Before & After: Summer Patchwork

Hello!!


There are only a few more challenges left in the Crumpet Nail Tart's summer challenge, and I'm savoring them as much as I can...It started several months ago, so I guess I should be tired of it by now, but I'm not. It's my first challenge, and I feel like I've grown leaps and bounds through it...I've come up with manicures I never in a million years would have come up with if it hadn't been for these themes. I guess that's the point, lol, but I still can't believe how true it's been. I've tried hard not to miss any challenges because I didn't like the theme or didn't know what to do for them, and have only missed challenges because of time constraints. So, I'm proud of myself on that front, too.

But the point is, this is one of those manicure I never would have put together on my own, at least not when I started this challenge, and my creative aesthetic has changed so much! Today's theme is 'Crops/Fields or Summer Patchwork', and I decided to go with the second half. All of the nails have a different color, so I didn't have a base color to start with. I wanted to do something summery and fun, and here is what I came up with:

Here's how I did it:

1) Used painter's tape to mask off all but just the tip of my ring finger. Painted the bare part and my index finger with China Glaze's Flirty Tankini (told you the other day's post make me want to use it again!). When that was dry, I stamped over it using Sally Hansen White On, and Konad plate m60.

2) Used painter's tape to mask off all but the bottom part of my ring finger. Painted the bare part using Color Club Wink, Wink, Twinkle; also used this to paint the pinkie. When it was dry, I used a dotting tool to dot on White On.

3) Used the tape to mask off half of the middle stripe that was still bare. Painted it (and middle finger) with Barielle's Soul-er Powered.  When it was dry, I stamped on it with Flirty Tankini using Cheeky plate CH16.

4) Painted the final blank spot on the ring finger with Zoya Ivanka.

5) Painted over the seams in the ring finger with White On.

6) Covered everything with Seche Vite.

I wasn't really happy with how the white lines came out on the ring finger; they came out a bit thick and awkward, I think--I should have done them smaller. To try to make them a bit more subtle, I painted over them with Flirty Tankini, but I'm not sure I like that any better:

Maybe the next time I do this technique, I'll just use nail tape over the seams. or leave them visible. Regardless, I love how this came out--it's bright and fun and happy. And I really enjoyed playing around with the colorblocking technique to incorporate stamping into it--it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. :)

Hope you enjoyed it, thanks for looking! Please check out what the other bloggers did, linked below. :)

M.