Nail Tutorial Prettiness (the facebook album)

So I’ve been working on the facebook page. Mostly just updating from posts here to there and sharing awesome quotes from Sevenly and others. One new thing I’ve added is a Nail Album. It’s called Nail Tutorial Prettiness, if you want to check it out. The idea is to post finished pics from the tutorials and their corresponding links to the how-to. I also want to post idea pics to the album so that people can comment if they want a tutorial…. just a thought. Anyways, check it out and let me know what you think!

Acrylic Nail Tutorial: Coffee Stripes and Chocolate

Hey peoples! For this nail tutorial, I’ve tried to make it a little more pinterest friendly so there is a longer photo at the end with all the steps :) After I had finished painting this particular design, my brothers informed me that my fingers looked like I had committed M&M murder. After another look from this perspective, I have to agree with them haha!

~~~ Ingredients ~~~

• Paint Brush
• Cup of Water
• Paper plate to mix colors on
• Clear Coat
• White Acrylic
• Brown Acrylic
• Paper towl

~~~ Instructions ~~~

1. Paint your nails with a clear coat. This sets the base for the nail design and protects your finger nails.

2. Paint your nails the brown color of choice. As many coats as you think necessary. I have a cheaper brown paint so it took about three to get the coverage I wanted. I didn’t mix it any lighter or darker, mostly because I really love the chocolate brown color I had. Very pretty :D

3. Once that was dry, I did something a little different this time: painted my clear coat on all my nails, including the accent. I did this by accident at first. I only meant to paint 4 of my fingers, but got a little carried away and before I realized, my ring finger was completely painted. You can either clear coat them all now or skip to the next step. (Sorry I didn’t get a picture. You can tell from the next one that the other fingers are clear coated.)

4. Once the clear coat is dry (or paint if you skipped that step), it’s time for your accent nail. I mixed a little of the brown with some white to make a very nice coffee color. Then I put two stripes on my accent nail.

5. Let the paint dry and then clear coat over all the nails with exposed acrylic paint. For me, that was only my ring fingers.

6. When the clear coat is dry (I used a hair dryer to speed up the process), you can then wash your hands with soap and water to remove the excess acrylic paint from your hands. I love that it cleans up so nicely!!

Have fun with it!! I’d love to see your nail designs, so feel free to pingback, comment or even post them on my facebook page. I’m looking forward to seeing them!

Anddddd as promised, here’s my pinterest friendly picture :)

Giving. It’s the new black.

This post is dedicated to Sevenly. I love Sevenly. I love what they do. I love the causes they support. I love what they stand for. I love that they are changing the world. I love that they let me (and you if you want) change the world with them.

Sevenly is all about giving. AND I love that. So give. Not for praise, adoration, recognition, or acceptance. Give because it’s right. Give because that is something that binds us together. Everyone can give. I give time a lot because it is more readily available. I don’t have much money to give, but I still give it too. Give love. Give hope. Give grace. Give peace. Give laughter. Just GIVE!!! You might just change the world.

Acrylic Nail Tutorial: Gray Business

Hey peoples! This is another acrylic nail art tutorial. Unfortunately I was in a hurry on Friday and didn’t make a video of my nail painting. I could have, but I would have seemed overkill to me since this one is pretty easy. It is basically two coats of gray sandwiched between two clear coats. The hardest part was mixing the color to get the one I wanted. I also didn’t use an accent nail this time. Don’t get me wrong.. I love accent nails, but it just didn’t seem business appropriate for this occasion. Plus, tomorrow I have my professional meet and greet and I didn’t want to have to redo my nails for it :)

~~~ Gray Business Nail Tutorial ~~~
Materials:
Acrylic paint (I used a gray and white)
Clear nail polish
Paint brush
Water (to rinse brushes)
Cloth to wipe brushes on (I use a paper towel)
Plate, paper, board, or something else to mix colors on and put paint on

Instructions:

1) First add a clear coat to your nails. This gives the acrylic something to stick to and it protects your nail. I used a clear strengthener coat. Be sure to let it dry before you move on to the next step.

2) Then it’s time to mix your colors. Add a little dot of gray (or black depending on how dark you want to go) and white to your plate. Blend them together until you get the color you want. You might want to make a good amount of this color so that you don’t run out. I ran out three times. Luckily, I’ve been color blending since my mom let me first play with paint (19-20 years ago) so I’ve had good practice on matching colors I wanted.

3) Once you’ve got the color you want, it’s time to cover your nails. Don’t worry about messes because the acrylic washes off wonderfully. It’s one of the reasons that I like acrylic nail painting soooooo much more than plain nail polish. Mistake recovery is easy!

4) Once you’ve covered your nails with one or two coats of paint, it’s time for your clear coat. This is the time to make sure your nails are the way you want them to be. Cover with a clear coat. Be careful here. I did take off a bit of the paint on Friday while clear coating. Probably because I was in a hurry to finish before the recruiting picnic. Nevertheless, make sure you don’t rub the nail polish bristles too hard because paint WILL come off. It only happened on one finger… maybe because I slowed down after that :)

5) After your clear coat has dried, wash your hands really well. This will take off the extra acrylic paint, leaving a very nice looking nail job.

~~~

I really like the gray color. It looks great with my suit and professional tops. AND it looks good with my turquoise skinny jeans. Gotta have variety :) Feel free to pin it and view the rest of my nail inspirations/tutorials on my Nailed board on pinterest.

Acrylic Nail Tutorial: Glow-in-the-Dark

Hey peoples! This is another acrylic nail art tutorial. I meant to post it yesterday, but I made a tankini instead ;) I’ve made two ways to view this tutorial. You can read the instructions and view pictures OR you can scroll to the end and watch the youtube video. Your choice. I like having options in tutorials so I thought I’d share the same courtesy.

~~~ Glow-in-the-Dark Nail Tutorial ~~~
Materials:
Acrylic “Glow” paint – I used Green Glow by FolkArt
Clear nail polish
Paint brush
Water (to rinse brushes)
Cloth to wipe brushes on (I use a paper towel)
Plate, paper, board, or something else to mix colors on and put paint on

Instructions:

1) First add a clear coat to your nails. This gives the acrylic something to stick to and it protects your nail. I used a clear strengthener coat. Be sure to let it dry before you move on to the next step.

Acrylic Nail Art Tutorial: Sea Foam Green

Somewhere I saw the idea of using acrylic paint on nail polish followed by a top coat to paint your nails. It was probably either pinterest or youtube. It’s probably also pinned on my Nailed board for nail art, but that’s beside the point.

The point is I tried it out last Saturday and it works!! I was so surprised!! It’s such a good idea too. Imagine the cost that can be saved. Instead of many bottles of shades of one color nail polish, all I needed were bottles of black, white, and some other color (all of which were bought for under $1… take that nail polish people!) to get every shade imaginable of that color! Oh the possibilities make me happy :) The clean up is nice too. Soap and water and all the extra color on my hands is gone. Super fast. And the paint dries quickly. And it is durable. And if I mess up mid-painting, a little water lets me start over. And it doesn’t smell as bad. And it’s pretty. And….. you get the point.

~~~ Tutorial ~~~

Materials:
Acrylic paint (there is an endless range of colors, glitter paints, glow-in-the-dark paints, neons, etc.. check them out and get creative)
Clear nail polish
Paint brush
Water (to rinse brushes)
Cloth to wipe brushes on (I use a paper towel)
Plate, paper, board, or something else to mix colors on and put paint on

Instructions:

1) First add a clear coat to your nails. This gives the acrylic something to stick to and it protects your nail. I used a clear strengthener coat. Be sure to let it dry before you move on to the next step.

Hair Chalking Redo Tutorial

This is another how-to on hair chalking :)

~~~ Tutorial ~~~
First prepare to have dirty hands, but no worries because they clean up quickly!

Materials:

• Water (spray bottle, sink, bucket, etc… just need a way to get it on the hair. I used my hand.)
• Soft Pastels (don’t use oil pastels, as they will make your hair nasty, or sidewalk chalk since it won’t stick)
• Towel (only if putting heat near someone’s face)
• Straightener or Hair Dryer (flat iron works best and you just wipe it off when done)

Instructions:

1) Wet the hair completely.

2) Pick a section of hair. It is best to use small portions. Rub the pastel in a downward direction. Keep rubbing down. If you start rubbing up the hair, it will take the pastel back off. If the pastel isn’t sticking, try wetting the actual pastel stick to get more pigment. I also found that rubbing the long side of the pastel down the hair left more pigment than the small drawing end. Scroll down to see how to do ombre, if you like that look.

Graphic Tee DIY (with bleach and a fabric pen)

I got the idea for bleach tees off pinterest. But first a warning about the post:

Warning! This post contains a ridiculous amount of pictures. Some of these images may contain mustaches, llamas and Darth Vader.

Well, that’s the warning :) I promised a bleach tee tutorial and this is it!

Materials (at least the ones I used):

• shirt of some kind
• design, preferably a clever and entertaining one ;)
• bleach or bleach pen
• fabric pen
• freezer paper
• x-acto knives
• iron
• sink with cold water
• pen or pencil
• cutting board
• cardboard

Instructions:

1) Find or create a design. These are my designs. I created all of them except the Alice in Wonderland one :)

Batman via Twitter

Making Batman bleach tees tomorrow because I'm cool like that #batman #bleachtees #causeimbatman

— Lauren Kaylor (@laurenichole89) August 11, 2012

I’ll try to take pics so you can see how we made them. The inspiration tees are pinned under Geeked, if you want to check them out :) Have you ever made a bleach tee before?

Update: The tutorial for the bleach tees I made are here. And yes, one says “Cause I’m Batman” in a deep raspy amazing voice :D