Before Instagram Series - Watermelon

After the Converse nail art success, I decided to try watermelon nails.

This look is pretty simple, but mastering the look of the green part took me a couple of tries. By the end I was very pleased with the result and it's a look I would totally try again.

Before Instagram Series - More Crackle

This is another quick post about crackle. You can read what I think of it here.

This time I used Kleancolor Bikini Green and topped it with LA Girl Fracture.

(OMG my cuticles)

Before Instagram Series - Checkered Nail Strips

This is the only time in my life I have used nail strips. I don't like them, I feel they look fake, they wrinkle and they don't last long. As a matter of fact, these lasted just long enough to take the pictures.

On the bright side, you can't beat the designs! I don't think I have ever seen perfect checkered nails like these, EVER. But the coolest thing about these particular ones is that they glowed in the dark! I was super excited about that feature. Keep in mind this was way before Serum No. 5 Day Glow which was my first glow-in-the-dark nail polish. Now they are so common, they are not even that exciting anymore.

Before Instagram Series - Crackle

I don't know why people hate on crackle so much, but I'm glad cause I really like this look and it's always super cheap cause nobody else buys them ;)

For me, crackle nails are an instant nail art look without much effort and if you use fun colors like these ones it can turn out pretty cool

For these I used Kleancolor Pastel Purple and LA Girl Fracture. I wish I had better pictures of them cause they were pretty fun and cute.

Before Instagram Series - Striped

Another trend I early adopted was the stripping tape, I found a set of 10 different colors on eBay for a very good price and I went for it.

When I received them I had nothing to compare them to, so I thought they were the bomb. But in reality they were really bad quality. I think the glue was too strong so when I pulled it out of the roll, the color would peel off :(

Before Instagram Series - Silver and Holo

This is just a simple swatch of a couple of those Kleancolors that started my addiction.
I can't say enough how good this brand is for starters and even not so newbies. I'm still loving the chuky holo ones and here's Holo Chrome over Pearl Silver.

Before Instagram Series - Gold French

This is a very simple but it looked kick-butt elegant so I'm sharing it

Before Instagram Series - Pepsi Nails

Around the time I bought the stamping plates, I also got a set of nail art polishes, commonly know as stripers, from Shany that I still use to this day. These strippers are very convenient for nail art and this particular set is very inexpensive and has every color you need and more. The first time I tried I was just playing around with no particular design in mind and this came up, some said it looked like the Pepsi logo so I call them Pepsi nails, even though that's not what I was trying to achieve. I used a red base and did the blue and silver stripe with the Shany set. Also, the nails were growing! :)