Do they still make those holiday commercials with the Coke bears? I sort of hope they do, if only because there's such a specific holiday nostalgia attached to them. They are definitely what inspired today's mani, even if there is no cola product placement in this particular design. While this design could certainly be considered more winter themed than specifically holiday themed, I did add a touch of red and green and I do think that there's something Christmasy about polar bears, so I'm saying it's definitely a holiday mani!

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I definitely wanted this mani to have the vibe of polar bears at night, so that's really what drove the color story. Well, that and the fact that I knew EXACTLY which polish I wanted to use to fill in the bears. I decided to keep it overwhelmingly black and white, with just the pops of red and green from the bear's scarves, so when it came to choosing a base polish it really was a no brainer. Picture Polish's Winter is a dark grey base packed with holo flakes and it makes a sort of perfect night sky, in my opinion.

I started by applying two coats of Winter to all of my nails and letting those dry down while I worked on my decals.

Like I said, I knew exactly what color I wanted to use for the polar bears in this design and that is Picture Polish's Lakodom, which is an almost white base also packed with holo flakes. It's by far one of my favorite polishes for reverse stamping. Using a combination of a dotting tool and a nail art brush, I filled in the two bear designs using Lakodom as well as Starrily's Everest and Infrared, which are two of my other favorite holiday season polishes.

To put everything together, I started by applying the snowy tip to each nail using a white stamping polish. This really is a step that turns out best if you don't get too precious about it, so I just sort of slapped it on. Next, I went in with the star stamping, which can be interpreted either as falling snow or a sky full stars. And finally, I applied the bear images to my two middle fingers, placing them as though they were perched on the snowy ground.

Once I was happy with my design, I sealed it in with a nail art top coat and then finished with a generous layer of quick dry glossy top coat for shine and volume. And voila!

I'm honestly so, so in love with how this mani turned out. This was actually my second try at it, as the first one was cute but not quite right, and I'm so glad that I decided to give it a second go because I genuinely love how it turned out!