Nail Art Challenge #8 - Showers/Flowers

A springy ombré manicure in shades of soft lilac.

I'm so excited to see the violets and hyacinths finally starting to bloom around here so I decided to go all out purple this week and break out a pre-packaged ombré set I had bought over the winter.

Overall this looks pretty good, but I'm not thrilled by the base shade. The colour on my thumb (which I usually call muddy or mauvey lilac) is one of the very few shades that REALLY don't look good on me. I had been hoping it would come out brighter, but such is the way with internet buying. I will probably re-use the darker shades and the glitter but the lighter ones I suspect will get pretty dusty, though I did use them in the Muppet mani.

It's lucky I just happened to be really bored sitting in my car for a little bit this afternoon and used the opportunity to take a few shots in natural sunlight because my regular camera doesn't capture this colour family well AT ALL. This is fairly true to colour on my monitor if *slightly* washed out, on my camera this shifted to a very blue periwinkle->indigo ombré.

The polishes are not really great quality and if you ever wondered what people were talking about when they mention Seche Vite shrinkage, my middle finger is a fantastic example. The colour actually shrank at BOTH ends despite adding a layer of the Gelous on top. It's very hard to get the proper coverage without flooding your cuticles. I am going to have to remember to glob on more and cleanup with a fine brush and remover afterward.

I still feel that the Seche is worth it for that shine and the fact that I was able to pull my laundry out of the dryer within half an hour of finishing. It also completely smoothed over the fact that my nails are kind of a peel-y mess under all of that polish.