Glitter Nail Polish – How To

So here’s a little how-to follow up to my last post about glitter nail polish. I happened to find those fabulous colors in a retail store, however I haven’t always been able to find just the right shade.

There is a nail salon nearby that I used to frequent and, if memory serves, it [probably still] has the greatest selection of colors I’ve ever seen. Since I can’t always splurge on a mani-pedi just to get the color I want – and I also actually enjoy painting my own nails – I inquired about purchasing my favorite polishes for home. Unfortunately, they didn’t sell all the colors they stocked in the shop. However, one of the girls who worked there suggested I might make my own.

Surprisingly, it was something I’d never considered. When she recommended using extra fine body glitter, which can be found at a beauty supply store if not in a drug store, it was truly a, “like, duh!” moment. I bought 2 shades of glitter - Hollywood Lights from Cinema Secrets, to be precise – and 2 cheapo bottles of clear polish. In hindsight, as with most polish, the somewhat pricier ones are usually worth a bit more. Just a bit!

Use a rolled piece of paper, or something similar, to help funnel the glitter into the bottle of clear polish. There’s no exact proportion for this, I made sure to use quite a bit because I wanted good coverage. (I hate sparse glitter polish that requires 2 coats just to notice it!) Keep in mind, as with all glitter projects, that this has the potential to get super messy, so put some paper down in case of spills.

That’s it. Just pour glitter into your polish and stir. This could depend on the polish, but I know the glitter in mine tends to settle at the bottom, so you’ll have to make sure to mix it well before using. I wonder if a thicker polish helps suspend the glitter better. I imagine it does, since my store-bought ones don’t have this problem.

So let this be a lesson to you as it was to me- whether with nail polish, or almost anything else, if you can’t buy what you’re looking for, try to make it yourself!

Glittery Nails Make Everything Better

Fact.

It’s been pretty dreary here in LA for the past few days, and the chill and drizzle are quite an odd converse to the 90ºF we hit on Friday. But as gloomy as it may be outside, I’ve been livening things up with my new nail polish!

I’ve considered myself an experienced nail painter since at least the 7th grade. In fact, I remember challenging myself at one point and painting my nails a different color and/or pattern every day for 2 months straight. These days I just hope that my polish makes it through more than a day without chipping so I don’t have to redo them. Don’t get me wrong, I love painting my nails, but all my free time lately is just before bed, and fresh polish + sheets + I swim in my sleep = disaster.

Anyways, this green is not being properly represented in these pictures, and I don’t have the wherewithal to color correct them now that Picnik no longer exists, but they are a brilliant shade of emerald. Think Wizard of Oz, or a box of Thin Mints. The color in the pictures is pretty, but not nearly as vibrant as it looks in person. Boo to that.

So I picked these new colors at Forever 21 over the weekend. (It was weird for me too, those bins by the checkout stands are so dangerous.) When I was a polish novice, I used to think that a couple of coats of glitter shellac were enough to convey a color on their own. Then at some point, when I was older and wiser, I realized that by pairing a glitter polish top coat with a base coat of a solid in a similar hue, the sparkle and color impact would be tenfold. Take my toes for example, in real life they look like the finish on a bowling ball. Epic. (I purchased those colors at Forever 21 as well. They have a solid summer palette! You’ll notice that the teal glitter is finer than the green, and I actually prefer that aesthetically – even though my nails are totally kickass!)

According to the Forever 21 website, the base coat on my fingers is Go Go Green, and the glitter is, cleverly enough, called Green Glitter. For my toes, I used a base of Cobalt Blue, and topped it off with Blue Glitter. (In real life, the labels on both the blue bottles say “blue,” and the green say “green.”)

Having never used it before, here is my review of the polish. The one downfall of this particular brand seems to be that is that it’s super matted, including the glitter, so to get a any shine you’ll need to use a clear top coat. Besides that, I did 2 coats of the solid green, and 2 coats of the glitter. The opaque color coated just fine in one, but I wasn’t sure how the glitter would distribute since it’s not fine, so I wanted to make sure everything was covered. You don’t have to do as many, I get carried away. On the major plus side – surprising with what I thought would be a very cheap polish, and despite the fact that there are so many layers – they still haven’t chipped, and it’s been over 3 days! (knock on wood.)

So there you have it. If the gloom has got you down, shake up your regular nail routine and pair your matte colors with a cop coat of matching glitter. Now you too can spend your dreary days like I do – grinning stupidly at my nails every time they catch my eye.

Oh, hello there!

Some of you may already know me as that girl who putters around the kitchen, but my first love will always be arts and crafts. In the spirit of my recent, burgeoning creativity (thank you, Pinterest), I have decided to start a separate blog to highlight some of my non-baking creations. Basically, I wanted a forum to show off all the fun stuff I can make with other mediums.

My love of arts and crafts has been around since as long as I can remember. I’m pretty sure that in every home I’ve lived in since childhood, there is a blue stain on the carpet (or couch…) from some rogue acrylic paint. (My current apartment is no exception.) On this blog, I will showcase all different kinds of artwork, from painted nails to painted canvases, my extensive collection of stickers and glitter, and anything else I find pretty. While some entries will be pictures of pieces I’ve made in the past, I also anticipate posting some how-tos of all the projects I’ve tucked away and have yet to make.

For my first ever post on They Call Me Crafty, I have chosen to display the two paintings below – the oldest paintings of mine that I have in my home. I kind of thought the first was likely painted with tempera or acrylic on a 9 x 12″ canvas board, but it actually looks a lot like water color. I can’t remember, and can’t really tell. Anyway, it’s a painting of a house I grew up in, painted in an art class I took at a local community college probably when I was 8 or 9. We moved in 1993, so all I know is that the painting has to be from before then, but isn’t dated.

The second painting is acrylic on a 9 x 12″ canvas board, and was created while I was at summer camp, and is dated 1995. I was, and still am, pretty proud of the job I did with shading.

I look forward to sharing more of my artistic endeavors with you, both past and present. Thanks for joining me on what promises to be a sometimes sparkly, but always colorful adventure.