Never Without Polish: "This is Halloween" Nail Art Challenge: Inspired by Jack-o-Lanterns

Hello again!!!

A bit late--I realized I hit "Save" rather than publish on this one--silly me! Aw, well, better late than never!!

Today's prompt was "Jack-o-lanterns". So of course, I started with orange nails. I used two coats of Zoya Arizona over a base coat of Sinful Colors Nail Hardener. This wasn't pumpkin-orange enough for me yet, so I layered on a coat of Zoya Coraline (from the Birchbox Blogger set) to get a deeper color. Once again, I found myself without a stamping plate to use (I've been lusting for both of the newer Bundle Monster sets forever..... I wish I had an unlimited polish budget!!). What now?

Jack-o-lantern Nail Art. Indoors, artificial light, no flash.

Well, this "plan b" idea came from Pinterest. Someone had posted a picture there of a dotted manicure done with Sharpie markers. I thought, "Wow, why didn't I think of that?!", and pinned it as something to try out. It works! I used a black Sharpie to draw on the faces. I didn't use a topcoat, though, now see that I should have. I took the pictures after washing dishes, and I can see where the marker has started to fade. This was fun and a little easier for me than using nail polish. I'm not so great at free hand nail art yet. I'll get some more practice in before I reveal my (lack of) talent! I liked this guy the best (and, yep, that one on my thumb may be familiar to some of you --_^).

Jack-o-lantern Nail Art. Indoors, artificial light, no flash.

This second mani is more inspired by pumpkins rather than jack-o-lanterns, but jack-o-lanterns are pumpkins! I snagged a few Essence polishes last weekend, and Gorgeous Bling Bling was one of them. I had just read Chalkboard Nails' Dot Manicure Tutorial and wanted to try it out. I was already wearing Gorgeous Bling Bling, which is a fabulous burnt-orange with subtle gold flakies in it. This was two coats of Gorgeous Bling Bling (ugh, that name.... >.>) over my normal basecoat of Sinful Colors Nail Hardener. On top of that, I used my trusty bobby pin to dot on some OPI Skull & Glossbones. The smaller dots were done with China Glaze Glittering Garland.