Spring Challenge - Bugs

Hi everybody! It's time for another installment of the Spring Challenge created by the lovely Mateja at Purple Glitters. For all the rules and info, you can go to the great write-up she did right here because I am horrible at explaining things.

Today's theme is bugs. When I first started looking at nail art online, I was always amazed at the butterfly manicure. I knew one day I wanted to try it and with a theme of bugs how could I resist? But I didn't want to do just the same butterfly wing everywhere, I wanted to try to make it a bit different. Enter my inspiration, this manicure by Wickless & Polished, who also drew inspiration from the amazing videos by Tartofraises.

Just a warning to you all, this ended up in a total failure. I am very not pleased with my results but I know exactly where I went wrong, so I will post it as a what not to do :P The color combo I had left was pink and orange. No big deal, pink to orange gradient was applied without major incident. Then the acrylic paint came out and it all went downhill. Protip #1: Make sure you have the right size brush. None of my paint brushes are actually for nail art and so they of course aren't the right size. My smallest was still leaving very thick trails and it was very sad. I had to go back with a toothpick to scratch some away but it just made it worse. Plus I ended up covering most of what was a pretty nice gradient I had going. Protip #2: For the love of chocolate let it dry before you apply top coat. I am such an impatient person. This coupled with the fact that I am at the bottom super spazzy part of a bottle of Seche Vite and you can see for yourselves what happens. Learn from me, people. On to the horror show...

Polishes used:

• Sinful Colors base coat / Seche Vite top coat
• Sally Hansen First Blush (lightest pink)
• Sally Hansen I Pink I Can (medium pink)
• Sinful Colors Hazard (dark coral pink)
• Pure Ice Hot Tamale (orange)
• Assorted acrylic paints (black/white/orange/pink)

Color Combinations

Pink and Green

Blue and Purple

Yellow and Green

Orange and Pink
Rainbow

Check out what all the other wonderful ladies on this challenge did!

Mateja

Taya

Ducky from I Love Pretty Colours

Sue from Creative Nail Design by Sue

Kat from Hooked On Polish

Kelly-Ann from Nail Art by Kelly-Ann

Riley from Pinky To Thumb

Aylin from Posh Nail Art

Brianna from Welcome to Brianna's World

Aurora from World of Happy Nails

Mateja D from Mateji Ustvarjata

The Nail Buff

Moonchild

Anna

Colorful Bottle

Thalie from Glazed Talons

Hema from Rainbow Nails

Ladyflower123

Nail Crazy

Mimi from Mimi's Vanity Box

After being so unhappy with my attempts I tried several other ideas and just ended up making my cuticles very angry with all the polish remover and myself very tired and cranky. Protip #3: Plan ahead so you don't frustrate yourself for no good reason. If I had followed my own advice, I would have seen I didn't have the proper tools to attempt this and I would have given myself a good backup plan and time to actually execute it. In the end, lessons were learned. Not a total failure, right? After all this I'm gonna go put on a solid creme and just appreciate a nice two coats of polish.

If you made it this far thanks for reading! Come back for the last installment of the challenge on Monday (April 30th), rainbow day. I WILL REDEEM MYSELF!