Nothing to Disclose

Hello all my gorgeous readers!  I did some nail art over the weekend and I have been just so mesmerized by the result that I haven’t even been able to bring myself to write it up for you.  That’s because I kept stopping to stare at my nails.  This mani probably ranks up there in one of my favorite that I’ve -ever- done.  I hope that you will enjoy it!  To be fair, while it’s not an impossible bit of nail art people who are new to nail art may find it a bit more challenging because today (or this past weekend, whatever…) we water marble!  In true Relly fashion though, at every step I thought, “oh I love this…but what if I added this?!”  Then, I did it.  The result was much better than I anticipated.

Let’s start off with what you need for water marbling.  You’ll need 2 or more polishes (creme polishes work best, but, some jellies and holographic polishes will also work well but you’ll want to avoid polishes with glitter or flakies), white nail polish, a small cup with filtered room-temperature water, an orange stick or water marbling tool, q-tips, cuticle barrier of your choice (tape, liquid latex, vinyl cuticle shields, etc.), and base and topcoats.

I started with five polishes from the Bohemian Polish Washed Out 2.0 collection.  When I want something Springy, bright, cheerful, and great for nail art I usually reach for these:

First you will prep your nails.  Apply basecoat and then a layer of white polish.  I only did one coat and I didn’t worry about it being a perfect finish, it’s going to be covered up after all:

Next, apply your cuticle barrier.  I used Digital Nails – Questionable Browser History which is a liquid latex product, but you can easily use tape or those handy vinyl cuticle barriers (that are latex-free!) that I’ve seen around.  If you’re using liquid latex you’ll definitely want to go a ways up your finger, you’ll see later I didn’t go quite high enough!

Then, you’re going to create a bullseye in your cup of water by dripping one drop of nail polish color into the water alternating with each color until it forms a bullseye.  It should look something like this:

Using an orange stick, tooth pick, water marble tool, or other pointy thin tool carefully drag it through the colors until you create a pattern that pleases you.  I kept this one pretty simple:

Next aim your fingernail at a slight angle toward the part of the pattern you would like to be on your nail then dunk your nail gently into the nail polish pattern.  Using a cotton swab gently collect the excess polish from around your finger so that it doesn’t get transferred to your nail.  Gently remove your finger from the water.  Take care not to move too quickly and work at a bit of an angle to avoid bubbles as much as possible.

Now, you can totally see why you need that cuticle barrier!  Cleaning that up would be a right mess! Gently remove your cuticle barrier and clean up any stray areas with acetone and a clean up brush that you couldn’t protect with the barrier and apply topcoat.  Floating the topcoat will help avoid smears.

Now…this is where most people would be like, “YAY, a successful water marble!  Let’s stop here.”  I am clearly not most people because what I said is, “Oh, let’s add flakies!”  So I did.  I added a generous layer of Digital Nails – Hyperbole which gave the whole look a shifty iridescent quality.  It’s subtle but when it catches the light it’s lovely!

Again, I said to myself, “what else can I do?!” so I stamped butterfly wings using Vivid Lacquer – VL002 over top:

Ahhh, and then I was finally satisfied.  This turned out so cheerful, happy, and pretty that I could have been more pleased.  This is probably the most successful water marble I’ve done.  They take practice and patience but the result is so great that it’s worth it!

You can find Bohemian Polish, Vivid Lacquer, and Digital Nails at the stalker links below.  As usual, I’d love to hear from you!  This is definitely a win in my book.  I hope you really like it as well!  Don’t forget you can find me on social media by using the big pink buttons to the right!  Until next time I hope your days are filled with glitter and flakies!

Bohemian Polish

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Digital Nails:

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Vivid Lacquer:

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