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Treat Yourself to the Perfect Manicure

A professional manicure is great… until that first chip. And with the busy lives we lead, it’s next to impossible to avoid chips and scrapes! For lovely nails, use these tips for a perfect home manicure. Start with nail polish remover. Whether your nails have polish on them or not, swipe your nails down with a gentle, acetone-free nail polish remover. The nail polish remover helps remove oils from the surface of your nails and will make the new nail polish stick better. Non-acetone nail polish remover works a little more slowly at taking off old nail polish, but in … Continue reading →

Toe Horns

The toe horn is not some wacky new instrument… I definitely would NOT want to play one. I saw my first toe horn at the cats-only boarding facility where I work part time. A coworker and I were doing a toenail trim for a guest (it’s often easier with two people!) when we noticed a strange growth on one of the cat’s toe pads. It looked sort of like the toenail had grown into the pad, or like a toenail was growing out of the pad itself. It definitely looked weird, and we left it alone. My coworker asked one … Continue reading →

Cuticle Care Tips

Okay, nail biters… I’m mostly back on the wagon. I’m giving that whole “stop biting your nails” thing another try! One problem I have is this: when I stop biting my nails, I tend to attack my cuticles instead. So to be completely honest, I’m only redirecting the chewing behavior, not stopping it. At the moment, I’ve got eight “good” nails, two slightly nibbled nails, and two hands full of sad looking cuticles. Cuticles are dead skin that overlaps the exposed portion of your fingernail — the nail plate. The cuticle makes a seal between your skin and your fingernail … Continue reading →

Fix Salt and Chlorine Damage

I love summer. I love sunshine, and I love swimming — ocean or pool, it doesn’t make a difference! But all that sunshine, salt, sand, and chlorine can be very damaging to your hair, skin, and nails. Always wear sunscreen! I can’t stress this one enough. Wearing sunscreen protects your skin from damage from the sun’s ultraviolet rays. That skin damage can develop into skin cancer over time — taking time to slather on sunscreen can help prevent skin cancer. Help heal your skin: If you have sensitive skin, try applying a thin coat of Vaseline before you go into … Continue reading →

Falling Off The Fingernail Bandwagon

Time to confess defeat. I thought I’d triumphed over my lifelong nail biting habit, but I’ve fallen off the nice nails wagon. In one afternoon, I chewed away several months’ worth of nail growing progress and am back to square one. It’s my own fault, really. I’d been doing so well because I’d take the time to shape and paint my nails every few days. When my nails were pretty and colorful, I didn’t bite them. But I stripped off the polish without repainting them, and BOOM. No more nails. I hardly noticed I was doing it, at first. Then … Continue reading →

How I Stopped Biting My Nails (a work in progress)

I’ve been a nail biter for longer than I can remember. When I was younger, my grandfather used to try to bribe me to stop — at first, he offered me twenty dollars if I could stop biting my nails for just a month. Before he gave up, the bribe was up to two hundred dollars for just a month of not biting my nails. And still… I couldn’t do it. I’ve tried to stop on many occasions. But nail nibbling is a long-ingrained habit. Just wanting to stop isn’t enough for me. As soon as I stop paying attention, … Continue reading →

Valentines Night for the Single Parent

I went through the day and what it would consist of for my son and I. I told you all about how I make it his day and about him. What should you do now that your children are in bed? Now that you’ve spent the day with the one(s) you love, it’s time to spend it with the one you didn’t. Yourself. There are so many people I could quote about loving yourself, but I won’t, because I’m sure you’ve heard them all. That doesn’t mean, however, that it isn’t true. You need to love yourself. You need to … Continue reading →