work & play: nailed it

if you follow me on twitter or instagram, then you already know that i tried Sally Hansen's Insta-Gel Polish Starter Kit for the first time last week. it was so easy. the kit itself came with everything you need, including the polish, gel strips, LED lamp, nail file/buffer, cuticle stick, and nail cleansing pads. the instructions were super easy to follow too. first you shape your nails and clean up your cuticles (while i've given myself probably hundreds of self manicures, i never really push my cuticles back/trim them because they're never that bad...so this was definitely the trickiest step for me!). next you buff your nails and clean them off with the cleansing pads, and then apply the gel strips. i thought this part was going to be really difficult, but it was actually really manageable. you use the nail file to get rid of the excess strip, then coat each nail with the gel polish and keep it under the LED lamp for 30 seconds. one more swipe of the cleansing pad, and voila! you're done! my only issue came from not being the best at cuticle maintenance...so a few days later i could see that the polish was starting to peel off at the base of my nails so i just removed it all. note to self: get better at that.

now that i've conquered at-home gel manis, i'm moving on to bigger and better things! ok, not really, but i am trying to decide how to paint my nails next. these are a few options i'm considering; would you try any of them? i'm kind of loving the white statement nail that Danielle from weworewhat is rocking in this pic (especially with the black nails...totally on trend right now)...but anyway, here are the other options!