Nail Art Experimenting.. Water Color Nail Art With Markers!

Hi everyone! So the other day I was sitting on the floor trying to see if I could think up a new nail art technique that no one had done before. Then, my eyes wandered to the other side of the room, where I had a bunch of markers sitting out from when I had been drawing, and I had an idea. No, I did not paint my nails just with marker, although I did have fun doing that as a kid. I was thinking of the times where I had drawn on a smooth surface and didn't wait long enough before running my finger over it, and it smudged. I started wondering, what if I could do something like that on my nails to make a cool water color effect?

The answer is yes ladies and gentleman, yes I can. Here's what to do if you want to try this,

1. Paint 1 coat of white polish on your nails (I used Sinful Colors White on White. You can use another coat if it looks really streaky, but be careful, because you're going to use a whole bunch of top coat and you don't want your mani to be really thick.)

2. Paint on a coat of your favorite shiny top coat. (I used Out The Door)

3. Let dry COMPLETELY. (This is important because the next step will dent the top coat if it's not totally dry)

4. Use a marker of your choice to draw on your nails. Leave plenty of white space. I chose to draw chevrons. Make sure you press to get as much marker ink as possibly on your nail.

5. Before the marker ink has any time to draw, quickly paint over it with top coat. Press down with the brush to really pull the marker color through. You might have to go over places twice to get even coverage. 

It took some trial and error to get this right. I drew some nail shapes on paper and covered it with tape to try it on that first. Then I could see which colors and which markers worked best. I found that dark colors and permanent markers worked the best, because they are more pigmented and have a stronger, more visible water color effect, although crayola markers worked too if you want a more subtle effect anyway. You also want to work fast with the top layer of top coat, because if you don't two things could happen. One is that the marker ink will dry and you won't be able to get good streaks of color, or even coverage, and the other is that the top coat you already put on will start to dry and will smear, which doesn't look good.

So, what do you think? If you like it, try it for yourself. Let's see if we can start a trend! If this does catch on, I vote to call the art made with this technique "Marker Manis". :)

Despicable Me Minions Nail Art

Hi everyone! So..first i'd like to give you an update about whats been going on in my life. For the next few months i'm going to be working with my aunt. She's a kindergarten teacher, and everyday I've been helping in her classroom. It's a lot of hard work, but I love the kids and the job. Plus it will give me great experience for when I go to college and start studying early childhood education.
So..for the first day of school I was thinking about what I could put on my nails. I wanted to do some cute nail art, with something that would appeal to kids. So..I thought of doing this.

Minion nails! I've seen some people do them before, so I decided to put a little bit of my own twist on it. Instead of making a minion on all of my nails, I made one on my accent nails and spelled out "Bah Nah Nah" across the others others. This was inspired by the minions love of bananas, and of the song that they sing in the Despicable Me 2 trailer.

I even made a little banana on my thumb. Also, I apologize for the slightly less than appealing background in my pictures. I haven't quite located a good place to take pictures up here in Maryland yet. 

So..what do you think? I'm pretty proud of myself because this is my first nail art involving letters(Not counting the XOXO in my textured valentine nail art). Yay for milestones! :)