31 Day Challenge, Day 23: Inspired by a Movie

Day 23 of the challenge, today the theme is "Inspired by a Movie". I was waffling back and forth forever about what movie I wanted to do.. there were so many on my list. The one that won was the one I wanted to watch the most after I viewed all the trailers: Empire Records!

The movie came out 1995 and starred, among others, Liv Tyler and Renee Zellweger. It's about an eventfull day at a record store (I suck at summaries that don't give away too much). If you like mid-90s teen movies, you should watch this asap :)

Here's a close up for you. I used Essie Mesmerized as a base and then painted on the swirls first in white and then in China Glaze Sun-Kissed, a neon yellow. I painted a record on my middle finger and dotted a couple of swirls with Yes Love 876.

On the thumb and pinky, I also first painted the letters in white and then yellow. The E and R stand of course for Empire Records, in neon yellow, as is the neon sign on top of the store. The record, because it's a record store (duh), and the metallic dots for the coins that A.J. glues to the floor (one of my favorite scenes).

Have you watched Empire Records? It's one of those movies that never get old for me. There was a summer I watched it nearly every day :D

31 Day Challenge, Day 11: Polka Dots

Welcome to day 11 of the 31 Day Challenge, Polka Dots! Before we get to the good stuff, let me just say, I'm so excited to be blogging and overwhelmed by the number of views I'm getting every day. I never even thought more than 10 people would look at my nails, let alone comment on any of my posts. I know most of you (if not all) are here because you see my little link under the great posts of all the other fabulous bloggers, and I just want to say thank you for clicking on that thumbnail and having a look at what I do :)

Now, back to business! Here we have a red franken that I did a couple of weeks ago, with a couple of random polishes that I have no recollection of. Then I painted a white fishtail-style tip and dotted the edge of it in white, creating a scalloped look. I added the red dots to the middle of the white dots to make it look eyelet-like. Clearly I have no trouble at all explaining this :D I hope you get what I'm saying.

I did the white dots on top of the red with a cuticle stick instead of a dotting tool, because I didn't want them too be too large. I'm not doing a lot of dotting manis because I have trouble keeping them uniform and in a pattern, but I'm pretty happy with this one. 

Again, thank you for stopping by, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this mani! 

Dotted Zebra Nails

I don't often plan out my manis before I start. Most of the time I just pick a color I like, and make up the rest on the way. This time I decided on Essie Cute as a Button. It's a beautiful bright, pink jelly, with a nice dash of orange in it. Three coats for full opacity.

I then put hole reinforcers on the base of my nail and stamped the zebra prints on with Essence Matte Black stamping polish. The image is off an Essence stamping plate. 

The dots along the outline of the stamp and the free edge are Sally Hansen White on and Kiko Steel Grey. I think they pull the whole thing together.