Easy Cherry Print Nail Art Tutorial

by | Dec 10, 2014 | Nail-Art-Tutorials, Nails, Tutorial

Today’s nail art is inspired by James’ favourite part of this time of year: cherries! He can barely eat them because of his allergies but he still loves them! So let’s get into it 😀

You need:

  • Yellow base polish
  • Red polish or acrylic paint
  • Green polish or acrylic paint
  • White polish or acrylic paint
  • Clear top coat

Begin by painting a yellow base coat and allowing it to dry.

To make the cherry shape paint two small circles which are almost touching each other. The right circle should be slightly higher up than the left.
I’m making this into a larger pattern so I painted pairs of cherries all over the nail randomly.
Next for the stems, using light green paint a thin line from each circle so it meets up the top and forms a sort of upside down “V” shape.
Add a small triangle at the top of the stem as a leaf.
Repeat on the other cherries. I also added a stem which went off the edge of the nail so it appeared like the pattern continued.
Once all of that is dry, use your white to add very small dots to the leaf and cherries to make highlights.
Lastly give everything a top coat using clear polish.
This pattern is so cute! … but now I’m hungry for cherries!
Hope you guys are having a good week and let me know if you try this out!

 

Portrait – Let’s Paint! Watercolour Walk Through

by | Dec 8, 2014 | Art, Artwork-Tutorials, Tutorial

Hello again! Let’s get into another watercolour tutorial, this one is more of a follow through than a tutorial. This is the end result, some kind of galaxy goddess something…

Hopefully you’re a little more excited about this than the sad bunnies on my note paper.
First up, sketch your basic outline.
Keep the details around the face fine.
While the hair out the back is long and flowing.
The most important part of paintings like this is the colouring. Think about colours that work well together. My favourite combination is bright blue/green/pink/purple.
I decided to go with the blue and green for the girl and then pink and purple for the sky. I like to start with the face details because if I don’t get that right then there’s no point doing the rest of the painting. Each line and area is a combination of the two colours.
The technique is simple, lay down a thick-ish line of water.
Drop on the two colours and move them with the paint brush until you’re happy.
While the face outlines dry I moved on to the fabric. I find it easier to do the outlines first then move on to the shadows etc once it’s dry using the lines as a guide.
Moving on, the hair is next. Large sections of hair first making sure to keep it so it looks flowing.
Swoosh!
Use your colours to indicate the texture and folds of the fabric. Keep an eye on where you’re placing each colour eg. use the darker blue for areas in shadow.
Overlapping the hair layers once they are dry creates even more layers.
The face and skin is shaded very minimally.
Now let it all dry.
Once it’s totally dry, erase any of the pencil which is still showing through.
Now to paint the background,we don’t want to get any of the pink/purple on the greens so cover the edges with masking fluid.
Cover the entire background with water.
And then drip the colour on.
More water and more colour.
You can see the water pooling and the paper beginning to buckle. So long as the water isn’t a danger to the other colours don’t worry about it. Water makes cool patterns as it dries.
Once it dries it will look something like this:
Now remove all of the resist from the edges.
All done!
I left a gap around the edges for aesthetic reasons but you can paint resist directly on top of the green/blue if you want to keep it nice and close.
So let’s have a look at all of the details!
With techniques like this, the paint and the water are really doing most of the work so all you need are basic drawing skills.
Textured paper really brings out water colour.
So there you have it! I hope you enjoyed this walk/paint through 😀 Let me know what you paint, I can’t wait to see!

James’ Candy Cane Mocktail Recipe

by | Dec 5, 2014 | Baking, Cooking-Tutorials, Tutorial

Last year James decided to make a mocktail for our Billy Idol Day feast!

You need:
  • Lemonade
  • Candy canes
  • Ice
  • Raspberry/Cranberry grenadine
  • Bitters (optional)

To make the grenadine, boil a large bottle of raspberry/cranberry on the stove with 1 cup of sugar until it was reduced by half.

Of course you need fancy glasses to have this in! Start by adding in a few ice cubes.
Fill the glass 80% with lemonade.
Gently pour in the grenadine, it’s important to pour very slowly and to sort of drip it down the side of the glass otherwise you won’t get the cool gradient effect.
Gradient! At this point you can also add a few drops of bitters or actual alcohol if you are thusly inclined.
Lastly, add in a candy cane as a stirrer.
After a few minutes, the candy cane will melt into the drink and make it even more delicious!
Yum yum yum!
Let me know if you guys try this out this year!

Our Glitter Heart Wreath – Home Sweet Home

by | Dec 3, 2014 | Craft, Home Sweet Home Tutorials, Other-Tutorials, Tutorial

Last year when I was decorating our house for Billy Idol Day, I made a little heart wreath thingy to replace our previous one. The previous one was actually really cute but we slammed the door a bit too hard one day and it fell and shattered *_*
So this was the result:

I used some styrofoam balls as well as some old baubles, roses and a LOT of glitter.
To begin with, I hot glued the larger styrofoam balls into a basic heart shape.
Then I filled in the gaps with smaller baubles and some roses.
I then took it into the bathroom and covered it with PVA glue and silver glitter. Even with paper laid down it still made a massive mess haha!
I didn’t have enough glitter for the back as well so it really only looks good from that one angle haha!
But there you go!
It looks quite cute! It certainly brightens up our ugly door a bit!
It probably represents us quite well, James is the heart and I’m the constant glitter ^_^

How To Make Watercolour Scarves – Tutorial

by | Dec 1, 2014 | Art, Clothing-Tutorials, Craft, Tutorial

I think I mentioned to you guys already that I’ve been working on some techniques to make my scarf painting a little more watercolour styled. I think I’ve got it much closer to a point that I’m happy with now and I’m having much more fun with it!

These are two scarves I made as gifts recently.

For all of my fabric painting I use Opulence silk dyes because they dilute really well and are fairly easy to control.

The basic technique is really easy. Just wet the fabric and then squeeze most of the water out. I’m using a basic cheap muslin.
Hang it up somewhere that it doesn’t matter if it gets messy. I used my shower door.
The water all over it will get patchy as it dries. You can add more or less water depending on the design you’re going for.
Slowly drip paint into areas where there is water. You will notice that the paint only travels along the water veins. You can add more water or keep it dry so the paint is quite vibrant.
Add a second colour overlapping the first. I use colours which are similar in tone.
Allow the first layers to dry and then repeat wetting areas and adding paint.
The effects you get depend entirely on your control of the paint and how much/little water it has to move around in. I like to add spots of water after the dye to move it around even more.
As it dries the paint is sucked to the edges of the designs so they look more vibrant.
Keep layering over and over until you’re happy with the designs.
With the blue and purple version I used much larger areas of water.
Once the design is how you like, just heat seal them with an iron and give them a final wash out.
The colours are so vibrant and pretty.
The crushable muslin makes a really nice fabric for a Summer scarf.
So there you go, another technique to add to your arsenal!

Now I need to stock up on some more actual silk and give this a try with that as well!

Natural Waves Using Buns – Photo Hair Tutorial

by | Nov 26, 2014 | Hair, Hair-Tutorials, Tutorial

Today’s hair tutorial is another one which can be a bit hit or miss depending on the type of hair you have but it can’t hurt to give it a try because there’s very little effort involved! We’re going to try getting natural waves by sleeping in buns overnight!

To get these overnight styles to work I found that the best thing to begin with was a decent volumising spray. I like the one from Toni&Guy.

So to begin with, spray around the roots and allow to dry. If you want extra hold then activate it with some heat.
Volume! Feel free to stop here if you are on your way to a Whitesnake concert  \m/ >_< \m/
Now the buns, divide the hair into 3 sections, one at the top and one on either side. A lot of people will just do two buns but I like a lot of volume at the top so I do the extra one there.
Twist each section tightly into the bun and if you have hard to curl hair then add some more product.
It does look a little bit ridiculous… very much like an alien XD
Now enjoy a good night’s sleep!
And fast forward to the next morning!
Undo the buns…
Not looking like so much right now:
But separate each of the twists with your fingers.
That looks a lot better!
Considering how little effort went into it, I think this is a really great style for mornings that you know are going to be very hectic.
Definitely not going to work for everyone but it’s a good one to try out anyway because if it does work it’s great to be able to use less heat styling tools. Hope you found it helpful!

 

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