Back to Nature (Sort Of) - Part Two

Welcome, all, to the second installation of my restoration process. Today, I'm focusing on the feet.

Now, I will first say that my feet aren't nasty. I can go barefoot with minimal shame, and I can't find a nail tech who gives a better pedicure than me. That said...I spent winter wearing socks, and not really worrying about my feet. Toenails got a little stained, acquired a few callouses, skin a little dry. No biggie.

Sandal season, however, is upon us, so I am prepping my toes for display.

Considering the last time I got a pedicure, the woman pampering my feet was asking my advice, I felt like this is something I should share to the masses. I see way too many nasty cracked feet in the summer, and I feel like this post counts toward serving the community at large. So please, please share this link if you know one of those women (or men) who wear flip flops with gnarly feet.

I'm not showing my toes on the interwebs until my project is complete, but here is my process:

1. Soak your feet. This is the most crucial step. If you skip it, the rest will be useless. You can soak in the bath, or just soak your feet in the bath. I personally use my kitchen sink, since I can sit on the counter and reach my feet without actually being in the water. You can use a foot soak if you want. I personally use a mild soap like Johnson's Baby Wash or even my Black African Soap. I've also been putting about 1/3 cup of peroxide in the water, too, to help whiten and disinfect my toes. Soak about five to ten minutes, depending on how rough your skin is.

2. Scrub your feet. I've been using Qtica's Lemon Dream Sugar Scrub, since I've been spending WAY too much money on polish lately and they send it free with larger orders. I also posted a recipe for a great, but cheap and easy sugar scrub last summer. Here's the trick: Don't rinse it off yet.

3. Scrub your feet even more. I use a pumice sponge (softer and more foamy feeling than a pumice stone), but if you have a foot file or stiff brush, that will work, too. Scrubbing your already-scrubbed feet will make your skin that much smoother.

4. Rinse and brush. I use a nail brush to get the sugar scrub from between my toes, but a toothbrush or washcloth will work, too.

5. Dig up the dirt. Sounds gross, but stuff gets under your toenails when you're rocking sandals outside. Even lint from inside your socks get stuck in places, and if it doesn't get cleaned out, you can run the risk of infections, or just gross-looking feet. Orange sticks will work quite well. If needed, this a good time for cuticle remover.

6. Trim. Now that the nails are soft, trim them to desired length. Straight lines help prevent ingrown toenails, which I can assure you, are not fun.

7. File and buff. I use a regular nail file first to shape and smooth the edges of my toenails to prevent them from snagging on sheets and socks. Then, I use a buffing block to smooth the surface of my toenails. The smooth surface makes your polish look glassy, or if you go au natural, your toes just look nice and shiny and healthy.

8. Brush again. This time, just to get any filings off of your toenails.

9. Kill the germs. If you go to the gym, the pool or outside the sterile safety of your bathroom, you are in danger of getting athlete's foot or some other germy things. I de-germify my toes with Barielle Maximum Strength Fungus RX. Tea tree oil is also a natural anti-fungal agent. This step is optional, but not a bad idea.

10. Strengthen. I use Hard as Hoof to strengthen my nails, but if you prefer, a strengthening base coat like Julep Nail Therapy will work. Something to nourish your nails is the end goal.

11. Moisturize, moisturize, moisturize. I got some great mineral foot cream from Ahava in a Birchbox a few months ago. I like that it's not quite as oily as some others. Any Body Butter from The Body Shop is a good choice, too. Again, the goal is to keep your newly soft feet feeling smooth.

12. Socks. If possible, cover your silky smooth feet to keep that moisture trapped on the feet. I do this overnight so can keep them all clean and shiny and the lotion will be fully absorbed before I have to wear shoes again.

13. Lucky number 13 is my favorite: POLISH! Pick something pretty and bright and flaunt your newly fabulous feet!

There you have it, folks. My secrets have been revealed.

Stay tuned for the next episode: Trying to lighten your hair back to your natural (ish) color without spending hundreds for someone else to fry your hair.

Happy St. Patrick's Day! (Zoya Holly & Julep Oscar)

 Happy St. Patty's Day! As mentioned previously, I'm on a pastels-only kick until my nails regain a healthy pink glow, but what kind of polish junkie passes up a holiday? Especially a holiday where bright, awesome green is encouraged and even required? Not this girl. No way. Throw in some glitz, and I'm good to go.

 For my St. Patty's Day fun, I started with a coat of Essie Grow Faster base coat, then two coats of Zoya Holly. Holly was released as part of the Gems & Jewels Holiday 2011 Collection, and as the name indicates, is a lovely green the color of holly. Holly is well-pigmented and goes on like buttah. The shimmer is gorgeous, and I barely noticed when I put the top coat on. It took me an hour before I decided my nails really were dry. It's that glossy.

 If the photos look a little awkward, it's because my Holly is a mini bottle, courtesy of my December Birchbox. If you don't know about Birchbox, you should. I blogged about my January Birchbox here.

 The accent nail is one of my favorite trends in nail polish, so having received a new glitter last month, I figured this would be the time to bust it out. For the accent nail, I used Julep Oscar. Julep's Maven subscription is another great service. I've blogged about their polish quite a bit. More info here.

 There are two things you need to know about me: 1. I do not wear yellow gold. Like, ever. 2. Glitter polish usually requires 8,000 coats of topcoat to feel smooth.

I was actually a little bummed when I got my February Maven box. Red carpet glam: a red shimmer and a yellow gold glitter. Meh. Put 'em in the drawer and didn't even swatch. I thought Oscar might be an okay accent nail, so I put it on. SO sparkly. I wish it was a little softer, as I can't say the color is incredibly flattering, but it's really glittery. Oscar also goes on really smooth, and could probably be opaque in 2-3 coats. One coat of top coat, and I the nail was pretty smooth. I took some closeups of Oscar to give you a better idea of the color and shine. I would love, LOVE a pewter or gunmetal glitter like this.

 And there you have it: My St. Patrick's Day manicure! Not too fancy, but nice and festive.

What shade of green did YOU choose for St. Patty's Day?

Julep Emma and Kelly

 Following up on the unboxing of my March Maven Box from Julep, I figured I should get some swatches up!

First up is Kelly. She's described as a blushed white creme, and one of the newest neutrals for Spring. Kelly has a peachy tone, which I found really pretty. The finish is like glass. Just pure shine. I really like this color. I'm not sure I've worn peach since 1990, but this one makes me want to.

 The March box also included Emma, a pretty seashell pink shimmer. It's a very delicate color, and would take an eternity to get completely opaque, I would imagine. I layered Emma over Kelly as something of an ombre to start.

 This combination was really pretty. So soft. If I were taking a vacation to the coast, I feel like this would be an excellent neutral to wear.

 I also layered Emma over OPI Thanks A Windmillion, which really brought out the pink shimmer. This was after about 3 days of Thanks a Windmillion, so kudos to OPI on the lack of chips, but please excuse the tip wear.

I'm really happy with the color selection this month. I almost requested a shelf pull to get a new flakie glitter, but I think I would have missed out.

Julep Maven March 2012

 I've got a quickie post today: My Julep Maven box for March! This month, Julep joined the sparkly top coat bandwagon, which means a pretty shimmer and a great formula. Here is the unboxing...

 They send a card every month with information about the products, which is nice.

 The packaging from Julep is always adorable. Rando digs the little crunchy things.

 Emma, Kelly, Argan Oil and a nail file. The Argon Oil has been doing great things for my nails, and I have swatches coming soon for Emma and Kelly.

Mommy's little helper, hard at work. He made a good mess with those crinkly black paper things. Cute.

Julep Maven January 2012

Since I posted Helena last night, I thought it might be a good idea to get a post up about the January Maven box she came in. Along with Helena arrived a bottle of top coat as well as the Pomegranate body creme. I used the top coat with Edyta previously, and I can't say it was extremely glossy, and I used another top coat with Helena, so I can't credit Julep yet. The body creme smells fantastic and has a lighter texture than some creams. It's definitely not a body butter, but it doesn't leave you feeling greasy after using, which is nice. Smells yummy, too. :)

Julep Helena

 I'm finally getting around to wearing my new Julep polishes from the aforementioned Maven boxes, and I'm featuring Helena tonight. First, let me say this color is AMAZING. I love me some pink. This pink is hot. Fuchsia or magenta would be more accurate, I guess. Surprisingly, I think it could be pretty wearable for most people, too.

 The formula, like the other Julep polishes I've tried so far, applied smoothly. Like buttah. Flawless in two coats. I used three, just to see if it made a difference. It didn't. You're good in two. For this mani, I used a base of the Julep Nail Therapy followed by Julep's Base Coat, which seem to be a good combination. One interesting note: Helena dried on the matte side (see above photo). I don't know if it was the base coats or the polish, but I added a coat of Barielle Matte-inee, which isn't SUPER matte, but I thought might change it up. Didn't see a difference. The picture above is the most accurate representation of the color. It's almost dead on with my monitor.

 As pretty as Helena is by herself, I REALLY wanted to make her glossy, and a plain magenta mani seemed a little boring, so I busted out some more Nail Art Decals from Cina. This set is Garden Glam, which is a couple of little fairy-looking things and cute sparkly daisies.

 The bright pink flowers were a little hard to see unless in direct lighting, but I'm pretty happy overall. To get my glassy, glossy look, I used a coat of Julep's Fast Dry Topcoat, followed by the Beauty Secrets Top Coat I've been using for years. A lot of bloggers use Seche Vite and swear by it, but the big ole' bottle of Beauty Secrets is about $6 at Sally, which is a steal. It dries really quickly and is really good for sealing in nail art decals and stripes and the like. It's also free of formaldehyde and toluene, which makes me happy.

Helena dried like a sheet of glass. I've been wearing this mani for about 72 hours, and I chipped my index finger because I sometimes forget fingernails are not screwdrivers, but otherwise the wear has been fab. I was able to patch my finger, and you'd never know the difference. That's one sign of a great polish.

Catching Up: Julep Maven December 2011

Again with the playing catch up. December's Julep Maven box was pretty sweet. This one is the American Beauty set, which included Anne (the awesome purple) and Maria (pretty pink), Nail Therapy and a Pomegranate body scrub. I haven't had a chance to wear the polish yet, but the Nail Therapy makes for an excellent base coat. Four days and not a chip before I got bored and needed to change colors. It didn't save my nails from Dree's magical staining powers, but I did only use one coat. The scrub smells AMAZING. Even my boyfriend loved it. It has a kind of a fluffy texture for a sugar scrub, but whatever oil they used was great. You don't really notice the oil until you run your hands under the water, but my hands were really soft.

Overall, this was a great box. I haven't been disappointed with Julep. The polishes are always great quality. All of the lotions and scrubs I've sampled so far have been high quality. The Maven program really is a great value. $19.99 a month for a box of high quality products that would cost more at Target. You can check out more information about Julep's Maven program here. Disclosure: that is my referral link.

Catching Up - NYE 2012

Since you all got a glimpse of my pretty Christmas nails last night, I figured this would be a good night to show off the continuation of the glitz for New Year's Eve. As you can see looking at my ring finger, I kept the Zoya Ibiza with China Glaze Skyscraper layered over it. The other nails were chipping terribly after wrapping all those presents and tearing new ones open, so I had to rework them.

 

I kept the non-chipped nail the same, but the rest got 2 coats of Julep's Trina, which, since it's covered in glitter, is a fantastic deep plum shimmer, that has a similar glow to Ibiza. If you're not familiar with Julep polishes, you should get to know them better. More on that later. To match the sparkle on the accent nail, I layered a coat of China Glaze CG in the City over Trina. I had a heck of a time getting lighting that would photograph well, but my nails were twinkling. Very pretty.

This shot is a little blurry, but you can get a better look at the glitter. Very pretty. China Glaze makes a great glitter. Very smooth application. Just needs a lot of top coat for a glossy finish.

Julep Maven American Beauty Box #1 Review

Some of you may have heard of Julep. They're a new-ish nail polish company and they have a subscription program similar to Birchbox (for those of you not familiar, keep watching the blog for more info). You pay $19.99 per month, and they send you a box with over $40 worth of their merchandise. The selections are based on the style quiz you take when setting up your account. I just received my first box, and here are my thoughts thus far, along with some serious photo spamming:

The Box

Contents

Card with Product Info

Letter from Company (and Rando)

Maven Program Info

Nice Presentation

Other Side of the Bag

Rando Claimed the Ribbon

The Goods

Hand Cream Sample

My Surprise, All Wrapped Up

Cameron, Basecoat, Alfre

Rando messing up my backdrop

Facial for Hands Glycolic Hand Scrub

Cameron, natural light with Nikon camera

Cameron, natural light with Thunderbolt camera

Alfre, Natural light with Nikon

With Flash, Thunderbolt camera

Natural Light, Thunderbolt camera

What I like:
*The packaging is really nice. I don't feel like my entire $20 was wasted on excessive fancy paper, but it looks classy. The fact that the letter was hand signed with ink was a nice touch.
*The formula on the polish is very nice. It's a little thicker than some brands, but not at all hard to work with. The brushes were decent, though they could have been problematic with a thinner formula.
*While not really unique, the colors were nice and would work well with most skin tones.
*I haven't had a chance to test the longevity, but the base coat applied very smoothly.
*My order shipped when it was supposed to and I had the package in hand within a week.
*The hand scrub is really nice and didn't leave my hands feeling dry. Unlike a lot of hand scrubs, this one doesn't feel like they dumped sugar into regular hand soap and called it a fancy scrub. This one is made with glycolic acid and apricot seeds, so the base to the scrub actually softens and exfoliates, too.
*The hand cream is fantastic. You barely need any to coat your hands, it doesn't leave your hands feeling greasy or slimy, AND it contains SPF 30, which is hard to find.
*Decent value. While the price tag is a little high when purchased separately, the Maven program gets you 3 polishes and a goody or two for $20.
*You can refer friends and get a $15 Julep gift certificate.

What I didn't like:
*The color selection is a little bland. There isn't much from their whole collection that I haven't seen twice already.
*The price tag is a little high. Maybe a lot. The polish is $14 per bottle, and the bottles are only .25 oz. Basically half the polish for twice the cost (and then some) of most brands. At most, I pay $8 for Zoya's unique colors or Essie's great selection. The formula IS nice, but it's not THAT nice. The hand cream and the scrub run about $28-30 each. The Maven program is a decent value, but considering I just bought 13 bottles of Color Club, China Glaze and Orly for $40, and they're all unique colors.
*The polish bottles are tall and thin, making it easy to tip them over if you're not careful, or if you have a curious cat who likes to walk on your desk while you're doing your nails.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with the first box. I'm going to give it a few months to see if the selection gets better, and what other products they send. If you're interested in the Maven program, you can click on this link to sign up (Full disclosure: This is my referral link. No pressure. I am not offended if you don't want to use it). I'm not sure if this works after October, but you can use promo code WELCOMEMV5 to get your first month for $5.

One final note: I have heard stories online about poor customer service and people not getting their referral bonuses. I used my referral link above to test the validity of the program, and to see if the rumors are true or not. I am proceeding with caution with this subscription, but I feel like I should give Julep a fair shot. I work for a large company that gets badmouthed in the press because people incur large bills or want to break contracts, especially if the company declines to issue credit for valid charges. Having been on the receiving end of MANY of those calls, I prefer to get experience firsthand. Read the agreement before you sign up, and pay attention to cancellation policies.

**Update: While Rando was trying to climb into the gift bag (which was hilarious, since he is far too big to fit in that little bag), I found another sample packet of the glycolic hand scrub in the bag. Not sure why they included a sample and a full size, but only one sample of the hand cream. Weird.**