Nailed It,

I've mentioned on here before that my nails were something that ruined the idea of engagement photos and that I wanted to try and get them sorted before the wedding, and I was really happy to have been able to do it. It was something I started about three months before the wedding, getting my nails done with BIAB to make them stronger and less easy to bite, and now I have to come to a decision on what to do next. Do I soak the BIAB off and probably end up going back to biting my nails within minutes of them coming off, or paint them at home and hope that I can keep them in half way decent condition, or is this my life right now? Do I just have to accept that I'm going to be going to get my nails done every few weeks for the foreseeable?

It's not that I don't love the girl that does my nails, because I do. She's brilliant, she does brilliant work and I enjoy going spending time in the salon, so much so that I even managed to convince myself to get my hair cut there before the wedding and then was super thrilled to have the hair dresser come to help me get ready the morning of my wedding, but it's not exactly cheap to get them done and with the fact that I'm still on maternity leave it's not the most important thing in the budget.

I would also say it's not like they're perfect. It's not that my nail artist does anything wrong, but BIABs are a gel which uses UV to set it, and I've read a few things about how prolonged UV exposure, even little and often over time, can cause skin aging and potentially skin cancers, which is obviously more than a little concerning. I've also had a few episodes of catching my nails in things, because they're a lot longer than I've ever been used to, or catching them when trying to do things like closing the door, catching them on the handle and feeling like I'm peeling them straight off of the nail bed, which honestly made me feel pretty sick. I know I could trim them down and this would be less of a problem, and now that the wedding is over I feel like I don't need them to be elegant and pretty, just neat, but other than those incidents, and the fact that typing is different on either my phone or my laptop, I've actually really enjoyed my nails being longer.

The only problem I have with my nails at the moment is how quickly I need to get them replaced, though I think that that is at least in part because of the number of nappy changes and bottles I am doing, because it means I'm constantly washing my hands, and that doesn't help nails, even gels, to last as long as they can do.

Honestly. I think I'm going to message my nail artist tomorrow, because the last thing I want is to end up back at the stage where I'm biting my nails until my finger hurt, but I think I will get them done shorter so that I can let my nail beds have a bit of a rest from the peeling sensation and also get back to typing like normal. A bit driver in that though is because I don't think I could paint my nails well by myself, even if they were as strong without the BIAB gel on them, but it does mean it will soon be time to say goodbye to my wedding nails, which is kind of sad.

That Photo,

Let me start this by saying I am a habitual nail biter and have been for a decent chunk of my life. I have used the "trick" of painting my nails clear or nude or with a transparent glitter in order to not bite them for a small period, but my nails are pathetic and not just because of how long I have bitten them for; my mum's nails kind of suck as well (sorry Mum). I was never really bothered by it. And then I got engaged...

When we got engaged, I didn't want a photo of the ring on my hand where my nails were visible, because I just hated that they looked so awful and having a beautiful engagement ring (I think she's gorgeous anyway) only made me feel like they looked worse, but I just didn't take the 'traditional' photo or photos like the photo of just my hand and the ring or one with my hand on him with the ring visible, and I never really thought it bothered me too much that I didn't have it. And then I thought about our wedding photos... 

We've spent a fair amount of money on having a photographer for certain parts of the day, partly with the idea that at least one of those photos will be hanging in our house, and let's face it, both sets of parents are likely to want a photo from it in their homes, as are our grandparents, and I just kept thinking about how it would either be really hard to hide my hands, or they would just look awful, so when we were walking around the village a few weeks back getting errands done, I went into the nail salon and asked if there was anything that they could do to sort them out.

When I was going for the appointment, my partner asked how long I would be so he knew whether to try and keep the baby awake for me or to do bedtime solo, and I told him I had no idea. I even had to Google it on the way there as to what the type of nails I was getting done were since I had no idea. I had never had a manicure before so I had no clue about any of it. I didn't know how often I was going to need to get it done so they're alright for the wedding, or how much it was going to cost, but I knew it was going to be worth it so I didn't have to feel like they were ugly as hell and something I needed to hide on my wedding day, and I was right.

The finished nails are not something ridiculous or obvious, but they are a significant improvement, so much so that I  couldn't stop looking at them and kind of wanted to take the photos we had missed out on when we got engaged, but at the same time I don't want to feel like I'm trying to rewrite history just because I like something about myself now that I didn't like back then, but like this I can keep them looking lovely and have them looking nice on my wedding day for the photos with our rings and actually any of the photos that we have taken for the day. It seems like such a little thing but it's the sort of little thing that means a lot and I'm glad it's another item ticked off of the to do list. And given the number of things we are doing in the next few weeks, including a couple of My Chemical Romance gigs, I'm kind of proud that I didn't go for something crazy like black or red polish that would have been a lot more obvious!!