Fifty Shades of Gray or Grey

Do I have any intention of seeing, let alone reading Fifty Shades of Gray?  No, I don't.  It is not really. . . my cup of tea.  If you want to see or read it, more power to you.  What is my "cup of tea," is the plethora of gray manicures that have become popular due to its eminent cinematic release (Now there is 100 dollar phrase if I ever saw one).  I saw one released by OPI (Which I now can't find), and I thought, hey I could take that up a notch.

Since I don't have the original design you can't see how took it up a notch, but trust me I  did.  The original design had all solid colors, but for my design I used Betina B-07 to get the heart design.

I don't own the OPI colors, so I made use of what I had.  The colors are, in no particular oder, Julep Braiden, Sally Hansen Big Smoky Top Coat, Konad Special Black, China Glaze Concrete Catwalk, Elephant Walk, Merry Berry, and Pelican Gray.

Julep Braiden is a matte texture polish, but it doesn't soak up top coat like other texture polishes do, so when I put a top coat on it the cool difference between it and the shiny red heart was no longer apparent, so I used Essise Matte About You to make it matte again and then put top coat only on the heart.

I hope you like my Fifty Shades of Gray manicure.  It is simple, but I love it anyways.

Tootles!
Fitz

Pop! Six! Squish! Uh uh, Cicero, Lipschitz!

I have a co-worker and friend who loves is obsessed with Elvis Presley.  She gave me a CD of her favorite Elvis song.  I was looking at the list and when seeing Heartbreak Hotel and Jail Hose Rock, this design of a heart behind bars came to mind.  But I was missing how that fit into a theme and when talking to my Mom, she brought up Cell Block Tango from Chicago.  So I thought of blood splatter on my other nails.

The colors I used were Nina Ultra Pro French White, China Glaze Red Satin,  Merry Berry, Concrete Catwalk, and Elephant Walk.  I tried to highlight and shadow a bit and mixed colors to get the light and dark.

So the blood splatter nails. . . The first time I did them was with a Bundle Monster stamping plate and Konad Special Red.  It didn't turn out.  So I tried again trying to splatter it with a straw.  Well, the straw didn't work at all.  I think I needed to use a stir-stick straw, rather than the regular one I used. . . So I ended up dry brushing it on.  I am still not happy with it, but I had no other ideas.  Eh.

I am really rather proud of this.  I know the highlights on the bars could be a bit more subtle, but I still love it.

I am not sure if this constitutes a Valentine's Day design, but will just it does.  You know the extreme negative Valentine manicure.

Tootles!
Fitz