Alice in Wonderland

A friend hosted a Mad Hatter's party a while ago, which opened a great opportunity for design. It was first suggested that I should try something like this one, but that felt like a challenge way above my skills. The regular research started and I fell for this as the source of inspiration. Whilst I didn't have any pearls or other decorations for the 3D effect much of it could be done with the much trusted toothpick and a black nail art pen. 

As a base I've used Loreal's French Riviera, a lovely colour but tricky to work with. It definitely requires at least two layers and is sometimes hard to paint even with. It also takes a while to dry, so at the end of the day it's a fair amount of effort for the colour compared to many others!

 All the black details were done using the tip of the nail art pen from TopShop, white was done with a mixture of the normal brush and toothpick to get the edges right (circles are tricky!) and the eyes were done using the home made dotter. The cat is meant to be Cheshire cat that can make itself invisible.

Unfortunately, I only got around to taking pictures when the design was falling apart, hence the index finger looking a bit messed up. As you can see I deviate a bit from the original design by changing the bow tie for the smiling cat and the hat. Especially since I didn't have the physical decorations it ended up as a good compromise. 

Index fingers were time consuming and the base layer's drying time but still think I completed it in 1.5h! 

Leopard nails

Did you know that leopard dots were Gema's first design? I think it was about a year ago she tried it out, but I haven't got around to it until now. Why I don't know, I got distracted along the way.

The reason I decided to do them now was thatI wanted a fairly neutral design for when starting a new job. I've been told that many companies wouldn't be too happy with their employees using their digits as mini-canvases but luckily that is not often the case in engineering. 

The base colour I'm using is Mint Choc Chip by 17, a lovely colour but not very good quality - it chips easily. For the dots I used our beloved pin (from sewing kit) and then I drew around them with a permanent marker. As I applied the topcoat the marker smudged a lot more than I expected, which worried me, but at the end of the day it actually helped the design.

Pastel colours are also a great way of reminding yourself of the upcoming (sometimes visible) spring!