Do it yourself Nail Art

Originally I had wanted to design a temporary tattoo, a rainbow peace sign to wear at the Pride Parade.  Had heard of doing them yourself using a special inkjet printer paper, available at Staples.com, Amazon, and possibly at Joann Fabrics.  Unfortunately I didn't realize I would have to be ordered online.

Then on June 26th I went looking for rainbow nail art at Sally Beauty, after work, needless to say with the events of the day the pickings were pretty slim,  so I did some online searching and found an idea of making my own nail art.

Using a plastic baggie, I painted rainbow stripes using nail polish:

My first attempt wasn't very neat, and honestly I didn't think it had worked, until this morning. When I looked at it in the morning light I could see it had possibilities, so I tried to "peel" it off the plastic, and it worked, easily.

 

I trimmed the edge, and cut off a small "slice"

 

 

I then applied it to my pinky nail and was THRILLED!!!

 

Repeated with a nail on the other hand and that was even better:

I wanted to make a larger palette, to make a stripe big enough for my large toe nail, so my 2nd try I used a business card to "cut" the edges:

As you can see, it still doesn't look very neat.  But when you look back at the cuts, the neatness of the actual painting doesn't seem to make much difference on the cuts.

Here's how I applied it.  After cutting the slice, I did it on the diagonal so it would fit the nail I wanted, while leaving all of the colors of the rainbow.  I used base coat and just touched the edge of the purple so that it would stick at the starting point, then laid it down over the nail and positioned it.  Brushing a little more base coat carefully to lock it into place.  I let that dry, then painted a full coat over the nail, again letting that get good and dry. Then I painted two generous coats of clear 60-second dry top coat.

It did take a steady hand, but it really was not that hard, it just took a little patience. In my opinion the outcome was well worth the work, and because the rainbow "slices" are actually pretty small, I have enough left to do this again several times (or share).