Easy and Fun Nail Art

Before I start today's tutorial I am going to tell you about the minor heart attack I had last night.

I was grabbing my camera bag off of my bed thinking it was closed-because I always close the bag when I'm not using the camera-and started to walk out of my bedroom. All of a sudden I hear CRASH! Oh crap...Crap...CRAP! Right away I knew what the sound was. The camera crashing to the floor, after bouncing off the bed. Oh no... no, no, no... this cannot be happening. (Now, this would be pretty stinky no matter what camera it was that took the dive. But it wasn't our cheaper point and shoot-this was our Nikon D80 digital SLR-oh NO!) I turned to pick it up and all I hear is rattle, rattle, crinkle, crinkle-the sound of broken glass/electronics. By this time the hubs is in the bedroom too, he takes the broken camera into the kitchen to get a better look at the damage. He manages to get the cover off of the lens-it was kind of jammed-and all we see is broken glass. Did I start crying? Surprisingly, no. But believe me, I almost did. I vacuumed all of the glass-just in case it wasn't the lens that was in pieces I didn't want to risk scratching it. Guess what! It wasn't the lens, it wasn't the camera. I did a couple of test shots with it and it still works. (Huge sigh of relief!) All that broke was the UV protective filter that goes over the end of the lens! Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU Lord! So needless to say... I probably have a couple more grey hairs because of this, but I have to say I slept better than I probably would have knowing that I don't have to replace it.

On to the tutorial...

I recently bought a nifty little contraption for doing my own nail art at home. You may have seen them in a kiosk at the mall. It's called Konad. Yeah, I'm the sucker who always gets stopped by those sales people, and I don't know how to tell them no. Anyway, I'm pretty happy I bought it. The girls and I have been having a blast doing our fingers and toes.

Here's what you'll need:

Konad Image Plate

Scraper

Stamper

Nail Polish

(Konad sells special polish but Sasse's Stamping Stampede has a list of normal polish)

polish remover

q-tips and cotton balls

Start with a base coat, any color will do. If you have wiggly toes and get some on the skin it doesn't matter, the stamper will also get some paint on the skin too, you'll clean it all up at the end.

Put some polish on the design you would like.

Using the scraper, scrape off the excess.

Pick up the image with the stamper. (Please pay no attention to my hands, I always forget to make myself stuff, like Holiday Hand Scrub.)

Stamp the design onto the nail. Continue until all nails are to your liking.

Cute little zebra stripe toes.

Adorable little houndstooth and polka dot fingers.

Now wasn't that fun?! Not only do we have fun doing this, it will save me and the hubs loads of green since we won't have to go to a salon. There are 4 females in our house, can you imagine the salon bill that could potentially be? Yowza!