Get your nails ready for Valentine's Day!
Photo: Melissa Hill/MTV
In case you missed the memo, Valentine's Day is this Friday. Yep, four days from now. Whether you're looking for a festive manicure to help take your V-day outfit to the next level or just looking for a subtle (and artful) accessory, you've come to the right place. We've teamed up with COVERGIRL to bring you THE Valentine's Day manicure that pays homage to the colorful candy that few people actually like, but everyone receives. We're talking conversation hearts. They're perfect for your Valentine's Day #covermoment and are sure to get people talking (LOL, get it?). Peep below for a step-by-step tutorial, including GIFs!
OK, so this manicure requires sliiiiiightly more prep than usual. Before you begin painting, you're going to need a shallow cup filled with 50% alcohol and 50% water and 10 pre-cut printed conversation-heart sayings. The sayings will need to be backwards so they read correctly on your nails, so you'll need to input your sayings into a generator that can flip them (there are a bunch, but here's a simple one!), or invert them yourself using Photoshop.
Melissa used six different COVERGIRL colors for the manicure: Tickled Pink 165, Skylight 147, Coral Silk 240, Bon Bon 141, Lav-Endure 145, and Salt Water Taffy 142. Once you have your supplies and polishes ready, you can get started.
STEP ONE
ALL GIFS: Melissa Hill/MTV
Apply a base coat of Tickled Pink 165 to all of your fingers.
STEP TWO
Using a nail art brush, paint a heart on each finger. You wanna make sure your heart is large enough to fit the text you've printed. You don't want your ability to invert phrases to go to waste!
Paint hearts of different colors and sizes on each nail. Let dry before moving on to the next step.
STEP THREE
Dip your conversation-heart strips into your alcohol mixture.
STEP FOUR
Press the paper onto your nail, being careful to center the saying in the middle of the heart. Trimming the paper may help.
Press the sayings onto the hearts and marvel at your work. Look how cool these are! I may watch this GIF all day.
TIP: If there's some paper stuck on your nail, dip your finger in the alcohol mixture and gently rub your nail in a circular motion. Bye, paper! No, you won't ruin my manicure.
Ta-da! Look at these beauties. You're totally ready for whatever you have planned for Valentine's Day, whether you have a hot date or plan to sit on your couch all night.
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