Studs

This was inspired by a bag that I saw in a shop. (By inspired, I mean I totally copied the pattern.) It was a white faux leather bag with colourful fabric circles fastened onto its face with silver studs. I almost bought it, but I was rather poor at the time, so I left the shop without it. Now I'm glad, because although I love its colours, its shape and size were totally irregular and I would never have used it. 

Pretty, though, isn't it? The thumb is my favourite. 16 studs! I can't tell you how much pleasure it gives me just to look at pictures of it. Oh, I love my nails.

Cookie Monster

So, the hiatus has ended a little earlier than I predicted. I've got a new computer. And it's blue just like the cookie monster.

I love cookies. Just like the cookie monster. I wanted to paint a cookie on my ring finger, but I didn't have the right colours and didn't feel like getting my acrylic paint and mixing. So, all monsters.

And yes, the picture quality is bad and there's a big chip on my middle finger. I didn't manage to take a picture until about 5 days in. School, ya know.

Dark Side versus Bright Side

I know, I've been away too long. I've got a few designs accumulated which I haven't written about. I've been meaning to, but school work, sickness and indolence got in the way. I'll get to it this week, though. Hopefully.

We all have dark sides and bright sides. Side by side. This is how I expressed mine. Can you see how the dark side glows with tiny blue and purple glitter? And how the bright side is dulled by gray shimmer? Sometimes dark sides aren't very dark and bright sides aren't very bright.

And yeah, I messed up. There are dark spots on the bright side of my left middle finger. And my right pinkie is smudged. I can make up some philosophical crap that makes them tie in with the whole concept, but I won't. Just ignore them, okay. :)

Sari Stripes

I saw a woman wearing a stripy sari in these colours and I couldn't stop looking at it. So of course, I had to put it on my nails. Pretty, isn't it? The colours are spot-on because I just happened to have them in my collection. I love my nail polish collection. 

And yes, the black lines are jagged. I used a thin brush which I'm not used to yet. Maybe I should have just used scotch tape. And if you think those lines are uneven, take a look at the nails of my right hand:

Oh, man. I need more practice.

And why am I holding an orange? I was about to eat it, and wanted to take a picture of my nails before I use them to tear away its skin. Loodie Loodie Loodie has a helpful tutorial teaching us how to peel an orange with a spoon, so as not to ruin nice nails, but I just can't be bothered to do all that. My nails are always protected with thick layers of top coat hard as glass, anyway. No orange peel can hurt my nail polish.

Nightmare Eyes

Ever wondered what a nightmare looks like? Well, that depends on the content of the nightmare, actually. This is what a certain nightmare that kept disturbing me looks like. It was about rejection and abandonment and emptiness. Purple for rejection and abandonment and white for the emptiness. Pale blue for loneliness, and the bright blue just to hold it all together.

I applied mascara only to the lashes on my upper eyelid and didn't comb them so that my eyes would look shocked and afraid. I used purple eyeshadow instead of black eyeliner because there was nothing bold or bright in the dream. It was all pale and cold and almost dead. But not dead, just empty.

School Girl Sassy

School Uniform Blue & White 

Recently, I got back in touch with a friend from secondary school on Facebook. That reminded me of the five long years I spent in a uniform.

You know, I sometimes miss those days, when I had 2 sets of the same outfit to wear to school. Now, there are so many decisions I have to make in the morning. I can't wake up, throw on a uniform, chuck some pens and files in a bag and leave for school (late) any more. I have to decide what to wear.

While I spent most of the five years feeling angry and left out, as stereotypical teenagers do in cliched television shows, there were high points. Like having friends who were just close enough, listening to the radio and goofing off instead of studying during free period, shocking my friends and developing some style by cutting off my hair, eating french fries and Snickers for lunch, eating ice cream and reading in the school library, trying to rebel by wearing a stud in my nose and six studs in my ears, and getting away with it so easily that it wasn't even fun. Going to school ridiculously late and sleeping during class, not doing any homework and playing games on my phone during lessons, and getting away with all of it because I got good grades and spoke well. Damn, those teachers were no match for me.

Also, I found a picture of myself in secondary school. Look!

Adorable, I know.

Ombre

According to Chloe's Nails, painting the nails of one hand different shades of the same colour, from the lightest to the darkest, is called an Ombre manicure. I did some research (i.e. googling) and found out that "ombre" means "shades" in French. As in different shades of a colour.

I liked the idea, even though the nails on Chloe's Nails were done in black, white and gray. I just can't do that. Can't. I can't live in monochrome. I don't even have any gray nail polish.

So I decided to do it in blue and pink. Blue on one hand and pink on the other. Because those colours look good on me and I had enough shades of them. Plus, lately, I had been doing nail art that involved a lot of work and wanted to just slather on some nail polish and be done, for a change. This is how it looks:

Ombre Blue

Ombre Pink

Looks cool, doesn't it? I'm getting bored, though. I might change my nails very soon. Or maybe stamp them or put rhinestones on them or something.

I need more hobbies.

Paddle Pop

Very picture-heavy, but I know you love it. Paddle Pop! Colourful, swirly butterscotch-flavoured ice cream. I never loved the flavour, but I used to eat it all the time because of the colours. The best part of eating it is looking at the colours. Lick, look, lick, look. That's the way to do it.

It got messy while I was trying to interpret the look of the ice cream on my nails. I put big, fat drops of nail polish on my nails and swirled them using a toothpick. Of course, the polish overflowed and stuck onto my skin. And the polish on my nails was uneven and bumpy. But I use a top coat called Seche Vite, which makes everything even. And when they're smooth and even, my nails look just like Paddle Pop. I'm always hungry now.

I've changed my hair colour, too. It isn't faded reddish-brown anymore. It's a deep, dark, purple-based blue, which online reviews say will fade to a primary blue. I love it. I'll post a picture if I ever manage to capture a good one.

Cosmic

Cosmic

I have a fear of sleep and lately that has led to the development of a fear of night time. So I did this in an attempt to remind myself that I'm a tiny thing in the gigantic universe, and that if I didn't live a place with so many lights at night, I could see proof of that in the sky. So night time isn't scary, it's starry and fascinating and fun!

Of course, this didn't drive my fear away. It's pretty, though, isn't it? You can't really see it on the blue base, but I used both silver and gold glitters. And glitter polish holds everything together so there was very little chipping at the tips and cuticles. I could have left this on until the weekend, but I was given something today that gave me inspiration! I love being inspired.

So now my nails are different. The next post will be soon. :)

Stamping

When I started this blog, I vowed that it wouldn't be like the boring nail blogs that feature just nail polish slapped on nails, without any "nail art" involved. But just look at this blue. Look how delicious and creamy it is. It is perfect. I couldn't help snapping a shot of it before doing some art.

I bought some nail polish stamping plates on eBay recently. The most popular brand of nail art plates is Konad. It's also purportedly the best quality. I decided to try it. Shipping from South Korea to Singapore takes a surprisingly short time. Anyway, check it out:

I stamped purple concentric circles over the blue. Very sloppily. I haven't gotten the hang of stamping yet. You may not notice, but there are smudges and overlaps.

I also haven't gotten the hang of photographing my nails. I'm a very bad photographer. When I get good shots, it's purely by luck.

But practice makes perfect, right?

bavani's colours

I've always found beauty in colours. It's what I love most about nature, and wildlife and all that. Bright flowers in green trees. Light from the sun captured in water in the sky, forming rainbows. Black stripes dark against the brilliant orange stripes of tigers. Iridescent wings of huge, scary black insects. Clear rain water mixing with sandy soil to make chocolate-brown mud. Shiny gray dolphins jumping out of deep blue seas. White-blue Husky eyes. The contrast of the pure white and stark black of my cat's fur, and the clear, sharp yellow of his eyes. The same colours on mynas - yellow beaks, black bodies and white wing tips. The thick, rich red of blood that rushes through all of us.

These things are why I love colours. Colours make me feel calm. That's why I always paint my nails. People think it's because I'm insecure about my naked nails, but no. It's to remind myself of things that make me happy. When something upsets me, I can look at my nails and feel composed. When I look at my nails, there's nothing but my cat's eyes or a flower in a tree or the blood that's pumped through my lungs. Everything else fades. Nothing can make me unhappy when my heart still pumps blood and flowers still bloom and my cat still looks at me with love. I don't paint my nails to hide myself from the world. I do it to hide the upsetting things in the world from myself. The more troubled I am, the more colours I put on my nails.

I feel in colours too. I don't know it when I'm feeling them, but when I think back about times when I experienced strong emotions, everything's tinted a certain colour. Every emotion in every situation has a unique colour. Painting that colour on my nails or my eyelids is a way of releasing the emotion.

I hope you didn't expect this blog to be light-hearted fun, with manicures and makeup tips. Nothing about me is light-hearted. My heart is very heavy.

Here are some of my best expressions:

 Black Cat With Yellow Eyes

 White Cat With Blue Eyes

 Day And Night

 Patriotism

 Orange Juice, Blueberries And Chocolate

 Rainy Sky Over Trees

 Melted M&Ms

 Bird Park

 Warm Side Of The Rainbow

 Mad Hatter

 Citrus

 Chinese New Year! One of my favourites.

 Claws

Empty Blue Sky

Look forward to a lot more pictures.