Wedding Bells
The morning after the night before we were all still buzzing from the positive vibes that the meet and greet had given us. As I looked around the dining room at Tom's co-stars and friends all I could see was happy smiling faces. The general mood seemed to be, that given the chance, this was something they'd all like to do again. Tom, Luke and I went round every table, thanking people for their time, especially as both sessions over ran by an hour or more.
Today, however, was a day for relaxing. The spa in the hotel was available for anyone who cared to use it, all treatments free as part of the package. Lizzie, Emma and I had already decided that we were going to have a full manicure in preparation for tomorrow and thought it would be nice if Lucy and Caitlin had a mini manicure and India had her nails painted too so we all trooped off to the nail salon, picking up Diana on the way. The technicians dealt with India first, just a pale pink shade for her but she was made to feel so special and chattered away excitedly all the time, she seemed particularly taken with the nail dryer, giggling as it blew air over her tiny fingers. Once she was finished it was time for Lucy and Caitlin to have their turn, they had never had a manicure before and watched everything avidly as their nails were filed and painted a slightly darker shade of pink than India's. A few seconds under the nail dryer and then a top coat, nail dryer again and they were set. Their mother, Susan, took them off to play for a while with strict instructions to mind their hands for the next hour.
Then it was time for Diana, Lizzie, Emma, and I, we all sat close to each other and gossiped, giggled and chatted as our hands were cleansed, then our nails were filed and shaped. A thick layer of moisturiser was applied, our hands were placed in plastic bags and then into heated mitts, a warm wheat bag across the back of our necks and the next twenty minutes were spent relaxing. The mitts seemed to have a heating and cooling cycle which helped the moisturiser to be absorbed which felt strange at first but I soon got used to it. When the twenty minutes were up the mitts and bags were removed and we were treated to a wonderful hand massage. The feeling in my hands alone was enough to convince me that a full body massage was not too far in my future! Hand massage over we picked the shades of nail polish we wanted. Diana picked a dusky rose pink to go with her outfit, Lizzie and Emma had the same shade of green again to match what they were wearing the next day and mine was a dark emerald green. After a bit of giggling and discussion Lizzie and Emma had also decided to have a gold glitter coat on top of the mid green colour they had chosen. On hearing this my technician immediately asked me what embellishments I wanted on my nails. I wasn't wearing false nails, I didn't want them to get in the way so there wasn't a great amount of room but my technician assured me that she would be able to do some nail art if I wanted. I said yes straight away, she dug around in a side drawer for a few seconds and produced a gold nail pen and a few tiny gold gems. I said I was worried about the gems catching on clothes during the day and she assured me that with a top coat to smooth any edges that wouldn't be a problem.
A base coat was applied first and dried under a UV dryer to make the process quicker. Two layers of my dark emerald green were applied and dried and then we started with the gold. A few deft strokes of the pen and there was a perfect tiny flower on my ring finger nail. A gem was applied to the centre and I admired the result, the same was done to the ring finger on the other hand to keep everything symmetrical. Bigger, more elaborate flowers were created on my thumbs again with gem centres. My other finger nails were decorated with botanical style swirls and curls, each nail matching its counterpart on the opposite hand and the finished effect was stunning. A couple more gems in bare patches of polish completed the look and then after a quick stint under the UV light the final top coats were applied and dried. I was warned to be careful for about an hour which I decided was just the right amount of time for a cup of coffee so we all went to have some refreshment.
