kisses grant wishes.

Dallas Green - Sleeping Sickness

my sister (aka bestest best friend in the entitre world, claire at little love) is completely and utterly obessesed with Hello Kitty! - folders emblazoned with with that little red bow, iPod and blackberry adorned with stickers and numerous pens/mugs/compact mirror shaped like that infamous feline face. so in an ode to her cutesey preoccupation, i thought i'd try out some Hello Kitty! nails and do a little Hello Kitty nail tutorial. (i know they're a little shakey and not perfect, but i sorta like how the face are slightly different - Hello Kitty sisters perhaps?)

you will need;
- a background colour of your choice (Topshop's Milkshake)
- a white (Barry M's no.66)
- a yellow/gold (17's Sphnix)
- a red (Misguided's Mischievous)
- a black liquid eyeliner (Barry M)
- a bent out bobby pin



after applying your base coat, load on your background colour all over the nail.

using your white, draw on thick white tips, curving them slightly so they're shaped like Hello Kitty!'s head. here is also where you make her ears, (but I forgot to do that till after I did the nose, sorry!) by using the edge of your brush to form tiny triangles for her ears. you WILL get varnish on the edges of your fingers, but that's easily remedied by dipping an earbud in nail varnish remover and tidying up!




take your bobby pin and dip it in the gold/yellow, and place a dot in the centre of the white bit of your nail, nearer to the tip of the nail than smack bang in the middle.




with the black eyeliner, form tiny dots for her eyes both side of her gold nose. then, pain three lines on either side of the nail for whiskers (and try and get the middle whiskers level with the eyes)




finally, take your bobby pin again and dip it in the red, and first, make a single red blob by the right ear (this is the middle bit of the bow). then, after dipping it in the red varnish, make slightly bigger red blobs either side of the first one to create the iconic red bow. finish with a top coat and revel in the praise you'll get from EVERYONE!

kitsch nails like this often spark either LOVE IT or hate it - what do you think? cutes and kitsch or tacky?