Baa, baa, black sheep...

...have you any wool? (Long post and lots of pictures below!) By the way, like me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thepolishedbean :)

Pinky finger was my favorite but hard to see in this pic! But there's a better one below!

Okay, so I should've posted this last week but my roomies and I have been in this I DON'T WANNA [do work or anything really] mood for a while, so productivity has been very low recently. Hopefully this is a change towards more productivity! Haha...

Totoro Inspired Nail Art

Have you heard of Totoro? Or Hayao Miyazaki? If you haven't, go look them up, because you're missing out! Just some quick pictures today.

Totoro and the little soot gremlins! The base color for this manicure is Zoya: Rocky. (Such a nice summery blue!) The black and white are both from YH Beja Nail Design. I got a set last Christmas with twelve different colored polishes with fine striping brushes as well as a fine tube that you can use to squeeze polish out of the bottle. It's really cool! I haven't worked with it much yet, but I've been practicing. 

So I finished this manicure at the beginning of summer and then i went to Macy's and saw this bag...

...and couldn't help snapping a picture because the colors were so similar! Too bad it's way out of my price range...

Thanks for reading, and see you next time! 

Iron Man Inspired Water Marble and Art

I'm back with a water marble today! 

Okay, so I admit it, the water marble is the same one from here. But I also improved on execution! Look at my pointer and middle fingers! So pretty :) (If you can't tell, I really liked how this turned out.) The polishes I used for the water marble on my pointer, middle, and pinky fingers are all the same as the ones used in my Hunger Games water marble, so check that out if you haven't already! I'll just go over the Iron Man designs on my ring and thumb.

I made this manicure in early May for the Iron Man 3 Premier. I based the thumb design on the 2nd core that Tony Stark makes (as opposed to the original circle shape) and the ring finger design on the iron man helmet. I don't have brushes (sadface!) but I do have nail striping tape which I used to block off thin lines on the face and the triangle outline. For the triangle, I started with the inner triangle and then added a white border afterwards.

Polishes used for the triangle: Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear: White On, NYC: Cashmere Creme, and Zoya: Maisie. Polishes used for Iron Man face: Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear: White On and Black Out.

Below I'm holding this adorable Iron Man mini clay figure that my good friend made. Isn't it cute? If you look closely you can also see I have a bit of tip wear on the edges of my nail because this photo was taken several days after the first. The whole manicure held up for a long time. I usually take off my polish before it has a chance to chip (so I can try out a new manicure) but from what I remember, this one stayed near perfect for at least 8 days. 

Thanks for reading! Has anyone else seen any good movies recently? I've seen a whole bunch this summer so far...I'm actually going to a movie tonight, too! Next time:

Special: Happy 4th of July!

We interrupt your regularly scheduled posting to bring you...4th of July themed nail art! Pop Quiz: does Great Britain have a 4th of July? (Don't forget to click Read More to see more pictures!)

Yay for stars and stripes! This manicure is mostly stripes, though I do have part of a star on my thumbs. Time permitting, I was planning on some little stars on my pinky finger, but I took too long doing everything else.

Hearts...and Dots

 Happy Valentine's Day! (Don't forget to hit the read more button!)

Just kidding. In case you needed ideas for a holiday half a year from now, here's some <3 inspired nail art. (Or if you have a time machine, 'cuz that'd be really cool.)

Butter London: Pink Glitter Manicure

Hi! A quick post today (as an apology for missing one last week...and posting late...and...yeah.)

This manicure was made using nail striping tape, Sinful Colors: Snow Me White, and Butter London: Rosie Lee. I used a base coat of white, applied tape on the pointer, middle, and pinky fingers (where you now see white), painted over with the pink glitter polish, and removed the tape. For the thumb (hard to see) and the ring fingers, I used a bobby pin as a dotting tool to add large drops of Rosie Lee.

This was for my roommate's birthday! Unfortunately, it chipped rather fast...the Butter London polish isn't one of my favorites, but I liked it surprisingly more than I thought I would. (It's pink, but it's also glitter...glitterrrrrr!)

That's all for now! Check back tomorrow and I might have another special post! ;) Thanks for reading!

Tiger Stripes Inspired

Hi, I'm back! Sorry for the lack of punctuality and posts for the past week. 

Here's another water marble! If you haven't looked at the title, it's inspired by tiger stripes. I used a base of Sinful Colors: Cloud 9 over Sinful Colors: Snow Me White. For the marbling, I used Cloud 9 with Sinful Colors Black on Black. Yay for school spirit! I'm not quite sure why the marble on my thumb looks more mixed...but I like both the clearer look and the mixed look. Which do you think is better? Comment below!

Thanks for reading! Check back often, I may do a special post to make up for last week! Next time: more glitter.

Red, White?...and Blue

As I was going through my pictures, I looked at this one and was wondering if I had intended to do this for the 4th of July...turns out I got too excited and read the date wrong :( 4th of July is not in June...anyways...

Another water marble from 2012, this one really surprised me! Because the polishes I used were on the thicker side, the overall marbling effect was darker than I expected, but it turned out better than I thought it would, too! My favorite parts on this mani are the loops on the ring finger and arrow shape on the pointer finger.

As a base, I used Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Extreme Wear: Celeb City (silver) and for the marble another Sally Hansen: Red Carpet and Love and Beauty: Royal Blue (from Forever 21). The interesting thing about the blue polish is that it looks more turquoise in the bottle, but in the marble, it mixed nicely with the red, producing a few areas of fuchsia.

Thanks for reading!