Fun Edges Tutorial

So here's a fun addition that I made to my News of the Beloved Mani. I got the bright idea that you could use decorative scissors to create something similar to the french tip guides. I remember seeing someone using a similar idea with painters tape (sorry, can't remember where) but figured I'd share my version.

Lets pull together our supplies.
First you'll need some cool craft scissors. Being a bit of a jack of all crafts I have a multitude of decorative edge scissors as you can see. These are just some of the ones that have potential for my purpose.
I use electrical tape because it seems to be pretty close to the material they use for the nail guides. It has great adhesion and won't tear. The narrowness of the tape makes it a bit more difficult to work with so find the widest you can.

Here you can see I've taken a length of electrical tape and cut it down the center. You then have for lack of a better term a negative and a positive pattern. From here you can cut them into shorter lengths for your individual nails.


Then, just like with the nail guides, place them on your nail (which should already have a nice dry base color) and with the polish of your choice (I used Sally Hansen Xtreme 'Blue Me Away') paint from the guide out (notice how my brush strokes start in the middle of the guide) filling in any missed spots as needed. Be careful to not to use too much polish, if you do it makes it harder to achieve a nice detail. If you do accidentally use too much polish, take a cotton swap dipped in polish remover and clean as close to the edge of the guide as possible, this cuts the goopyness and hopefully allows for better detail.
Wait until the polish is almost but not quite dry and pull the guide TOWARDS you slowly. To clarify, on my nails I pulled it back towards my arm not toward the tips of my nails even though they were pointed towards me for this picture. Make sense??
From there, it's just a matter of applying your top coat and enjoying your new look.

Here are some pictures of other edges I've used (pardon the glitches...the things you don't notice until you take a closeup.). Play around with it and have fun. I hope you enjoyed this little tutorial. If you try it out I'd love to see it!