Alexis Wolfer is a well-known beauty and lifestyle expert and the founder of The Beauty Bean, an online magazine that promotes Real Beauty. She is also the creator of the international and viral Makeup Free Mondays movement and can be found tweeting about all things real and realistic beauty at @AlexisWolfer.

In a throwback to tie-dyed t-shirts and 80s-style spin-art, DIY nail art takes a polish from proper to psychedelic without any artistic talent with – get this – the help of a glass of water! Here’s a fun way to start the summer with your favorite nieces!

After prepping your nieces’ nails for polish and applying a base coat, let the nails fully dry. Once the base coat is dry, fill a few plastic cups with water (high enough so that they can easily dip their fingers into the water, or about an inch or two from the top).

Carefully, using the nail polish brush, drip the nail polish colors of your choice into the water. (I used L’Oreal Colour Riche Nail Polish in Tweet Me, $5.99, and ButterLONDON in Primrose Hill Picnic, $14.)

Experiment with dropping colors adjacent to one another as well as onto each other. Use an orange stick – or just the tip of a pencil! – to swirl colors into a desired pattern. How they appear in the water is exactly how they’ll appear on your nieces’ nails.

Have your nieces carefully roll their nails onto the surface of the water, depositing the color onto the nails. (A lot of nail polish will end up on your cuticle, and even on the pads of your nieces’ fingers, but don’t worry about it.)

Add more nail polish as needed, rolling one finger into the polish at a time until all the nails are covered – and likely messy.

Once dry, use q-tips will nail polish remover to clean around the cuticles (or, in my case, my whole hand, which, by the end, was covered in nail polish).

Know that the nail polish will take longer than usual to dry because of the water, but, on the bright side, the smudges won’t show very much because of the pattern.

Finish with a top coat and enjoy!

For more fun DIY nail art projects and tips, check out the links below!

-How To DIY Ombré Manicure!
-Love Glitter Nail Polish? Here’s How To Remove It Easily!
-How To DIY Animal Print Nail Art Easily!

Photo: Courtesy of Alexis Wolfer
Published: June 4, 2013