once.

1 KBShimmer - What's Your Damage

2 China Glaze - Bells Will Be Blinging/Turned Up Turquoise

1 OPI - Samoan Sand

4 Maybelline Color Show Polka Dots - Dotty/Pretty In Polka/Blue Marks The Spot/Drops Of Jade

1 Maybelline Color Show - Born With It

5 LA Colors - Boomerang/Tropical Breeze/Wired/Sassy Sparkle/Mega Grow Formula

1 NYC - (unnamed)

1 Hard Candy - Crush On Amethyst

1 Revlon - Whimsical

1 Small Models Own Nail Polish Ring (handmade by me!) - From The Speckled Eggs Collection - Goose

1 Large Loaded Lacquer Nail Polish Ring (handmade by me!) - Rubbernecker

10 Nail Striping Tapes (individually wrapped)

How To Enter My Giveaway

Ok y'all, so up until today there has been only 3 ways to enter into my 1.3K Giveaway. I've been gaining quite a bit of followers, but not as many entries for the contest. So, I've decided to add a 4th way to submit an entry. I'll go ahead, and list them all for you.

4 Ways to Enter

1. Reposting the original photo (I will also allow a repost of the prize photo), tagging my account (@w0nderlandbby), and #w0nderlandbbysgiveaway in the COMMENT (do not tag me in the actual photo).

2. Leaving a your instagram username in a comment on My 1.3K Giveaway blog post.

3. Recreate ANY mani listed under My Nail Art tab at the top of my blog.

4. Tag 5 friends on the original post (found at #w0nderlandbbysgiveawayrules).

So there you have it! The 4 ways to enter my giveaway! Below you will find the original copy of the rules & guidelines (it will not include the 4th way to enter the giveaway). I hope that y'all utilize all the ways to enter! Having your name in a drawing four times is better than just once, or twice, wouldn't you agree? ;)

Rules & Guidelines

1. You MUST be following me (on instagram)! If your profile is private, I will NOT be able to see your entry, so make sure it's public if you want to be counted! (ALL unfollowers from here on out will be BLOCKED so their participation in future contests/giveaways will not be allowed).

2. FIRST entry: repost THIS picture, tagging @w0nderlandbby, and using #w0nderlandbbygiveaway. Also, do NOT tag me in the actual photo, just in the caption.

3. 18+ unless you can provide parental consent.

4. US residents only (sorry international ladies, but I'm not entirely sure about nail mail overseas-however, you may provide a US shipping address but I will not be held accountable for lost/damaged goods).

5. SECOND entry into this giveaway, check out my giveaway blog post. More details listed there. Clickable link is in my bio.

6. NO DRAMA! I will not tolerate hate/unnecessary rudeness! This is all in good fun!

7. THIRD entry: recreate ANY mani listed under "My Nail Art" page on my blog. Try to keep to the colors I used in the manis, and a written note stating your intagram username, and #w0nderlandbbysgiveaway is required. On your own nails please (acrylics are fine). Also tag me, and #w0nderlandbbysgiveaway. Again, clickable link to my blog is in my bio.

8. Obviously, this giveaway will end when I reach 1.3K followers (on instagram). I will give numbers out as the days go along, so keep checking back for updates on them. The winner will be chosen by random.org