From the File Drawer: 52-Week Challenge: 6/3 - Summer

I went over two weeks without posting earlier this month, but I didn't go without painting my nails. I just was in a slump and when I'm depressed, I get anti-social. And no words means no blogging. Pictures were taken and saved, though, so you get to see the backlog! I don't follow every week's theme from the Reddit!Lacqueristas 52-week challenge, but I do have the list in case any particular week's theme inspires me. Summer was the theme for the week of 6/3, and all of my co-workers thought I nailed the challenge admirably with this bright pink and polka dot creation.

The pink (which you may recognize, since I've just done four manicures with it for June's Tri-Polish) is China Glaze Sugar High. I used Sinful Shine Wisp for the white french tips and accent nails, and Wet N Wild Sunny Side Up bordered the tips, and with Sugar High made the thin lined french tips for the accent nails. Polka dots of Sugar High, Agent Lavendar, and For Audrey completed the set.

June Tri-Polish Day #4

It's the last entry this month for the Tri-Polish Challenge from Crumpet's Nail Tarts! This month's Tri-Polish colors were red, pink, and purple. My polish choices for the month were China Glaze Adventure Red-Y, China Glaze Sugar High, and Cult Nails My Kind of Cool Aid. I decided on simple stripes and dots for this entry, and I really liked the way it came out! It's a base of Milani Whitest White, freehand stripes, and dots made with Adventure Red-Y with the smallest dotting tool of my five-piece set. There's not much else to say about it, except that I alternated the colors of stripes between my left and right hands. 

It's the fourth day of this month's challenge, and everyone is going strong!

June Tri-Polish Day #3

It's the third day of the June Tri-Polish Challenge from Crumpet's Nail Tarts! This month's Tri-Polish colors are red, pink, and purple. My polish choices for the month are China Glaze Adventure Red-Y, China Glaze Sugar High, and Cult Nails My Kind of Cool Aid.

I've said before that I'm not a terribly creative person. I frequently get my manicure designs from other nail artists, and today's is no different. If this challenge didn't have specific posting days, I would have put this up for Monday's Monkey See, Monkey Do (another Crumpet challenge! :) So, as I often do, I'm copying one of Raggio di Luna's amazing manis: 

I did rotate the diamond to take advantage of the fact that my nails tend to get long in the summer since I started keeping them polished. (I have a whole two summers of data now. Not statistically significant. :P) I used Milani Whitest White for the base dot color.

I love the shimmer in My Kind of Cool Aid, but I haven't been able to do a good job of picking it up in photos.

I wish I had a steadier hand for centering the over-dots better, honestly, but I love the way it came out anyway!

One of my co-workers said the index finger on this hand below looked like it was looking at her!

And now for something completely different! (Except for the red, pink, and purple, of course. ;)

Joe Fresh Color Blocking

I went a few weeks there without posting to the blog, until I had to for the challenge timing, but that doesn't mean I didn't do my nails and take pictures! This particular manicure was done with the new Joe Fresh polishes that one of my exchange group besties sent me. New polishes don't stay untried in my stash for very long. In fact, I keep them out on my desk until I've used them before I put them on the shelf with the rest of the polishes. ^_^

This started with a base of Joe Fresh Khaki, and some color blocking added Mocha in different places. Then I added Twilight - which I was so excited to receive, as it has been on my wishlist almost as long as I've had a wishlist! - to my accent nails. I used Nubar Greener to draw stripes between the color blocks, and voila! Awesome nail art that I really loved wearing.

Twilight is one of those color-changing flakies that I really love, but I have a nearly impossible time catching it on camera. Here are a few pictures that together show the range from emerald green through orange to copper. I've seen some amazing bloggers show this polish all the way into the blue range (shown below), but I haven't been able to capture it personally.

Rebecca from rebecca likes nails took this amazing bottle shot that I just had to share:

Thank you, my wonderful exchange group peeps for giving me such awesome colors in my polish palette to work with!!

June Tri-Polish Day #2

I'm almost too late for the second day of the June edition of the Tri-Polish Challenge from Crumpet's Nail Tarts, but not quite! There's still an hour before the end of the day in my time zone. :)

This month's Tri-Polish colors are red, pink, and purple. My polish choices for the month are China Glaze Adventure Red-Y, China Glaze Sugar High, and Cult Nails My Kind of Cool Aid, and my second manicure brings you a nail artist whose work has only been on this blog once or twice before: my nine-year-old daughter. Yep, I gave her the three polishes, and the rules of having to use at least two of them, and she could only add white, black, silver, or gold. (Though the rules also allow a clear-based glitter, but she didn't care about that.) She even went to the trouble of painting a practice pattern on a swatching stick first!

I turned this picture upside down so you could see what the pattern was actually supposed to be. She was going for hearts, but I think the one I circled here is the only one that really looks like a heart. But once I pointed that one out to everyone who was looking at them, they all went, "Ohhhhh, I see it now!"

So there's my second manicure using this month's Tri-Polish Challenge colors. Don't forget to go gaze on all the other pretties today!

June Tri-Polish Day #1

It's time for the first day of the June edition of the Tri-Polish Challenge from Crumpet's Nail Tarts! This month's Tri-Polish colors are red, pink, and purple. My polish choices for the month are China Glaze Adventure Red-Y, China Glaze Sugar High, and Cult Nails My Kind of Cool Aid.

I started off with two coats of My Kind of Cool Aid, and then added a french tip of Sugar High. I used a detail brush to draw flowers in Sugar High, and then lined the tip and added details to the flowers with Adventure Red-Y. A few details with Sinful Shine Wisp, and my pretties were done! Personally, I think the Sugar High comes off too bubblegum bright in this manicure, but that's just my preferences. I'm so not a pink person in the first place! :)

Stay tuned for Thursday's entry into the Tri-Polish challenge, where I let my nine-year-old daughter have free reign with the challenge on my nails!

Now check out what everyone else has come up with for the first day of pink, red, and purple!