Guys, I think it’s time I showed you some of my less than awesome attempts at nail art. I saw this awesome tutorial from my friends at Julep, and I thought. Well, shit. I can totally do that. In fact, I can make it even better!

PRETTY SPOOKY – Easy (so they say) Halloween Nail Tutorial from Julep

Okay, so to be fair, if I used just one color under the black to give it that cool orange flame-like appearance, I probably would have been fine. Instead, I decided to take it to the next level. I made sure over the course of the last year to acquire the colors to make candy corn nails when Halloween rolled around this year, and I thought I would combine the two looks. I’ll show you the tutorial first.

Here are the steps to for a candy corn mani (but obviously results will vary):

1. Paint one coat of white nail polish. Let dry. (The drying part is really important, even if you’re impatient like me.)
2. Paint 1/3 of the way up with yellow nail polish. LET. DRY.
3.  Paint a strip of orange nail polish across the center. LET. DRY.
4. Using a striping tool (some people say a toothpick works, but seriously, though…I’ve never figured out how to do that…so striping brush it is) to polish on borders with black nail polish.
5. Polish the outline of the points with one coat of black polish. This is trickier than it looks. I actually used the striping tool to paint borders near my cuticles too.
   
6. Add a top coat and you’re done!

Doesn’t that look and sound ridiculously easy? Well, it wasn’t.

Now for the pictures you’ve been waiting for:

Okay, so in the grand scheme of things, this really wasn’t that bad, right?  I mean, sure…some of the candy corn kernels are crooked, and there may be some white missing…but I mean…this is real life, not some fancy-pants nail artist, amiright?

Things I would do differently:

1. Wait a good long time for each layer to dry. Be patient and watch more 30 Rock.
2. Try to aim for the same angle with the border lines.
3. Not overthink the different colors of the candy corn. I ended up painting over spots and multiplying the layers which you can kind of see and wasn’t necessary.

What’s the worst tutorial fail that you’ve had? Any nail art designs have you played around with? Are you as adventurous with attempting nail art (and failing somewhat miserably) as me? Do you know how to use a toothpick for striping?