The F-Files

How did the summer treat your feet?

Even when doing the necessary regular maintenance, once summer is over and we take a good look at our feet, there's probably some work that needs to be done. I'm a DIY girl and have been experimenting and comparing three de-hooving tools over the last couple of months.

1. Diamancel Tough Buffer #11


I've had mine for the last seven or eight years and have been using it regularly. It's a heavy duty tool and I've yet to see a callus that can survive it. Operating is easy and the rubber grip is quite comfortable. The price is scary ($49), but it's durable and easy to clean, and as I said: it lasts for many years.

Pros: It works like magic, lasts forever
Cons: Messy and requires cleanup (best to use it in a dry bath tub), the wide surface makes it difficult to use on smaller parts of the feet, the buffer is suited for serious calluses but not as effective for final touches and a smooth finish. And, of course, the price.

2. The Ped Egg

It promises to save you the mess and gross cleanup, because the dead skin is supposed to go right into the compartment instead of fall on the floor. However, this is only partially true, because the smaller skin particles fall right out through the perforated part of the grater and there's still skin shavings to clean. Just like the Diamancel, it works better on the really bad parts, but leaves even more jagged skin in need of buffing. That's why they give you sand paper stickers to put on the back of the egg and finish the job. It definitely works. Too well, even, as I've discovered one day when I got really into the process. Unlike the grater that's famously safe to use on a balloon, the sand paper will flay you unless you know when to stop. Ouch.

Pros: Effective even on the roughest patches, cheap and widely available.
Cons: Still messy (despite the promises), the plastic isn't that easy for maintaining a good grip, requires extra buffing, you'll need to buy replacement parts every few month, both for the grater part and the buffing stickers.

3. Tweezerman Glass Pedicure File


After falling in love with crystal glass nail files, I decided to try a glass foot file. Tweezerman is just one of the companies offering this tool, as you can see if you either google it or follow the link in my nail file post. It soon became my favorite. While it requires a bit more effort that the Diamancel when dealing with really hard skin, it's still very effective. And it completely buffs the feet and makes them truly smooth.

Pros: price ($15), easy to clean and even disinfect, thin enough to reach every part of the foot, works amazingly well, does not require extra tools to achieve a smooth finish, lasts forever.
Cons: Leaves the usual mess, requires more work on really bad calluses.

Bottom line: While I'm not tossing out my trusted Diamancel, I'm using the glass file a lot more. A perfect pedicure combines both: a couple of strokes from the Diamancel to do the hard work, then the Tweezerman for an easy and smooth finish. The Ped Egg? I haven't touched it in over a month.

Diamancel products are available from several high-end retailers like Beauty.com . I'm pretty sure I bought mine from the Bliss catalog, but that was ages ago.
The Ped Egg is available from every drugstore and is easy to find online. I got it as a PR freebie.
Tweezerman have discontinued their glass pedicure file, but it's still available online at Amazon (where I bought mine), BeautyEncounter.com and several other sites. There are also other brands that make similar products. An online search yields dozens of results, all within the same price range.

Playing Footsie

It feels almost silly to be writing about bare feet and prepping for sandal season while there are still huge puddles around town, and the temperatures are refusing to rise above mid-to-upper forties.

But, let's assume that bad weather isn't eternal and that eventually our feet would emerge from the depths of wellies, galoshes and boots. Are they ready for exposure?

I've mentioned in the past that I'm partial to most of Bliss foot products. I'm also very fond of L'Occitane foot cream and couldn't live without my faithful Diamancel buffer (the #11 can smooth the worst case of armadillo skin into puppy soft). But the single most effective product I've ran across is Foot Patrol from Bliss.

This cream is a mild exfoliant (it's not a scrub: You massage it into your feet and let it soak) that contains salicylic and glycolic acids (as well as several softening agents like aloe and lanolin). Using it daily has given me the softest feet I've had in years. It's different than regular foot softeners (like the Sock Salve from Bliss, the L'Occitane and every other product that work only as heavy moisturizers), because it gets rid of the old, dry skin (you still need to use a file for serious flaking and callouses, but once you're done with that, Foot Patrol keeps them at bay).

A good foot routine is to use this in the morning and softening socks with a cream at night (you can find reasonably priced drugstore brands that works just as well as the Bliss ones. Their Sock Salve is overpriced and doesn't offer anything you can't get from a Dr. Scholl product, but I do love the actual socks).

I don't like the sharp, medicinal smell. Actually, as much I'm fond of many Bliss products, I find many of them to be on the stinky side. But this cream is so good that I'm willing to tolerate it. Foot Patrol can be found at Sephora, most big department stores and online.

Not That Anyone Has Asked, But...

The bloggers that were featured in August's Allure were asked for their list of ten favorite products. Apparently, some of those lists were slightly altered (read this post by the Beauty Addict), but they did get to name their absolute favorites. So I've been trying to compile mine. It's not as easy it seems. I'm sort of cheating, as in certain places I picked a whole product range. But, it's my list so I make the rules...

1. Leave-in conditioners. There are several on the market and I alternate between a few. It doesn't really matter which one I use, as long as my hair gets its moisture fix. My favorites are Aveda Elixir and Neutrogena Triple Moisture Silk Touch.

2. Body washes and creams from L'Occitane. I love everything that they make, in every fragrance and line. The shea butter products are wonderful in winter, mimosa is a dreamy summer scent and I also adore the Honey Harvest line. Their web site is horrible, though. You need to know exactly what you're looking for, otherwise you'll miss most of the products. So I highly recommend a trip to their nearest store.


3. Bliss Sole Train set. Everything one needs for feet (except for polish). The Diamancel Buffer is amazing (they also sell it on Drugstore.com, and their lotions and potions are wonderful. I only wish it all smelled like Rosy Toes. What's better than having your feet smell like roses?

4. Mario Badescu's seaweed night cream. I've talked about it before and can't say enough good things about this product. They sell the entire line in Nordstrom, and I also recommend taking their consultation online, because in a few weeks you will receive an envelope full of samples of products recommended for you. That's how I became a fan of their products.

5. Lancome eye liners. If I had to choose only one eye makeup product, it would have been eye liner, and if I had to narrow it to one brand it would be Lancome. The pencils and liquid in a pen are all beautiful, durable and easy to use.


6. Chanel Vitalumier foundation. I haven't succumbed to the mineral trend. I like the silky feeling of a liquid foundation and the fool-proof application. Vitalumier is semi-sheer. You get more coverage if you use more product. It blends well with my skin and has a lovely, natural finish. My color of choice is beige, and it's the best match for my skin out of the many products I've ever tried.

7. Dallas by Benefit. It's a blush and a bronzer. It gives my skin the perfect natural-looking glow and I have no idea what I used before discovering it. Well, I do know, but now I can't picture myself without it.

8. Besame Cosmetics Enchanting Lipstick in Chocolate Kiss. I've already declared it as my holy grail lip color. The more I use this reddish brown lipstick, the more I love it. It's very pigmented, the texture is perfect and the color is neutral enough to be wearable for either day or night, but still bold enough to be noticed and make a difference in my look.

9. O.P.I Start to Finish base & top coat. I've tried so many nail products. From the ubiquitous drugstore products to the top notch Lippman Collection. This is the best I've found. It's a 2-in-1 product that gives outstanding results. It makes applying polish a breeze and the manicure lasts for well over a week.

10. Perfume. My mother has taught me that you should never leave the house without putting on some perfume. I also wear it at home. It makes everything prettier and finishes off the look. I don't think that it really matters what anyone is using, as long as it's something they love and feel good wearing. I'm always looking for new ones, not as a holy grail thing, just building my fragrance wardrobe.

Invigorate My Foot

In the nearly two years since I've discovered Mario Badescu's products, I've given very little thought to skin care products. I use several of the moisturizers, according to my skin's needs and alternate between cleansing products with the change of weather and activity. The one thing that MB's line hasn't been able to provide me is the perfect scrub. I tried, but wasn't smitten with any of their offerings.

Before my love affair with Mario Badescu I was a Clinique devotee for years, but even then I never liked their scrubs and found them too harsh and not effective. So I've been using Lancôme's Exfolliance Confort on and off for many years now. It's a good scrub, not too drying, unless my skin is having an über-sensitive day, and it usually gets the work done and leaves a soft skin behind.

A few weeks ago I felt like changing something and getting a deeper scrubbing. I was at my local Target and picked two Neutogena products: Deep Clean Invigorating Foaming Scrub and Deep Clean Gentle Scrub. I tried both over the following days, and the results were such that I needed to apply my trusted MB seaweed cream a few times a day to rectify the situation.
Both scrubs were very abrasive and drying. There was no gentle exfoliating. More like full-force flaying, that left me with a dry and flaky skin. I didn't see much difference between the two, except that the Invigorating scrub also feels tingly, has a stronger grapefruit smell and it's blue. After a few days of the horror, both tubes were exiled to the land of forgotten beauty products, the Siberia in my utility closet. I returned to my tried-and-true Lancôme, at least for now.

The other day, while giving myself a pedicure I decided that I could use a scrubbing cream or gel. I love Bliss foot froducts, but they don't have a specific foot exfoliator. So I looked around and found the almost forgotten Neutrogena tubes. I used the blue one and it was good. The tingling was nice and the results were great- soft and smooth feet. I did feel the need for good misturizing right after using it, which makes sense. I already new that this product was drying.

Bottom line: I'd never use Neutrogena scrubs on my face again, but I now have two tubes of a pretty decent foot scrub.