TopCoatIt

I had been reminding myself all week to ask the Hubs to choose a nail polish or two for this week’s theme. I kept forgetting and forgetting. When I finally got around to it, he had our daughter help him choose. I stopped her at four polishes. I think she would’ve handed me my whole collection, one by one if I’d let her.

The four I ended up with were Sinful Colors Pull Over, Sinful Colors Dream On, Zoya Robyn, and Milani Rad Purple. Rad Purple and Dream On are almost the same color on, although Dream On is a matte creme and Rad Purple is a jelly. Because I was a bit rushed in doing this one, I was running low on creativity and originality. I went with my old reliable, leopard. No matter how many times I do a leopard mani, I never tire of them.

To make good use of both purples, I polished with Sinful Colors then brushed some Milani Rad Purple on the to the tips to give a gradient effect. It’s pretty subtle and it nicely obstructed by the print, but it’s there.

I was impressed that my family did so well choosing colors. No ultra sheers, no horribly mismatched colors and almost all cremes. All four played well together. It made my job easier.  So are you liking the new watermark?  I’m still getting used to it, but think it’s an improvement.

Be sure the check out all the other manis today:

Amanda of Amandalandish
Anna of Going to the Showing
Anne of Grape Fizz Nails
Ashley of Art Evolve
Brandi of The Beaulieu Review
Chelsea of Nailed Blog
ChiChi of I’m Just Me…ChiChi
Cordia of Seriously Swatched
Elizabeth of Did My Nails
Jamie of Polish, Please!
Katherine of Haul of Fame
Maribeth of Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite!
Marisa of Polish Obsession
Meredith of Polish and Charms
Nory of Fierce Make Up and Nails
Sarah of See Sarah Swatch
Tara of Polishy of Truth

After putting this mani together and taking all the pictures, I realized that I’ve never done a tiger stripe mani. Why not? I’m adding it to my list.

I’ve seen plenty of similar manicures out there so I decided to try one myself. My favorite is the leopard, of course. Love me some leopard.

I painted my tips with polish and pretty much did the rest with acrylics. The polishes I used were OPI The “It” Color, Jordana Chiffon, Sally Hansen White On and Essie Alligator Purse.

What is your favorite animal print? Just in case you aren’t sure, my pinkie is a cheetah print. Yes, cheetah and leopard are different. Google it.

This mani is 100% inspired by my hair.  Several weeks ago I showed you that I’d had my sister put leopard panels in my hair.  While I miss the vibrant purple and red of my coon tails, I love how unique the leopard is.  I’ve literally had people stop mid sentence to ask me about my hair.

I started out doing a full leopard mani, then freehanded in the brown to represent my hair with the leopard peeking out from behind it. I used OPI Swedish Nude as my base color, black and burnt orange acrylics for the spots and Finger Paints Sketchy Character is the brown.

I can’t imagine that I’ll ever tire of leopard prints in general.  It truly is my favorite mani and I love rendering people speechless with my unexpected hair.  Now I just need to get my self the pair of leopard TOMS I’ve been eyeballing and I’ll be set.

I’ve been seeing these type of French manicures around a lot lately and I love them! So I decided to do one for myself.Fortunately my nails are stained at the moment so I was safe to show off a little naked nail. As I often do, I chose my colors from the polishes I already had out. I used OPI Pink Friday for my tips, Color Club Edie for the aqua spots and CND Asphalt is the grey. I topped this off with Chill Zone top coat. I should have used two coats to hide all the ridges in my nail. I don’t do much buffing of my nails and I didn’t use a base coat for this design, so one little coat of top coat over my naked nail didn’t hide imperfections as well as I’d have liked. Oh well. That’s what I get for not using a top coat I guess.

I pinned this post from Enamel Girl a while back. I was looking through my pins the other day hoping for some inspiration and this jumped out at me.She stamped hers and I’ve never really done a zebra print so I was a little apprehensive. I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was to do.

I love this look! I’ve been doing manis on my right hand for a few days because I can’t bring myself to take this off!

I used NYX Girls White for my base, sponged on some Julep Stella on the tips and used black acrylic for the stripes and spots. I topped it off with Chill Zone top coat.