Heated weather demands fabulous sandals, but if you are not taking care of your feet, sandals do not seem so fabulous. Obviously regular pedicures will help this, but who has the time to be popping into the nail salon every time a nail chips and your heels get rough. If you haven’t already, here are some maintenance ideas to practice between professional appointments.
Polish
Whether colored or clear, a sheen on your nails is delightful. To keep it up between pedicures, have the color your salon used on hand for touch-ups. If you can’t find the same shade as the one you use, start bringing in your own color. Remember when touching up, a clear coat after the color will lengthen the life of your touch-up.
Sunscreen
Put sunscreen on your feet when they are exposed to the sun. For me, this means everyday. I tend to slather up my feet, legs, arms, hands, face and the center of my chest right after my morning shower to avoid forgetting and enabling the sunscreen to absorb so it actually works when I do end up in the sun. I use Banana Boat for my body and Lucréce’s proctection for my face and chest.
Wash your feet
Crazy, I know, but it turns out a lot of people, including myself, do not take the time to bend over and scrub the ‘ol stepping parts. When washing your feet, use a firm tool like a puma stone or hard bristle brush. Regular soap will do, but fun exfoliating washes are available.
Foot File
A foot file takes away the rough. It works best right after a warm shower when the foot is softer and more willing to shed it’s tough layers.
Lotion and Socks
It turns out, if you wore cotton socks everyday your feet would be like a baby’s butt. Unfortunately, during the summer I have no interest in wearing socks outside of my running shoes. No matter, you don’t need to wear socks outside your house to get a piece of the sweet socked affect. At night, generously lotion up your feet with a quality body or foot lotion, then slip on those cotton socks before slipping your body under your bed covers. While you are sleeping, the cottony lotion caves are doing wonders to your feet. One night, one of my socks had slipped off because my feet were so soft and smooth.
Scar Cream
My feet are covered in scars from cheap shoes of my high school years and a few “Hey! I thought you were going to be comfortable!” heel moments in college. Periodically I am still surprised when it turns out a shoe was only made for six hours of my life, not twelve. To tend to these scars, I have been applying Novo Scar MD on the worst of them and then covering the entire foot in Scargo
instead of lotion at night.
Which of these foot care ideas was new to you?
