Valentine's day mani #1

A few weeks ago I bought a bunch of Joby nail decals for the upcoming holidays -- Valentine's day, St. Patrick's day, and Easter. They looked really cute when they arrived, and I had a few ideas for Valentine's day manicures. Why just have one manicure for the holiday, right?

This is the decal set I used. Holiday Set Valentine #2:

I used China Glaze Winter Berry and some scotch tape for an angled quasi-French tip. And Art Deco gold glitter for the stripe. OMGOSH I can't even begin to tell you how much I love the Art Deco striping brush. It's made my attempts into nail art easier.

I also attempted a marble water on my ring finger as an accent, but I failed spectacularly at it!


Winter Berry is a lush color. It's richly pigmented and you really only need one coat to get maximum coverage. Two darkens it into this rich deep red. Clean up is a nightmare, though. Red is not forgiving when you make a mistake. It also dries super glossy even without a topcoat.

Here are some photos of my outcome. It didn't turn out quite how I had it in my head. As for the decals they work best on polished nails, instead of the half-natural I had. So I have some corner lift on them, but so far they're staying put with a coat of Seche Vite. I also put a few of the decals on upside down. But this was my very first attempt. I'm still learning so I'm okay with this outcome!

This one is my favorite even though I smudged the heck out of it.

My failed watermarble on my ring finger.

You can see some of the decal lift on my middle finger. I put it on horizontally instead of vertically.

Please forgive my horribly dry cuticles. Right after I took these photos I slathered on some oil and lotion.

My first water marble

Hello everyone!

So after obsessively watching SimpleLittlePleasures and her perfect water marble skills, I decided to try my hand at it. I didn't take photos of the process because I fail. This was my outcome.

The colors I used were: Alpine Snow as my base color. My bulls-eye consisted of OPI Fly, Khloe had a little Lam Lam (which is a gorgeous color), and Re-fresh mint. Then I did a coat of Servin up Sparkle.


Initially I was only going to do an accent finger but I fell in love with how it looked and did them all.

I  got a lot of compliments on this. I even had someone ask me where I got my nails done(!!!!).


Things I learned:

   - Nail polish eats through Styrofoam. I had a drop sink to the bottom of the cup, and it ate a hole through it. So halfway through my water marble I had a lap full of water. Not fun!

  - Glitter hides all flaws. that's why I used Serving up Sparkle. It distracts away from the mistakes I made.

  - Next time I'd use the lighter (or darker) color that I marbled with instead of white.


  - It was easier to do than I imagined and I can't wait to try it again.