The first time I ever got a pedicure I was already in my 20s. I was visiting my sister, who lived in Minneapolis at the time. We went to her shi-shi spa. The woman who was doing my nails was pregnant, and as she was trimming my cuticles, she looked up at me and said "My water just broke."

Now, being as I'd never had a child, I was sure the baby was going to pop out in the next 2 minutes (then again, that's kinda what happened when my water broke with Sage). But this woman was very calm. She stood up, quietly walked away to tell her boss, and then left.

The staff rushed over to offer us champagne to help us recover from the shock of such an occurence.

I believe it was a few more years before I ventured into another salon. Now, however, pedis are a regular part of my life. And I was very excited when I was pregnant with Sage and learned I was having a girl. Pedis! Shopping! Shoes!

Last weekend I decided I needed a little one-on-one time with her. Xander accompanies us wherever we go. And Sage had been litte Miss Sassy Pants lately, and had been wetting her bed A LOT, so I thought maybe a special outing would set us back on course.

It really is amazing how much a 3 year-old can hurt my feelings. Saturday morning our neighbor, who has three little boys, called to see if we wanted to go to some Boy Scout festival. David said he'd take Sawyer and Xander so that Sage and I could have our special morning together.

Sage started to cry because she wanted to go with the boys. When David pointed out that she was having alone time with Mommy, she shrieked "NO! I want to go with YOU!" and started crying. I think sticking a fork in her eye was more appealing than spending a morning with Mean Old Mommy.

I told her it hurt my heart that she didn't want to go with me. Miraculously, she relented, but only after I chlorformed her.

And she WAS excited when I brought her into the nail salon for the very first time. She didn't even mind that they kept us waiting 40 minutes (the place was packed, and I kinda get that they were taking women ahead of us who would be spending more money than we were, but it still pissed me off. I finally told the manager, "We WILL be next, RIGHT?!?!").

The thing is, I forgot to mention to Sage that she can't touch her nails for awhile after they were done. I mean, I've painted her nails at home and told her that, but it didn't really matter since I wasn't paying for that.

She rubbed off two of her fingers before the woman was finished with her toes. Then, after she was done, I tried to put her flip flops on. I was successful with the first, but with the second, Sage moved her foot and I smeared off the flower on her big toe. In her disappoinment, she stuck her thumb in her mouth - and yep, there went another flower.

Her big green eyes filled with tears and she started to cry. Even I felt bad. I believe my heart of stone might have even developed one teeny crack. The woman who'd done her nails was already working on someone else, but the sight up a little girl crying got the attention of all the customers - and the woman quickly fixed her nails.

Smiles all the way around.

Poor Sage. For the next four hours, she carefully kept her fingers fanned out so she didn't mar her nails.

The lesson? Beauty hurts. Both of us.