Confessions of a Tomboy – DIY French Manicure

Well ladies I am hooked.  I went down to our local beauty schools salon and had my very first manicure and pedicure.  I thought it was going to be boring and unpleasant but I could have sat there all day with my feet in the little spa thing.  I don’t think I have ever been so relaxed.  If you have never had a pedicure let me show you what you’re missing:

 Kohler

Ok so the beauty school didn’t have equipment this fancy but the little foot spa they did have worked wonders and to catch their weekly manicure and pedicure special for $17 was fantastic.  I can only imagine what this is going to feel like in a spa. *blissful sigh*

So what prompted me to give this a try?  I had been thinking heavily about doing this for our wedding and having two friends getting married on back to back weekends was just the motivation I needed.  One of the things I did learn though is if your nails grow very fast, like mine do, after a week your French manicure is going to need to have some touchups or be redone.  Being the cheap person that I am I decided I would do it myself and the results were fantastic.  So it seemed only right to pass along what I learned.

First let me introduce you to French manicure strips.  French manicure strips are these little curved stickers that you place on your nails to serve as a guide for painting them.  They can be bought in any store and look like this:

e-beautyshop.com

Here is how I did my DIY French manicure:

1. Place the stickers on your nails following the natural line where your skin and nail separates.
2. Once they are all on use a bottle of white or off white nail polish to paint the tips.  Use at least 2 coats of polish.  (Paint your thumbs last so that if you have any problems you can use your thumbs to wipe off any excess polish.)
3.  Once completely dry remove the stickers and put one coat of see through pink polish over the entire nail including over the white tip.  Don’t worry; the pink will blend right into the white.
4.  After the pink polish is completely dry add a hard as nails clear top coat to protect it.

Yes it really is just that easy.  When I was done here is what they looked like (don't mind Wicket in the background, he was just checking out my nails too):

I have to say I am very pleased with how they came out and for just a couple dollars.  Anyone else have any tips for DIY French manicures?