See you on Instagram!

Hi everyone! In case you've wondered what happened to me and my blog, there is one simple answer:  Alex.

Our little son couldn't wait to see the world and arrived a bit earlier then planned. Since November he's occupying my every free second, so this is my first mani since then :)
I cannot be happier, but there's no time for blogging at the moment. So I decided to take a break and will be posting only on Instagram for a while. So stay in touch on IG!

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[#WNAC2015] September Jewel Tones: Stained Glass

I could't resist to join into the last topic of weekly nail art  challenge 2015(#wnac2015): stained glas in jewel tones. I'm in love with my emerald-gold mani! The color and the holo particles are just gorgeous in the sun:

I used acrylic paint to draw the lines. Do you notice, I'm getting better - the lines are almost straight!.Yeeey! :) 

My base color is the beautiful Il était un vernis called In Teal We Trust. This polish is perfection: fantastic formula, almost full coverage in one coat, smooth finish with a lot of depth. I used two coats here.
The glitter polish is not another brand, but In Teal We Trust, mixed with gold holographic topper China Glaze Angel Wings. I mixed a drop of ITWT with two/three drops of Angel Wings and added a drop of nail polish thinner - this way the mix was a bit more fluid and didn't dry so fast.

In the indirect light of my photo box the mani looses some of it glittery magic, but under direct electric light the small holo particles come alive again:

Base color: Il était un vernix called In Teal We Trust
Glitter Polish: In Teal We Trust mixed with China Glaze Angel Wings and a drop of nail polish thinner
Lines: acrylic paint and a thin liner brush

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Floral mani with Priti NYC Baby Blue Eyes

Priti NYC is a 5-Free indie nail polish brand from the US. Baby Blue Eyes is such a cute color, I instantly fell in love with it. It reminded me of the Forget-me-nots, which were the inspiration for my floral mani:

My index finger and the pinkie are Baby Blue Eyes, the flowers are acrylic paint. I was really surprised how durable this polish was. My nails are quite soft, but this mani looked good for five full days, which almost never happens to me.

Base color: Mesauda white and two coats of Priti NYC Blue Eyes, bought on Amazon Germany
Flowers: acrylic paint

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Summer floral mani

With the sunny days and flowers everywhere, I was in the mood for a light floral mani :)

This mani was super easy - the flowers are basically overlapping dots. I used three pink and two green polishes. I got the idea from this fantastic tutorial by Fallinnailove.

Base color: white Mesauda 03
Flowers: Dance Legend #883, Revlon Bubble Gum, Essie Skirting the Issue
Leaves: random green polishes :) Read More......

Xmas mani: Rudi the reindeer nails

Hello my fellow nail art addicts, I hope you had great Xmas time :)
My Xmas only felt like Xmas, after I painted my nails :)

My base is a soak-off gel color by Gelish called Arctic Freeze. My hope is that I can remove the design with acenton-free remover and reuse the white base for another mani. I'll let you know if my plan worked in my upcoming Gelish post :)
Everything else is acrylic paint.

Rudi the reindeer was inspired by a cute nail art I saw on @bagheeranails. 

I couldn't paint Rudi with my non-dominant hand, so i went for some Xmas decoration instead. After I was done, I couldn't decide, which design I like more :)

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31DC2014, Day 07: Black & White Nails

I'm going through the topics of last September's 31 Day Challenge - why not use them as the inspiration for your next mani? :) Here are my black and white nails:

For this mani I followed "Dabbed Floral Nail Art" tutorial made by Lindsay of Wondrously Polished. She is one of most talented and creative nail art bloggers out there and I'm a huge fan :).  I used acrylic paint for the dabbed flowers/drops.

Since I still cannot control my brush perfectly, my mani not perfect, but I still like it. I expected the painting to take ages, but it was quite ok. The most important thing was to find the right brush - I went for medium sized nail art brush, not the thinnest I have.

Base color: one coat of Cult Nails Fetish
Dabbed Pattern: white acrylic paint

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31CD2014, Day 04: Formula X Fearless

I'm on holiday, so my posts are a bit irregular again.
I decided to do some free hand practice and paint some leaves for the  31 Day Challenge:

I used Formula X Fearless as my base color. The leaves are acrylic paint. I cannot say I love the look, but better some nail art for practicing then nothing, right? Otherwise how am I suppose to get better? :)

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31CD2014, Day 03: Mint Polish Tart

Last week I only managed to do one mani for the  31 Day Challenge - Yellow Nails:

I wanted to do a floral mani for ages, so it took my favorite yellow - the cute Tart by Mint Polish (reviewed here) - and set to work.

I used my small nail art brush and acrylic paint. I mixed white and black paints and layered different shades of grey over each other - darker grey first, then light grey, then some medium grey on top.
I love how cute this mani looks!

I'm always surprised, that it doesn't take ages to do such a mani. Maybe because it looks like you'd need hours to paint all these small flowers. But believe me, it's much faster - the flowers don't have to be perfect, just small. A tiny, cut down brush does the trick for me. Check out this tutorial  on how to cut your brushes.

Base Color: Tart by Mint Polish, bought through their website with delivery to Germany. Hypnotic Polish is also an option if you are located in Europe. Read More......

31DC2014, Day 1: Strawberry Nails

Already late with the first post for the 31 Day Challenge, here I come with "Day1: red nails".

I wanted to do strawberry nails for ages. So finally, with the autumn looming over Hamburg I decided it's high time to do it. My inspiration is this fantastic mani by Coewlesspolish.

Base color: Hot tomato red by Inglot #724 (bought on my holiday in NY) and Barry M Coconut
Strawberries: free handed with a thin brush and Inglot #724 and two additional shades of red. Leaves is China Glaze Starboard. Yellow dots are KBShimmer Chick Me Out

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Roses with Dance Legend 186

I was seeing these beautiful floral manis all over the internet - roses, sunflowers, violets, daisies... I decided it's time I learn how to paint flowers. So here is my fist attempt on roses:

I didn't know how to create this shading on petals, so I watched countless tutorials on youtube. Just search for roses... and spend the evening glued to the screen ;)

I used nail polishes and a very, very thin brush which I cut down as shown in this post (scroll down, there is a link to a tutorial how to cut your brushes).

It was a bit easier than I thought and surprisingly didn't take ages. The main thing is actually to have a thin brush and try to paint with very light strokes. I tried not to press the brush too mush, just barely touch the nail. Frankly, at first it looked really bad, but my top coat blended the colors together and it looks kind of cute now, right? 

The Dance Legend polish #186, which I used as my canvas is "solar active"  - it changes color to pink, when exposed to the sun. In my case the effect wasn't as as strong as shown on their shop page, but it was still very pretty - maybe I just move my hands to much when I talk :D. And the shadow/indoors color is just pure elegance for me. As for the formula, it's a dream - not streaky, self-levelling and fast drying. I'm wearing two coats.

Base color: sun active Dance Legend Magic Sun polish #186, bought online in their shop. If you are in Germany or North Europe, Hypnotic Polish  shop would be a better option.
Roses: pink Inglot 674 (from my NY trip), white highlights with Barry M Coconut (got it in here, Germany only )
Leaves: Formula X Fearless (the same NY haul) and darker Leighton Denny Femme Fatale (TK Maxx outlet) Read More......

Retro stripes with KB Shimmer Sky Jinks

Last weekend a friend of mine had a retro themed birthday party. So naturally, retro nails matching my outfit were a must :)

The blue polish is a fantastic creme from KB Shimmer Spring 2014 collection called Sky Jinks. The formula is a dream and the opacity is amazing - I'm wearing one coat! The color is probably the matter of taste, but I think it is awesome - bright blue like the summer sky, with a hint of dustiness. Not a neon, just a beautiful blue.

Base color:  KB Shimmer Sky Jinks, bought from Harlow & Co (they ship internationally).
Stripes: free handed with a striper brush and Essence Flashy Pumkin   Read More......

31DC2013, Day 28: Inspired by a flag

The flag topic of my never ending 31 Day challenge was a really difficult one. Honestly, what kind of a flag manicure can you wear to work, if you work in a fairly conservative, men dominated industry? Not during the finals of a football championship, but just on a regular business day?..
I gave up and decided to do a tribute to Hamburg - my most favorite city in the world. My colleagues would cope with that ;) My mani features its official flag:

I cheated a bit this time - I used thin permanent markers in black and white. I wouldn't be able to pull off such thin lines with my brush, to be frank. And even with the marker it was difficult. Then - aaarghh, buggers! I don't want a gradient!!! - my top coat started dissolving my castle... The result is quite messy, but thank god, the Hammerburg is still standing ;). So please don't look too close ;)

Base color: A-England Camelot and OPI Big Apple Red (which started getting gooey and had lots of air bubbles from my unwise shaking)
Hamburg flag: thin permanent markers in black and white

Apart from my semi-successful mani, if you're somewhere near or traveling to northern part of Europe, visit my beautiful home town, it's worth it!

Source: wikipedia

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31DC2013, Day 27: Inspired by artwork

The end is near for my first 31 Day challenge. This time my mani is inspired by art, by Piet Mondrian to be exact. Currently there is a Mondrian exhibition in Hamburg, so posters with this picture are everywhere. After seeing the posters for a couple of weeks on my way to work, I basically HAD to do this! :)

I used acrylic paint, a striper brush and a very thin detail brush to fill out the squares. For my other hand I created decals as shown here. Perfect solution if you, like me, are not very good with your non-dominant hand.

I loooove how they turned out! I think black is the perfect complimentary color here - it lets the pattern really pop. It took me some time to do this, but apart from getting the lines straight - this was annoyingly difficult as always - it was actually quite easy.

This mani was a huge success at work. Even my male colleagues recognized the pattern and asked me about my nails! And lets be frank, normally software engineers are not the type of men who would even notice nail polish! ;)

Base color: white Cult Nails Tempest and black A-England Camelot, both in just one coat!

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31DC2013, Day 26: Inspired by a pattern

I must confess, I was a bit of a chicken to proceed with the next topic of the 31 Day Challenge 2013. I played with the idea of using one of my stamping plates - I mean there are so many fantastic patterns out there (think MoYou!!!)... But a challenge is a challenge, so for me that meant a free-hand pattern.
I got a fabulous body butter for Xmas, which also has a pretty retro style pattern on its cover. So here I come with my Inspired by a pattern mani:

I really love the color combination - it's quite bold with all this bright turquoise and orange and a bit of mustard yellow, but somehow it really works, right?

It took ages again - two episodes of The Blacklist to be exact ;) - but it wasn't as difficult as it might look. I didn't have to be very precise and that was really relaxing for a change. I even managed to do the right hand pretty well. I used acrylic paint and a very thin paint brush and a dotting tool.

Base color: fantastic gelly-ish creme called Pure Turquoise by Barry M
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31DC2013, Day 25: Inspired by fashion

Yee-haw! Day 25 of the 31 Day Challenge 2013! Never thought I'd need half a year for a one-month-challenge... But mark my words, I am going to finish it!!! :)
It was fun to scan the net for inspiring fashion pictures. I almost settled on Valentino Spring/Summer 2014 collection (awesome ethnic designs!) and than I saw the Alexandre Vauthier S/S 2014 collection. I thought it is PERFECT as a mani inspiration and set to work.

Source: Alexandre Vauthier

I'm so in love with this design! I think this is my favourite mani so far. It was pretty easy to do, although it requires a little patience.
The copper lines are acrylic paint, glitter and brown are nail polishes. I discovered, that I have to work much faster if I want to use nail polish for my nail art. It's just not possible to draw a thin line with a drying, gooey polish. But the glitter was worth it! (My accent nails are more sparkly in person).

I used a toothpick to create small dots and a very thin nail art brush for the lines. In the beginning I used tape to create a crisp outline. Once I've drawn a couple lines, I removed the tape and could stay within the "borders" without problems.

Base color: Cult Nail Tempest
Accent nails: stripes and dots with p2 Next Exit Party(pale gold), A-England Briarwood (shimmery brown), China Glaze I Herd That (gold-orangy glitter)
Studs: golden 2mm studs bought on Ebay


I can imagine, that this style would also look great in different color combinations. Imagine white base and 1) silver and blue; 2) silver, grey and black; 3) grey and Shrek-green; 4) rosé and gold ...
Would work, right? What  do you think?

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Valentine's Day mani

Being a romantic at heart I had to do a Valentine's day mani :). I wanted to so something special, but not the typical pink roses / red hearts stuff. Thank god, there are such fantastic nail art bloggers like Meghan of Will Paint Nails For Food. I saw her stained glass Valentine's mani and loved it instantly. I was determined to re-create it and here it is:

I was over-eager with all the stained glass fragments, but I still like the result! I wondered, how it would look with matte top coat and tried it out:

With matte finish the gold fragments look duller and the shimmery particles in my pink polishes stay hidden, but the pattern looks more defined. Hmm, I still cannot decide, which finish I like more :)

Glossy

Matte

Do you like the glossy or matte version more?

Base coat: very cute white based indie polish with matte pink glitter called Theoretical Girlfriend by Vivid Lacquer bought on Etsy
Stained glass: A-England Rosebower, Kleancolor Pastel Pink, Picture Polish Electric Dream, OPI Elephantastic Pink, p2 gold Next Exit Party
Matte Top Coat from Born Pretty Store

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