How-To: Get Soft, Pretty Feet!

Are you sick of your rough, callused feet? Of course you are! It’s no secret women want every (and I mean every) part of their bodies to be soft and pretty. Unfortunately, your feet are literally at the bottom of the barrel, and most of us ignore them until they feel like sandpaper. Fear not, my fellow foul-footed females – the Dove is ditching the makeup for a day and teaching you how to make your tootsies trendy & touchable – no pedicure required! Read on and get a foot fetish! …er… you know what I mean.

Step 1: Slough What’s Rough

Grab some Epsom salt at the drugstore and toss a couple spoonfuls of it in a warm bath. Dip those haggard feet in there and soak, soak, soak. As soon as your feet feel comfortable in the water, grab an exfoliating salt scrub like Arbonne Awaken Sea Salt Scrub and scrub the bottoms of your feet like a madwoman. (I suggest salt-based, but sugar is also an option; the usual benefit to using sugar instead of salt, however, is that it’s less likely to irritate and inflame skin. Since the skin on the bottom of my feet is pretty comparable to the exterior of an armored car, gentle handling really isn’t necessary.) Rub the entire foot – this means the bottom, top, ankles, ball, heel, big toe and bottom again – vigorously until your foot closely resembles a steak tartare. No pain, no gain, baby!

Step 2: Pumice Power

Now that your foot is all tender and vulnerable, swoop in like a horny high-school boy and strike. Grab a pumice stone on a stick like Natural Sierra Pumice Stick – it’s much less unwieldy than your classic soap-bar shape. Since your feet have been soaked, salted and beaten to near death, the dead skin is just waiting for someone to knock it off. Don’t disappoint. Make sure, again, that you hit the big toe, ball, heel, outside of the arch (the long side of your foot that lays lower to the ground) and then repeat!

Did You Know?
The pumice stones created for sloughing off dead skin aren’t pure, real pumice. Pumice is a volcanic rock that cooled so quickly, air got trapped inside. That’s why it’s so porous. Another part of cooling so fast was that it didn’t have time to form any crystals – so it is essentially natural glass. Thus, the edges are sharp and since it’s got so many tiny gaps, there are lots of places you can cut yourself. Skincare companies don’t want you to cut yourself, because they don’t want to get sued. Ta-da! You have fake pumice. So don’t worry that you have to be too gentle.

Step 3: Touch Up, Buff and Polish

You should scrub your feet again with the salt scrub after pumicing to clear off any dead skin the pumice may have kicked up but not out. Just because you’ve started to slough it off doesn’t mean it’s gone; the dead skin, if left in contact, can still become cemented back on to the bottom of your foot. (I know it’s gross. Deal! That’s your disgusting mostly dead foot, missy.) Rough them up for the last time, and then massage until all the salt grains are rubbed in or gone. Warning: salt can be kind of painful here if you’ve abused your feet as much as you should have. Power through the pain! Salt won’t do anything bad except hurt. Hey, it may kill some germs! I’m going to send you ladies to Beauty Boot Camp if you don’t stop crying. Rinse them, take them out of the water and yell at them for staring at you that way. NOTE: Try not to stand right now, if possible. Use a chair or whatever, but don’t put the bottoms of your feet on the ground if you can help it – it will work against us.

Okay, you can baby your little toesy woesies for a minute. Put on a rich moisturizing foot creme – Neutrogena Norwegian Formula Foot Cream for Dry Rough Feet feels like you smeared glue all over your feet, but it works like a charm. Apply some cuticle oil like OPI Avoplex Cuticle Oil To Go to the toenail cuticles and massage it in.

Now it’s time to buff. Are your toenails rough on top and nearly unbreakable? Join the club. Luckily, there’s not only help but a quick fix. Get a nail buffer; I like the FPO Lil’ Whistler Buff & Shine Solution Kit because it includes the solution that helps your nails really shine on the last step. It’s a 3-sided buffer with instructions and works great. Do the whole process on all of your toenails. Yes, I said all, and yes, if you’re doing it right it will take like thirty minutes. Did you want nice feet or didn’t you? Yeah, that’s what I thought. If you get a hangnail as you’re buffing,  just clip it.

Once they’re fully buffed, every toenail will look extremely smooth and shiny. You don’t even have to polish if you don’t want to! I prefer to keep nicely buffed nails naked. The good news is, they’ll hold polish a lot better than their previous Astroturf-ish texture, so if you’re up for it, polish away!

A few guidelines for good-lookin’ polish:

• Nude or skin colored polish is never bad looking. (Unless it’s old and yellowed. THROW IT AWAY!! Seriously. Disgusting.)
• If your feet turn red or look weird and flushed, use a dark, cool-colored polish. It will create contrast and make the foot appear less inflamed.
• Black polish and bitten-down nails may be trendy, but your boss will not like it, I promise.
• It’s better to paint less of the nail than get all of it. By that I mean, don’t sweep your brush back through a decent stroke of polish trying to cover the entire nail. You’ll end up with painted cuticles and nicks in the polish. Ew.

Are you all done? Is your polish dry? Are you SURE?? Good, then reapply some Neutrogena Norwegian NASA-type shellac, shove your feet in a pair of fluffy, breathable socks (or plastic bags will also do), and go to bed. Well, if it’s not bedtime, sit around and watch TV – just don’t walk around on them! Give your feet some time to soak in the moisture before compacting dead skin back onto them. Enjoy your new soft toes, girlies!