Goldfish Kiss

A pop of color with a fun little pattern makes for a cute & easy DIY pedicure…and to be honest, I can’t stop staring at my toes now. It’s like one of those cute retro but stylish prints I’d put on a thank you note, but…it’s on my toes.

DIY Cherry Blossom Toes

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There is an unexpected perk to 1: having problematic skin and 2: being a self employed penny pincher. I’ve learned to take care of my skin without spending a lot of money.

One of the easiest ways to have soft, glowing skin is to get a facial, yet unfortunately it’s also one of the more expensive things out there to do. Never fear, with some household items, products under $10, and about 30 minutes to kill, you can get the dewy skin and save your money for bikinis.

Alas, I present to you, the DIY at home facial I’ve perfected over the years.

*This is geared towards combination skin that’s out in the sun.

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My 3 year old niece, Ella, was the guinea pig for the latest DIY Pedicure. She wanted Strawberry toes, so I was going to give them to her no matter what. So if anyone has a little daughter, cousin, niece or friend who can sit still, this is the cutest little pedicure ever.

It also looks great on adult toes. In case you want to try it out.

DIY Strawberry Toes:

1. Paint base coat.

2. Paint toes a bright deep strawberry pink color.

3. Using a white nail art brush, in the center of each toe, by the base of the nail, paint three skinny triangles that connect at the base, to make the strawberry leaves.

4. Paint over the white with a bright green nail polish (if you can find a nail art brush that will work best.) By doing white first, the green will be much brighter.

5. Using either a black or yellow polish and dotting tool, paint a few tiny dots on each toe for the strawberry seeds.

6. Let polish dry completely, then cover with glossy topcoat.

Eat your heart out Strawberry Shortcake.

Leopard Print. Everyone loves it for some reason. Including myself. Especially on nails.

Good news. It’s easy to paint the beloved print yourself, and I think if you don’t have a steady hand, it looks even better.

So here’s the DIY for some Leotastic nails.

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They say the key to being happy at what you do is to find something you love, and figure out how to make a living out of it. Well if that’s the case, Phyllis Nelson, Designer of Long Lost Jewelry, took great notes.

After making jewelry for family and friends for years, purely for the love of it (sheesh, nice friend). Phyllis turned her hobby into a collection of hand crafted bracelets, necklaces, earrings and re-crafted vintage finds. We are all benefiting from her decision to start her business. The jewelry makes you instantly go from beach babe to beach-head-turner-whoa-where-did-she-get-that, babe.

Each piece is beautiful, old-meets-new, extremely versatile, unique, handmade in limited quantities, and the vintage pieces are one of a kind.

Some of my favorites are the gold and turquoise Fraternal Twins necklace (Gosh, I love that combo), the perfect for layering Driftwood/Disc/Pearl combo (pictured above), and the simple, yet appropriately named, Dainty Bracelet.

To Phyllis’s family and friends, thank for sharing her skills with the rest of us :)

Like Long Lost Jewelry on Facebook,

Pick up a piece of your own online and at the Taryn Michelle Boutique.

A big ol’ plump set of smackers. There are a lot of glosses, injections, fillers, and who knows what else out there promising give you lips that look like they could burst. But I prefer a natural plumper that doesn’t cost $30, and I know exactly what’s in it causing the increase in volume. Alas, if you have some spare time, here’s a recipe to whip up for some temporary, yet almost instant plumpification.

DIY Homemade Lip Plumper

Mix together:

1. Aquaphor, or a plain clear gloss as the base

2. A few drops of Liquid Vitamin B6,

3. A few drops of Liquid Niacin

4. A drop of Cayenne pepper (you might be able to get away with tabasco or tapatio)

5. Drops of Peppermint, Cinnamon Leaf, or Clove oil

6. For color and shimmer - add in some loose powder blush or shimmer.

7. A dash of honey

Mix until smooth, and spoon into an empty lip balm pot or jar.

Test on a small patch of skin before slathering on your lips.

Other DIY plumpers that I do not recommend and have experienced first hand:

1: Sunburn lips (My fault)

2. Getting hit in the mouth by a surfboard (Also my fault)

3. A bee sting literally smack dab on the center of your lips resulting in way too much volume, and a trip to the emergency room after realizing you are allergic. (Great Story. Maybe I’ll post the pic here someday)

Photo Via: Fashion Gone Rouge

Recipe courtesy of: ehow.com

Matte nails. Love ‘em, everything about ‘em. Pair it with some strategically placed shiny topcoat and you have some nails that look like they’ve been pecked by a rain shower.

Here’s the how to. It’s simple.

1. Paint nails as you normally would. Opaque, non shimmery colors work the best.

2. Using a matte topcoat (I used Essie Matte About You) apply a layer to each nail and watch that gloss go buh buy. Alas, nails that look like velvet. Pretty sweet.

3. Using a homemade dotting tool (my favorite is a push pin stuck into a pencil eraser) place random dots of a super glossy top coat all over nails.

4. Let polish dry

Enjoy your velvety yet glosstastic nails.

As the great Poet, Missy Elliott, once said: “Me I’m supa fly (uh-huh), Supa dupa fly (uh-huh), Supa dupa fly.”

Ok well, I’m not supa fly at all, but my toes are. They look like Monarch butterfly wings, which served as great inspiration for an easy and impressive DIY Pedicure.

Here’s how to get some Supa Dupa Fly toes, in the Monarch sense.

1: Paint toes with a basecoat

2: Paint toes with 2 coats of a very fun, almost onoxiously bright color.

3: Using black nail art polish brush, paint a swipe across the upper inner corner of each toe. Then fill that corner in, this will make a black triangle tip on each nail corner.

4: Still using the black nail art polish, draw 3 lines (big toe) or 2 lines (other toes) that connect the other side of your toe to the black triangle corner.

5: Still using the black nail art polish, curve the area where the line and the black corner intersect, so there now are no straight edges. This makes the black look like the curve pattern of the wings instead of straight edges.

6: Using either white nail art or white polish and a homemade dotting tool, paint dots randomly in the black tip area.

7: Let polish dry then apply a top coat.

8: Watch the video tutorial because I most likely made no sense.

9: Move your toes around as fast as you can and see if they flutter.

Polish used: Illamasqua: Jo’Mina  Milani nail art laquer

Time spent. About 8 minutes, no joke. (not including drying time)

I honestly have no clue what to call this manicure, but it looks rad. Really, it should be called the - I tried three different manicures and messed them up then somehow came across this color combo, did a reverse french manicure, and added a stripe, and it came out rather sweet - nail art.

So here you go. If anyone comes up with a name for it, shoot it my way.

Step 1: Apply base coat

Step 2: Paint nails some obnoxiously fun & bright color

Step 3: Paint the TOP 3/4 of your nail a less fun, but very opaque color. (keep the line smooth) You should have what looks like a reverse french manicure now.

Step 4: Using a nail art brush or pen, paint a thin stripe where the two colors intersect.

Step 5: Let polish dry, and apply a top coat.

Step 6: Think to yourself, wow, this was way easier that a simple French manicure, but is much, much cooler.

Bikini top from: Dkoko

A splattering of sunspots is pretty much inevitable unless you’ve spent your entire life indoors or avoiding the sun. Yeah, not me. I’ve got a plethora. But thankfully they are fading off into the sunset solely by pledging allegiance to sunscreen, a clarisonic skin brush, and a few easy, all natural homemade DIY sun spot erasers.

So never fear, the spot faders are here. Below are three home remedies to help diminish those spots without any expensive lasers or light sabres.

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I seriously adore the oh-so-luscious neon & neutral color combo. It’s natural with a little touch of BAM! So, I had to translate it into a subtle yet fantastic easy-peasy manicure. All you need is the right buttery nude polish (ahem, Essie Sand Tropez por favor) and my favorite miracle worker for those of us who don’t have a steady hand, Sally Hansen nail polish strips.

How to get the look:

1. Paint your nails with a nude, opaque polish.

2. Let polish dry.

3. Cut a nail polish strip in half, and place the straight edge in a 45 degree angle from one side of your nail tip to the inside of your finger.

4: Press and seal the strip firmly on your nail, and remove the excess with a file. Repeat on the rest of your nails.

5. Apply top coat to entire nail.

6. Sit, stare, and pat yourself on the back (after the polish dries of course) for a killer manicure that really didn’t take that much skill at all.

Pictured above: Essie Sand Tropez, Sally Hansen salon effects: Electric Shock, and Salt Swimwear Bidget Bottoms.

I love being bronze, I love looking bronze, but I don’t like little bronze specks known as sun spots. Enter the wonder product, bronzer. Problem, I also am wierded out by all the unpronounceable ingredients in a lot of bronzing powders. So I was rather giddy when I I found this intriguing recipe on crunchybetty.com for homemade bronzer. It works, is customizable to your desired lever of bronzification, looks natural, and if you have a craving for something cinnamon-y, you just figure out a way to lick your face.

Here is the how-to, try it out and let me know how it works:

Homemade Bronzer. Save Money and your face.

Ingredients:

1 tbsp cinnamon powder
1 tsp cocoa powder
1 tsp nutmeg powder
2 tsp cornstarch
15 drops rose otto, lavender, or rosemary essential oil

A few tips on the color: Cinnamon = glow, cocoa = depth and darkness, and nutmeg = a sunkissed brown. Cornstarch spreads it all out and lightens it. Essential oil keeps it together and thickens. If you want just a loose powder, leave out the essential oil.

Adjust the levels of ingredients to your shade and mix well in a small bowl, and break up any clumps until it’s smooth. Place the powder in a clean, empty compact and pack it in firmly

Try it out, but don’t go overboard, or you’ll look like this.

Photo via sun-believable.

*Also a guest blog post on foammagazine.com…

Whenever I set foot on Lanikai beach, I don’t know if I am walking on sand or baby powder. The sand is soft, white, and makes me instantly want to roll around in it like a dog. I once read about some Brazilian supermodel who said she kept her skin super smooth by scrubbing her skin with sand whenever she was at the beach. So, in an attempt to one day perhaps look like a Brazilian supermodel (ok, more like embark on the impossible quest), whenever I go to Lanikai, I treat myself to a free spa treatment. The only thing missing is cucumber mint water.

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