Trouble stabalizing my dreams

I've had two lucid dreams recently that each lasted about ten seconds. The funny thing about the first one is, the dream slipped away right as I was looking at my hands to try and stabilize the dream, my arms actually faded into shadows as I was looking at them.

The second time I had a different problem. I had discovered I was dreaming using the nose holding RC. I jumped fifty feet into the air to test the dream, then crashed back down like Neo in the Matrix (complete with ripple effect). I then tried and make Angelina Jolie apear. I found making her appear out of thin air didn't work, I only got little snap shots, so I tried closing my eyes and opening them again. The process had worked for making things disappear, and I thought it might work for making them appear. Unfortunately when I did this my real eyes opened and I lost the dream. Either that or I had a false awakening, it was difficult to tell.

At any rate I'd like some advice on how to deal with these problems.

Well at the beggining of my lucid dreaming experiences i had the exact same problem i think your problem is your getting too exited and going to fast. Persanily when i become lucid i stand still repeat the words im dreaming softly two times and rub my hands together try not to think to much and then get into things like flying and sex .
Good luck :)

What about the first one? I was in the middle of doing that sort of thing when the dream slipped away. Is there anything I can do about that?

I cant say for sure. My first few were short too but i gradgualy started to have lucid dreams more often and they lasted longer everytime. It happend without me knowing how or why it was happening i can only guess the brain developes new neural connections or you subconcesly become used to the idea but i gradgualy got to the point i am now where at average they last 10 to 20 minutes and i become lucid about once or twice a night. Im not a "natural" meaning i had to develope the skill from the very start so i know your situation but all i can say is it gets easier and you will naturaly get better. all you can really do concesly to help extend the dream that i know of are spinning, (altho i sometimes fall into a blackness) saying "im dreaming", rubbing your hands together, staring at something , falling backwards, paying close attention to sounds,or like you said look at your hands. im sure there are many more but thats all i can think of. I hope this has helped you and goodluck:)

rubbing my hands together and spinning seem to work for me. The difference is that rubbing stabilises the dream but maintains the current surroundings, while spinning changes the surroundings, but stabilises the dream.

I also learnt recently that sleep deprivation combined with lucid dreaming leads to the stabilisation of dreams, without any effort. Try skipping a whole night of sleep, then, on the following night sleep 3, 4.5, o 6 hours and do a WBTB; or the transition period in an Everyman sleep cycle is a good time to try it. I suppose that this is because the body needs sleep so badly, that even the excitement that causes premature awakening is not sufficient to prevent sleep.