Twinsie Tuesday: Game of Thrones Dragon Egg Mani

Tuesday always means one thing in my world: It's time for another round of Twinsie Tuesday! This week's Twinsie Tuesday theme is fictional animal print mani--essentially, imagining a mani based around a fictional creature, like a unicorn, dragon or what-have-you.

I am a huge fan of the TV show Game of Thrones, as well as the original Song of Ice and Fire books, so I decided to do a mani inspired by one of the most feared creatures of Westeros: dragons! In the first season/book, the character Daenerys receives three dragon eggs as a wedding present, which is what I used for my inspiration.

Since the show and the books are both very popular I figured there must be a nail art how-to somewhere out there similar to my idea and sure enough, I came across this video tutorial and while I didn't follow it exactly, it served as a nice jumping off point.

I spent a long time working on this mani, only to find that when I went through my pictures of it, most of them turned out terribly. The sun created a huge glare against my nails, so many of the pictures were unusable, but I managed to salvage a few that turned out kind of okay. I apologize if they aren't the best! I am really bummed that I spent so much time on this and don't have much to show for it!

I started with a thin coat of OPI Here Today...Aragon Tomorrow on my nails, let it dry for about 30 seconds, then used a dotting tool to freehand the "scales." (This was the hardest part! I don't have the steadiest hand or the most patience, so it was a bit of a trial and error.) Then I took a small bit of sponge and dabbled OPI Electric Eel over top to give the scales some sheen and sparkle. Finally, on my thumb, I used OPI Stay The Night to represent (SPOILER ALERT) when Dany rises from the ashes with her newly hatched dragons at the end of the first book/season. The texture of Stay The Night and the little glints of red glitter reminded me of hot embers in a fire, so it seemed appropriate. I used topcoat, which kind of smeared some of my lines, but it really brought out the sparkle in Electric Eel, so win some, lose some. :)

It didn't turn out quite how I'd envisioned it (and I certainly wish the pictures were better) but I'm still proud of the time and effort I put into this mani. I can't wait to see what the other girls have dreamed up this week!

Amanda at Amandalandish
Anna at Going to the Showing
Anne at Grape Fizz Nails
Ashley at Art Evolve
Brandi at The Beaulieu Review
ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi
Cordia at Seriously Swatched
Elizabeth at Did My Nails
Jamie at Polish, Please!
Katherine at Haul of Fame
Maribeth at Obsessive Cosmetic Hoarders Unite!
Marisa at Polish Obsession
Meredith at Polish and Charms
Nory at Fierce Makeup and Nails
Rachel at Top Coat It
Sarah at See Sarah Swatch
Tara at Polishy of Truth