Hello lovely people, and a happy Monday to you! Here in NZ, the first weekend of June is Queen's Birthday Weekend so we get a day off work / school to celebrate, and this year it coincides with our Queen's Diamond Jubilee - she was crowned on the 2nd of June, 1952. This is only the second Diamond Jubilee in British history! So I've got a bit of Brit on my nails for the occasion. But first, I wanted to show you the cupcakes I baked for my friend Beth's birthday on Saturday (when I was running crazy late...). I consider myself a decent baker, and cupcakes are definitely one of my specialties. Aren't they pretty?
Now, onto the nails! I saw this post on Sunday afternoon and knew there was absolutely no way mine would possibly compare as Sammy is such an incredible nail artist! So I thought I'd keep mine sweet and simple with just enough British flavour for the day. In the Friday Fail post I said I'd decided to use BYS Reign Supreme as my non-accented nail colour. Well, I lied. I went with BYS Glamourpuss instead, mostly because I'm obsessed with it, but also because the deep cherry red somehow seemed more British than the purple. I started with two coast of Glamourpuss on my index, middle and pinky fingers, and two coats of BYS Drop In The Ocean on my thumbs and ring fingers. The blue is the background for my Union Flags.
Public Notice: On my nails I have a Union FLAG. It is only called a Union JACK if it is flown at sea!!!
Sorry to get all bold and stuff, but it's a pet peeve of mine that sooooo many people call it a 'Union Jack' at all times. No! Just, NO! </rant> =)
Over the lovely clear blue I taped off the central cross pattern and painted it in Revlon Red Hot. That was the easy part. My goodness, I should have spent more time thinking about the easiest way to do this. Over the red cross I used a dotting tool to outline it in BYS French White. Then with my dotting tool I added in the smaller 'background' lines in red, and outlined them too. They ended up a lot messier than I'd hoped, but from a distance it's very effective, and I'm happy with it. I thought doing my left hand was hard... Then I did my right hand... Never again!!!
I suppose they're not as bad as they could've been, and I did spend a loooong time 'touching it up' to get it to this stage, but they are obviously far from perfect. Again, from a distance, not too shabby... Like the flash pic coming out of the dark? Rawr!
Close up of my left hand in direct sunlight. Red Hot is usually a lot lighter and brighter and more orange-based than Glamourpuss, but because it's over Drop In The Ocean, it actually came out looking quite a similar shade which is what I was hoping for! I had my morning cup of tea outside in the sunshine today and had to snap a couple of shots with my new tea cup. Apart from being a really pretty cup, tea + British nails? Had to be done!
Everything topped off with Seche Vite - two coats over the Union Flags. I hope Her Majesty had a lovely Jubilee on Saturday, and that all you lovely people had a wonderful weekend, whether it's still going or not! Thanks for popping in =)
- Ally xx
