Moved to Wordpress!

Hello!

If anyone's seeing this then you're you're in the wrong place for the Nailington's site.. Doh!

It's here at http://www.nailingtons.com/

I should have put this up earlier but I'm super forgetful. The site is now in its new and shiny home (with still plenty of edits to go) as a Wordpress site. It was very hard to make the decision to move from Blogger but after a lot of reading, I took the plunge and went away. Both have positives and negatives to the move but I just had to weigh it up and think about the future. The biggest pull I guess was the modification freedom and the additional css/php learning curve which has been tricky but fun. I hope that if anyone does read the blog that they will enjoy the new look of the site and find it useful or at least more appealing to the eye.. who knows! Anyways, at the very least I have something to play with that makes my eyes (and brain) a little happier.

It's already been through a few design and layout changes, so who knows..next week it may look very different but so far, this is how it's turned out (minus the top and bottom browser bits):

Thank you blogger for the awesome start in nail blogging life!

Review Section Update!

I'm very very happy to have finally got over my review page hurdle! It's been sitting there for a long time now looking rather sad due to my lack of blogger knowledge and general 'I'll do it tomorrow' thoughts. I should have donked myself on the head though because the new way of doing things was much more simple than the old.. *donk*.

Before I just ended up pasting them one after another and then using anchors throughout the page to then link them to a rather ugly top title (which took me ages to work out what/where to place it in the html). Now they have pictures that link through to their own little pages, which makes things a hell of a lot easier when adding in new reviews.

I know that the content isn't fabulous and that probably no one reads them but there's just no excuse for them not to look pretty anyway!

There's been a big lack of nail posts recently, due to my nails needing a break and some repair time (testing OPI Nail Envy) after the 31 Day Challenge. There's a couple of designs I want to do soon but they'll be scrubbed off as soon as they're photographed so that the repair stuff has a fair chance! Even though I miss painting them and they look horribly ugly when bald, it's a great opportunity to work on things.. especially parts of the site.

Next up... Tutorial section! Eeek :)

31 Day Challenge - Inspired by a NPQueen

Yeeeeeey, it's over!!!

Polishes

Candy Coated by Sinful Colors
Pistachio Ice Cream by MUA
Jack Frost by Models Own
Snow Me White - Sinful Colors

There's been a slight modification to the last challenge so that now it relates to the designs of the other NPQ ladies participating in the challenge. I'm honestly in awe of how amazing and creative their work has been, it's certainly given me more 'oomph' to do better and keep going.

For my very last inspired by I've chosen to replicate +Magali Neuville-Bisceglia 's day 15 set for 'Delicate Print'. I just thought it was just so pretty and lovely, and now that the challenge is over, it's something that I would like to keep on my nails for a good few days! She's a very talented lady with an amazing range of her own designs.. and has short nails like me, yey! I didn't have the colours or stamp to copy it exactly (though I really should get hold of them, the Essie - Mint Candy is amazing!) but I got as close as I could.

Mags Polishes

Essie - To Buy Or Not To Buy
Essie - Mint Candy Apple
Kiko sparkle touch 228
Konad sp white
Moyou Tourist 7

Thank you to everyone who's been following along, it's been a mad ride. Will do an 'omg it's over' post in a few days but for now I shall have a few days away from the fumes!

 #notd #nailart #nailartoohlala #thenailartstory #nailartofinstagram #nailsofinstagram #nailstagram #instanails #nailspiration #nailartwow #nails2inspire #fcnails #craftynails #31dc #31daychallenge #modelsown #sinfulcolors

31 Day Challenge - Inspired by a Tutorial

For my tutorial inspiration I've decided to go with one from a lady I know via Instagram - @oxygennails - http://instagram.com/oxygennails. A little while ago she posted a pictorial of her 'Jewellery inspired nailart' on Instagram and I said at the time that I'd give it a go for the 30th day challenge.. so here it is! Nowhere near as neat or nice but it's as close as I could manage :).

I didn't have the right stud so I made a small alteration in adding the gems to each nail (tried using only one and it looked a bit odd!). The bit I struggled with the most was the lines in between where the striping tape is removed, it's really fiddly work. Some nails it went okay, others just went *splat*. I'll copy in the full details of the tutorial below so you can see what it should look like.

The Tutorial

1.Apply base coat on your nails.
2.Paint them white and let it dry completely!
3.Put nail tape on your nails criss-cross.
4.Paint the upper side of your nails gold.
5.Paint the lower parts silver, outer parts dark grey, inner parts light grey respectively.
6.Remove nail tape and draw a small black line using fine brush and acrylic paint(u can correct ur line with white acrylics)
7.Put a drop of topcoat on the center of the ring finger nail and place the square gold stud on it. U can do it on all your nails and priced it with topcoat. Or, for a lighter design
8.Draw white squares on the middles of the rest nails.
9.Outline them with black. Topcoat it and your ready!

Thanks for the tutorial @oxygennails!

#notd #nailart #nailartoohlala #thenailartstory #nailartofinstagram #nailsofinstagram #nailstagram #instanails #nailspiration #nailartwow #nails2inspire #fcnails #craftynails #31dc #31daychallenge #nailart101

31 Day Challenge - Inspired by the Supernatural

I really had no idea what to do for this challenge and it's probably the one I've been dreading the most. I've ended up with a graveyard because.. well that's kinda spooky!

I started out with a base of Snow Me White by Sinful Colors, then created the gradient with 24 Dark Grey by George, Wet Cement by Sally Hansen, Black on Black by Sinful Colors and finally the Snow Me White again.

Using splodges of the Black on Black I hand painted the rest of the details with a very fine paint brush. I think I got a bit carried away and tried to add some mist with a blob of foundation sponge and the white varnish. but that just ruined it a bit so I tried to paint over the bits that I could.

Two more to go!! Yey!

#notd #nailart #nailartoohlala #thenailartstory #nailartofinstagram #nailsofinstagram #nailstagram #instanails #nailspiration #nailartwow #nails2inspire #fcnails #craftynails #31dc #31daychallenge #nailart101 #supernatural

31 Day Challenge - Inspired by a Flag

The "Prinsengeus"

 The end is in sight.. hooray! Just a few more days to go. Today should be the day I return from an awesome long weekend in the Netherlands, however, with the legs still as they are, it wasn't possible :( (bye bye holiday). So for the challenge I wanted to pick something Netherlandsy, so I've gone with one of their alternative flags; The "Prinsengeus", the naval jack of the Netherlands.

Unfortunately I made a bit of an error.. I did it from memory so a few of the reds and blues are round the wrong way. I noticed just after I'd once again battled past the masking tape..Nooooooooo! But nevermind, you get the idea :). I think my blue was a tad dark too, whoops! Thank goodness it's 'inspired by' and not 'carbon copy of..' :D

Polishes

In The Navy by Models Own
Chelsea by NYC
Snow Me White by Sinful Colors

Stamping Plates

GA1 by Gals

Other

Masking tape
Small fine nail art brush for painting the mid lines and neatening up bits!

#notd #nailart #nailartoohlala #thenailartstory #nailartofinstagram #nailsofinstagram #nailstagram #instanails #nailspiration #nailartwow #nails2inspire #fcnails #craftynails #31dc #31daychallenge #nailart101

31 Day Challenge - Inspired by: Artwork

Jackson Pollock - Lavender Mist 1950

For my arty inspired nails I've decided to go with an artist I studied at school; Jackson Pollock. I've never done splatter nail art before so this seemed like a good time to start. I looked up a few tutorials which told me how to do it but it just wouldn't work.so I nearly gave up and went with Calder or Mondrian. Then I found a video on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEzBdZew1yo#aid=P-wP9GUvQ84) that said to cut the straws short. Then I watered down the varnish a littler more with nail varnish remover, made sure that the straw had a decent amount of varnish in it, pulled back a little further from the nail than I thought I needed to be and then 'phuuuuff'.. it was messy but the result was okay!

Jackson Pollock - Lavender Mist 1950
National Gallery of Art, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1976.37.

"Paul Jackson Pollock (January 28, 1912 – August 11, 1956), known as Jackson Pollock, was an influential American painter and a major figure in the abstract expressionist movement. He was well known for his unique style of drip painting." - Wikipedia

Polishes

Naked Glow Hypergel by Models Own

Black On Black by Sinful Colors

Snow Me White by Sinful Colors

Pinball by George

Unnamed blue by Primark

Other

Straws
Lots of patience!

#notd #nailart #nailartoohlala #thenailartstory #nailartofinstagram #nailsofinstagram #nailstagram #instanails #nailspiration #nailartwow #nails2inspire #fcnails #craftynails #31dc #31daychallenge #nailart101 #splatternails