Lorena Marquez sculpted clear acrylic extensions with EZ Flow Clear Polymer Powder and painted them with OPI’s Hey Vito, Is My Car Red-y? for this month’s cover.

Lorena owns At Your fingertips, a 680-sq. ft. salon in Watsonville in Northern California. “The area where we are located gets a lot of tourists because of the Victorian mansion next door, which is a historical landmark,” she says. Actually, At Your Fingertips is located in a converted Victorian home as well. Lorena expanded into the office next door last summer and hopes to one day occupy the entire building.

“Hopefully in about five years I will be able to expand into the whole building,” she says. “Then I could add a private pedicure room, and tanning, among other things.”

But for now, Lorena and two booth renters (one of whom is her sister Isabel) operate Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. by appointment only.

In addition to owning her salon and having a full book of clients, Lorena has been competing for four years now and educating for EZ Flow for about a year and a half. “I have even done some international educating for them down in Mexico,” says Lorena, who is fluent in Spanish.

And while most salons are closed on Sundays and Mondays, but open on Saturdays, the Monday through Friday schedule works out perfectly for Lorena. “I have a son, so I get weekends oil to spend with him, which is nice,” she says. “And when I compete, I usually travel on Saturday to compete on Sunday, so I don’t have to move everyone’s schedules around to accommodate that.”

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