Nail School Weeks 6, 7, 8: Ready, Steady, Acrylics! || In weeks six through eight, we really focused on honing our acrylic skills in preparation for the full evaluation. In addition to our regular daily clients, we practiced our acrylic sculpting on classmates, our mannequin hands, and our skill sticks. My class has been progressing at different rates; for me, my full acrylic evaluation came at the beginning of week eight.
Pink and white fever
We made quite a bit of headway in our pink-and-white sculpted acrylics. We practiced choosing the right nail forms for each individual's nail beds, and then did some drills on the various stages of sculpting. We did a full set of acrylics on our mannequin hands. We continued to work on our skill sticks to get the fundamentals of sculpting down pat!
At my school, we have two acrylic evaluations before we are released to do them for clients. The first is a three-finger evaluation on one of our fellow classmates, which you can see below. No oil is to be applied, as the instructors need to be able to see the nails as they are! My three finger evaluation went okay, though I know there were (and are) areas I had to improve on.
Once you pass your three finger evaluation, you have to bring in a model to perform a full set in two hours. I brought in my dear mommy! She sat like a champ as I went over the two hour time limit by about a half an hour. You can see my completed set below. Not too shabby for my first go, eh? I passed the evaluation and immediately was assigned a client for another full set! Nerve-wracking!
I also began doing acrylic fills at this time, and was given my first demo with the electric file. We don't use it for much, but there are certain circumstances that require it.
I imagine that my updates will become much more infrequent from now on! I think going forward, it will be a lot of client work and honing previous skills, versus learning brand new ones. We'll see!