31DC2013: Day 18 Half-Moon

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Good Morning!

Today's manicure prompt is half-moon. I had a hard time coming up with something because last year's half-moon nails are still some of my all time favourites. So I literally spent hours thinking of things that are round, and images with the moon in them and after sketching out about 5 ideas I finally settled on the wolf howling at the moon!

I actually love these! I started off with Pure Ice Bikini on all my nails as this was what I wanted the base of the moon to be. Then I pulled out Revlon Midnight Affair and freehanded the moon shape using my medium length striping brush. Then I used the brush from the polish bottle to fill in the rest of my nails with Midnight Affair.

I then used Essie Butler, Please mixed with acetone to mimic the effect of the surface of the moon. I wasn't entirely happy with that so I went back with Bikini and acetone over that in some areas to get a more layered look. I then went in with my smallest nail art brush and Midnight Affair to draw the wolf howling and some trees to give it a scenic feel! I almost used a deep blue creme instead of Midnight Affair, but I am really glad that I went with the blue shimmer as I feel it adds to the look!

I quite like this manicure and am happy with these even though I don't think they come close to topping last years nails! :P What do you think of my wolf howling at the moon manicure?!

Be sure to stop by The Lacquerologist to see what Emily's half-moon nails look like! I am sure they are awesome as she has been kicking this challenge out of the park! Also ENTER OUR GIVEAWAY!
See last year's half-moon nails here!

Wal-Mart Wednesdays: Half Moon Gradient

Hello Everyone!

Welcome back to my second installment of Wal-Mart Wednesdays! I have been seeing this style of the half-moon gradient nail art around for awhile and finally decided to try it out. I'm not sure who was the originator of this, so if you know please let me know so I can give proper credit!

I started off with Wet n Wild Through The Grapevine and then one nail at a time added a paper reinforcement near my cuticle and did a gradient with Through the Grapevine and Wet n Wild Shield. Remove the reinforcement right after you finish the gradient and you're almost done! A little clean up and add a coat of NYC In a Minute Top Coat while the gradient is still wet to smooth the gradient even more.

All the products used in this manicure are from Wal-Mart and nothing costs much more than $2!! Wet n Wild is usually $1.97, paper reinforcements can be found for $2.27 for a few hundred, and cosmetic sponges are $1.97 a bag for 30!

Even though all the products used in this post are extremely budget friendly I felt very luxurious wearing these nails. The gold and purple combination and the half moon gradient is awesome together in my opinion. I also got quite a few compliments on these while wearing them.

These polishes can still be found at Wal-Mart they are not discontinued, so you can recreate this Wal-Mart Wednesday look! What do you think about the half-moon gradient combination? Would you wear this?

Hope you are having a wonderful Wednesday my loves!

Like a Princess

Gooooood Morning lovelies! How are you all doing this Friday morning? I am hopefully fabulous. I'm scheduling this post in advance. Today is my one year anniversary! :D We've got a very romantic day and evening planned and I am very much looking forward to it. My boy always tells me that I'm his princess so I did some princess inspired nails for you today. :)

I've been seeing quite a few manis around that incorporate some nude nail. So I decided to go with that theme. I did a base coat of my favourite Essie Grow Faster and then used reinforcements to create a half moon. I did two coats of Nail the B.Y.T.C.H. Caught in Candy and removed the reinforcements, which left me with a nude half moon. Caught in Candy is a little brushstrokey, but it isn't a complete frost. I really love this blue. Then I took some iridescent loose glitter from Born Pretty Store and with a dotting tool placed the glitter in the half moon. One coat of NYC Top Coat and I was feeling like a princess.

These were very simple and to do and literally took me 20 minutes to finish both hands. Exactly the kind of mani that I need while in these last few weeks of school. :)

Nail the B.Y.T.C.H. polishes can be found here for a mere $6.00 a polish! AND my Canadian friends they have started shipping to CANADA! How exciting is that!? So all of you should scoot over here and pick up a few. ;)

I love playing with loose glitter. Have you ever incorporated loose glitter into a mani? Is this something you would spend time doing?

I hope you are all having a fabulous day!! I will talk to all of you lacquered lovelies tomorrow! Thanks for stopping by! :D

Abstract Nail Art Challenge Day 7: Half Moons

Morning sweeties! Today is the sixth day in the Abstract Nail Art Challenge and the criteria for today's nails are half moons! I really like doing half moon manis, they are simple, eyecatching and there are endless colour combinations! I'm not really sure where the colour inspiration came for this mani, but something popped into my head and I had to grab these out of my drawers! 

I started off with a coat of Sally Hansen White On, making sure that it was opaque near the cuticle but didn't worry about the rest of my nail. Then I grabbed Sally Hansen Glass Slipper, a white flakie and brushed that on near the cuticle. I added a coat of NYC In a Minute Top Coat so that it would dry quickly. Once that was completely dry I took a paper reinforcement cut it in half and placed it at the bottom of my nail. I then took Color Club Sky High and painted over that and then peeled off the sticker before it was dry. Once all my nails were done I added a coat of NYC top coat and then added the two rows of silver bullion balls. 

These pictures really don't do these nails justice, I wasn't able to capture the blue to pink duochrome quality in Sky High and Glass Slipper looked really cool as the base! I think the above picture does the best job of capturing how Glass Slipper looked over white. 

I loved wearing these. I actually wore them for two days before I started picking all the beads off. I felt like they had a sort of wedding quality to them? Or is that just me?


What do you think of my half moon mani? Do you like the addition of the beads or is that a little too much for you? 


Remember to stop by my gorgeous challenge buddies and see what they have done for their half moons! 

The Lacquerologist

 BeautyGnome

 Manicurator 

Rocking the World with Fools Gold

Goooood Morning!


So I have seen around that a number of people have been doing nail art using their nude nail. So I decided to give it a shot with a half moon mani. I've really been on a half moon kick lately they look so classic ;) 

I started by putting reinforcements over my nude nail. Then I grabbed Orly's Rock The World and painted over the reinforcement. Rock the World is from the Mineral FX collection released last year. It's a purple, red base with gold and holo shimmer throughout. You can see all the glorious shine in the photos! Then I took Elemental Styles 79 Fool's Gold and just placed it over the nude part of my nail. 79 Fools Gold is a clear jelly based gold glitter polish with hints of holo glitter. 

I'm seriously loving how sparkly this combination is! It just makes me giddy. In the sunlight this bad boy was epic let me tell you lol. 

Half-moons are really easy to achieve and can look really great in a number of combinations! I anticipate a lot more of them in my future :) 


How do you like this simple classic mani? Have you tried the half moon in any combinations?


Sincerely Stephanie