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.

Christmas... Unicorns?

*** Some of the items in this post were provided free of charge for honest review ***

Unicorns are Christmas-y, right?

Ah, who cares. Unicorns are good any time of year.

Pardon my funny coloured hands, I have circulation problems and it gets cold in Casa de Painted Claws!

Monochrome Party Nails

*** Some of the items in this post were provided free of charge for honest review ***

Born Pretty Store kindly provided a few items to me for review in the middle of last month - this is the first of 3 posts showing you these items and how I've chosen to show them off.

Nub Club - Tree in the Snow

I'm trying to pack the nub nail art in before Christmas, and this was something I was intending to do on my larger nails before my de-clawing.

Little Christmas tree!

Nub Club - Christmas Reindeer

A few weeks ago I bought some gorgeous little deer charms from She Sells Seashells, but there was one little problem - my talons were (at the time) too big for them! I was devastated. The poor things would have just looked completely lost on my nails.

So the nail breakage was kinda good, as it means I can finally get my cute little (rein)deers on to my nails!

Apologies, and some Winter Sparkle

My apologies for the almost three week silence here on Kitty's Painted Claws - Winter hasn't been awesome so far as I've been super run down. I have, however,  managed to get a few mani's done in between bouts of coughing my lungs up or other things and I nearly exploded with glee when I got my first MoYou London Festive plate for stamping.

As you saw in the last post, I bought myself quite a few MoYou London stamping plates recently and I totally couldn't resist picking up one of the new Festive collection - specifically plate 02, the one with all the snowflakes. I'd put up a link directly to the plate but... its sold out. As it has been pretty much since it was released - it's been that popular.

Tara's Talons & Pocket Money Polishes Snow White Duos

I picked up these gorgeous pairs of polishes from two of my favourite indie makers - Tara of Tara's Talons and Charlie of Pocket Money Polishes when they released their limited edition Snow White duos a while back. Originally I only intended to get one, but in the end I was paralysed by choice and bought the two I couldn't decide between, which was the best option I could have gone for.

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.

ER31DC Week 24 - Inspired by a Book

... or a series of books.

My first fandom was Sailormoon. I'm a massive kid when it comes to this anime, I love it to bits!

Pokemon Challenge Gen II, Round 1

Welcome to the first week of the Pokemon Challenge Gen II!

The first round is Normal type pokemon, and this round I picked....

ER31DC Week 19 - Galaxy Nails

Oh my word these were a right faff on. Don't even think they've come out that well, but I'm a heinous perfectionist that is unhappy unless I'm absolutely perfect on the first try, so not much to worry about there.

ER31DC Week 16 - Tribal Print

I managed to get the last of the new BarryM summer Gellies last weekend, so I figured what better way to break all five of them in then in a tribal print?

Stamping Attempt #2 - Flowers

As well as getting the hang of leopard print this weekend, I figured I'd give stamping yet another go.

I've only ever managed one set of stamping that hasn't come out as a complete and utter mess, and that was for my 31 day week challenge Blue mani. Clearly blue is my lucky colour when it comes to stamping, as I've managed once again to get something that doesn't look like a complete fail on to my nails.

Spring/summer/the slightly warmer season has arrived in Newcastle with a vengeance this weekend, resulting in a frenzy of sandals buying and skirt wearing. I decided to try out a couple of floral full nail designed from the two Bundle Monster sets I have, more specifically with plates BM306 on my thumb, BM318 on my middle finger and BM16 on my pinky, all stamped in Sinful Colors Snow Me White over L'oreal Color Riche 611, Sky fits Heaven.

ER31DC Week 11 - Polka Dots

The very first post on this blog was a polka dot mani, many moons ago (Ok, it was only in January, but it feels like ages.). I didn't even have dotting tools back then, I just did the dots freehand with a little paintbrush I pilfered from my Other Half's miniatures painting kit. I love the cute, vaguely retro look of a dotticure.

I decided to use my two newest additions to my stash - A England's St George and Morgan Le Fay, courtesy of Chloe on the Facebook group UK Only Polish & Beauty Swaps (I love this group but its totally tempting to bankrupt me!).

I'm so glad I have dotting tools now, doing this with a paintbrush is so hard, haha.

Swatched: KBShimmer Lottie Dottie

I eyeballed this polish for absolutely ages before I eventually got over myself and bought it. Prior to this I'd not really been too fond of white nails, and thus the wash of white based glitters that swept through the indie polish collections over the winter left me a bit puzzled. I came to realise that I actually had nothing against them apart from the fact that I never had worn white as a main colour on my nails.

BarryM Nail Art Pens

When I saw that BarryM were releasing a line of nail art pens I was over the moon. I have shaky hands with a brush, and doodling on your nails with a little pen is miles easier. I remember having nail art pens when I was younger that had an almost needle like point, and I remember finding them quite easy to use.

The BarryM pens are slightly different, with tips that are more like felt tip pens. When you first get them you have to pump the nib like a metallic pen to get the polish flowing, but after that you just doodle all over your nails to your heart's content.

I got black, white and silver, but there is also a pink available

I have to say that they work slightly better on matte nails than shiny, mainly because the matte surface gives them more to grip on to then the smooth finish of a gloss polish.

As you can see on the picture, I graffiti'ed on my nice black and white 31 day challenge nails to try these out on the various finishes. The lines are lovely and thin and (to me anyway) much easier to control than a brush.

Expect to see lots more of these pens coming soon, I absolutely love them! I really hope they bring out a couple more colours (blue/turquoise please if anyone is listening!)

Please note I didn't receive these for review, I bought them when I really shouldn't have because I'm on a no-buy! Hahaha!

ER31DC Week 7 - Black and White

This is a terribly conveniently timed week. I am over the moon.

I live in Newcastle Upon Tyne, where the local religion is football (or soccer to any Americans). Twice yearly we must vanquish the savages from the next city, and the next fixture is sunday.

Newcastle United play in black and white stripes, so my nails this week are dedicated to my football loving other half and his religion.

Pokemon Challenge Week 12 - Ice

A week late, but last week's attempt wasn't fit to be shown to humans and then work got in the way. This weekend I have a long weekend, so I figured I'd better get them done eventually.

Didn't do so great.

Last week I tried Dewgong. This time I tried to go for Cloyster.  Didn't do very well on either run.

Background is Sinful Colors Snow Me White, topped on four out of five fingers with an un-named glitter from a Color Club pack of minis. Cloyster is painted in Revlon No Shrinking Violet, BarryM Grey and Models Own Pro Jack's Black.

There are no close ups, I'm not proud of this one.

ER31DC - Week 2

Ah ha! Caught up.

Week 2 is Orange, a colour I was always convinced I didn't suit until I stopped being afraid of wearing anything that wasn't black. I love orange on nails, and I'm pondering doing a super 70's orange/white/brown mani at some point because that is one of my favourite colour combos ever.

I decided to do an orange skittle as I really couldn't decide what I wanted to do or which orange I wanted to do it with. I found I had quite a few different oranges today, ranging from quite pastel to pretty damn in-your-face.

Snow!

It snowed, this week. For England, it snowed lots. At the worst point our street was about half a foot deep in snow, which I'm sure doesn't sound like much to inhabitants of Northern Europe or the northern end of North America, we're far more used to just being wet.

So, in honour of the odd weather - snowy nails!

These really were the product of a sunday trapped in the house by the weather. Both the snow and the snowman (who I have named Armand for some reason) were painted free hand with my teeny little paintbrush. The brush I'm using at the moment is just something we had lying around the house as the other half used to paint Warhammer miniatures - its a Citadel standard with shortish bristles so not much good for nice neat stripes but not bad for spots and actual painting.

Colours used were George Quick Drying Nail Varnish in Dazzle for the main colour, BarryM white for the snow, and little bits of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Rapid Red, Models Own Pro Jack's Black and BarryM Block Orange for the snowman's details - yes, he even has an orange carrot nose.

I have to admit that the main colour is just a cheap polish I bought ages ago for £1 from Asda, but it turned out to be an absolutely gorgeous shimmery navy. Formula for the polish itself is a little on the gloopy side, but that may be because I've left it while a while before I used it.