Happy Nails, Happy Girls

A few weeks ago, during our girls' night out with Mona, Lori and I decided that we should do the girly thing and get our nails done, since I wanted to look my best for the upcoming family portrait. Unfortunately, Mo was unable to join us, but Lo wanted to look great for her vacay, and I had the portrait thing, so we went anyway.

Happy Nails is a chain of manicure spas, and I had been to the location in Huntington Beach, so I thought that we could try out the one at Paseo Colorado in Pasadena. We had made appointments, and arrived early, so we did a little bit of shopping first. I needed some stuff from Bath & Body Works, successfully declined buying all of the pretty shoes from Aerosoles, and then found out that Lo had never been to Harry & David, so we spent plenty of time tasting stuff and choosing items, since they were having a sale on everything (buy 3, get the 4th free). One of the best tasting goodies we sampled were Cookie Bites, which were little balls of cookie covered in some kind of confection. Evil.

We finally dragged ourselves out of the store and entered Happy Nails, where it was quite busy. We took a lot of our waiting time trying to choose our colors. They have lots of funky colors there, but I wanted to be a bit subdued for the pics, so I picked colors more subtle than the electric blue that I might try another time. They nicely sat us next to each other for our Spa Mani/Pedis, and Lo cracked me up by changing her mind about the color/design of her nails about 25 times. She ultimately decided on a dragonfly for each of her big toes. I finally relented and let the manicurist sell a French manicure to me on both my hands and feet, so the colors I picked had been a waste of time, though it was fun. Lo and I were amused by the different designs on the feet of the staff. The manager had alternating black/white toes with polka dots of white/black, respectively. My manicurist had a different color on each toenail, which matched her very colorful bracelet. They showed Lo a little pallette of nail design samples, which were really cool, and I might try one of those another time, like maybe the palm tree. The design on my toes is a little half-flower which, with the French manicure, is pretty and summery. My hands have a little line of glitter underneath the french tips. I keep staring at the sparklies. Everyone there was very nice, and they did a very nice job on our nails, and our hands and feet are nice and moisturized from the spa treatments. (Yes, Cindy and Jenn, I knew how much I'd be spending before getting into the massage chair).

Afterward, we enjoyed a yummy dinner at Tokyo Wako, where Lo had Fresh Water Eel sushi for the first time, and found it tasty. We also tried the Firecracker Roll, which was spicy and flavorful. Their tempura was perfectly done, and the chicken yakisoba was a good balance to the fried and spicy foods.

We had thought of going to see a movie afterward, too, but I was tired and needed rest, so we called it a day. Of course, since Brighton was still open, I just HAD to introduce that store to Lo before we went home.

Thanks, Lo, for the great evening! I hope that the polish on our nails lasts a long time, at least for a few weeks!

FRNZ 4EVR