Tip of the Day

It's that time of year again! When select parts of my body are about 10 shades darker than the rest of me, and my foundation no longer matches my face. Sure, I may look less than picture perfect with my tan lines but this is the best time of year! The BEST! It is currently 90­ degrees outside and I've thrown my front door open (complete with a baby gate to keep the dogs inside) to let all that glorious warmth permeate every nook and cranny of my normally cold basement apartment. Ah yes. The time of year when it gets so hot that I can only manage to weed about one row in the garden at a time before I need to come in for a few minutes.

The garden is now almost complete, though I've been extremely lazy about my last two rows. I mean to plant squash/zucchini and cucumber there, but I keep procrastinating. Because I'm made of awesome like that.

With the front door open I can hear one of my chickens singing the egg song. Maybe I need to go get that egg soon. It has been about 15 minutes, after all, since I've been outside! We wouldn't want to spend too much time indoors now, would we?

I'm actually here to share a Tip of the Day (is this the first in a new series? No. But it sounds stupid to simply say I'm here to share A Tip, whereas Tip of the Day somehow sounds...less stupid).

If you've read much of my blog at all you know that I am an active person. I have a vegetable garden to tend, various other flowerbeds around the yard (often full of herbs and vegetables; I find it hard to plant things with the sole purpose of looking nice; I want it to look nice and provide food for my family, or my animals, or something), 12 chickens, 10 rabbits, 2 dogs, plus housework. I hand wash our dishes probably 95% of the time. So between the animal and yard care, I wash my hands at least a dozen times each day. Add in washing dishes for two throughout the day and...well, you get the picture. I'm not a paint-my-nails type girl, when I know that doing so means my hands will look pretty for a couple hours, and then bit by bit, before the first full day is out, I'll look like a lazy teenager with flaky, chipping nail polish that looks like I applied it a week ago! But regardless of whether or not you garden gloveless like I do, we all know that one of the biggest frustrations with painting our fingernails is how quickly the nail polish begins to peel off! Enter Tip of the Day!



I painted my fingernails on Saturday night. This photo was taken yesterday, but the polish looks just the same now as it did then! At this rate my nails will grow out before the polish chips. So what did I do, you ask? I ran across the idea on Pinterest. I've been fairly disappointed with Pinterest ideas in the past, but this one really worked. All you do is wipe your nails with vinegar prior to painting! And tada! I am rather pleased with this. :)