Monday, August 22, 2011

Back from Vacation

Last week when I was trying to stay off the internet, I was also enjoying a vacation in northern Idaho. Work issues pulled me away from my fun (and condo improvement projects) and back online more than a few times, but I did manage to spend most of my waking hours places other than plopped down in front of a computer screen.

Mr. Karen and I did lots of walking and hiking; we went down by the lake, around the neighborhood on the mountain, and onto nearby National Forest land on various days. Looking at the great scenery and pretty wildflowers mostly distracted me from realizing how much I've been slacking on my aerobic exercise—some of those mountain paths are steep! On one trail, I got passed by a tiny dog who was clearly in much better shape than I was.











On another day, we got out of nature and went to the Silverwood theme park.





We didn't have to leave the condo to see things, though; mule deer walked quite near the building a few different times.



For most of the week, my nails were adorned with Sally Hansen Salon Effects strips in Fly With Me. I hadn't tried this butterfly design before, and now that I have they're on my good list. They applied nicely and held up pretty well. They weren't quite up to the challenge of staining a railing, but even then only a few nails looked the worse for wear after emerging from the chemical-resistant gloves; not surprising given how I was using a rag to rub on the stain and pushing my fingertips into all the tight spaces where the pickets and posts joined up so I could get the color in there. I got lots of comments and compliments on these—my mom thought I'd gotten my nails done by a professional. My photos of these aren't the best (I did not take my lightbox on vacation with me) but still give a good idea what they looked like.





My mom flew in mid-week to join us, and I used the time in the big city before I picked her up at the airport to check out some of the local stores for nail polish. First stop was Fred Meyer, where they have L.A. Girl Disco Brites, Metal, and Rock Star polishes. I'd seen these before on visits to the northwest U.S. and bought some then (and swapped for some since) so I didn't buy any of these.



They also had an L.A. Splash display with Crackle'd polishes (and some base colors and top coat). These I hadn't seen before, so had to buy a couple. They were sold out of the purple crack (called Divorce'd, which I don't understand, any more than I understand the apostrophe in Crackle'd—what letters is the apostrophe supposed to be standing in for there?), but I managed to console myself with the pink (Love'd) and seafoam (Psych'd). I'm not sure how many colors there are in this line; the display had a royal blue that wasn't on the the "color matching" guide, and there were plenty of empty slots. I looked on the L.A. Splash website and couldn't find any mention of this line at all, so they're no help.





Something I'd hoped to see at Fred Meyer but didn't was a Cosmetic Arts display; I did find a few marked down bottles in a basket at the end of an aisle but no sign of a display. Maybe I just wasn't looking in the right place, though I weaved through the cosmetics aisles a few times.

At a Dollar Tree, I spotted some L'Oreal polishes from a line I don't recall ever seeing before: Grow Strong. I was tempted by the bottle because I don't have any like this, but I was able to resist because the colors and finishes all looked like things I already had.



At a Walgreens, there were two Sinful Colors displays I hadn't seen in my area: Wild Instincts and Go Plaid. Each had four nail art colors and four polish colors, but none of them looked new to me. I wish they'd put as much effort into creating new polishes as they do into putting out new displays.





All too soon it was time to come home; on our way, we watched the sun set over the airport in Minneapolis, where we had a long layover.



(Note: I tweaked my template to allow bigger photos; please let me know if you have any trouble with the new format.)

24 comments:

  1. Yay for vacations, and welcome back :) I'm not having any problems with the bigger photos - they're great!

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  2. Welcome back! I agree - bigger photos are great.

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  3. I missed you KarenD!!!! Idaho looks lovely! Glad you had a nice time-I had already set up this type of posts for my vacay coming up-with lots of pics! Can't say about the pics yet-my work computer is not my ipad and that's at home!

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  4. I was just there last month :) We stayed on the lake- just beautiful! I hope you had a great time!

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  5. Welcome back! I have missed you!

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  6. Welcome back!
    That looks like Lake Pend Oreille!

    I've not been up to Silverwood, but driven by a bunch of times.

    It's gorgeous up in that area, the growth in the last decade has been exponential, huuuuge since 1999.

    :D

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  7. Welcome back! Your were missed! Love the scenery! I need to visit that part of the country some day.

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  8. Welcome back . Your manicure with the butterfly s looked beautiful. Also very pretty pictures:)

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  9. Welcome back! The bigger photos look great! Love the sunset picture!

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  10. Hope you enjoyed . I love the mani and loved the bigger pohots .

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  11. Thanks for sharing your vacay pix; they all look great; no formatting issues at all!

    Glad to hear that the SH Salon Effects turned out better than last time; I'll have to keep this in mind for future vacation plans instead of taking bags of polishes, remover, basecoat, etc etc!

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  12. The purple polish in the Go Plaid display is a new color. It's name is Amethyst. It is a possible dupe for China Glaze Grape Pop.

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  13. What a beautiful vacation, and welcome back!

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  14. I love the picture of the deer. So pretty!

    As a PNW resident, I can tell you that Fred Meyer's beauty section can be both exhilarating and frustrating.

    Nonetheless, looks like you had a great vacation and I loved all of your pics!

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  15. looks like you had a lovely time. welcome back to blogdom! x

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  16. Welcome back, Karen! It looks like you and Mr. Karen had a great time! :)

    I like the template adjustment!

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  17. I love your pictures, ladscape was really... WOW!
    I spent my holidays at the beach (my parents live in a city on the Adriatic Sea) and took a lot of photos of holographic nail polishes, lol. :D
    LA Metal Collection seem great, hope it will be available on Cherry Culture (maybe it's already available, I will check but only when I finish the Project 10 Pan!!!).

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  18. great pictures, love the natur :-D
    welcome back :-)
    p.s. bigger = better ;-D

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  19. aww your trip sounds sooo fun!
    i love all the vaca pics!!!
    (:

    <3 BB

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  20. That scenery looks so beautiful.. and the deer made me gasp. How lovely!! Speaking of lovely, I loved the butterfly nails! I haven't seen the Sally Hansen ones in Australia yet but I did see the OPI ones which are selling for $20 US here. I was a bit tempted but $20 is way too much - even for me. Not when I can buy OPI polish for $7 instead..

    I do love the bigger pictures too btw.
    Cheers
    BV

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  21. Thanks for the welcome back, everyone!

    Paillette, it is Lake Pend Oreille! I can't imagine I'll ever get tired of looking at it. :)

    Esmerelda, thanks for that info! I did pick that one up and didn't recognize the name but was sure I'd seen the color so thought it was a re-promote--but could be I was thinking of Grape Pop, etc. which of course I have because they're purple. :)

    BV, OPI strips? I've not seen these around here yet (though I have been trying to stay out of beauty supplies and only hitting up drugstores since that's better for my wallet).

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  22. Wow! the last pic is breathtaking! amazing!
    welcome back! :)

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