Don't Dilly Dally!

Okay, back to the nail stuffs!

Today I'll be talking about this here super simple mani. And I'm going to eat my words, too. 

For this mani I started off with the Bridge the Ridge base coat ($5.49 at Sally Beauty Supply with card). I only did one coat, since it doesn't seem to make that big of a difference with two. I figure I'll just use it until it's gone and then go back to my normal Pure Ice "Bottom Line" base coat.

For the base color I used the Sinful Colors "Rise and Shine" ($2.02 at Target) that I wasn't so keen on. At least on the swatches.... But WOW! Once I actually got it on my nails?? I don't know if it was due to my skin tone or what, but this color after two coats really popped! I can honestly say now that it's one of my favorites.

I then applied one coat of Sally Hansen "Pixel Perfect" ($2.49 at Target). Now, when I say "applied", I mean "fished and swirled and globbed". Then I applied a second coat. And then a third... Ugh, okay. I got all excited with the Sinful Colors, but I guess this stuff is still as lackluster as it was when I swatched it. Oh well, at least there's an awesome color under there. 

I will admit that after a few days it did grow on me a little. But I highly doubt it'll get worn very often.

And then there was the fact that I put on a regular base coat instead of a peel off... what the Sam hell was I thinking?! I figured this was a good time to see exactly how much product I needed to use to get glitter off. For all ten fingers I ended up using two pads and five soaks in the acetone.

I would say that's still more cost-effective than a $10 bottle of UNT. Albeit severely more time consuming...

And there's no peel porn...

Next up? Striped and sassy.

Target "Treasures"

Good afternoon folks!

Now, you might be wondering, "Why is 'treasures' in quotes?"  Well, see, when I was at Target all these polishes looked to be treasures. Then I got them home... 

Let's take a look at each in detail, shall we?

First up we have "Jazzy Jade" from the Sally Hansen Xtreme wear line. I paid $2.49 for this. In the store this looked like a gorgeous opalescent green jade. However, when I swatched it, it looked... well, it looked terribly boring. And it was very similar to Wet 'n' Wild's "Be More Pacific", which I already have. I'm not a fan of having dupes--that's a waste of my hard-earned money. To be fair, though, I do not top coat my swatches. Maybe the opalescence will pop if I do. I'll have to keep you updated on that.

Next I purchased Sinful Colors "Rise and Shine" for $2.02. I'm not sure why I purchased both of these, as they're very similar to each other. And again, it looks much like "Be More Pacific". This polish was almost opaque in one coat, though. You could probably get it opaque in one coat if you did a thicker coat. 




Then we have Sally Hansen "Pixel Perfect". This was $2.49. It's a black and white matte glitter in several shapes and sizes and has a clear base. From the look of the bottle, you'd think it was fairly dense. NOPE! Far, far from it. I had to do quite a bit of fishing and maneuvering to get this stuff to look decent on the swatch nail (the photo is over "Jazzy Jade"). I also tried sponging, to no avail. All I accomplished with that was getting glops of glitter in one spot. The swatch shows about three coats. 

I don't normally go for pinks, or holographics, or glitters, but this one... man, it just looked amazing in the bottle! This is Sinful Colors "Pinky Glitter", that I bought for $2.02. It's a sheer pink base with holographic glitter. It's... it's pretty, I won't lie. But it's so sheer that even three coats won't get it opaque. You could use it as a topper, but then of course you lose that pale pink finery, and there are better holographic toppers out there. I may try this over a white base in the future, because overall I really do like it.


The last polish I purchase was another Sinful Colors for $2.02. This is "Cinderella". It's a sheer baby blue with a lovely pink shimmer. And it, too, is so sheer that three coats won't get you to opacity. I tried this one over black and was surprised to find that I didn't like it--I normally like everything over black. However, I did try two coats over white, and that fixed the opacity issue, but the blue was much paler than it shows in the bottle.



Overall I was pretty disappointed with my purchases. Normally I get pretty good stuff from both these brands. I guess my game was just off that day. Here's to hoping for better luck next time!


Next up? I eat my words!

Frilly French

Short story time!

It's 12:30 at night. I have to be up at 8 to go to work. I'm exhausted, and I know my son will be waking up soon for mommy milk. I need to go to bed. But...

...My nails are bare. 

Oh no!!

That is simply unacceptable. I must do something with them. Something quick and easy. Stamping? No... too messy. Watermarble? Ha! No way. Gradient? Uhmmm no. Something with striping tape? Pbbt. Might as well stay up all night if I wanted to do that. Plain polish? Hmm... tempting, but I just did that. What can I doooo?

Aha! French tip! Quick, easy, classy. 

I slap down some Bridge the Ridge and make a grab for my Finger Paints "Paper Mache". I'm halfway through my second coat when I hear my little guy stirring in the next room.

Shit! Dry faster, paint faster! Faster, faster, faster!

Finally the second coat is on and dry. The youngin' seems to have gone back to sleep. Whew! Disaster averted. I snag the Seche Vite. We're in the home stretch! First four nails, done! Twist the hand to get the thumb...

FACK!!

I've smudged my middle nail... Appropriate, since I'm now cursing and flipping off random inanimate objects in the room. 

But it's now 1 a. m.  Screw it. I need sleep. I finish top coating the rest of the nails. I can do something more with the mani tomorrow after my ten hour shift. 

I double check to ensure the Seche Vite is dry, change into my jammies, and crawl into bed. After a bit of flip-flopping to get comfy and to make sure I won't get sheet marks on my nails, I close my eyes and prepare to surrender to dreams.

And, of course, that's the very instant my son wakes up crying for his next meal. 

Sigh. The joys of motherhood...

The end!

But, thankfully, not the end of the mani!

The next day at work I kept trying to think of something that would add a little pizazz and also help me cover up that smudge. Then I remembered something that I had seen Yagala do... a frilly, fancy french tip using stamping. 

Game on! I used BundleMonster's XL-06 plate and the same polish I had used for my tips. This was the end result: 

It's a bit more... delicate than I'm used to, but I liked it nonetheless. Besides, it distracted from the smudge nicely. Though, if my brain wasn't so sleep deprived, I probably could have done some "polish surgery", as Colette calls it. Ah well, live and learn.

Next up? Target treasures!

Glittery Golden Goodness

Good afternoon ladies and gents!

Today I'll be raving about this here polish:

This is Pure Ice "Studette". I bought it for $1.97 at Walmart.  It's a clear base with tons of gold glitter, some silver glitter, and some red glitter. And it is dense. "Studette" is so blingy, my camera had a hell of a time capturing it, as you will see. 

Below are my swatches. The nail on the left is two coats of "Studette" on its own. On the right is one coat of "Studette" over black polish. 



I'm guessing you could probably get this opaque in three coats, it's that dense. Or, you could sponge it on using a makeup sponge as I did for the manicure I'll be featuring in the next post. 

The still photos don't really do "Studette" justice, though. I tried to get video of this golden goddess's blingery, but it was just too much for my poor camera and it decided to focus on the boards of my deck instead. Hopefully you can still get an idea of how awesome this polish is.

So, do I think this glitter polish was worth the $1.97? Abso-freaking-lutely. Go get ya some!

BundleMonster Booty

Greetings folks!

Today I'll be going over the BundleMonster goodies I ordered from Walmart.com a couple of weeks ago.

First up we have the BundleMonster stamping plates. I got a collection of ten extra large stamping plates for $31.99 with free shipping. There are twelve full size images--images that cover the entire nail--per plate. That's a total of 120 images to choose from. Break down the math and that equates to just under 27 cents per image. Good luck finding a Konad plate for that price! Generally speaking, Konad plates tend to go for around a dollar per image.

I got the ten-piece XL set #1, BM-XL01 through XL10. There are also sets #2 and #3 available for the $31.99. They have other sets available as well, but these are the best deal in my opinion.

These aren't your typical "cheap", shoddily made, so-thin-you'll-cut-yourself plates. BundleMonster puts out some high quality stuff, and these plates are no exception. They have a sturdy plastic backing and arrive at your door with the blue protective film. They stamp very well, even with most regular polishes.

I also snagged the BundleMonster Creative Art Polish Set #3 for $11.99. There are six stamping polishes in this set, putting each .4 oz bottle at $2. Not too shabby, right?

This is their "metallic" set of stamping polishes. Going from left to right, we have: "Wavelengths", which is a nice royal blue metallic; "Optical Illusion", which is a metallic purple; "Seeing Rainbows", which is a spunky--yet not all that metallic in my opinion--pink; the burnt orange/coppery metallic "Visionary"; a deep burnished gold called "Electromagnetic"; and finally "Chromo", which to me looks much more gunmetal than chrome.  And then as an added bonus, there's the cat hair that always makes a cameo in my photos...

Also, if you're curious which stamper I use, it's the Winstonia double-sided semi-squishy stamper. I paid $4.95 for this, but unfortunately the price has gone up a bit since then. I believe they're now either $5.45 or $5.95. You might be able to snag one on ebay for cheaper, though. I'd kind of like to get a colored head since stamping white polish is a bit tricky, but that's a luxury I'll probably have to pass on.

Anyhow, I'd recommend the aforementioned BundleMonster plates and polishes to anyone. They work very, very well and can add a lot of dimension to your manis. If you're anything like me and can't freehand paint to save your ass--not even stick figures--then stamping is definitely the way to go.


Next up? Golden glittery goodness!

FALLing for the Mani

Good morning! 

Today I'll be sharing how I did this fall colors inspired mani. 

I started off by using the Bridge the Ridge base coat I talked about in my last post. This is actually last week's mani, so I had only tried the one coat. The sunlight glare kinda shows how bad my ridges are--especially there on my pinky. Normally, however, the ridges don't show too horribly once my top coat is on. 

I then put down one coat of L.A. Colors "Hottie". This is a bright orange...

Let me interrupt myself here to say that I normally don't wear oranges or yellows. But hey, it's fall, right? It's a great excuse to break out of my norm. May as well throw both of my least used colors on there. 

Anyhow, as I was saying... "Hottie" is a bright pumpkin orange. And you can find L.A. Colors at most dollar stores (Dollar Tree, Family Dollar, etc.) for... yep, you guessed it! A dollar. 

I then used "Hottie" and Pure Ice "Show Stopper" (a banana yellow) on a makeup sponge to create a gradient. I did four coats, but I honestly could have gotten away with three. As far as I'm aware, the only brick-and-mortars that carry Pure Ice polishes are Walmart and Big Lots. I typically get mine at Walmart, and they cost $1.97.  

Now, I'll be honest here: gradients are not my specialty. No matter how many of Cristine's videos I watch, I just cannot get the dab dab dab correct. BUT! I sucked at watermarbles and stamping when I first started those, too. I just need more practice with gradients.

(My son is practicing his raspberries here next to me... it's totally cute and totally distracting, so if I'm bouncing around a lot, I apologize!)

After the gradient, I applied a fast drying top coat. I then used BundleMonster's XL07 plate and "Visionary" to stamp on the trees. I'll go into more detail about the plates and polish in my next post. I know, I know... the trees have blossoms on them, which screams "SPRING!" instead of fall, but it was the best image I had available. I'm SORRY, okay?? I'm sorry! 

Remember when I said that I use products under five dollars with a few exceptions?  Yeah, I'm about to lay an exception on ya. The same fast drying top coat I used between the gradient and the stamping is the top coat I use to finish all of my manicures (except of course the matte manis). I use Seche Vite. This stuff isn't cheap. With my Beauty Club Card I can get it at Sally's for $7.99. That's not chump change when you're on a budget. Is it worth it? Hellz yes it is. Seche Vite dries soooo shiny! It does a fairly good job of hiding my ridges, except when a glare hits them. It also doesn't smear your polish as other, cheaper top coats are wont to do. It is amazingly smooth and easy to apply. And the best thing of all? Seche Vite circumvents "The Phenomenon". You know what "The Phenomenon" is. We've all been there. "The Phenomenon" is that occurrence--I often wonder if it's an ingredient in all polishes that causes this to happen--when you've just finished your mani and you suddenly and inexplicably have to pee, right now! Don't fret! Throw some Seche Vite on your nails, wait five minutes (do the potty dance if you have to, but those five minutes will pass, I promise), and then you can safely--yet carefully--undo the button on your jeans.


...Or untie the ties on your jammies if you're still in them, as I often am. 

The point is... Seche Vite dries super fast. This stuff has literally saved my mani countless times. So yes, I do feel that it's worth going beyond budget. Can you survive without it? Sure, if you have a lot of time on your hands. As a working mom, I don't. So this is a must have for me.



Stay tuned for the BundleMonster booty!

Welcome to Mani on a Budget!

Greetings, ladies and gents.

Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Jennifer Ravenwing, but I prefer to go by Jenn. I'm a single mom to a beautiful five-month-old boy. I work full time as a delivery driver (it's not glamorous, but it pays the bills and I get to show off my manicures to lots of different people). I love doing my nails--it's relaxing and it allows me to delve into my creative side.

But here's the thing: I have a mortgage to pay and diapers to buy, so I need to be able to do my nails without paying an arm and a leg. Hence, mani on a budget!

In this blog I'll show you the manicures I create using nail supplies that cost five dollars or less (with a few exceptions). So if you're here looking for the latest trends or the must-have current mainstream polishes, this isn't the blog for you. I change my mani at least once a week--twice if my son lets me--so longevity isn't a major concern of mine. Therefore, I really don't see the point of paying fourteen dollars for a bottle of polish. Do the expensive brands have polishes that I'd love to play with? Sure. Hell, if F.U.N. Lacquer wants to send me their entire lineup for free, I wouldn't turn it down! But I can still make some pretty awesome looks with regular drug store polish, which is good enough (and cheap enough) for me.

I'll also be sharing what nail goodies I buy, where I buy them, what price I paid, and what I think of the products.

In fact, let's do that now. I recently made a trip to Sally Beauty Supply. I do have a Beauty Club Card, and will try to stop in whenever Sally's is having a sale of some sort. Here's what I picked up:

 China Glaze was buy one get one free. With my Beauty Club Card, I paid $6.49 for both, putting the cost of each at about $3.25. The blue on the left is Frostbite, and the silver on the right is Icicle. These are the only China Glaze polishes I own, as they're normally out of my budget. Frostbite is amazing. I live for the bright cobalt and aqua blues. It's opaque in two coats and dries pretty shiny. Icicle is nearly a one-coater, but I would go with two just to be safe. I'll probably be pairing these two together in the future, most likely in a stamping manicure.


I also grabbed an ASP crystal nail file, which was on sale for $2.99. I've heard that the crystal/glass files are a lot better for your nails than the cardboard variety, though I can't confirm that myself. I have used this once, and I will admit that it did leave my free edge much less straggly. Plus it was much faster taking down my length. I approve!

The next item is a bottle of Blue Cross Cuticle Remover. This cost me $4.99 for a 16 oz bottle, and those 16 oz will go a looooong way. My cuticles never want to cooperate. So I thought maybe it was time to just remove them completely. But... I can't seem to get this remover to work. Chances are I'm doing something wrong because this stuff has gotten rave reviews everywhere. It does make it easy and painless to push my cuticles back, but it doesn't outright get rid of them. Perhaps I'm not leaving it on long enough? Or maybe I'm not applying enough? If any of you have used this and have any tips or tricks for me to try, please let me know! Also, if it makes a difference, I never ever use cuticle nippers (I almost typed "nipples" in there... d'oh!). Just the thought of getting those nippers anywhere near my nails makes me cringe. 

The last item I picked up... well, I did a no-no. I went beyond the budget. I paid $5.49 for ACI's Bridge the Ridge base coat. Supposedly this stuff fills in ridges and creates a nice rounded surface for your polish to glide over. This product also got great reviews, and it's also not working for me. Maybe I should try the stuff that nobody likes? Heh! Anyhoo... when I first put it on, it does round out the nail, but then the inevitable happens and it falls victim to the valleys. I've only tried using one coat, so I'll probably try two coats to see if that helps. Generally by the time I have a top coat on, my ridges don't really show, so I'm not sure why I bothered to buy this... especially at that price. However, this stuff did result in much less tip wear than I normally get in a week--even on a gradient--so I was pleased with that aspect. Was it worth going over the five dollar limit? Well, I can't really say yet, as I haven't tried the two-coat approach. But if I were to decide this very moment, I would say no. I'll try to remember to update you on that when I double coat. 

And that's all I have for you today. Stay tuned for the manis!