Follow The Milkyway

A product in this post was purchased using an affiliate discount and nail polish was previously sent for swatching purposes.

Kids can be naughty from time to time. It's a fact. They bend rules, and push limits.

I remember the first time I disobeyed the rules regarding bedtime; it was the night of the Leonid Meteor Shower in November of 1998 (kinda makes me feel old...). It was around 3 am, and I had  managed to sneak out of the house and out to a large field of dirt, the potatoes all gone, not far from where I lived. 

I had asked to be allowed to see it, but was told it was not for young girls, and it was far to late at night. That, and there was wolves in the area, having killed our sheep and goat just the year before...

I was prepared with blankets and layers of woollen clothes to fight off the Norwegian Chill. 

There, alone in the dark I got to see the most spectacular view in my life. It has to be the longest I have ever sat completely still, and I didn't return back inside until it was well after 5 am. No one had notice, and I never told them about it. 

I wanted to start with this story, because it was that night that I started to truly be fascinated by the night-sky, and whenever there is a meteor shower, lunar/solar eclipse I try to get to see them. 

Earlier this year I sat on the roof to one of my dear friends in Norway, both wrapped in blankets on a sun chair looking at a meteor shower. It was magical.

It was reminiscing over these moments in my life, that inspired me to create this look.  

Opulent Essences - Gravity over black with waterdecals and some simple dotticure.

Opulent Essences - Gravity 

A product in this post was purchased using an affiliate discount and nail polish was previously sent for swatching purposes.

Opulent Essences - Gravity

Polish was sent for swatching purposes, but the opinions expressed are solely mine, nothing else to disclaim.

If you are a regular to my blog you know that my current obsession is with Opulent Essences polishes. They have so many gorgeous polishes, and keeps coming out with new ones. Recently they launched a Game Of Thrones inspired one, and since I live "just around the corner" from where the series is being filmed, I am a fan.

Since I have to move very soon I have put myself on a No-Buy until the living-situation is sorted, and I know that I have an address where I will be able to receive my parcels.

Opulent Essences is a Vegan Friendly Nail Polish Maker from the UK. Behind the brand is the duo Sharon and Zoe, if you ever have any questions, the girls are lovely to chat with.

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Gravity 10 ml - 6 £
Gravity  5 ml - 3 £

Opulent Essences - Gravity is s semi-sheer smooth glassfleck polish that shifts between blue and a rich jeweltoned purple. 

Opulent Essences - Gravity

In the swatch above you can see it applied in two coats over Wet n Wild - Black Creme on the index , ring and little finger and on the long finger it is applied over Barry M - Gelly - Blue Grape. 

It also looks good over grey and purple. 

Opulent Essences - Gravity with Bundlemonster Waterdecals.

I decided to use some waterdecals that I have received in a Surprise Bundle from Bundlemonster, and added some dotticures using my dotting tool to complete the look. I am not sure if it is possible to buy these waterdecals separately, but they are called GID-033.  

Polish was sent for swatching purposes, but the opinions expressed are solely mine, nothing else to disclaim.

Pretty Serious Wired Nails

Today I have for you another Wired Nails look, you might have seen my previous Wired Nail designs, if not here is a handy link for you.

1. Speedy Wired Nails
2. Wired Nails

To make Wired Nails you need a sandwich bag or something similar to make decals on. If you got the Über Chic Beauty stamping mat, then count yourself luck and use that. You also need a dotting tool and some nail polish. 

If you are wondering why you have not seen the Red Wired Nails design that I did in this video, on my blog. Then I can tell you that Wine and filming nail art tutorials is just asking for problems. No Wine or Polish was spilled while filming this video, but mistakes were made.

Today I did the Wired Nail look using Barry M - Cardamom. I got away with only one coat so very happy about that. I think I got pretty much the entire Barry M - Gelly line now. They are quickly outgrowing their A - B drawer in my Helmer. If it continues like this, I will have to move out A and use the drawer for B only.

Barry M - Cardamom

Wired Nails using Barry M - Gelly - Cardamom and Pretty Serious - Nightopia

I really like this technique and it is something you don't see around very often which is cool. So easy to do and creates a unique look.

What do you think about Wired Nails?

Mermaids

Ever dreamed about being a mermaid?
To just flap your fins in the water all day, the silence of the deep?

Today I have for you something that is outside of my comfort zone, and textures. I was experimenting on my Uber Chic Stamping Mat and came up with this look.
I posted a picture of this in a nail art group and got some questions on how I did it, so I thought I would share the details here.

Pretty Serious - Nightopia

First I filled a 5 cm x 5 cm area on my Uber Chic Stamping Mat with Pretty Serious - Nightopia (seen on the index finger is one coat of this polish). The colourshifting in this polish made it perfect for this project, so I didn't have to work in other shades to make this look like wild water.

It all started out with me trying to do decals, and I messed up one and just decided to destroy it with my dotting tool. As I was dragging my dotting tool through the polish I noticed how it created pearls and rolls with polish and that it was sticking to itself. While did was happening the polish was also slowing drying which allowed it to be molded to shapes.

It was reminding me about how you make a painting of the sea when you work with oil paints. Thick, a bit gloppy. So I slapped it on my nails and used my dotting tools as chisels to make shapes in the polish. I added more where needed, pushed it flatter here and there to make the shifts that wild water would have.

I personally think the middle finger turned out the best, the little finger sort of look like an emerald geode, which wasn't the look I was going for today.

To make it all tie in with the mermaid theme I took my BornPrettyStore - BPL021, (link to full review, bought with my own money), and stamped the mermaid on my index finger using Wet N Wild - Black Creme.


I recently made an Instagram account, so if you hang around on that social media platform you can find me there as well. Click Here.


What do you think about today's look?

Speedy Wired Nail

This design was invented by NailYourIdeas and is called Wired Nails.

For this manicure I used two new polishes that came out to the Speedy line from Barry M.
Barry M - Speedy - Supersonic and Barry M - Speedy - Turbo Charged.

First I started with a sandwish bag and applied two coats of Barry M - Speedy - Supersonic, and took a dotting tool and started making lines in the polish. You have to work quick here.

When you are happy with the look, let it dry before topcoating it.
Two coats of polish was enough for all my nails.

I applied one coat of Barry M - Speedy - Turbo Charged to all my nails except middle finger where I used Barry M - Speedy - Supersonic, and added the decals over.
One the middle finger I added a 3D bow for extra pow. 

Barry M - Speedy - Supersonic and Barry M - Speedy - Turbo Charged

What do you think?

Wired Nails

This design was invented by NailYourIdeas and is called Wired Nails.

For this manicure I used Seventeen - Bronze Shimmer and Collection - 20 - Storm Grey. 

To make Wired Nails you need a sandwich bag or something similar to make decals on. If you got the Über Chic Beauty stamping mat, then count yourself luck and use that.

I started out with 4 coats of Seventeen - Bronze Shimmer and made lines with a dotting tool, after it had dried I added topcoat. While it was drying, I made another decal using Collection - 20 - Storm Grey and did the same with that.

I applied Collection - 20 - Storm Grey to all my nails except the middle finger, which got Seventeen - Bronze Shimmer on it. I added the alternating wired nails decals on top.

Seventeen - Bronze Shimmer and Collection - 20 - Storm Grey

Seventeen - Bronze Shimmer and Collection - 20 - Storm Grey

As you can see from middle finger, Collection - 20 - Storm Grey did not show up that well over the base. It makes for a cool shaded effect, but if you want it to show up crisp, be sure to use a more opaque polish for these designs.

Watermarble in Green

I loved playing around with the water marble, so when I sat there putting it on my nails, I wanted to keep practicing and make another manicure using the decal method for water marble. I am trying to use different techniques when dragging my needle over the design. I have seen some alternating on dragging up and down, so I tried doing that here. My design bled out a little creating an interesting look. I am much more pleased with this try, as it is more solid, with no large empty spaces like the previous one.

I was sticking to green for this design too, but I swapped out some of the colours.

The Green Watermarble - Just out of the glass, and patted dry

ESSIE - Mojito Madness
ESSIE - Navigate Her
Barry M - Lime Green

I had a little mistake on some of the tips, when adjusting the decals, and cutting them, and when I grabbed a polish to paint over, to make it blend in seamlessly... I grabbed the wrong polish. so the errors was corrected using ESSIE - School of Hard Rocks. Oops. Did not mean to do that.

Green Watermarble

Green Watermarble

I still think it all turned out well. To make it less obvious I grabbed ESSIE - School of Hard Rocks, and a dotting tool, and "went to town", by adding some dots here and there. I think it worked well.
You know, sometimes the coolest manicures starts with a mistake of some kind.

I wasn't quite happy with just the dots and the water marble, and was advised by some lovely ladies on Polish-aholics Anonymous Facebook group, to add Out The Door - Northern Light. So, I did just that, This is actually the second time I use the topcoat(!!) I have had it for a long long time, just never ended up using it. I think I overloaded it a little bit on the middle finger, but it all turned out very nice. I think I am falling in love with water marbling this way.

Northern Lights over a green watermarble

Northern Lights over a green watermarble

This is not the last time you will see watermarbeling on this blog. I got some cool ones coming up, so I hope you are all not too tired of my marble adventure.

Once upon a time ...

 Once upon a time there was a young little girl, with golden hair as long as the ocean. In her curls lived birds...

Okay maybe not. Though I am sure, that would make a great manicure as well.  I decided to go a bit more edgy than that for this "Once Upon a Time" -mani.

Sorry for being completely MIA on you all, I have been spending a week in Wales, catching up with good friends and preparing to move to Spain for the summer. I am so excited to go and work there, it's going to be so exciting.

I started out with 2 coats of Barry M - Gelly - Plum.

Barry M - Gelly - Plum

Barry M - Gelly - Plum

It did stain a little, so if you get this polish, you have now been warned. I find that these gelly polishes takes a while to dry on me, but I love the glossy feel they give of, and how "polished" my nails look with them. 

I had yet to show you a manicure using the MoYou-London Scholar Collection plate - 02.
I wanted to show the versatility of these plates, in not just being able to create interesting manicures within the obvious theme of each plate, but also how you can work in your other plates as well.
I used Cheeky - Viva Mexico (a plate I have not used until now) together with the Scholar plate, and I really liked how they all played together nicely and created this look.

MoYou-London - Scholar Collection - 02

Cheeky - Viva Mexico 

 For a full review of this plate, check out my video on Youtube

I stamped using my trusted Sinful Color - Snow Me White, and Wet & Wild - Black Creme. I also used Essie - Navigate Her for the lime, and a dotting tool for the salt.

Once Upon A Time - manicure

Once Upon A Time In Mexico

Once Upon A Time In Mexico

What do you girls think? I like how the black polish almost disappears in the plum, and only shows in certain light conditions. 

Sunflowers - Prado Red - manicure

There is one thing that I want to get better at when it comes to nail art.
Freehand

I took my acrylics out for a test. I'm glad I had plenty of time, cause the stuff I was attempting was a bit harder than I thought. So instead of a one stroke manicure, which was what I attempted first. I went for something a bit easier, and did sunflowers.

My favorite sunflower is the Prado Red. I think they are beautiful. Just look at em!

For this manicure I used Savina - Royalty. This was one of my first nail polishes, and I haven't used it for ages. I felt it was time to give it some love. 

Since I did this manicure long into the night hours, I do not have steps-to-steps pictures on how this manicure was built.

Savina - Royalty needed 3 thin coats to cover all VNL. I added topcoat over Royalty before I proceeded to the acrylic art. I used a deep red acrylic colour for this manicure and a flat brush. I used a stippling motion with the brush to create the petals. For the seeds I used IsaDora - Winter Rose, and a dotting tool. 

I then proceed to the stamping. I used Cheeky - Jumbo plate 3 - European Romance. For stamping polish I used China Glaze - Exotic Encounter. I did a full stamping accent, and isolated some vines on two other nails. This was really tricky, since I wanted the vines to fill in the gaps. I think this was pure luck with how well the stamping came out on the index finger and the ring finger. 

What do you girls think? Do you wanna see more nail art like this?

Innisfree - 83

In 10 hours I am out travelling again. I got a box with nail polishes packed, so that I get to do some swatches, and nail art. I am planning on experimenting more with acrylic paint and nail art.
It's getting colder outside and my nails and cuticles are suffering under the conditions.
With today's post I have added some girly hearts and white dots, using Sinful Color - Snow Me White.

This is one of four "Yoghurt" inspired nail polishes from the Innisfree line. Innisfree is a vegan polish, has a pleasant scent, nothing to overpowering. It comes in a milky base with glitters and have a lasting hold. Easy to use, the glitters glides on well. Only reason why I haven't used them since I bought them (almost a year ago), is because of the removal of glitters, it's just not worth it having to soak my nails in acetone and kill my already dry cuticles. So when I got my PVA glue and started using that as a base for glitters, well, needless say, I felt the urge of using these gorgeous polishes again.

Innisfree - 83.

Milky mint green base with blue and pink hex glitters.

Holy Motherboard

I have to admit I am a bit late with this post, I'm playing catch-up on these challenges. The girls over at Llama Nails on FB have this Nerd Challenge going, and it looks really cool.
Previously on this challenge we have had "Inspired by Math", "Inspired by Space", "Inspired by Science Fiction" and "Inspired by Litterature", now its time for "Inspired by Technology".

I love computers, that's just how it is. So when this challenge arrived I knew what I wanted to do. A post I did last year was a programmers -manicure with HTML codes, and this time I'm going deeper, and taking a look at the Motherboard. Interesting enough, I'm holding my first motherboard in the HTML -code manicure.

For this manicure I used black and white acrylic paint, a liner brush, a script liner brush and a dotting tool. I used China Glaze - Unpredictable as my base color. At the end I added a metal circle and a nail art sticker ( for the serial number)

Mystic Dotticures

It's been incredible sunny lately, its insane. I would never guess that England could be this warm and toasty. It's like being in Florida. My hair goes all curly, I don't sleep as long as I usually do, cause its just too warm, too bright a light outside. I get about 4-5 hours before I'm up again. Then another hour middle of the day, when I'm outside working on my tan (I got an alarm waking me up after 30 min, to turn around, and do another 30 min)
I have decided to get a decent tan this year. Nothing over the top, but a little bit more than a base colour. Last year, my tan stuck on my skin for 6 months before it was gone (without added sun). I'm guessing that's what you get when you avoid sun for all cost when you are younger. At least I am conscious about the dangers of overexposure, and use sunscreen and stuff.
An hour outside a day has really done wonders for my skin though, not just with giving me some color. If you are a regular visitor you might also have noticed that my normally super dry hands are not so dry. I'm very pleased with that.

I'm back with a nail art using NYC - Aqua Mystic as a base colour. I wasn't quite sure what to do, so I opted for dotticures.

This looks so pretty. The sticker with three dots on the other nails. 

I feel like this was a bit too much. It would have worked without the sticker in my mind. Stick to one thing...

Green of Envy

I needed something green, for my manicure today. Specially after seeing Mishka's Favorite Green post.

I settled for Sinful Colors - Exotic Green, and added some sparkles with Dancing Queen - Models Own, and finished it all off with some polkadots with Bobbing for Baubles - Essie. 

I am very pleased with Exotic Green. Drying time, and application was like a dream. Just the way it's suppose to be. I hear it's a dupe with China Glaze - Starboard, which was why I picked it with me, when I saw it on the display at Boots.

Indoor

Outdoor

Sparkles all the way!!

I'm on a little holiday in Norway at the moment, so blogging have been sparse the last two weeks. I'm back in England on Monday, and will do my nails as soon as I land. I am expecting nail mail, and nail art supplies a plenty in my mailbox, so you girls are in for a treat (!!)

Can't wait to see it all. 

So excited!

Barry M - Chameleon Blue

Somehow this manicure was never posted, but here is it. A bit later than planned, never the less. 

It's a gorgeous blue color, I like the shine it puts of.  The Chameleon colours can't have topcoat on them, cause that makes them change colour. and even then, it doesnt seem to last long for me. Kinda puts me off wearing this, but it looks beautiful. 

... And ... its a stainer.

I tried it briefly last year, when I bought it, and it stained my nails like hell. (link to prev. blogpost) This time I used a different basecoat, but with no luck. I had it on for a few hours and even that was enough to stain my nails. I have tried it with Linda Johansen basecoat, and OPI Nail Envy, both leaves me with staines. 

Anyone tried it with other basecoats? 

Is there hope for this polish?

70's print makes me blue

TGIF!
Have a great weekend girls!!

Today I have Cheeky plate CH48 for you ladies. To create this manicure I used 3 nail polishes, and a dotting tool. I'm sorry for the scratches on my hands, I have been doing extensive gardening, and this manicure has held like a rocket through digging in the dirt, to sawing trees.

I feel like a 50's "You Can Do It" -poster girl here.

But lets drag us back to the 70's with this manicure. I hope you liked it, and remember for more 70's style, check out Mishkas take on this plate over at Lacquer of Leave Her!

Basecolor was Fnug - Bandana, I stamped using Essie - Bobbing for baubles, and dotted the center using Makeup Mekka - Remember '79.

Eeek! I look so pale!