Dotting Tools...Nailed It.

I'm not sure if you're aware or not, but apparently, I am utterly unoriginal in naming my blog. I really should've done my research before deciding to use "Nailed It." as my blog's title. Let's take a look at the other blogs, also called Nailed It in some form or another. Interestingly, none of us were lucky enough to snag the URL "nailedit.blogspot.com". That goes to someone with a nerdy grudge. Instead, we nail bloggers were forced to choose a less obvious username to accompany our URLs. Here's just a few I've found:

• NAILED IT! - A woman from Washington
• Nailed It - Lisa in Florida
• You nailed it! - Renee in the Netherlands
• Totally NAILed It! - Sayra

Not to mention the countless other Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr accounts using this popular meme phrase as their own nail tag line.

So, to those of you who happened to weed through everyone and at least find me, congrats! Though my blog's title may actually be slightly uninspired, I try not to let my nails and designs be.

Luckily, the internet is chock-full of inspiration, which I'm happy to draw from. Using my spiffy new dotting tools, I made this beautiful pattern my muse.

Gorgeous right? And just dying to be dotted out. This being my first time using the dotting tool, I was unsure how big the dots would wind up being, so in the end, adding the stitching would've made the art a little too busy. I also swapped out the burnt orange color for a hot pink. This is the final result.

I'm pleased as punch with this cute design, and beyond excited to use more dotting tools. It also feels really good to have a complete manicure that matches on all 10 fingers again. With vacation, busy weekends and swatching, my nails haven't matched since...well I think since New Year's Eve! The glimpses you've caught in swatching wasn't consistent across both hands. Take it from a Capricorn...it feels good to have everything in its place.

I used China Glaze's Electric Pineapple and Flip Flop Fantasy for some of the dots, and OPI's Mermaid's Tears for the rest. The base is Movie Star from Essence. I really love Movie Star, but I wish the bottle I had were bigger. It's a shrimpy little 0.16 fluid ounce bottle. Is this how all Essence polishes are?

Everything's topped off with my new Seche Vite, which I honestly don't understand the rage about. It dries quickly, but not too much quicker than China Glaze's Fast Forward top coat, and it smells downright toxic. Fast Forward doesn't give me the same "If I inhale much more of this I'll wind up on A&E's Intervention" feeling that Seche Vite did. It did dry in record time though, so maybe I'll have to do a side-by-side of the two to really get the full benefit of it.

Either way, the nails are dry, protected, and shiny. Not bad for a first timer eh?

UPDATE (1/22/12):

Allie-Bee asked for this tutorial. Enjoy!