Water Marble Nails

 

 This was my first attempt at Water Marbling. I think it went pretty well. The colors I had brought were to try this sand and water pic I had seen and then I saw a a little tutorial on water marbling and thought, "Heck, why not. All you really need is polish, a cup of water, and some q-tips." Well ok, that is over simplified. I found the tape to be very helpful and you need remover too, to clean things up.

Colors I used:

Orangie/Red - Essie Geranium

White - OPI Alpine Snow

Yellow - Revlon Buttercup

Blue - Wet n Wild I Need a Refresh Mint

 

 
I used the scotch tape to tape off my cuticles as best I could. Color order was a drop of Geranium, then Alpine Snow, then Buttercream, then Mint, then another drop of Geranium.

 My first time I only did one nail but that seemed like a waste so next time I did 3 of my nails at once and it worked great. Did it with the remaining nails too. It wasn't so much that I felt I was wasting polish. It was that I hated having to put one drop in at a time. I know, ridiculously lazy. Once you peel off the tape you have little corners that you can use the q-tip and remover to clean up. I had a few weird spots I cleaned off and then painted over like a corner of my pinkie that got clumpy because I accidentaly didn't clean the polish away from the nail in the water and so it doubled over.

Once your nail is cleaned up and touched up, clear coat with Seche Vita.

 

Here is part of the mess left behind. This is just 1 nails worth. It can be messy work but I have been loving the variety and color pop of my nails today so it is worth it.

Patriotic Nails

Red, White, Blue Glitter - Icing Patriotic
Red - Nivea Cardinal 20
White - OPI Alpine Snow NL L00
Blue - OPI Dating a Royal NL B70

1 coat of the Cardinal as the base for Icing Patriotic glitter. Since Patriotic doesn't cover fully, even with the 2 coats i used, I wanted a bright base that wasn't just white. Trick with Patriotic to get it even remotely ok is to put on one coat and then let it fully dry. That way you don't pull up the 1st coat when you are trying to glob on the 2nd. After the 2nd coat is at least tacky, apply the Seche Vita to rapid dry the rest. It will still be waterbed-esque for a while so becarful not to cautch it on anything.

2 coats of Dating a Royal. The 1st coat always makes me worry because it is so translucent but the 2nd coat magically makes it opaque and just the perfect color blue.

Ring finger is a base of 2 coats Alpine Snow.

I used Cheeky nail plate CH4 to make the stripes and the stars.

I was having issues with Nail Polish Remover residue, so I actually had to touch up the stripes with a dotting tool. Cardinal is one of the only 2 colors (The other is Pure ICE Wild Thing) I have found so far that will smear with Seche Vita so I used that to my advantage to smooth out my touch up marks.

I was worried that my index and pinky would make it look too cluttered if they had any stamping so I stopped there. I am pretty happy with the results and now I just have to resist the urge to try out something else before the big day on Thursday.