26 Great Nail Art Ideas - Winter Warmth

I really don't like the winter, I hate being cold and could happily have summer all year long except for one thing... my knitting. I am not much fussed by summer knitting, I like thick warm chunky knits and I guess without cold winters there'd be no chunky knitting!
So, of course I was going to do a knitty thing for the Winter Warmth prompt.
I hadn't quite decided on colours but the #fanbrushfriday colours for this Friday were cream, brown and red and I thought they'd be great for knitty nails.
I went for quite a patchy hit and miss fan brush pattern (not least because my fan brush loses bristle every time I use it and it's getting quite bald) but I think it made a great base for the knitting stamp.
I used Avon Tender, Avon Desire and M.Y.N.X Vixen for the base and then stamped with Moyra 02 Fabric Texture and Esmaltes da Kelly Fox Fur.
Such a simple mani, but I really liked how it turned out and for once I was up to date with manis so it got 2 whole days of wear!

fan brush base

Moyra 02 Fabric Texture and Esmaltes da Kelly Fox Fur

 

with Emily's Christmas Jumper!

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Crazies Unite - Fall Foliage

I am a bit disappointed with the end result of this mani.
In my mind it was going to be wonderful and to be honest in real life it did look nice but it absolutely would not photograph.
I started with my fan brush mani as a base as the colours white, gold and burgundy seemed a reasonable base for an autumnal mani, and I do like to try and be efficient and combine where I can.
I added an outline leaf pattern with Uber Chic Lovely Leaves and Esmaltes da Kelly Bee.
Then I added a different outline leaf with Hit the Bottle Absinthe Minded and finally I added a negative image with Hit the Bottle Copper Haired Girl.
I also added a matte top coat to see of that would help but really I should have used a darker polish for the final layer and typically I broke my own rule and didn't top coat between layers so I couldn't rethink the final layer. The macro looks OK though 😉
I didn't do a full step by step for this mani either - I took a part way photo with each nail at a different stage, so I'll include that here so you can see the layers.

Step by Step with Uber Chic Lovely Leaves

Uber Chic Lovely Leaves

 

Uber Chic Lovely Leaves

An InLinkz Link-up

26 Great Nail Art Ideas - Black Base and some Gothic Stamping

This weeks's challenge was Black Base which rather conveniently coincided with #clairestelle8nov prompt of Gothic.
So, I started with a black base... of A England Camelot.
Then I stamped a lacy pattern with Colour Alike Venus and Dixie Plate DP 01.
Then I added a rather Gothic image from DP 04 using Colour Alike Supernova.
These two Colour Alike polishes are gorgeous duo chromes: I don't think Venus had much of a chance to do its magic with the pattern I stamped but I loved how Supernova looked and was delighted to see the camera catch the browny gold and the pinky red.
Finally I added a matte top coat.

A England Camelot

Dixie DP01 and Colour Alike Venus

Dixie DP04 and Colour Alike Supernova

Dixie DP04 and Colour Alike Supernova - matte

An InLinkz Link-up

Nail Crazies Unite - Coffee

Well, in a crazy moment I joined a new group with another fortnightly challenge which will fit neatly between the Crumpet Challenge, so not so crazy after all.
This was the first week and the prompt was coffee. Luckily for me I had just done a brown, chocolate and cream fanbrush mani so it was a pretty perfect base for some coffee stamping.
I stamped coffee beans using Hit the Bottle Espresso Martini and Uber Chic UC 2-01 on my index and little finger. Then I used the same cream from the base to stamp the coffee cups image from the same plate on the other fingers, and then stamped over that with the same image and Espresso Martini.
I was a bit worried whether the stamping would show up but I think it looked OK and I was really pleased with how they turned out.
I also added  matte top coat and now I am not sure which I preferred :)

Uber Chic UC2-01

 

 

An InLinkz Link-up