The Year in Review, And a Look Ahead

I've been fairly consistent in not posting lately, since about June/July is when I started slacking off. There really hasn't been a good reason, especially since I found myself with some much time after the beginning of July (see This post for why). You'd think that having more time on my hands would allow for more blogging. But I think I just didn't feel like it.

Despite a new job, that I love, I think the last part of the year was a bit of a funk for me. I was holding steady in my weight loss, but not losing any more. I was training for a new job. And then I was in school, too. I don't know that I really felt like writing anything, despite having plenty to write about.

But 2013 was a good year. I am no longer traveling on a bi-weekly basis. I'm not longer traveling at all! I work a half mile from my current home. And Mr S had a couple of great opportunities pop up at his job as well that sweeten his resume up nicely should a promotional opportunity come about.

Looking forward to 2014, I have a lot of plans. I start back to work on the 2nd. I start back to school on the 6th. I'm working on a budget to reduce our debt. We'll be moving...not sure to what yet, house or apartment (our rent is going up and this place isn't worth the increase). It just feels good looking forward.

I'm not giving up on my weight loss goals. I am, however, starting fresh. I'll still be doing weight watchers, and I'll get more focused on what I'm doing. I'm also working out with a co-worker and her roommate twice a week. And I'll start supplementing in between with my own stuff at home or at the complex gym.

Hopefully you'll see me on here more often. I've changed schools, though, so I don't know what my work load will be like with my new classes. But I want to be more active on here. Not so much for you, though I do enjoy the interactions I get from time to time, but for me. I want to document my life, and writing by hand just exhausts me thinking about it. LOL!

Here's to a new year and new beginnings and great things for all of us!

Happy New Year, dolls!

The Nail Files, a little late

This seems to be the only thing I have time to post lately. There's really not a good reason for it...it's just the way life is right now. I'm looking forward to things calming down...eventually!

On to this week's (and more) polish adventures!

If you follow me on instagram, you may have already seen this:

Essie's Set in Stones over two coats of Essie's Smokin' Hot. It was my mani for most of this week. I think I applied on Tuesday night, just in time for Christmas day. It's not a full hot mess now, but it's chipped it's way to {almost} oblivion now. Which is fine...I'm ready for a change now.

I got some great colors in my stocking this year, too:

Essie's Mochacino (not sure if you can see, but it has a hint of shine in there), Sinful Color's Ice Dream, and Essie's On a Silver Platter.

Ice Dream may appear in the mani I do for New Year's. I love the blue mixed with silver. I just need to find a base!

Well, dolls, I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday week and you got what you wished for.

Until next year (I just love saying that!)...

The Nail Files - Halloween Mani

Okay....I know it's been about four weeks since Halloween. But I did a really great mani and I'm finally having the time to blog about it! So just bear with me and enjoy the cuteness that was!

Color used:  China Glaze "Riveting" (part of their Hunger Games collection last year) and Maybelline "Onyx Rush".

I didn't know what to do with the thumb of my left hand, so I tried a "plaid" look that just ended up looking like a blank tick-tack-toe board. But I was okay with it.

Here's both:

The black French Tips were an after thought that worked in my favor!  :)

Anyway to those who also link up:



I would like to apologize for my lack of postings lately. I've been a little consumed with work and school. But I've implemented schedules in my life this week to help keep me on track for what needs to get done (cleaning, posting on time, school work) in my down time. So here's hoping it's working for the betterment of my life!

Happy Friday, dolls!!

Weekly update - 11/19/2013

As you can see, I’ve been pretty inconsistent here. I’m hoping to change that this week. I’m implementing some scheduling that, I hope, will get me in some semblance of order when I’m not at work. I just feel like so much is going on, but when I stop to list it out, it doesn’t seem like that much after all.

The new job is going well. I’ve officially hit my 90 days. I should have a review coming soon, I think. And, since I’m now past the 90 days, I’ll be changing schools (again). Honestly, if it weren’t for the no cost but books thing, I’d stay where I’m at as I’m really enjoying AMU. However, free is no loans to pay for stuff. And if all I have to pay for is books (either buy or rent), then that is also no loans. And No Loans is always going to trump just about anything when it comes to school costs.

School is going well. I finished my first class with an A. My second will probably be a C+ or a B as I didn’t turn in an assignment and have a 60 on another. And aside from really not liking my professor, it’s been a decent class. There’s been some things I’ve had issues with (like a two page memo…memos are not supposed to be longer than a page…that’s why they’re called memos!), it’s hasn’t been too bad. I have two more weeks left and I’ll be done. Just in time to get my transcripts sent over to CBU to finalize everything for the January 6 start.

My parents are coming for Christmas. That will be fun. It’s been two years since they’ve been here, and while I’ve been there a couple times it’ll be nice to have them here for a change. Dad’s looking forward to all the restaurants; mom’s looking forward to the shopping.

Speaking of two years, Mr. S and I celebrated two years of matrimonial bliss last week! WOOHOO!!

And, with that, I’ve run out of things to update with. Oh well, probably for the better. It’s time to clean the office/spare room and get ready for work.

Cheers, dolls!

The Nail Files - Gel Mani Kit

As always, I'm linking with Jennie and the rest of the Nail Files Crew this week:

I’ve wanted to try my hand at “DIY” gel nails for some time now. The hold back has been the cost. Sensationail starts at $49.95 depending on where you shop. Sally Hansen is around the same for the polish kits or $29.99 for the strips kit. I was leaning towards the SH Strip Kits, but I just didn’t like the selection offered. I knew Sensationail had a better selection of colors, but just couldn’t bring myself to drop $50 after missing the $10 off coupon opportunity from their website. So I was just biding my time waiting for extra money or a really good deal/sale. Then along came Groupon with the save:  A start kit and two additional colors for about $5 less than the starter kit! SHUT UP and take my money!!!

Here’s what I got:

And here’s what I did:

Here’s my review (my own words/opinion/thoughts with no type of incentive from Sensationail or Groupon for my services).

Overall, I am thrilled with the process! It’s extremely simply and the directions are easy to follow. The colors included in my purchase are great for me and ones I see myself getting a lot of use from. My only problem was the lack of warning regarding the stickiness/tackiness of the base coat, polish, and top coat after curing before using the cleaning solution and wipes.

I’ve only ever had a gel manicure that was administered by one of the ladies at my local nail spot. So, obviously, I’m not touching my nails between polish coatings to see if they’re dry. I let the pros do their job and I sit and get pampered. I didn’t know that, just because your nail has “cured” in the LED box/dryer that the polish would not be “dry” (by most people’s standards). Think regular polish that has air dried for about 10 minutes but you can still easily put your finger/hair print in it if you touch them. 

The direction say (paraphrased):  base coat, 30 seconds curing, color, 60 seconds curing, 2nd coat of color, 60 second cure, top coat, cure 30 seconds, wipe with cloth and cleaning solution. My mind interpreted the curing for drying. So imagine my freak out when I lightly touch my nail and my finger sticks a little! Seriously freaked out panic on my part. I was on my first coat of color, still freaking out, when I decided to Google this issue. Thankfully I found a review on Amazon by a lady that brought up this issue and how it gets resolved….the cleansing wipe at the END of the process. Calm ensued and I was able to finish. The end is when I realized I’d skipped the second coat of color, but I’m okay with that. The grey is just thick enough with one coat that you can’t really tell two were needed.

So I’m two full days into the manicure and all is well. No chips or peeling corners that aren’t related to broken nails (cause I’ve done that already, no surprise there). But I haven’t been hard on my hands either – no kitchen duty lately, no boxing on Thursday like usual. I’ll keep you posted on how they do. I also want to test out the base and top coats on regular polish to see if that will add some variety to the color spectrum (and the possibility of doing designs and such). We shall see.

Happy Friday, dolls!

Life Updates...Long Overdue

As you may, or may not, have noticed, I've been a little MIA here lately. There's been a lot going on since I was let go in July. Actually, there's really only been two things going on, but they seem to be pretty time consuming.

First things first - I HAVE A NEW JOB!!!

As someone who has worked more than half her life, not having a job (even for a month and a half) was very emotionally draining on me. Granted, we could survive without my paycheck, but barely. And, again, there's that whole thing about me having a job for the better part of half my life. I started working for my dad when I was 13 making $3-5 an hour helping him with his deliveries as a route salesman in Alabama. When I was 15 I got a "real" job with a local dollar store where I worked through my senior year in high school. When I started community college I was in the work study program on the days I had class, and was working at K-Mart the days I didn't. When I moved out, I got a job in housekeeping at a beach hotel. I've even done a 2-month stint in the fast food industry. My last job I was at for a little over 10 years. All this work history doesn't include all the babysitting I did ages 10-18 for various families in town we live in.  (FYI...never let a 10 year old baby sit your child, unless they have younger brothers and sisters or they're parents are home with them or in close proximity. I had NO IDEA what I was doing!!) I have worked a lot in my life. If I had to put them in order of worst to best (based on what my experiences were) it would be:
1.  Food Service (AKA - Fast food)
2.  Housekeeping (Cleaning my own mess, no biggie; cleaning another's, DISGUSTING)
3.  Babysitting
4.  Retail, especially dollar-type stores
5.  Anything that requires travel (the scenery and perks are great, but the hassle of security and such, as well as being gone from my husband every other week finally took it's toll)
6.  Office work of any kind

I love office work! Which is what my new job is! I am the receptionist for the Temecula Office of California Baptist University Online and Professional Studies. The office I work out of is a half mile from the apartment, so I could walk to work if I wanted (which I have done a few times now - it takes 15 minutes). It's also located at the mall (which could be very detrimental to my wallet and healthy eating). Right now I am one of two full time workers at this location. The other is one of the admissions advisers who handles the area we're located in and down to San Diego for enrollments. We also have three student workers that rotate throughout the week. Because we are located at the mall, we keep mall hours:  1pm - 9pm. My hours are 12 pm to 9 pm. My coworker usually comes in earlier as she meets with students and prospects throughout the day. I close with a student worker.

I love that I have stayed in the Online Education industry as that's what I'm most familiar with (my previous job was with an online university). It's very different because of various things (accreditation, degrees offered, the campus and/or hybrid options, etc), but I am loving learning these new things. And I really enjoy that I'm not traveling anymore. It's nice to be home every week with my husband for a change.

The other new change in my life is I am officially a college student, again!

While I was unemployed I decided I would start back to school as I didn't know how long I'd have all that free time on my hands. So I started the process with American Military University (no, you don't have to be military or former military to enroll with them) to enroll in a Bachelors program for Marketing. I started my second class today, Intro to Business.

I am so excited about this new chapter in my life too! I mean, I work in the education industry and I don't have my degree yet? How stupid can I be?! But I'm glad I waited...had I gone through my last employer it would not have been an accredited degree. Nor would it have been something I wanted...BS in Psychology. I could have done Marketing with them, and I was going to...but then I got let go and I moved on quickly. (I wanted no ties after the way the treated me.)

So that is the latest in my life. I'm still doing Weight Watchers...and I'm still holding steady at the 15 pounds lost mark. I have started a boot camp class in the mornings, twice a week. I'm hoping that will help kick-start the plateau I seem to be at. I've been doing it for two weeks and there hasn't been much change, but I had a few other things happen this last week that may have derailed it. So this week is the week to see my move beyond 15 lost to 17 lost (or more). I'm ready to do this!

Thank you for your patience with me. Now that I'm officially on my new work schedule and my class has started, I'm hoping to get a regular schedule going so that I can get back to blogging more. Until then...

Cheers, dolls!

The Nail Files

So, as I'm sure you are all aware, it has been SOME TIME since I've done a post of any type. I am not overly proud of that as I really have loved blogging. But I've been busy...and lazy. But more on that in another post.

Today is all about my nails.

About three weeks ago I splurged and went for a mani/pedi. If you've followed my nail posts at all in the past you know I only do gel polish on my nails cause I can't keep a manicure longer than 24 hours if my life depended on it.

Here's the original look:

I don't know the name of the color, but it's purple burgundy with a layer of lovely glitter.

A week and a half later, we had this:

In the grand scheme of things, the polish probably shouldn't peel this soon, but I'm really okay with the fact that I had a great manicure for a full week!

Not long after that picture was taken, the middle finger and ring finger polish was the rest of the way off. Now, I peel the polish off when it starts snagging on stuff. I'm not playing with it trying to make it come off. So that kind of left me in a quandry...I had three bare nails and two with polish that wasn't budging. I turned to my collection to see what I could find:

(Forgive the messy edges) This is a Julep polish from last month, Padme. It is an almost perfect match! (It's more the than gel polish, but you can only tell in certain lights). I was so excited!!
As of yesterday afternoon, this is what we had on the nails:

My thumb nail gel was hanging on for dear life two and a half weeks later. I finished it off when I got home last night.

Today I'm sporting jacked up nails...thumbs with no polish, an index finger with no polish, and two ring finger nails with half the polish torn off thanks to the shower this morning. It is, clearly, time for another manicure. I think I'll be doing my own this time.

I hope everyone has a fabulous weekend! I look forward to reconnecting on here in the coming days/weeks.

Cheers, dolls!