During winter my hands always get sooo dry! I end up with hangnails and, if you've ever had one, you know how much those suck! However, I do not have money to buy fancy nail soaking stuff. Well the other day I decided to paint my nails and thought, "Why not look for a homemade nail soak and turn this into a manicure instead of just a nail paint?" So I looked online and found several recipes. I wanted to use what I already had, so I had to be creative and make up my own, based on recipes already out there. First I cut and shaped my nails. You want to make sure to file on dry nails, if you wait until after they've soaked they will tear and weaken. Then, I removed my old polish and I washed my hands with a hand scrub from Mary Kay. (I was a Mary Kay person for like 5 minutes and now I have a bunch of random Mary Kay product in a box under my bed.)
Look at those long, thin fingers! I like to keep my fingernails short, otherwise they are in the way and I feel like I am going to break them. I wanted a soak that would moisten and strengthen. I decided to use orange juice, honey, and olive oil. The orange juice has folic acid which promotes growth, the honey strengthens and moisturizes and the olive oil is great for soft fingers.
It looked sooooo cool before mixing it. I felt a little sad using my honey for my nails instead of for eating, but I got over it. I have a cold and a boy (hehe) brought me the orange juice to help me feel better. I don't think he meant me to use it for my nails, but what he doesn't know won't hurt him right?
Give the mixture a little stir and put it in the microwave for 30-45 seconds. You want it warm, but not too warm that you can't leave your fingers in it without getting burned. While it's in the microwave, quickly set up your manicure area. If you are alone, do it in front of your TV or computer so you can be watching something while your fingers soak. Have a little towel or wash clothe for after you are done soaking.
Give it a stir when it's done heating. If the honey is still thick you need to heat it for a little longer.
My manicure 'station.' I had a TV show on netflix ready to go. You will need to soak your nails for 15-20 minutes. When they are done soaking, pull your hands out and rub the oil mixture into your cuticles and around your nails. Then go ahead and rinse your hands off! You'll need to let your nails dry before adding polish, or the polish will chip off too easily.
Once your nails are dry put on a clear base coat. Try and find a strengthening base coat so it's doing double duty, protecting your nails from staining from your polish and strengthening them. Let this coat dry fully. My sister usually ends up with grungy looking nails because she has no patience and never lets her nails dry all the way between coats.
Then add 1-2 coats of color. For the design I am doing it's best to use a color that works with only one coat. I chose a silvery-white color.
Let this coat dry for an hour or more (more is better). It needs to be completely, totally, EXTREMELY dry or the stickers will pull off the polish. I used french manicure sticker guides because that is what I had. Put them in whatever design you want, for me it was stripes. Put them on all of your nails before you start painting so you don't have to deal with them with wet nails.
Choose another color, again it should be one that only needs one coat, and paint over your nails. I found that it was easier to put the paint on horizontally, following the lines of the stickers, than vertically like you normally would. Let this dry for about 5 minutes.
SLOWLY pull off the stickers. If you lose any polish take a toothpick, dip it in your polish and use it to fill in the missing polish. Apply a clear top coat on top of that. If you re-apply your top coat every one to two days your manicure will last longer. Dip a q-tip into fingernail-polish remover and clean up any polish that you got on your fingers.
I think this is so much fun! I am going to use red and black next time. I might try diagonal stripes as well. My hands felt soft and my nails looked cool so I say this experiment was a success!!
On a completely unrelated side note, I used a collage picture frame, fabric, ribbon, a calendar, and a water color painting of a Chinese (Japanese?) symbol to make a really cool picture to put in my Asian-inspired living room. It was a lot of fun and I am crazy proud of the symbol that I painted. I think it means "love" but I am kind of hoping it actually means something random like spandex or donkey.
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