FingerFood's Theme Weeks - Brithdays/Celebrations

Supplies used in this post - China Glaze For Audrey, H&M Green Bluish and Andrea Fullerton Nail Jewels.

Another first manicure in a new nail challenge! FingerFood's Theme Weeks is a one-weekly challenge that assigns a certain visual theme or an idea. This week it's birthdays or other celebrations. I was in a bit of a pickle here, since I have no appropriate stamping plates, and my freehand is atrocious. Luckily, my eyes fell on my China Glaze stash, and inspiration struck. You see, about a month ago my best friend was having a unicorn-themed birthday party, and I made her unicorn poop cupcakes, covered in light blue frosting, silver pearls, and edible shimmer. For Audrey happens to closely match the colour on that delicious frosting - then it was simply a case of finding some matching sparkles!
I recently went into H&M, and found some great glitters from both core and seasonal collections, and being who I am, Green Bluish caught my eye immediately. And look at the cutest little bottle it's in! The red blob reflected in the cap is me taking a photo :D

China Glaze For Audrey, with H&M Green Bluish on the ring finger, and one gem on the others.

This is the first time I've ever used nail gems - I got three packs of them in Superdrug on a sale. It looks like Andrea Fullerton is discontinuing at least some of their lines, and I was able to pick these beauties up for 80p per pack. Go and see if they're still there, if you can! I also got gold round studs, and a jewel-toned gem pack. This particular set is iridescent, with a purple and gold flash, but I wasn't really able to capture their sparkle on my camera. Perhaps if it was sunny here...

Birthday/Celebration manicure, with China Glaze For Audrey and H&M Green Bluish

I had no problems with getting the gems onto my nails, since the box came with a tiny rubber ended gem picker. I smothered them with Seche Vite, but I am not holding my breath for how long they will survive on my nails. Still, it's great for celebrations!

Polishes used:

• China Glaze For Audrey - Duck egg crème, opaque in two careful coats. This is the runniest polish I own, and it was a bit of a bother to apply without flooding the cuticles. I would recommend laying the first coat thin, as a thicker second coat seems happy to stay within the borders of the first one.
• H&M Green Bluish - a super pretty glitter in a clear base. It's a mix of sparse large silver hexes and smaller blue and green iridescent hexes in two sizes. I had to fish a bit for the silver hexes, and overall it's not a full coverage glitter. It dries fast, and would probably look amazing over dark colours as well.

Thanks for looking!

Here are some of the other challenge manicures: