Nail School - Day 39 - My Last Day

Well, I did it. I finished nail school yesterday. My last day was busy and exciting. The first thing that I did was make some rings out of acrylics. That's right, the rings below were made from the same stuff that you make fake nails out of! I made three rings, but I'm too lazy to get up right now to photograph the other ones. This one turned out the best though. I'm thinking about starting a ring making thing on etsy because these were fun to make that I think I can make really intricate designs now that I know how to do it. What do you think, would you buy one for the right price? 

Simple brown ring with brown shimmer/holographic powder.

Close up of the ring. You can see the holo sparkles better here

After making the rings I was lucky enough to get a facial with a chemical peel. One of the students in the esthetics department needed to practice, and because I was done with everything I needed to do, I got to be the test subject! It was great. My skin felt amazing. But this wasn't the only present I got yesterday -- Because I graduated with over 90% attendance (actually, I had 100% attendance), the school gave me this manicure bowl:

I think the best presents that I got over the course of the day though were from my classmates. They gave me cupcakes, balloons, and one made a drawing on the white board for me. It was amazing! I didn't think I would miss the school too much, but after my fellow students treated me so well, I had a change of heart. I will miss the other students I got to meet, the teachers who helped me to learn, and everyone else who I got to interact with. 

My day continued at lunch with my mom, which was great. We even did a little shopping afterwards. And finally, I joined my friend for some drinks. Overall, it was a great day, and interesting experience, and although I'm happy it's over, I enjoyed it for what it was!

Nail School - Day 38

Tomorrow is my last day. At 1pm tomorrow I will be done with nail school forever. But that won't be the end of my adventure. As soon as I'm done with my school day, I will begin the quest to pass my state licensure exams. This adventure will begin at the doctor's office. By 2pm tomorrow I plan to be at the doctor's to get a form signed that certifies that I'm infectious-disease-free. Luckily, I'm pretty confident that I am, so getting this paper signed won't be a big deal. After the paper is signed, I have 30 days to get my temporary license. The difference between a temporary license and a regular one is that "temporary" signifies that I haven't passed my state exams yet. However as soon as the temporary license is in my hand, I can start working. To get my temporary license I have two options. I could either do it by mail (which could take weeks) or I can drive to Syracuse (approximately 1.5 hours away) and get it in person. The office in Syracuse is only open on Monday's, so bright and early Monday morning I'll be making that journey. I have high hopes to start working on Tuesday, but again, we'll get to that when we get to it =)

I am so happy that everyone has followed me along for this journey and I'd just like to say that without the support of this blog, and without having my own little corner of the internet to vent to, I'm not sure if I could have done it!

Since I started school I haven't just been changing my nail art, I've been changing my nails constantly too! So here's what's on my nails today! I did a fill on the gel nail extensions I had on and added some 3D roses. What do you think?

Nail School - Day 37

I only have 1.5 days of school left. Can you believe it? I know I can't. This week I've been trying to pamper myself since I know I won't have much time to after I enter the work force.  Today another student treated me to a pedicure with a mud mask and a sea salt exfoliation.  My feet are so smooth that I can hardly walk without slipping! I've still been taking clients because I really enjoy it and I don't want to stop just because I'm almost done. Tomorrow I'm going to do my own nails and Friday I'm hoping to get a facial.

Nail School - Day 36

As I said a few days ago when I talked about the goals I've achieved/am still working on, I made some Obele nails! I'm really into shaping acrylics in interesting ways right now. I guess it's a little less boring than just forming "normal" nails. For a first attempt, I think these Obele's turned out awesome! Next time I hope to make my edges sharper. Usually the Obele nail has a much more dramatic stiletto, but I decided to try to make a more wearable Obele. According to this website (which has AWESOME explanations of nail shapes -- Obele is at the bottom of the page), the Obele is usually made from a UV gel. I assume it's usually a UV bonding gel, but at school we only have self-leveling UV gel, which as the name suggests, wouldn't be very good for building upwards. 

The Obele's were created last week, but today I worked more in 3D nail art. Here's a peek at what I was working on: 

Nail School - Day 34

Yesterday (Friday), I didn't get home until very late because immediately after school I did nail art at my friend's store to celebrate her grand opening! I'll be posting about that later today.

Friday marked a very special day for me. It was exactly one week until I graduate nail school. At the end of my first week I blogged about accomplishments I hoped to achieve by the end of nail school. Here they are again with updates on my progress!

1. First and foremost, I want to get my nail technician license. This is really the only reason I'm taking the class to being with. I want to be able to practice nail art on others as a (sort of) career.

Obviously I don't have my license yet, but I'm on the right track to getting it! I am very confident that I will pass both of my exams after I complete school. After last night, I'm also confident that I will be able to practice nail art on others as a career. It might be a specialty thing, but it's fun and priced correctly, everyone wants it!

2. I want to be able to shape and file nails so that they are all the same length and shape. This has always been really hard for me. I depend too much on the nail bed and not enough on the length of the entire nail. I also really stink at filing. Once I tried to make my nails square and they were all sorts of crooked and crazy looking.

Okay, I was only semi-successful at this one. I am definitely way better at filing. But I feel that my biggest accomplishment with regards to filing is that now I can see what is wrong with the shape or length of the nail. However, that doesn't always mean I can fix it. 

3. I REALLY want to be able to create obele nails (see picture below). I think that I could do so much awesome nail art on these nails and I have an idea of how to make them more wearable too. I'm also interesting in learning the edge nail, which is a less dramatic version of the obele.

I'm gonna say accomplished on this one! You all saw my "The Edge" nail on Day 28. And I was so excited that on Friday I made my modified Obele nails! I, however, like a dolt, left them at school. I promise photos ASAP (probably Monday evening). We have these lockers at school and you get in trouble if you forget something at home so I always leave everything in the lockers, which is why I constantly can't show you all pics of the fun stuff I do! 

4. I want to have a job opportunity that allows me to do more nail art than the average nail tech. 

This one is almost definitely accomplished. But I don't want to count my chickens, so I'm going to wait to tell you all more about that for a few days =)

5. I want to get faster at nail art so that when I'm doing others nails it isn't too long of a procedure.

Oh yeah, I totally got this one. I can do a simple design in as little as 10 minutes now. And even more complicated designs don't typically take more more than an hour. But instead of worrying so much about this goal, I think I'll set a new goal: Don't be such a slave to the clock. 

6. I want to find out what types of designs other likes and be better at taking requests. I mostly do designs that are on my own nails so I really want to get used to doing nails that I'm not necessarily passionate about myself, but that my client will love.

I've been working really hard on this, but I don't think it's a goal that I will ever completely accomplish because it is something I need to build on for the rest of my life!

Nail School - Day 33

FINALLY! Pictures of the 3D nail art I did a few days ago. From left to right they go from first done to last done. My favorites are the yellow and white flower, the tree, the blue bubbles, and the ABC blocks. Which do you like? 

Now, on to my day today! Like I mentioned we had our 200 hour exam today. For it, we performed a full state board procedure on a model. I get super huge test anxiety which means I tend to freak out and then mess up. I didn't do *too* horribly, but I'll found out my actual grade soon. I know that I didn't do my best work, which means that no matter what grade I get, I will be disappointed. I know, I'm my harshest critic. The worst part of the exam was when I had to make a smile line using acrylic power/liquid. I made a smile hexagon instead/ Whoops. I later did my models nails with acrylics and formed all my own smile lines and each and every one of them came out perfect. So I'll chalk the error up to anxiety. On the plus side my teacher complimented my manicuring and polishing abilities quite nicely today. Which is odd to me because seeing all the swatchers polishing abilities, I've always thought I was bad at polishing. I'm finally starting to feel better, so there shouldn't be any more lapses in posts for a while!

These are on my nails currently. It's an acrylic nail that I made over a form (some call this "sculpting" the nail). The smile lines were all freehanded with the acrylic liquid/powder. I think I did a pretty good job! The green looks way more awesome in person! It's super glittery (but as we all know, glitter never looks as cool in pictures). 

Nail School - Day 32

Man, this cold I've had sure has decreased the number of blog posts I've been doing, huh? This post is for yesterday. I completely forgot to bring home my 3D nail art to photograph, but it's coming, I swear! Yesterday was great because at this point I'm done with my procedures so I have a bit more freedom as to what I'm doing in a day. By "done with my procedures" I am referring to the fact that we have to complete a certain number of services while we are at school. Here's the list of everything I had to complete:

21 Manicures
20 Pedicures
20 Acrylics
16 Wraps
12 Tips
8 Gels
20 State board hands
10 Nail Art

I've completed everything except for 3 pedicures. Which means I'm not only on track, but I'm ahead. In order to complete everything you have to do at least 3 procedures a day, but I regularly do about 5-7.

Today I have my 200 hour practical exam, so I'll let you know how it goes this evening! Hopefully this cold doesn't bog me down too much!

Nail School - Day 31

I skipped day 30, I know... I've been sick and pretty exhausted and most of the day I just slowly worked on my fake hand. Today I'm feeling a bit better so I'm back to blogging!

Today I did a Shellac mani on myself, which means that I have officially had acrylics, gels, wraps, and gel polish on my nails! That's pretty much everything, which is awesome! I wanted to try every product out so I knew how they felt and how they wore so that I could make sure I give my eventual clients the best results possible. Shellac is really easy, in fact I think it's easier than regular polish because it goes on so smoothly and if you need to clean up, it's super easy (it doesn't smear). The next investment I'll be making is a UV light so that I can do gels and gel polish when I start working. In a few days I'll be taking some pictures to show you the condition of my natural nails after all these procedures. Because I am gentle with my nails, they really aren't in horrible condition.

I also did something new for the first time today: 3D nail art with acrylics! It was tons of fun, which I wasn't expecting. I accidentally forgot to bring home the nails I worked on, so there won't be any pictures of them until tomorrow. But I promise it'll be worth the wait!

We also had our 200 hour written exam. I got a 95% and on Thursday I will be taking the 200 hour practical exam. Which is officially the last exam I have to take (until the actual state board)!

Nail School - Bonus Guest Post

Hi everyone! Today I have a follow-up guest post by Lexi from Finger Painted about what materials she received at nail school. Lexi is an incredible nail artist who just began nail school last week, and lucky for you, she's blogging about her progress! It's perfect timing to because soon I will no longer be in school so you can get your daily nail school fix from her! I forgot to mention the few things that the school gave me to keep (ie. they are my personal property and I get to take them with me when school is done), which include a brush for acrylics, a dappen dish, nippers, tip cutter, toenail clippers, scissors, tweezers. This is pretty much exactly the opposite of how Lexi's nail school does things, so without further ado, here's Lexi:

Hey! Its Lexi from Finger Painted :) I just started nail tech school and Ive blogging everyday as well. Nev asked me if I would talk about what the school provides and what I have to buy.  My school is sponsored by OPI so all the products we use are OPI. Just like at Nev's school, we have a closet in the classroom that has supplies and a polish rack, but we also each have our own nail kits. Part of our tuition goes towards the kit that we receive on our first day. The kit is absolutely tremendous and weighs a million pounds! haha. Most of the stuff we need in class is in our kits so we have to bring them back and forth with us everyday. I took tons of pictures of everything inside. The only thing we had to buy separately from the kit was a tip/edge cutter for tips and a straight edge toenail clipper. We also don't have fake hands to use at school so I bought my own.

Nail School - Day 29

Two weeks left! Crazy stuff! Today I did a pedicure and some work on my fake hand. Then I put more gels on myself. This time I used forms to extend the tip. I'll let you how they last because you may recall that I've had some trouble with them popping right off in the past! Here are some photos:

Yay gels!

This is my right thumb, I did a very thin application on this thumb because this is the thumb I use for EVERYTHING. I usually don't put nail art, nail polish, or anything else on this thumb. 

Anyways, yesterday I promised a discussion on where I get the products that I use while I'm in school. Susie, my soon to be mother-in-law asked about this. And I'm under the impression that it's vastly different at different schools, so this is my school's policy. We have a big gigantic closet and a room that contain all the products we use while we are at school. This means that everything from acrylics, to forms, to lotions, to polishes (we use Zoya), to sea salt is provided to us. I think this is foolish for a lot of reasons, but here is the main one: This means that students regularly take WAY too much product because they don't get penalized if they do. There is a lot of waste in this school. However, I must say that I like our system because I don't feel pressure to be perfect when I'm first learning something, which is how I would feel if I were wasting my own products. Today I bought a BUNCH of products for at home use (I spent $100, eep!), but I'll be using them sparingly while I'm at school. Hopefully they'll pay for themselves! 

Nail School - Day 28

As promised this morning, I have tons of fun stuff for you tonight! First I have a special bonus surprise! My first set of "The Edge" nails!! These nails are made from acrylics and feature a rounded nail bed with a pyramid shaped tip. They were super hard to do but worth every second! They took me about 1.5-2 hours. Because they're hard to describe (and photograph) I thought I'd share a bunch of photos with you!

Next up is the promised video tutorial on how to do the chevron nails I posted yesterday! The video shows me painting the nails without a ton of direction. If you have any questions about how I did it and the video doesn't answer them, feel free to ask!

Next up, a photograph of me in my uniform as requested by Susie, my soon to be mother-in-law. Ignore the horrible un-photogenic-ness... That's just who I am haha!

Finally, Susie also gave me a great idea for something to write about. I haven't mentioned much about what actually happens during the licensure exam, so here goes! First you have to take a written exam, upon passing that you are allowed to take the practical exam. On the practical exam you have to bring a "model" with you whose nails you will be performing services on. One hand gets a regular manicure and the other hand gets "advanced services" which include wraps and acrylics. I'm having a really hard time trying to find a model because who in their right mind would want one hand manicured and the other hand to have a different type of artificial nail on each finger! It's true that I can immediately remove the acrylics and wraps, but it's not like that's super good for your nails... So needless to say I'm really struggling to find a model. Hopefully I'll get a volunteer because otherwise I might have to drag Ron there and put some beautiful fake nails on his man-ish hands haha. 

Here's another little tidbit about nail school that Susie asked about: We are supplied everything that we need while we're in school, so we don't have to buy any products unless we want to practice at home. I'll be writing more about this tomorrow and hopefully getting Finger Painted to chime in since she just started blogging about nail school! She started Monday, wish her luck!!!

Nail School - Day 27

Nothing happened today. I'm having a mental break down today so I won't be filling you in on the nothingness of nail school since I think my pessimism might be unfounded. Have you ever done something that you're morally against? It eats you alive.

Nail School - Day 26

I was a busy bee today! I did 9 procedures! That's a lot. In order to graduate you have to do an average of 3 procedures a day, so 9 is like unheard of. I was supposed to have a pedicure, but she called and canceled last minute, such is life. I was sort of happy she cancelled though because it gave me the time to perform some services on a student who graduated from the esthetics program this afternoon. He wanted a beautiful shade of CND's Shellac called Negligee (which is a sort of pinkish opalescent sheer polish) but he also wanted the thickness and resilience of acrylics. Previously another student applied acrylics atop his Shellac, and he loved the look, so that's what we decided to do. I'm a little bit concerned about the staying power of these two procedures. Usually if someone wanted both I would apply the acrylics first then the Shellac, but since he liked the look before I decided to try it out. Plus I will totally find a way to fix it for him for free if any nails pop off! The reason it's a little concerning to me is because in order to put an acrylic onto a nail you have to "take off the surface shine" of the nail (aka rough it up). But if you rough up Shellac it comes right off since it's like a polish! I ended up putting on the Shellac, skipping the top coat, which gave me a slightly grittier surface, then applying the acrylic. I must say, they looked beautiful. I was really happy with how they came out. The experience was sombering though because it reminded me that I can be a perfectionist on myself all I want, because I have all the time in the world to fix what I mess up on myself, but with clients I need to work on getting close to perfect in a short amount of time. Here are some pictures:

Nail School - Day 25

EDIT: I completely forgot to say this and it's one of the best things that happened to me all day, so I want to make sure it's the first thing that anyone reads! Quite a few readers have said that I've inspired them to go to nail school because of these posts and I don't think that I can possibly express how amazing that makes me feel. If I've inspired you, or encouraged you, or pushed you one step further: you are the exact reason I am continuing to blog. You mean more to me that you could possibly imagine. Thinking about how much it means to me could almost bring me to tears because knowing how hard this journey has been, and how worth it it apparently is painfully beautiful. Thank you!

Notice something different about my nails? Oh yeah, that's right, they have beautiful acrylics on them! And I did them! Awesome, right? Today was super amazing. First we prepared for the state board exam and then I had a client. The client I had was a client who came in a few weeks ago for a manicure and today she requested that I perform a manicure AND a pedicure on her! I felt so good, it was affirmation that I'm doing a good job. She said she came in not only for the mani/pedi but also to give me her contact information so that she can follow me to whatever salon I get a job at, she specifically wanted to make sure she didn't miss me before I graduated. How amazing is that? It felt so good and it was an honor to give her a mani and a pedi. I hope I did as well today as I did a few weeks ago!

After my client I decided to put these beautiful acrylics on my nails. I wanted to add some length but I wasn't a huge fan of the tips that I had on previously (I put on tips/wraps on my nails which you can see here). So to add the length I used forms. A form is a kind of sticker that you use to create a base to extend the acrylic over the free edge. I really like forms because you can do things like create "the edge" nail with them and they are really fun to work with.

I used an acrylic color called warm pink opaque which was beautiful. I really like colors that start with the word "warm," I think they help to boost your skin tone. I ended up being proud of the application which is awesome because I definitely rushed the process. That was also great because they are my first acrylics on a human hand (as opposed to my fake hand). I plan to use them in my eventual portfolio. And I'll let you know how the hold up!

Both hands. I really messed up my ring finger on the bottom hand (ie. my right hand) because I got the acrylic WAY too close to my eponychium which can cause lifting. 

Here's a side view. The side view can really help you to see imperfections so that I think this helps to show what a good job I did. I know, tooting my own horn =) 

Here's how thin they are. I think it's a good thickness. Because I added length and there is not support system I didn't want them to be too thin so I went with a slightly thicker acrylic than I might have done without a lengthening enhancement or with tips. 

Nail School - Day 24

I officially only have 15 days of school left, which is insane! I feel like it's moving so fast and I'm concerned I won't be totally prepared to start my job hunt when it's done. I experimented more with gels today. I was able to get them on better but when I tried to pop them off I was able to get them. On the plus side, I had the teacher do two gel nails on my hand and I was able to pull those off too, so it's possible that this is just how gels are. Has anyone else used them before?

Nail School - Day 23

One of my objectives in nail school is to try out tons and tons of nail products on myself. The reason for this is two-fold: First of all I've never really had any nail enhancements so I'm curious about them and second of all because you can't get a feel for how good you're doing until you test it out on yourself! A perfect example was my attempt at putting gel nails onto myself today. I'll start out by describing what gel nails are. They are sort of like acrylic nails. It's a layer of gel that cures in a UV light and results in a hardened overlay over the nail. One of the advantages over acrylics is that gels are thinner and therefore more natural looking. One of the disadvantages, as I've found, is that gels are VERY hard to apply. I have no difficulty making them look nice but soon after I applied them they began lifting and they popped right off! I obviously need more work on them, so I'll keep you updated if I ever get them on good!

Nail School - Day 22

Today we learned how to do gels and shellacs. Shellacs are really easy suggesting that you're good at polish application (seeing as they are just polish that you have to cure under UV light). Gels are a little harder. They have a gel consistency (go figure!) and are harder to work with. When you apply them you have to have a light hand to spread the gel over the entire nail but a heavy enough hand to make sure they don't get clumpy. I plan to put them on my own nails asap so I'll let you know what they're like!

On another note I totally forgot to post about the fact that I put tips and wraps on my nails! That's right I had fake nails on my own hands. It was kind of cool -- I had extra length to do nail art on! The only reason I didn't like them (and the reason I took them off only two days after putting them on) is because they aren't conducive to nail art in the sense that if you change your polish a lot, they can start getting annoying. I think they were pretty while they lasted! And boy did they last, it was super hard to take them off!

Here's what they looked like head on

Here's an idea of how thin they are. I know a lot of people don't like acrylics because they feel so unnatural, well these felt exactly like my natural nails, just stronger!

Nail School - Day 21

I've been super busy lately, which is why these posts are so late! Yesterday we did our first "state board hands." A state board hand is a fake hand that you prepare as you would at the state board (which is the liscensure test).  On these hands you do all the nails differently. On three nails you do a tip application, you do an acrylic overlay with white tips on one nail, silk wraps on another nail, fiberglass wraps on another, and finally an acrylic with a form on the last. I enjoy doing them because it's good preparation. I tried to do timed hands and get faster at things like white acrylic smile lines. Anyways, boring boring boring. Same old, same old. Oh well, at least it's fun!

Nail School - Day 20

Wow, 20 days of nail school! It doesn't feel like it's been that long! Today I officially hit the half way mark to my completion date, which is exciting. Because I'm now half way done I get to wear a black shirt instead of a white one. I haven't told you about the uniforms yet, so I'll take a moment to explain uniforms before I tell you about my day. At my school we have to wear black closed toe shoes, black pants (that aren't jeans), a white shirt (until you are half way done, then you can wear black), and a black apron that says our school name on it. These are my qualms with the uniform: On the first day you are told that you need to look professional. Do you know how hard it is to look professional in a white shirt when you are constantly getting dirty because of the work you're doing?! I also am not a fan of the apron, not due to appearance, but due to material. It's like a sleek garbage bag kind of material and it gets dirty fast but is impossible to wash. I wish they gave us a cloth apron so that I could wash it.

Anyways, today we had a substitute so it was a pretty low key day. We worked on our fake hands for most of the day. I got to have another client. She came in for a pedicure and was more of a challenge than the previous pedicures I've done. She had what are called pincher toe nails (which are HIGHLY curved nails) which are a little hard to work with. It was nice to give a pedicure to someone who didn't have essentially perfect feet, I felt like I learned a lot. She was incredibly nice though, so I'm still waiting for my first mean client!

Nail School - Day 19

This is a super late post about last Friday at nail school, I had a super busy weekend and haven't gotten around to it! Friday we learned how to use acrylics (monomer and polymer mixtures, not the paint) to make smile lines for french manicures on acrylic nails. Usually in nail salons if you want a white tip on an acrylic set the nail technician will apply a white tip to the nail, then a clear acrylic over the top of it. But we learned how to actually form the smile line with a white acrylic. I liked this a lot because with the acrylic tips you can only have the smile line that the tip comes in, but sometimes you want a deeper or shallower line. The only problem is that it turns out it's super hard! First you apply the white acrylic to the tip of the nail, then you form it into a smile, but sometimes it dries to quickly, or it's too wet, so it's definitely a learning process!