Syrup Nails!!! Love Love Love!

I was getting bored with the green so I decided to do my nails early.  I did just Orly girly, and decided to try out the m56 plate that made me want konad really bad.  That bow was the thing that pulled the trigger.  So after the 2 coats, I did the bow and ......  yeah hated it.  Too boring.  The green was not great, so I wanted something more fun and bright.

Here is Orly Girly (2 coats) with m56 with wet n' wild white.

I like the idea of this and it shows up more crisp in the picture then real life, but it was too boring for today.
So I took of the bows with some remover and decided to add some bright color.

I think this is so much better!  It only took 15 min to remove the bows and add the syrup, and it was well worth it.  I used a lot of colors (mostly because I am weird and love to mix stuff) so the list is kind of long.  One bottle doesn't have a name since it came with a generic "nail polish gift" set.  Sorry I don't have how to pictures.
Base - Orly Girly
gradient colors - Wet n wild 437C, Sinful colors 36 frosty, Orly shine
How to do syrup nails (gradient nails)
1. Apply base color, this will be the color close to the nail bed.  If you want to be able to remove a mistake, add a cleat top coat.
2. Get a plastic plate, or some aluminum foil (whatever to drop your nail polish into) and take a cosmetic sponge edge and dip it into regular clear (non fast drying) nail polish.  This help with adding color little at a time, and also not having the sponge soak up too much color.
3. Take the base color and add it to the dish.  add a little bit of the contrast color. Tap the tip of the nail and slowly work down toward the nail bed, depending on how dark you want it. if there is too much nail polish on the sponge, i move on to the next tip (just doing the tip) and when less nail polish is on the sponge, I go back and go further down on the nail.
4. Repeat step with just the contrast color.  If you want extra glitter or shine, add some Orly shine to it.  It ended up not overpowering any of the colors, just added sparkle.  Aldo if your base is fairly sheer, you can use just that color lightly on top to help with the gradient.  Girly is very sheer and has sparkle so adding it on top of the red made it have a sparkly effect.
5. If you like the "matte" feel, DON'T top coat.  I added topcoat and didn't like it at all (but it will help seal everything in) so I added a little bit of Girly with the sponge to get the effect back.  I think the bumpyness made it more sparkly then having that glassed over look.  For colors with no pear or glitter, I would definitly put a top coat over it to have a smoother look.

Maybellline Ocean Green

I wanted to try out some konad full size images but I ended up not liking the finished result too much.  The colors didn't really pop, and was more of a subtle green texture on my nails.  I think this would have been better if I had a green without pearl or anything, because the two clashed quite a bit.  Also the dark green was too thin to contrast the light green.

Maybelline Express Finish - Ocean Green (2 coats)
Revlon Street Wear - Toad  with Mash m60
Seche Vite

How to get more out of a Brother printer toner

When I first got the brother laser printer (HL-4070), it was before my wedding and I was printing stuff like invitations and programs.  Of course I wanted color, and I was printing many pages during this time.  So I have 3 days to finish printing the rest of the invitations, and the printer runs out of ink.  Ok, which color is it? Blue? I have been using mostly blue.  I never purchased toner, I was using whatever came with the printer.  So I go and look over, and magenta, yellow and cyan are ALL out of ink.  At the same time.  Yeash, no way I used them all up at the same time.  Plus, My design was very limited in the amount of color used.  I wasn't printing full page color.  Just some lines.

Turns out brother puts "sheet" limits on the toners.   You print a certain number of pages and it shows up as "no ink" no matter how much toner you use.  I understand that companies make money off of ink, but this is ridiculous.  I am not paying for a new yellow toner cartridge (around $90) when the one I have is full.

Using this method, I have yet to run out of ink.  I have only reset it once, so I don't know if the printer will tell me when I run out of toner, but I am done doing large jobs and can reprint one page without worry.  I have no idea how many pages the toner will actually last, but unless you are printing full page color, It's not going to be as fast as the sheet limit expires.

So here is how to increase the sheet limit and use whatever remaining toner you have in the cartridge.  I have no idea if this works on other brother toners, but hopefully this will help someone save an extra few bucks, plus save the earth from more litter.

How to get more out of a brother printer toner (ink) cartridge
For: Brother TN-115BK, TN-115C, TN-115M, TN-115Y toner
Printers that use this ink: Brother HL-4040CN, HL-4070CDW
Time: 5 minutes or less per cartridge
Level: Easy

Step 1.
Take out the toner/toners that are showing "no ink" or "replace  toner" sign.
If pages were printed, look at the page to see if the color is indeed missing or if it's still bright and clear.

Step 2.
Look at the side of the toner cartridge.  There will be a white wheel with a bar that looks like a small clip.  If the clip is clearly visible inside a groove, you have hit the printer sheet limit.  If you can't tell, it might be faster to open it up and see. (picture is after I reset it, so you can't see the clip)

Step 3.
Wrap the toner in saran wrap or paper towels with the sides open if you don't want toner on your hands.  Unscrew 2 of the + screws on the side.  Don't lose them.

Step 4.
Note that the side will not come off.  There is a small tab that needs to be lightly lifted to unhook it.  Lift the handle bar so it doesn't cover the side.  Use something small like the end of a fork, knife, - screwdriver etc lightly to unhook the tab and lift.  You don't need to force it, it will come off easily if it is  being done correctly.



Step 5.
Make sure you don't start losing stuff here!  I held this between my legs so it was standing up towards me.  there is a white gear with something that looks like a paper clip holding it down.  We are going to have to move this so it "resets".  I held the metal part lightly up while I lifted the gear and turned it.  You will probably not be able to turn the gear while it's connected to the other ones.  I didn't take the spring off because it would be another thing to do.





Step 6.
Once everything is in place, put the top back on and screw in the screws.  You should be ready to go! (oh, and when you are putting the top back on, make sure you didn't get any saran wrap or paper towel caught in the plastic.  You will have to remove the top again if you do to get it out.)  Place toner into the printer and see if what you did is a success.  If not, you just spend some time trying to save some money and litter so don't feel so bad.


*Please note that this method only increases the amount of pages you can print because it resets the limit on how many sheets you can print with 1 cartridge.  If you have no toner in the cartridge, you will be spending 5 min to find out you can screw and unscrew stuff.  I am not sure if the printer will actually tell you once it's reset, if the printer is out of ink.  So if you are printing 30 pages and it starts to print with one color missing, make sure you are there to check it and stop the printing if necessary.

Orly Opal Hope

This weeks manicure!

A simple girly nail thats not too intrusive.

Base coat
light pink franken polish
2 coats Orly - Opal Hope
SV
Mash plate in m22  wet n wild - white
SV

Memorial day nails

I have been following too many nail blogs including Chloe's Nails, Tough as Nails, and other sites from google searching.  I have finally broke down and purchased the stamping plates and konad stamper and did my first nail stamping.  I thought it would be a fun memorial day / wonder woman style American flag nail.  I am not sure if it was because it was my first time stamping or if it was because I had to stamp 20 times, it took over 1 hr..

Wonderwoman Nails

In order the order that I painted:

Silver (2 coats) - Orly, Shine
Clear -Seche Vite
Red - Revlon, Get reddy with Mash m64 plate stamped
(for my thumb, the plate isn't wide enough so I used the tape method)
Clear - Seche Vite
Blue - Wet n wild, ?? with Mash m44 plate stamped
Top coat Seche Vite



Here are images from the MASH stamping plate set I bought from Amazon.

You can see that my nails are almost the same size as the etched image.  This is quite annoying because it doesn't cover my thumb, and for the other fingers, I have to line it up just right to not have gaps on the sides.  I am not sure if they are the exact same size as the konad plates but the images measured 1.5 cm for the tips, and for full images 1.2x1.5cm.  I wish more brands would come out with larger image sizes....

First Post

After the tenth million idea I have had and not actually execute it, I have decided that blogs may be the creative outlet I need to record all the things I have and will learn on the internet.  I spend way too much time researching and learning stuff, only to forget the things I learned in a matter of days.  There are many useful and not useful pages on the internet, and sifting through the things that I need is a daunting task.  I am hoping that I can have a tutorial listed here to remind me of what I have learned and maybe get input from others how to improve them.  Like life, I want to learn more then one thing, and whatever it is I have to tackle, I would like to add that to here.  Maybe once I have it all written down, it will be a lot easier to sort through and be able to make a full website.  Well here it goes, Thank you for anyone who is interested!

Things that I would like to learn:
How to make a hockey goal
How to make a fighting (arcade) stick
How to sew a dress
How to iron better
How to alter dress shirts (men)
How to polish shoes
How to make cards
How to organize
How to pick ripe fruit
How to make cheese
How to mill grain and why
How to grow herbs
How to build a computer
How to clean WHILE cooking
How to make icing without it becoming drippy with less butter
What spices make up different foods
How to solder