Chocolately Pretzel Bites

My mom found a recipe online for these really simple chocolate pretzel treats and since she's thinking about taking them for a dish to pass at one or both of our family Christmas gatherings we decided to experiment with them to make sure they were actually as easy and good as they sounded.

Ingredients:
A bag of your favorite Pretzels (they sell Christmas tree shaped ones)
Hershey's Kisses (we used chocolate stars)
M&M's (we tried chocolate covered raisins too but the M&M's tasted better)

We threw 10 pretzels in a circle on a paper plate covered in wax paper and topped each with a chocolate star. After that you stick them in the microwave (we experimented for awhile before we found the right amount of time for our microwave) the recipe said 30 seconds we ended up doing 77 seconds. Pull them out of the microwave and shove an M&M into the melty chocolate star.

 

We ended up needing to put them in the fridge for a while to get the chocolate to harden up again (not that all of them made it that far ;P). They were indeed easy and tasty.
The cooks:

Candy Cane Nails

I finally gave in a did something Christmasy to my nails. I've been seeing pictures all over the internet of people's candy cane nails, below are mine. This was the first attempt and I have volleyball in like 30 mins so it was a little rushed. I'm typing ridiculously right now even though the Seche Vite is no longer finger-printable. Still, it turned out better than I thought it would.

It looks a lot more cute in person-when it's not so close up lol. You can really see China Glaze Ruby Pumps in this last one. The white is Rimmel French White Tip Pro, and as always, 2 coats Sally Hansen diamond strength nail hardener as a base and Seche Vite Fast Dry Topcoat.

Dilated Sketch

I've found out that I'm a lot more creative when I have some sort of sci-fi/fantasy movie or show playing in the background. Last night I felt like drawing so I threw in Star Trek (2009) and here we have what resulted. Some of my favorite of my own drawings are the ones that have a supreme realism with just a little tweak to throw it off, like the one below. Enjoy.

First Nail Polish Post!

You may have noticed I reorganized my blog a bit. Under exaggeration. Let me know what you think of the new style. And today's post:

As someone who always wanted long nails but couldn't stop biting them, I've finally found that keeping them pretty stops me from biting them. So as you can imagine, I've been a little obsessed with painting my nails lately. Unfortunately since I typically play volleyball three times a week I still have to keep them shorter than I'd like so that they don't break off far enough down to make them bloody and painful (which has happened by the way, and damn, ow).  

Here are some of the ways I painted them for Halloween this year.

  Above: Blood drips. 2 coats Sally Hansen diamond strength nail hardener, 1 coat Maybelline salon finish Go Currant Raisin Sauvage for the blood, and 1 coat Seche Vite fast dry top coat.

  Above: 2 coats Sally Hansen diamond strength nail hardener, 2 coats of both green and purple (the green is China Glaze Paper Chasing (which stained my nails REALLY yellow even through the two base coats), the purple is Sinful Colors Let's Talk), and 1 coat Seche Vite fast dry top coat.

Above: Pokéballs to go with my Pikachu costume. 2 coats Sally Hansen diamond strength nail hardener, 2 coats China Glaze french bliss Ooh La La White, 2 coats Sally Hansen diamond strength Honeymoon Red, Sinful Colors nail art Time Off for the black and 1 coat Seche Vite fast dry top coat.

This was the first time I used something other than tape to make a design; the tip of a bobby pin for the circles. Could have been better, could have been worse. It'll take some practice to get better at that.

Flowers, Space and Octopus Heads

Been a while since I've posted because I haven't been doing much art lately, but here are some random sketches from my sketchbook.