Try Something Tuesdays-Water Decals

I recently discovered YRNails water decals on Geordie Nails' blog and decided to treat myself and Rara to some (although Rara has only just discovered this and doesn't know which ones I've got her yet =p) because they have some really awesome designs but at prices which won't break the bank.
I got both the transparent designs and some full decals but this mani uses the partial ones, and I'm leaving the full ones for a braver day!
I had a couple of practises and they're fiddly little things so not great for someone like me who's clumsy and uncoordinated but I managed. They're not perfect but they still look really cool.

I chose these comic book style 'Pow' ones for my first time using them, and put them over what I consider to be "classic" comic colours-black, white, red, yellow and blue

Like this...can't understand how he's talking AND
kissing her at the same time though...
(Via)

Polishes used were the usual suspects: L.A Colors Art Deco-Black, Colour Me-Colour Me White, No 7-Siren, London Girl-Shade 148 and Barry M-Cobalt Blue.

I didn't want to waste a decal on a black polish so I did something a little different on my accent nails.

I was going to write 'POW' in my bubble but my nails are just too
teeny & I'm not that skilled! I like the exclamation mark too though.

I think these decals look really cool and I'm loving the retro feel to this mani. I was expecting them to be sticky once you removed the backing paper from them, but they aren't which means you can move them around until you are happy with their placing and then top coat the hell out of them to get them to stay there. They're not perfectly flat on my nails but I think that's more because I didn't cut them out perfectly so the edges have lifted slightly/because I didn't dry them all very well. You get 18 designs per pack, so I still have enough left to do a full mani if I wanted to-very good value for money at a pound a pack!
I think they're brill and will definitely be buying from them again in the future, as well as trying out my full patterned decals at some point too.

~Nail Art Novice~


Ooh and as a bonus here's a picture of one of my practice attempts over my mint nails:

I thought he was too cute not to share really.

One Day I'll Fly Away

While I am busy being ill and complaining and unimaginative, Rara has been beavering away and come up with another awesome mani so here's a post from her to brighten the place up a little:

Hello all! This is the first post I've ever written so I hope it's OK!
I love peacock feathers so when I saw this peacock feather tutorial from the NailNerd I knew I had to try it out!
I used Barry M-Matt White for the base because I wanted to use something pale so that the feather designs would really stand out. The green is Barry M-Watermelon but I wanted it to be sparkly so I added a Rimmel glitter topcoat to it. It is slightly sparkly under the right light but not quite as I imagined it would turn out. The yellow 'eye' is Avon-Inspire and the blue is Avon-Forget Me Not which is already really sparkly and pretty. 
First I painted the green feathers as you can see here:

 then I added the eye and layered on the blue, and added the blue feather details. I didn't think it looked completely finished so I added black flicks and a black centre to the eye. (Andrea Fulerton Dot and Flick in Black) before finishing with a Barry M topcoat.

My feathers are slightly thicker than I wanted them to be as I don't think I used the correct brush/have a thin enough one but overall I love it!!!!!
I will definitely be doing this again!


WOW. I'm blown away by how AWESOME these look. They're amazing! I'm super impressed by Rara's talent, she's only been doing this as long as me (possibly even less time) but she's definitely got the upper edge on painting skill. These are fantastic!!

~Rara & Nail Art Novice~

Title of Post taken from 'One Day I'll Fly Away'-Moulin Rouge/Randy Crawford

31 Post Challenge 3-What Makes You Happy?

It's a strange one for me this. Not because I don't have anything that makes me happy but because I'm generally a happy person, it's my base level of emotion I think. It just feels peculiar thinking of specific examples I guess.

What makes me happy:

• Wearing my Docs and a mini skirt and being all stompy and sexy and awesome.
• Laughing at stupid stuff with my friends until my sides hurt and I can't stop smiling and all of a sudden it's 4am and no-one noticed. 
• Getting awesome things in the post.
• Mastering a song on my bass so it sounds perfect, doesn't happen often but when it does it's brilliant.
• When my hair works with me and looks fabulous rather than a raggedy mess.
• Prancing around the house in pyjamas and a pair of stilettos.
• Singing along to my favourite songs much too loudly when I'm home alone. 
• Being Employed!! (hint hint to the mystery jobs fairy)
• The first warm day after winter, and scrunching through leaves in autumn.
• And of course, wearing something awesome on my nails so that every time I look down at my fingers it makes me smile!

Think I'll stick to 10, otherwise I could go on for much longer!

~Nail Art Novice~

You can find all my other 31PC posts here and the original posts and link up by Fabulous Finds by Tiffany here

Mint Ice Cream and Sprinkles

A fairly uninspired title for a fairly uninspired mani, I'm afraid. I'm still stuck with this cold, and have been for a week now, thoroughly fed up of coughing and sore throats and nose blowing and feeling awful and NOT BEING ABLE TO HEAR. Honestly, if someone isn't directly facing me when they speak to me then I can't hear what they're saying, it's like I'm constantly wearing earplugs-everything is muffled and sounds very distant. Plus I can hear my pulse in my ears loudly and above all other noises, meaning that if I move quickly anywhere I'm temporarily deaf for a few seconds whilst it settles down again.
Basically, it SUCKS. I've not been feeling especially creative because of this, so this was just another simple and quick mani. My original intention was to cover the green in purple sparkles, but I had sorely underestimated how dark the base was, hence I ended up with diagonal accents. To make matters worse, I've lost my base coat and had to use an old one that's almost made of glue. Grumble Grumble.

Polishes used: Barry M-Mint Green (at least I think so. It doesn't have a label on but looks about right compared to their website) and Revlon-Facets of Fuchsia on my accents.
Don't get me wrong, I adore this green, but it's a pain in the arse to apply-this is between 2 and 4 coats on each nail because it's really sheer and takes a while to build up opacity. In daylight, I've got a big patch on my middle finger that you can see through to the nail beneath even still.
Facets is frankly beautiful-I got it through a blog sale at the beginning of the year so it was a bargain for me. I think it's now been re-released as Scandalous but it's still a sheer black base filled with lots of purple glitter. This is 2 coats on each tip.

It is a nice combination but I'm not blown away by it-I'm not taking any joy glancing at my fingers when I type like with some manis. Here's hoping I'll be better soon, then I can get back on track and do something a little more interesting!

~Nail Art Novice~

A Quick and Dirty Mani to Tide Me Over

Firstly let me apologise for not posting much this week and also for not bringing you a 'Try Something Tuesdays' post. Basically I'm really ill-suffering from a horrible head cold that's generally making me miserable, plus I'm exhausted because it's stopping me from sleeping properly. I stuck this on at the weekend fully intending to do a post about it on Sunday but then got hit by the full whack of this thing and had to spend the day in bed. I'm not going to be doing a TST post because I feel like faffing about with noxious smelling polishes wouldn't do me any good at the moment, but I will try and resume normal posting within the week as long as I am feeling better.
This is a really quick and simple mani that's really quite pretty to look at-two coats of Barry M's Black Multi Glitter topped off with two coats of China Glaze's Luxe and Lush. There's a bit of tip-wear going on in these photos because it's a couple of days old now but oh well.

With flash

Natural light

I'm hoping I recover soon now, I've already had to cancel a trip to see some of my uni friends because of it and I'm getting fed up of constantly coughing and not being able to hear anything and feeling absolutely pants all the time. It's knocked me for six, this little bugger, and I am not a happy bunny.

Send me nice things to cheer me up lovelies?? (nailartnovice@gmail.com / @NailArtNovice)

~Nail Art Novice~

31 Posts Challenge 2-Favourite Quotes

Today it's favourite quotes which is something that suits me down to the ground. I have a little book that I 'collect' quotes that strike a chord with me and make me smile. My favourites tend to change based on what I'm experiencing in my life at the time but these all mean a lot to me:

'All The World's A Stage'- William Shakespeare, As You Like It.

I love performing, I love to be in a spotlight, it's my favourite thing in the world. This is a well known quote from my favourite Shakespeare play, the one I'm determined to be in one day. I love this quote so much I've got it tattooed on my foot so it'll always be with me.

'To be the place where the falling angel meets the rising ape' - Terry Pratchett, The Hogfather

The perfect description of humanity.

 'Letting it get to you. You know what that's called? Being Alive. Best thing there is.'- The Doctor, The Doctor's Wife (written by Neil Gaiman!) 

I am a massive Doctor Who nerd, I love it. This episode is amazing, it's full of brilliant quotes that make me giggle, but this one always strikes a chord with me. The above picture is my desktop background at the mo, coz I like it so much.

'You can't start the next chapter of your life if you keep re-reading the next one.' - Anonymous, as far as I'm aware.

This was something I needed to hear a year or so ago. I kept it as the background of my phone for a while to remind me of it every time I looked at it. It took me a while to accept that my last chapter had closed but I'm finally onto the next one.

'I'll come out the other side a brand new me'- A Brand New Me, Bitter Ruin

Again this struck a chord when I was living it. Bitter Ruin are an awesome band that no-one will have heard of, but I love their stuff, this song in particular. Last time I saw them they did it unplugged, with only an acoustic guitar and no amplification at all and it was just absolutely beautiful. 

'Be the best you'- Gala Darling 

Gala Darling is a fabulous blogger who wants to inspire people to love themselves a little more. I love this quote of hers (can't find the original page though,sorry!) because it reminds me that I may not be as good as someone else at some things, but if I am trying to be the best I can be then I am not letting myself down.

I could choose more-hundreds more, but I won't, I'll stick with these 6 as my favourites. Oh, and this too.

Until next time then, 

~Nail Art Novice~

31 Day Challenge...but not the one you're thinking of...

I discovered a 31 Day Blogging challenge on AlyssiaRose's lovely lifestyle blog (she also has a nail one right here too!) and really wanted to take part. Originally from http://www.fabulousfindsbytiffany.com, it challenges you to post a blog a day for 31 days on yourself and your life. Except...I'm not going to do it properly. I don't want to post every day, so I intend to do one or two posts every weekend until I've done them all. This way I can fit them into my life and also my blogging schedule a little better than trying to do one each day for a month, so for me it's a 31 Posts blog challenge. If you want to join in and link up, then the original post from Tiffany is just here and there is a linkup at the bottom of each of her own 31 Day posts.

Here's the list of blog prompts:

Today is day number one-Self Portrait and 5 random facts about yourself

Photography by Michael Lau

It's weird, this is the first time you'll be seeing me on this blog! I've never put a picture of my face up, just my nails. Oh and I cannot draw, so you aren't getting a hand drawn masterpiece I'm afraid. I love this picture though, it was from a photo shoot me and Rara went on in December because we had a voucher for a cheap one. This photo was taken without me realising it when Rara had just made me laugh and I love it. It's so me-the random bright coloured ducks and the Doc Martens and the big grin on my face =)


5 Random Facts
1. I am having a love affair with Doc Martens-I currently have 5 pairs and I'm not ready to stop yet. I honestly think if I could have a pair of Docs and a pair of my comfiest heels in every colour, I'd never buy shoes again.
2. I've never seen Star Wars...or ET...or to be honest most films that you "have" to watch. When I come across those lists of '100 films to watch before you die' I've usually watched about 6 of them and they're cartoons or musicals. I'm just not massively into films, I'm much more of a book person.
3. I'm unemployed and it sucks. I hate it. I really wish someone, anyone would give me a job to give me back my freedom and life, and give me a reason to get out of my pyjamas every day.
4. I also can't drive. I've had 2 lots of lessons and never come close to passing my test. This is something I am determined to change in the next couple of months though.
5. My favourite band is Queen, and always will be. I'm as much as a fangirl as you can be when a band is no longer in existence (sadly, RIP Freddie!). I looooove them. I can't even pick a favourite song because I love that every album of theirs has a different sound to it and I reckon they're all awesome.


So there you have it. Who knew thinking of 5 random facts could be so hard to do? I'll be back tomorrow with day 2, probably.

~Nail Art Novice~