Pick N Mix Week 15 - Dotting Tools / Pink & Aqua

I'm really fond of odd colour combinations. Orange and blue, purple and green (Hulk smash), and pink and aqua.

Alas, my aqua turned out a little more green that I wanted.

Pick N Mix Nails Catch up post!

Apologies for my absence, the holidays are always super busy in the Painted Claws household.

Instead of doing a series of posts for my catch up manis for the 52 week challenge, I'm putting them together in one giant post!

Pick N Mix Week 8 - Book / Brown

I tried desperately to think of a not massively popular book series to do and failed miserably which is such a let down as I read loads and loads of books. So I went for brown, which is a bit of an under-represented colour in the polish world.

Pick N Mix Week 7 - Wild Animals / Yellow

I am a secret lover of yellow nails. Painted yellow, not just stained from too much polish yellow. I think they look super summery as long as you find the right tone of yellow for your skin. If you pick the wrong one you tend just make your hands - and thus by extension, yourself - look a little ill.

I tried this mani first with pastel yellow and had to change it - I liked the colour, but a) I wasn't sure if it liked me, and b) it got totally overpowered by the dark grey.

Pick N Mix Week 6 - Domestic Animals / 3 shades of blue

Late post this week and I do apologise - work has been super hectic and its been all that I could do to keep awake for tea before falling asleep on the couch.

This is what should have been posted last week, which was domestic animals OR 3 shades of blue.

I went with 3 shades of blue.

Pick N Mix Week 3 - 60s / Matte or Texture

I'm really cheesed off about this week - I did have an awesome monochrome 60s geometric mani done, I even wore it to work for a week.... then I forgot I hadn't photographed it and took it off to do my nails for a night out.

When I realised I'd not actually done any photos I could have actually kicked myself - it took ages to do all the taping and painting.

I then remembered that I'd just gotten the three new matte Silks from the BarryM winter release and I was busting to try out Forest. How could I resist?

Pick N Mix Week 2 -3 colour Gradient / Pink

Week 2 of the Pick N Mix challenge, and the prompts this week are 3 colour gradient and Pink.

My nails aren't really long enough for 3 colour gradients at the moment - I cut them right back when I went on holiday at the end of august and they've been quite slow in growing. I also have quite short nail beds, so its not the best.

Instead of a 3 colour gradient including pink, I went for a pink ombre - I have far more pinks than I thought I did!

Pick N Mix Week 1 - Teal / 2 Colour Gradient

My first post of the epic 52 week Pick N Mix challenge!

The prompts for the first week of the challenge are teal and 2 colour gradient. This being a pick and mix challenge, we get to mix up these prompts and use one or the other prompts - or both!

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 17 - Steel Type

I'm nearly at the end of the Gen II pokemon journey, which makes me both sad and excited. Sad, because I'm almost done, and excited because I totally can't wait to do Gen III in the new year! Stay tuned for more details in the next month on that one, but first - the last type group of the challenge, Steel.

Steel was one of the new types introduced in Gen II, along with Dark, and its another of the types that I don't really use often. Some existing Gen I pokemon were retyped as dual-type to include steel, so I've gone for one of these this week...

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 16 - Dark Type

Dark was first introduced as a type in Gen II, and since then theres usually at least one pokemon in my party that knows a dark-type move as its so strong against psychic.

I'm quite fond of all of the dark type pokemon introduced in Gen II, but very little beats an eeveelution.

Umbreon!

Hallowe'en 2013 - Trick or Treat

Mmmm candy.

Now to be perfectly honest, I was a bit stuck on what to do for all five nails. You see - I never went round knocking on doors and demanding tasty treats as a child. We just straight up asked for cash. We never really got that much, or at least not much per house - perhaps 20p or so - but as a small child that might as well be a fortune. In fact, I can only remember being given something edible once, and that was because the very nice man in the house had just cooked cupcakes but had no change left.

Hallowe'en 2013 - Gothic

Slightly delayed Hallowe'en post - unfortunately I've been a bit under the weather the past week and a bit so nail were put on a bit of a back burner whilst I attempted to sleep it off.

Hallowe'en 2013 prompt 4 - Gothic

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 15 - Ghost

I love Ghost pokemon. Mostly I'm big on Ghastly, but Gen II brought in one of my other big favourites - Misdreavus.

Hallowe'en 2013 - Things that go BUMP in the Night...

What better to go bump in the night than...

Frankenstein's Monster!

Hallowe'en 2013 - Pumpkins & Jack O'Lanterns

I'm terrible at pumpkin carving, mainly because I hate the smell of pumpkin! Not the best at Hallowe'en, but I love looking at other people's carved pumpkins - some of them are absolute works of art!

Mine, however, are slightly childish. Like my actual pumpkins would be!

Hallowe'en 2013 - Scary Movies

This was a bad prompt to pick.

I'm terrible with scary movies - heck, I was terrified by The Little Mermaid as a child - so I went for the most Hallowe'en appropriate film I knew... Nightmare before Christmas.

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 14 - Dragon

This round posed a small problem - there was only one new Dragon pokemon introduced in Gen II, which was the water/dragon type Kingdra. But its not cute or derpy looking, so it clearly wasn't going on my nails haha.

So back a generation I had to go, for Dratini!

Hallowe'en Challenge

I kinda thought about taking a break from challenges for a little while after the end of the Extra Relaxed 31 Day Challenge ended, but seemingly I just can't get enough.

Kitty's Painted Claws and Racho's Nail Love are proud to bring you.... Hallowe'en 2013!

A challenge running three days a week - tuesday, thursday and saturday - in the run up to Hallowe'en. If you fancy joining in, come join us at the Nail Art Challengez facebook group and join in!

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 13 - Bug

Yet another pokemon type I don't use, or like.

Bug type are so annoying, with their paralysis and sleep and poison attacks!

There's one bug pokemon you just don't mess with though...

Shuckle.

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 12 - Ice

Ice is yet another pokemon type I don't use (unlness there's a dragon pokemon trainer in the elite four). I'm such a simple soul when it comes to pokemon, haha. So this week's pokemon is another in the "aww isn't it cute" category - Swinub.

I used swinub as an excuse to try out my new BarryM Matte in Mocha, which comes out as a beautiful milk chocolate colour with a great waxy finish. Two coats were used in the nails above, however I totally could have gotten away with one as its such a pigmented polish and it dries lightning fast.

The glitter used for the snow on my other nails is OPI Pirouette my Whistle which looks awesome matted, I love it.

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