Rainbow Skittle and Memories

 I've been depressed for a week or so...my best friend's death (over a year ago), my Nanna's death (3 years ago), and I've been wearing the necklace my Aunt gave to me for my wedding that belonged to my Nanna. I actually made a proper English meal (bangers the way she always used to make them, oven chips, and baked beans) for tonight. All the while I had no idea that today was actually the anniversary of her death until my mother reminded me. Just wow. 

So something we always used to do together is paint our nails/toes in pretty much every color. I remember as a tiny child we'd paint our toes together. I could never decide on a color, so she said just use whatever you want. We would be so random and they'd all end up completely different colors. My personality really makes sense now lol. So in honor of her today, I did a rainbow manicure and topped it with China Glaze Snow Globe. I swear we started this trend :P.

 I love you Nanna. 

 This is the picture I had at my wedding (6-23-2012) memorial for her, and now I keep it and the others (my best friend and my husband's grandmother) on display in my house.

 

 Here is a picture of me, my mum, and my Nanna back in the day :). I must have been 12? We all look so happy! 

This is my all time favorite picture of us, sharing a Tango at our favorite local pub down at the beach. Timeless. I love her permed overly red hair lol. She even wore short jean shorts at that age. She was sassy ;). You can even see a little bit of her "S" necklace in this picture, which I just now noticed.

 My rainbow nails with her "S" necklace. Her name was Sylvia...what a beautiful name. My granddad gave that to her around the time I was born and she wore it every moment of her life.

 

 I had it pinned to my bouquet on my wedding bouquet. I had expected just to borrow it from my Aunt, but was overwhelmed with love when she gave it to me. I wear it often now, and of course today. It feels so good to have something that is such a token of her.

I used China Glaze Hey Sailor, Orly Orange Punch, Hey Sailor and China Glaze Sunshine Pop mixed for the yellow orange, China Glaze Sunshine Pop, and Sunshine Pop and China Glaze Gaga for Green mixed to make the yellow green.

This is China Glaze Gaga for Green, the blue green is Gaga mixed with Breezi, Zoya Breezi, the indigo is Breezi mixed with Gothic Lolita, and China Glaze Gothic Lolita.

 I had my picture of Nanna with me as I painted and mixed :).

 I asked some friends if they wanted to do a rainbow mani/pedi in honor of my Nanna.

 My lovely friend Jenny submitted this picture for us :). She used Zoya Sooki, Zoya Robin, Ulta Sun of a Gun, Zoya Mira, Zoya Charisma. Thank you SO much Jenny. This means a lot. 

Nicole from Young Wild and Polished submitted a mani for my Nanna and me too :). 

 Thank you so much Nicole!!!

Made By Me also made a dedicated post for my Nanna and all the Nannas out there :). 

 I'm so flattered she liked my design too :).

If anyone else would like to do a rainbow skittle mani/pedi (it doesn't even have to be rainbow, just lots of different colors), I'd love to add it to this post at any time :). Thank you!

A Year In the Life of Megan

Happy New Year ladies! I wanted to review the last year with you in my life and in my blog. Most of the pictures have more to the story, so click the links for more info.

I volunteered a homeless shelter doing nails, and I'm doing it again this January!

My best friend Marian passed away. Her parents bought a piece of land with a waterfall Marian and I used to play on. It's now officially named Marian Falls. How amazing. (LtoR: Marian's mom and my mom, Marian Falls, her most beautiful gravestone, Jeremy and Me at the falls)

I spent a year working with Ginny. She loves having her nails done. 

Jeremy went on deployment for 186 days...but we survived and became stronger!

 Then he came home and proposed to me :D. We're getting married in June 2012.

You get two pics cause we're cute :P. And thank you to Jen for editing these pics for me.

I did a practicum (and survived another year of college) at an elderly home and they loved having their nails done. I organized a polish donation and the ladies ended up getting loads of polish, treatments, manicure tools, and all sorts of things!

For a little taste of each season we have:

Spring - Zoya Gemma

Summer - My awesome splatter pedi

Fall - Pumpkin patch nail art

 Winter - Freehand snowflakes on Zoya Kennedy

I made a blog Facebook page and finally joined Twitter. I blogged 206 posts, got 52,349 page views, and my blog has been around for 352 days. I have 544 followers on my blog and 731 on Facebook. 

So much in a year...I'm so thankful for each and every one of you ladies. Thank you so much for sticking with me and I can't wait to see what the new year brings!
Happy New Year!

Happy Birthday Marian

Today is my best friend Marian's birthday. I told you about her a few months ago in a blog post. We grew up together and were best friends. She died in a car accident May 7, 2011 at age 21. I think about her nearly every day, and more often lately when I remember that she won't be at my wedding. She would have been a beautiful bridesmaid.

Memories of her help me through so much. Even trying on wedding dresses, I looked down at my stomach and kept pushing it in, wishing it were smaller. Then I thought of her and how angry she'd be with me for worrying about something so petty and superficial. She dealt with serious self-image issues herself, but overcame them. To look down on myself would be a disgrace to her and the lessons she taught us. That's the biggest thing I have learned from losing her - Don't wait until it's too late to appreciate the people around you and learn from them, to tell them you love them, to wish you would have tried sooner to fix things. 

On the brighter side, I thought I would dedicate a manicure to her on her birthday. I chose a color I thought she'd like. It's Butter London Victoriana from my recent BL haul.

Victoriana is a lovely dusty steel blue with silver shimmer that also has a blue tint when it peeks through the base. She's slightly teal, but less than I expected.

The application was perfect and full coverage with two coats.

Close up of the shimmer

Moose seems to always be in my shots lol. Do your cats do this too?
Marian used to have the meanest cat named Jingles lol! The only person she'd ever tolerate was Marian.

Sharing this with you helps me through it, and makes me feel better that more people will think of her. Just remember what she taught me. Don't wait until it's too late.
"Never take your freedoms for granted and every chance you get let the ones you love know that they are indeed loved." ~Marian Curtner

To Marian!

‎"Never take your freedoms for granted and every chance you get let the ones you love 

know that they are indeed loved." ~ Marian Curtner

My best friend died in a car accident last week. We have been friends since I can remember. My mother and her mother are best friends as well and have worked together for 20+ years. We used to call them "our moms" when we were out together - like my mother and her mother, but it sounded like they were partners and we had lesbian moms :P. We always used to laugh about that. The vast majority of our friendship was spent hiking together - we both love being in nature. She was a wild child, a free spirit, a hippie, just like me.

Her funeral was this past Thursday. I had brought a black dress and cardigan, not really knowing what to wear. Once I got to my home town and visited her parents before the funeral, we all decided that we should wear what she would have liked - bright colors, flowy skirts, and just be normal. I borrowed a skirt from my mum and wore this to her funeral, along with a large blue flower in my hair, and a bright and groovy manicure:

The service was in Tellico Plains up near the mountains and back in the country. It was absolutely gorgeous and just what she would have wanted. Sharon, her mother, said she hoped she had lots of flowers, and I can't even describe to you how many there were. If I could guess, there were about 50 things of flowers. So many people showed up to pay their respects, say goodbye, and honor her memory...there must have been 200 in this small church. Even the standing room around the walls was full. I didn't get to see her, as they closed the casket a few hours before the funeral, but her Aunt and I had a moment together and she told me she was just beautiful. The funeral director was a lovely woman and said she painted her nails for me - our favorite color, green.

I at first, like with my outfit, didn't know what to do for my nails. After a while I decided to go a little wild with them and just do what she would have liked. This is two coats of Barielle Decadence (thanks Jeremy :D) with one coat of Essence Hello Holo holographic medium sized glitter in a clear base.

Just check it out in the sunlight! It's a bit blurry to accentuate the sparkle. It really does look like this in person though, it's just difficult to capture in a photo.

Even in dim indoor light it's just amazing. This is what it looked like at the funeral as well. I was so pleased that it was still stunning indoors. 

Here it is when it isn't looking that holo-y and you can just see the silver glitter. 

And a little bit of just the Barielle Decadence.

Please excuse my awful nail shape. My corners have been breaking off multiple times a day, so I'm trying to find a happy medium where they look good but don't break as much. And I brought very little with me on my trip, so I didn't have any cleanup tools.

Here's one to Marian! May she rest in peace and be remembered for all the beautiful things that made her Marian, my best friend, my sister.

November 13, 1989- May 7, 2011