A Month of Halloween Manis

I have so many nail polish strips stockpiled in my basement that it's a bit ridiculous, so I decided I would make an effort in October to wear some of the many Halloween-themed designs, since I sure wasn't going to bust them out any other time of year. I found I had enough just in the Sally Hansen Salon Effects section to fill the whole month, putting on a new set every week.

First up was the Patch-o-Lanterns design from 2012, which is black and orange with overlapping jack o'lantern faces. I didn't remember when I put these on that I'd worn this design before, two years ago when they were new. Which means I probably have half a box of leftover strips from back then lurking somewhere. Maybe I'll come across it before next Halloween and combine it with the half a box of leftovers from this year.

The next set of strips to grace my nails were the black bats on purple Batty for You, also from 2012's limited edition Halloween collection.

Here they are after three full days of wear (in daylight, where the purple looks brighter):

How Corny, with its white, orange, and yellow candy corns scattered on a white background, followed the bats. This, too, is from that 2012 collection.

Before I took off How Corny after six full days of wear, I attempted an accent nail with one freehand candy corn, using Sally Hansen Insta Dri in OMGhost as the base, Milani Yellow Mark and Sally Hansen Sugar Coat Candy Corn (of course) and Sugar Fix for the candy, and Maybelline Salon Finish in Cinnamon for the outline.

The outline leaves much to be desired but I'm pretty happy with the corn itself.

I'm finishing up the month with Ghoulie Girl, orange and white ghosts on a black background from the 2011 Halloween collection. I had a bit of trouble with these, in that for some of the strips, the clear plastic topsheet didn't peel off cleanly. I don't know if that's due to these being a year older than the others or operator error or what. That's why there's a split on my pinky finger—I could have busted open the other half of the box to get a full strip but decided the pattern was busy enough that no one would notice if I just stuck the ripped piece on as close as I could. In a macro photo, the split is obvious, but in real life, it's not. (Same with the uncovered bit at the tip of my middle finger.)

Last night, I tore the tip of one of my nails (grabbing for a handhold as I was slipping off a stair trying) so filed them all down to match (I like it when they match), which had the happy side effect of removing all my tipwear on the strips, leaving me with cute shorties for the actual holiday.

I've gotten a lot of compliments on my nails this month, and a lot of "how did you do that?" and "who did your nails?". I've been entertained myself looking at my tips and seeing grinning faces and bats and candy and ghosties. It's been fun. I want to share the fun (and also trim down the amount of space in my house devoted to storing nail strips), so if you'd like to be in a draw for a random set of Salon Effects strips, leave a comment to that effect. In about a week, I'll pick about 10 names. Happy Halloween!

*****
I drew the winner in the Mont Bleu giveaway: Ilaria Carraro. Congratulations, Ilaria! Please check your e-mail and let me know your address so I can pass it along to Mont Bleu.

Congratulations also to Charlotte of Lipglossiping, who won the design contest.