Champagne Tuesday Spa - Monika's Mani

Sometimes the most fun you can have with your BFF's is weeknight spa/pampering. With the CT girls, we not only do spa night, but we do it up right! Whether we're doing mani/pedis, paraffin wax dips, makeup tips or hairstyle ideas, we all are girly enough to love it! One recent CT we did manis, and by popular demand (Amy, Lauren)  I'm sharing my tips for a perfect at-home mani. 

Monika's Perfect Mani
1. Remove nailpolish (self-explanatory)
2. Shape nails with a medium-grit file. The best ones I've seen are the blue files available at any CVS, Walgreens. Decide if you want to do a round tip or a square. To determine what works best for you, look at the shape of your hands. NOTE: File in one direction! If you go in different directions, you'll wind up with little nail bits on the tips.
3. Use a buffer block to smooth out any splits in your nails or any weird chips in the surface of your nail.
4. Grab the olive oil out of your kitchen cabinet and pour a little into a small dish. Take a small paint brush and swipe the olive oil over your cuticles. You can brush all the way up the side of your nail if you want extra moisturizing. Let this soak into your cuticles for a couple minutes.
5. Take an orange stick and gentle easy cuticles back. Don't push too hard that you cause yourself pain.
6. Go to the kitchen sink and wash your hands. Wash them thoroughly...don't leave any dust or oil on the nail itself.

Here's the point where you start the actual manicure. Line up your polish bottles on the table and make sure you have the lids loosened so that you don't mess up your mani. Each coat is done one after another...don't wait between. Think of your polish as doublesided tape...the bottom coat adheres to the next coat, etc. Don't do thick gloppy coats either...a simple thin coat is sufficient. Finally, don't worry about color not looking bright. You'll need to do two coats of polish. If you go outside the lines, again, no worries. The color will either come off after your polish is dry and you wash your hands, or you can use polish remover.

You'll need the following:
-Chip Skip
-Nail Envy
-Polish
-Top Coat


7. Start with a coat of Chip Skip or something like it to keep polish chips to a minimum.
8. Immediately after the Chip Skip, use a coat of nail strengthener like Nail Envy or one of the Sally Hanson Hard as Nails products to encourage nail growth.
9. On to the color! Pick whatever color you like. Note that darker colors will be a bit tougher to paint on because they can look streaky after the first coat. You'll do two coats, one right after the other. Start with one swipe of polish up the middle of the nail, pushing down on the nailbrush gently. You'll get a nice stripe of color. Then, angle the brush slightly and paint each remaining side. You don't need to go all the way to the side. It's a visual trick - most manicurists don't actually paint all the way to the skin. They leave a little space on the sides, which makes your nail look longer and thinner. The bonus is that this helps keep painting outside the lines to a minimum, so keep this tip in mind!
10. Once you've done your two coats, take your top coat and do a thin layer on all your nails.

You're done! I like to let my nails dry for a full hour to make sure they don't get nicked or dented. Any questions? If so, leave them in the comments. My disclaimer is this - I'm not a manicurist, but as someone who likes pretty nails, these tips work for me. Enjoy!

- Monika

Lexus and Chez Nora, That's How We Roll

Fall is here! I cannot believe we've been celebrating Champagne Tuesday for about a year and a half now (that's like 8 seasons of clothes too).  Last night my Girlfriends and I sauntered over to Lexus Rivercenter to check out their local farmer's market.  Walking into the oh-so-swanky car dealership we found ourselves greated with endless bottles of wine and a plethora of fresh produce and delicious homemade (well Jean Francios made) Belgian Waffles and cheese plates.  Amy was happy with her fermented jars of kimchi, my sweet tooth was happy with the delicious waffles and fresh apples, Renie was happy talking about Napa and winning a large new bag via a silent auction and Monika was pleased to learn we would be grabbing some real food at Chez Nora later to curb her growling stomach after her second day on a new job.  Thus, Champagne Tuesday was in full effect.  We did have to call our other Aymie to wish her a happy day, after finding out she was in Diamond Seats at the Reds game without us.  We all have very sad and lonley lives, I tell you.

When we arrived at Chez Nora, we popped open two bottles of 1/2 priced Korbel and ate our 1/2 priced apps.  Tuesdays are great for special prices and discounts.  We don't complain.

People may wonder what girls do for hours upon hours of this Champagne Tuesday celebration.  What we do can be answered by what don't we do.  We've done it all, talked about it all and will live on to tell our children about it all.  I do know for certain, we are all very different and come from very different backgrounds, living in very different stages of our lives with different goals and ideas of happiness.  We are all striving to better ourselves while trying to reach our goals and find happiness in life's twists and turns.  Without these ladies I would not feel satisfied.  It's all very Jerry McGuire, they complete me. 

I know I can rely on my friends to bring out the best in me.  They call it like they see it, care how I feel about it and will tell me if my ass looks big in last years pants.  It's eight shoulders to lean on, eight ears to talk to and eight arms to fall into and hug out life's circumstances.  These women rock.

Tuesdays are my favorite night of the week. It's easy to see why.  I'm already anticipating the next one.

- Lauren

Bras And More..

Although last night was missing some lovely ladies from the CT Group, we managed to drink up and enjoy the atmosphere at Tino Vino.  They served wonderful drinks and allowed us to freely create all of the Bras for the Square that our little hearts desired.

As for next week's plans...we don't have one.  Any ideas are welcome!

Cheers!

- Lauren

We HEART Champagne...and Boobies

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so we will be celebrating.  Last year we all participated in Bras with Flair on the Square, each creating a special bra to remind everyone the importance of getting your boobies checked.  These specially crafted bras were all on display on Fountain Square and up for auction.  The proceeds from the auction benefited the Susan G. Komen for the Cure.  Some people left with some fancy bras, I tell ya!  And, we had a blast styling our bras for auction and drinking the bubbly to get our creative juices flowing.

Tomorrow, we will be raising a toast to boobies.  And, we will remind ourselves to get checked and make sure all of our Girlfriends get checked.

- Lauren

Champagne at Oktoberfest?

Well... no champagne was a-flowin', but we made it out to one of Cincinnati's finest events in a hastily planned text-messaging campaign.  I have been going to Oktoberfest Zinzinnati for a while now and this year proved to be fabulous.  Having a solid group of girls to Prost to while checking out the insanity of men in leiderhosen and women wearing chicken hats, you can imagine a fun night was had by all.

We came from different areas of town and congregated on the wonderfully redesigned Fountain Square to not only celebrate an annual festival, but to also celebrate each other.  I'm so proud to call these amazing women my friends and more importantly very proud that I didn't have to drink beer at Oktoberfest after finding a Barefoot wine booth.  Pinot Grigio and I get along.  And, thanks to Amy, we got a long for at couple more sips than I anticipated.  But that's the thing...being spontaneous, having fun, sharing stories and laughing about life's misfourtunes on a beautiful end-of-summer evening among an entire group of amazing ladies happens even when it's not planned.  And that's what I love most.

Taking the Shuttle back to Newport, I couldn't stop smiling.  My friends make me happy.

-Lauren

Hello World!

This is our first of many blog posts here on the new and exciting Champagne Tuesday blog! We'll share tips and tricks we learn about the lively libation we love so much. We'll also share our experiences at the new venues we check out all over the Tri-State. So, grab a glass of bubbly, make sure you bookmark this page, and join in our Champagne Tuesday fun!