I brought my dear little Grandma home from her assisted living place yesterday because she was in a dire need of a manicure which got me to thinking I should write out a few simple instructions for a quick, easy at home manicure! It makes such a fun little gift and everyone loves getting their nails cleaned up–even my husband was jealous of Grandma last night! 🙂

Now this really was kind of last minute for me but normally I would have cleaned my house spotless and created a relaxing spa like atmosphere as much as possible. Turned on some good music. Offered a few treats. Grams actually kept sneaking behind her and dipping into the homemade sugar cookies my sweet neighbor brought over yesterday so that worked out good! You can check out a better presentation of an at home mother’s day pedicure HERE 🙂

I set up my manicure station in my kitchen because I have the best lighting in there. I use a portable camping table like this for my nail station and it works out really well….

click to buy at Target for $45

If you don’t have a foldable table like this a card table, kitchen table, or even just a TV tray would work! Anything that you can sit comfortable at without having to reach across too far. Here is everything you will need for your manicure. This is a simple, easy setup so I tried to include things most people would have laying around the house with a few exceptions.

Don’t worry if you don’t have all the supplies–everyone would love just a nice hand soak and massage!

To set up your nail “table” fold one hand towel in half and then in half again to make an arm rest. Lay it where your guest arms will be. Lay one hand towel length wise across the table so your hands will be at one end and your guests will be at the other. Next place a paper towel on your side of the towel to put your soaking bowl on, fold another paper towel in half and lay on your left or right hand side to place all your supplies on and then fold the other paper towel and place on the other side to keep handy to dry your guest’s hands off when you take them out of the water. Place your file, clippers, nippers, pusher and buffer on the paper towel and then place your cuticle oil and lotion within easy reach. Here is a good video to watch that shows a good table setup! 🙂

Now fill your soaking bowl with a few squirts of a nice hand soap and warm water. Place it on the paper towel in the middle of the table.

Begin by removing any old polish off their nail beds with polish remover. Next you will clip the nails on your guests non-dominant hand. Be VERY careful not to cut them! After you’ve clipped their nails, file and shape their nails lightly. Place that hand in the water. Take the other hand and repeat the clipping and filing. Pull the hand from the bowl, dry off with the spare paper towel, and place the other hand in the bowl to soak.

The hand you just took from the bowl you will now gently push back their cuticles (if you have cuticle remover place a small amount on each finger nail.) Be very gentle when you push back their cuticles. You can cause infection if you are too aggressive. If they have severe hang nails you could gently remove them with nippers but if you aren’t comfortable using nippers I would probably skip this step because nippers are very sharp and quite frankly kind of dangerous.

Once you’ve cleaned up their cuticles you can take your orangewood stick and clean out under their free edge (nail tip) if it’s dirty. Wipe their nails again with the paper towel and then lightly buff the nail beds with the buffing block. Place a drop of cuticle oil on each fingernail and massage into the skin. Set that hand comfortably off to the side.

Retrieve the other hand from the soaking bowl and repeat all the above steps. After you have placed the cuticle oil you will now want to perform a little hand massage with the lotion. Here is a good tutorial you could practice if you really want to impress them! 🙂

After you’ve done the hand massage, if you are polishing their nails, clean their nail beds off with alcohol or polish remover and apply the base coat, two-three color coats, and a top coat. Make sure they sit still for a few minutes till their polish dries. That’s it! All done! Good job! 🙂 I think the most important aspect of this treatment is to make it comfortable, relaxing and special for your guest. If you are not a trained professional do not try to clip and nip excessively. Leave that for a salon visit. But you can make this manicure so wonderful for them by just giving them good conversation and a relaxing atmosphere. 🙂

I think it took me about 20 minutes to do my grandma’s manicure last night and she LOVED it! She kept telling me she couldn’t afford to pay me 🙂 It was the perfect gift for the woman that has everything. 🙂 My grandma has always been an inspiration for me to have nice nails because she always took really good care of her nails, even though they were constantly getting banged up by all her hard work in the house and yard. She is the one person that truly appreciates some hand pampering! She couldn’t quit staring at her pretty sparkly nails. 🙂

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and are almost ready for Christmas if you celebrate! I think we are almost there! I don’t know about you but I am really looking forward to 2014 as well! Oh, we are going to Las Vegas soon too so that should be fun–the weather look fabulous down there right now–I can’t wait!

Thanks so much for reading and happy Friday!

Tootles–Anna