#31DC2013 Day 31: the grande finale

Time flies. Day 31, the closing scene of the challenge. So, before I start, I want to say a big big Thank You to Chalkboard Nails for setting up the challenge. It was great, it was hard, but most of all, it was fun and very inspiring! I’ve seen so many designs that made my jaw drop! So, congratulations to all participants and again, thank you Chalkboard Nails!!!

Day 31’s theme was Honour nails you ❤

I went through my folder of saved images over the years and came across this lovely stuff. Thank God for Google’s new Image Search as otherwise I’d never be able to reference it!!! Oops!

As for the design, I thought it would be easy, but this design is actually a lot harder than I thought. The fact that it was my left hand doesn’t really help either! I do like it though, it’s so summery and happy, reminds me of fruit (kiwi’s and strawberries) and a whole lot of happiness.

Now that the challenge is complete and my nails are stained like no nail should ever be ;), I think I’ll do some redesigning of my blog and have a professional manicure.
I’ll be back soon, hang in there my dear dear followers! You are all very much appreciated!!!!

#31DC2013 Day 30: Inspired by a tutorial

I generally watch tutorials when I see new techniques pop up and I have no idea what they are (I should still look up “decal” cos I have no clue!), more than for design inspirations. But a while back, I stumbled upon Robin Moses’ youtube channel and I was deeply impressed.
She creates amazing things, things I can only dream of doing one day.
I’ve stuck to most of the tutorial. The biggest difference is the use of material. Often acrylic paint is used and though I have a huge collection of paints, I somehow don’t feel the two should mix. So, instead I use nail polish for everything.
The other change I made was the amount of butterflies. As I don’t have very long nails, I simply couldn’t fit the design as is. Other than that, I stuck to the awesome design as per the tutorial 🙂

 

#31DC2013 Day 29: Super Natural

I’m not much of a sci-fi / supernatural person. As soon as anything “spacey” is on the telly, I switch off. Much to the annoyance of the hubby, he’s a proper sci-fi fan. Alien, Predator, Battlestar Galactica, gosh the list is endless!
My list only holds one entry. He’s from the same year as me. I discovered him when I was 18. I was home alone and crying when my older brother and his friend suddenly walked in the door. They asked what was wrong and all I could sob was…. “E.T. is dead!” Embarrassing stuff! But that’s not E.T.’s fault. He didn’t really die. I know, because I’ve seen the movie at least 10 times since!

I love the nails. The pics probable don’t show it very much but I used 3 different colours for the night sky. The moon was done by mixing yellow and white somewhat, but not so much that there 1 solid color. The image was done with a tiny brush and black nail polish. Regular polish, as it’s a bit more fluid than striping polish.

#31DC2013 Day 28: Raise the flag

Flags don’t do much for me. I don’t know many, and in general I don’t really like them. So I went with my own country, and then twisted it a bit.
The Dutch flag is horizontal red-white-blue, a design and color scheme used by more countries (I.e. Luxembourg). The difference with the Dutch is the orange addition, a separate thin flag (wimpel, we call it). It’s our national color, our royal family are “of Orange”.
Not really much to tell about the Mani, except that the index finger is actually a marine/navy flag design and I think it might even be the official one, but I don’t know for sure.

My favourite out of these is the gradient one (middle finger). I took the same color of red and blue as all others, but after drawing each line, added white to lighten the color.

#31DC2013 Day 27: Art is interpretation?

As a Dutchie I should really have gone for the Dutch masters. Really. But no. I thought it would be fun to do Monet, water lilies. Really. But no. My water lilies looked more like a 4 year old’s interpretation of what it would look like if Monet did an aquarium piece. Really.
And I thought I had taken pictures before I “washed” them away. Ok. Enough disappointment.
When I was in high school, there was a poster in my French classroom of the bronze statue of a ballerina by Degas. If you’re not familiar with it: it’s got a real fabric tutu. To me, it was the best piece ever. So I took an interest in Degas. Turns out the majority of his work are either ballerinas or naked women taking baths. Let’s go for a ballerina 🙂

based on:

#31DC2013 Day 26: Inspired by a pattern, the sequel.

Thank you tribal day, for I am in love. How can I possibly turn my back on a pattern I’ve not yet completed? Yep, I just loved the tribal pattern so much, I had to give it another 15 minutes of fame.
Have to say, it took me over 2 hours and it’s just 1 hand, but man do I love this pattern!

 

 

Close up & the half pattern on my left hand. Have to say, up close they don’t look as nice as they do from slightly further away.

 

#31DC2013 Day 25: Warning! Work related blogging!

When you think of fashion, you think of… Designs? Patterns? Big labels? How about fragrances? Every Designhouse nowadays has at least a couple of fragrances to their name. And this is where work comes to play.
You see, I work for a Fragrancehouse. No no, I don’t have any olfactive skills (in other words, useless nose!), but nevertheless, it really is exciting stuff and a beautiful and passionate industry to be part of! It reaches far beyond the perfume bottle in your beauty case, and I’d love to tell you all about that part (functional fragrances), but I’ll save it. Unless you twist my arm. Or tap it 😛
So, fashion and fragrances. Kenzo. I personally wouldn’t be able to point out a design as “clearly Kenzo!” but walk into any perfume store and you’ll instantly recognise their fragrances. With the iconic Flower by Kenzo leading the pack. I love that bottle. It’s clean, it’s simple, it’s signature.
I give you Flower by Kenzo inspired nails.

….So, about Functional Fragrances….

#31DC2013 Day 24: inspired by a book.

I am not much of a book reader. I was when I was a little girl, but let’s face it, since internet was born, there has just been too much distraction. I did read books while on holiday, but then made the colossal mistake of buying a tablet (ironically, mainly to read books!) and yet again, internet triumphed.
So, no The Hobbit, Jane Austen or anything profound on my booklist. No, there really is only 1 truly memorable book for me. Shopaholic. Every single one of them!
On to the nail art. I wanted a bit of a cartoon feel, hence the crispy white base and black outlining. I like it a lot, fits the book!

#31DC2013 Day 22: inspired by a song

When it comes to music, I am a hopeless romantic. I always pay attention to lyrics, they can make or break a song for me.
For today’s challenge, there were a couple of candidates. I first thought of Into The Dark, by Ferry Corsten. But the promise of being safe from nightmares and all things creeping through the night, it’s pretty hard to visualise.
My second suggestion was Something About Us, a Daft Punk song which also has a great video. The song is about having all odds against you and your loved one. Again, difficult to visualise without completely copying the video.
So, I am choosing number 3: She’s The One, by Robbie Williams. I was a teenager when this single was released, and it really feeds the teenage insecurities of “I hope I’ll be someone’s ‘the one’ someday”. I did find my ‘the one’, but the song still touches me when I hear it.

31DC2013 Day 21: inspired by a color.

When I was a little girl, my mum assigned colours to all of us. Red was mine. So I had a red bag for my marbles, a red savings jar, basically everything red was my territory. And red has never been completely out of sight throughout my life so far. I even have a big red wall in my living room.
But for the kick off of ‘inspired by’, I never once thought of red. It seems, blue is my new red! Blue suits me better, half of my wardrobe is blue, I’m pretty sure there have been more blue mani’s than red so far too. It just had to be blue.