Musical Month: Ingrid

The musical month continues with the new song Niina chose for us.
Today's inspiration is Johanna Kurkela's beautiful song called 'Ingrid'

The lyrics (of the chorus – no way I'm translating the whole song!!) in English would be something around these lines:
""Today I'm cheerful, look at me -
doing my work with a smile on my lips.
And you're so blind to see
how I'm exhausted down till fingertips.""

I wanted to illustrate the dark and the light side we all have in us – and I definitely wanted to add a dash of hope in the form of wheat stalks. I believe we all have the seed for good in us, which we can foster and let grow to something beautiful – and also nourishing for others – with the right people  and love around us. The album cover was also clearly shot on a field, so maybe that's where the crop idea came from...

The base colours were picked from my oldies – as I have already packed my fave new polishes and shipped them to Spain where we are going to move shortly. The dark polish is Essence Urban Messages Nightline (it's definitely more blue IRL than in these pics), and the light peach is Nicole by OPI Persuasive Peach. They both needed four coats Now I remember, why I didn't pack them...

I picked the colours, and the idea for sponging, from the cover art of the album, which I really appreciate in so many ways. That's exactly the kind of landscape I watch from my desk at home, ever changing with the turn of the seasons, and I love it!

For the dark stamping, I mixed Konad's shimmery blue and Mundo de Unhas black stamping polishes. The bronze stamping polish is Kiko mirror 629.

The wheat stalk image came from Born pretty plate BP-L007, and the swirly image from BM-314. The latter is one of my most trusted stamping templates. It seems to save every manicure heading for disaster..  I actually have to stop myself to putting it on every other mani I make. Do you have those images, which just simply call your name every day?

But enough about me! The other girls have made awesome nails, too! Go and see at least Janina's art at her blog "Never grow up"!

Musical Month: Ungettable

My newer favourite in the Musical Month challenge (see more about the challenge in the previous post) is, ironically, an old song from the Finnish Band Naryan. Or well, not an old old, but from their album published in 2013. Maybe I'm so old already, that two years ago is practically 'now' for me.. :D

The song is called 'Ungettable' and I simply love the atmosphere, rolling guitars and beautiful violins in the song – and the band's way of visualising their art.

It might be deep, it might be dark – but somehow it's still hopeful and purging!
You can read and see more about Naryan on their website, and hear the song 'Ungettable'in Youtube.

The base in most of the nails is OPI Skull & Glossbones, and on the ring finger GAP Starry Night. I have to say I was a bit disappointed on the Starry Night: it took four coats to be passably opaque, and still I felt the glitters got a bit buried in the base..

The stamping is from BP-L015 With Essence Dark grey Stampy polish. Thumb and pinky got some simple marbling with saran wrap – and the pinky a tribute to the band logo with striping tape.

The other girls have been listening to these same songs, and striving to find inspiration in them. I think the results are really pretty! See Janina's awesome work in her blog 'Never grow up'!!

 Let's see, what we are going to make up of Niina's songs...
<3

Musical Month: You Learn

Nail art community is a wonderful thing – and dangerous in a way! How many times you have emptied your wallet because of a fellow nail maniac? How many times you have jumped onboard a crazy challenge without knowing where it might take you? And how many times have you enjoyed the ride immensely?

 Well, the latter two are what I did just recently. With a few Finnish nail artists we decided to go for a music related challenge this month. Basically, everyone picks two songs – an oldie and a new favorite – to inspire the nail art of others, all weekend. And this weekend is mine! :)

My "oldie" is Alanis Morissette's You Learn from the album Jagged Little Pill. It might just be THE comfort&motivation song for the girls in my generation. I still drive around with the CD in my car, and pop it in when I need uplift and want to sing my lungs out like no one's listening (and I make sure no one is..)

 I took my inspiration partly from the song itself, and partly from the album cover:

 And, of course, I made a holo version. Holo all the things!!! :D

I used Color Club Harp On It as a base, and sponged on other holo pretties: Girly Bits Too Hot for Pants, A England Tristam and A England Saint George.

I chose to stamp from the plate BP-71, with A England Saint George.

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

 You grieve you learn
You choke you learn
You laugh you learn
You choose you learn
You pray you learn
You ask you learn
You live you learn

These wise lyrics were written by 20 year old Alanis Morissette. Now there's a benchmark :)

My new musical favorite coming up tomorrow! Meanwhile, check out the other girls' nail art!

Links coming soon!

Free as a (Pink) Bird

Here's a happy manicure I did to honor the migratory birds, that are forming huge flocks, already preparing for their trip to south. They gather around their friends and family, feed as much as they can, and seem to plan their journey in an enthusiastic manner. How does that sound familiar to an academic seasonal worker? :D

In the middle and ring fingers, and on the thumbnail I'm wearing Wild and Mild Diamond - Queens
(as you might know, I'm a sucker to everything NYC-related. So I had to buy the whole New York themed collection from this brand, although I don't especially like the brand, the polishes are a nightmare to store plus the bottlecaps don't align...)
Pinky and index figers have two coats of Color Club Wild Orchid.

Stamping I made with with Kiko Mirror 618 and Essence dark grey stamping polish (a LE some time ago), both images from plate BPL-025

You will be seeing some Born Pretty stamping plates in the blog in the near future. And, hear this: all the products were purchased by me, with my own hard earnd money, from my own free will. Just so that you know. :)

A side note, though: I'm just a little bit bewildered by the discussion on bloggers selling their ethics and gravitating towards money and marketing. Maybe some bloggers do that, maybe some don't even if people think that -- and maybe there are many of us to whom this is not even an issue. I've never accepted any collaboration nor even products for review. I'm a bit confused with all the statements and disclosures and policies I possibly should be explicating, when the only thing I want to write about is the polish and stuff (bought by me) I play with and which brings me so much joy. So please bear with me and the occasionally missing commercial details - and feel free to ask if there's a question related to this bothering you!

Coral Nails (Not Including Coral Polish)

The other night I asked the Hubby THE QUESTION!

(No, it's not 'Will you marry me'  It's: 'How should I paint my nails')
:D

 And he answered: 'Paint corals!'
I have absolutely no idea, where that came from. We have never seen corals. We are not planning a diving holiday. We haven't even watched a documentary with corals on it.
But corals he said, and corals it was.

I painted a base with two coats of Zoya Wednesday, and sponged on a slight gradient using Wednesday, Sinful Colors Cinderella and a random white polish.

The stamping was made with Mundo de Unhas 13 which is a Reddish orange stamping polish, and DRK-A plate.

To top it all, I chose from my untrieds the Liquid Sky Lacquer Great White. You see one coat over Wednesday in the index finger - and some dabs on the other nails. Just watch the gorgeous shimmer!! The Great White fits in perfectly to the theme! ... This coral reef isn't safe anymore.... Watch out you little fish.... Duunn dun... dunnn dun...

TPC: Flashy Green & Blue

As you might have noticed, I was away last week, but as a compensation I've got an awesome feature coming up this week... just wait and see...

 Meanwhile, here are my first Green, blue and purple Tri polish challenge nails:

 The green polish I'm also holding in these pics is Kiko 441 from the Digital LE.

After the first coat I was disappointed, but after three coats I was happy I purchased this holo glitter beauty. It's so flashyyyy..... And it has actually got bar glitter! How awesome is that?!

To meet the challenge, I sponged the tips with China Glaze Water you Waiting For, plus added some

stamping with Konad black from BM305 (flashes) and Pueen 09 (peacock feathers)

I hope I had caught the holo sparkle in the Kiko polish better... But I loved these so that I wore them all last week in Jerez de la Frontera – and I was thinking of you, my dearest readers :)

An InLinkz Link-up

GOT Polish: As Orange as it Gets

This weeks Golden Oldies challenge was orange - and this manicure is about as orange as a manicure can get..

 This mani started with two coats of OPI Y'all Come Back Ya Hear and stamping with Konad white and BM308.

I then proceeded to do my first stamping sandwich by adding:
some more Y'all
some more stamping
a final coat of Y'all
... and a coat of Seche Vite.

I love how squishy it looks! I would like to drink anything that tastes like this looks!

 Let's see the orange artwork of the other participants!

An InLinkz Link-up

TPC: Tweedy

So here comes my last Tri Polish challenge manicure with February colours brown, pink and gray. In this respect the mani is a bit funny - you'll see...

The inspiration for this came from the amazing blog The manicurator.
Please look up her version! My own looks like it's done by a two-year old, in comparison...

Base three coats China Glaze Digital Dawn (I got this in a goodie bag in a meeting).
I added those tweedy lines with Color Club Beyond and Wild & Mild Diamond Roosevelt Avenue mixed with Gosh Silver.

The accent fingers feature stamping with:
Gosh Silver + DRK-A (mini houdstooth) Beyond + BM316 (lines in the left ring finger)
beyond + BM322 (large houndstooth in the right ring finger)

The funny thing with this manicure is, that I'm not really sure which colour is which - regarding the challenge. Which is the grey? Which is the extra black or the silver? Is the base really brown or pink?
Keep guessing, while browsing the wonderful work of other participants!

An InLinkz Link-up

GOT Polish: Springtime Flowers

Is it a bit early for springtime flowers? Well, I don't care!
This is my green mani for the GOT polish challenge

The base polish here Essence Fruity LE "Kiwi". I had to paint four coats, but the result was really nice with the glitters peeking through the polish.

The ring finger is the accent finger again, with Essie Navigate Her and sponging with Color Club The Lime Starts Here.

And then I added rhinestones to a flower shape. What a cutesy-flowery style! Although I could have used a thinner topcoat... ahem...

 On other fingers I added stamping with Konad white and DRK-A, and then some yellow dots with Orly Spark.

The pics didn't turn out too well – lobster hands, bubbling top coat, cuticles in bad shape and all that... But I really loved this manicure! I'll have to give this style another go soon, maybe even with more murky colour palette or jewel tones... Hmmm...

An InLinkz Link-up