Jamberry Review

So these cute little nail wraps have been popping up everywhere - these are called Jamberry Wraps

I have wanted to try them for sometime so I received a sample in the mail. (here's a link to a consultant where you can request a sample or view the wraps:

I applied the wrap per the directions (which were easy enough but you have to pay attention and use the tips and tricks). I used my blow dryer and it worked fine (since I didn't have the heater).

That mani (and I am sorry I dont have a pic of it) lasted for almost two weeks. The gel nails started peeling first and the accent nail wrap (on my ring finger) was perfectly in tact.

This is the second mani I did. It was easy to apply. Most of the wraps fit me without much trimming. This one lasted me about 6 days but this was the first one I did that was ALL wraps. One wrap started lifting about day 6 but instead of filing it down - i picked at it. The rest of them were left fully in tact.

This is the most recent mani I did. I applied it yesterday and I am going to do a before and after picture once a week or so goes by. 

I did this pedicure almost 4 weeks ago. I only have one wrap on my large toe and the rest regular polish. It's still perfectly in tact.

All in all, I would say these are pretty good.

Here are the Pro's and Cons:

Pros:

- So many styles

- Fairly Easy to apply

- Last for up to 2 weeks on hands and 6 weeks on toes

- Each sheet gives you 2 mani's and 2 pedi's

- Cost - only $15 per sheet

Cons:

- Some trimming of the wrap may be needed (but still easy to trim)

- You have to get the hang of applying them but it is fairly easy you just need to follow the instructions. 

You can check out the wraps here:
http://lindsayaz.jamberrynails.net/application

These are what the sheets look like. I'm excited to try the chrome ones.

What are your thoughts? Have you tried them?

Halloween Polka Dot Mani

Happy Halloween folks! It's already that time of year. Get your candy ready, your scare on, and out comes the Halloween mani's!

I got this idea off of Instagram. I have created an Instagram account so please follow me here or add me (@fabnfrugalnails).

I like this fun take off of Halloween colors without being too obvious.

What you will need:
- Top and base coats
- Black polish
- Orange polish
- White polish
- Gold glitter polish (optional)
- Dotting Tool
- Small piece of foil




Start by prepping your nails (clip, file, etc) and then paint your base coat and let dry or cure if you are using the gel polish.

Now, paint your thumb and ring finer orange. Paint you pinky and index finger black. Then your middle finger white. Let completely dry or cure if you are using the gel polish. Repeat as needed for as many coats you need.

Now, using a small piece of foil, dab some black and orange polish onto the foil. Grab your dotting tool and place random black and orange dots on your middle finger that is painted white. I used two different sizes dots for effect.

Add polka dots with dotting tool

Using your gold glitter polish paint over the orange nails with glitter to add some accent. Now let dry completely (or cure if using gel).

Add accent glitter (optional)

Lastly, paint your top coat and let dry. I added two top coats because I use the gel polish and I like mine thick. Enjoy your mani! I had help from my kitty Mya afterward. She sure seemed to like the mani!

Kitty Love! <3

Glitter Ombre Gel Nail Mani

I recently posted a step by step tutorial of a glitter ombre mani. I had some good feedback to it, so I did it on another one of my friends. 

For the tutorial on how to do this (with regular or gel nail polish) go here.

Since I did different colors this time, I wanted to post so you can get ideas of different ways to do this. The only difference with this one and the one in the tutorial is obviously the colors, and then we accented the ring finger with glitter on the entire nail.

Enjoy!

Glitter Ombre Nails

Glitter Ombre Nails

I am digging spring people! The colors, the weather, and the sunshine! I live in Arizona and spring is the best time of year because it's right before it starts to get insanely hot and we have to endure back-to-back 110 days. Guess that's the payoff for 75 degree winters!

Inspired by the Gelish Harmony new spring color line "Love In Bloom", I tried a glitter Ombre nail on my sister in law. I was surprised by how easy this was and had to share.

What you need:
- An all over color
- A medium thickness nail brush
- Accent nail glitter dust (I got mine on amazon.com for $2 and come with 12 colors)

Glitter Dust - $2 for 12 colors from Amazon.com

Start by prepping your nails as normal (clip, file, etc).

Paint your base coat and let dry (or using gel polish cure)

Paint your all over color. I used the Gelish Harmony 'A Mint of Spring'. Let your all over color dry (again if you are doing gel, cure the polish in your UV light). Paint as many coats as needed, but you don't want it too thick. I did two coats (curing each time with my UV light).


Next, before your all over color full dries, you want to put the glitter on. When using regular nail polish, you want the color a little bit tacky to give the glitter a good surface to stick to.

When using the gel polish, do your coats, and cure each time. Since the UV polish naturally has a tacky surface you can just apply the glitter after you cure your second coat.

Apply the glitter by taking your nail brush and dip into the glitter. You do not need to add anything to the brush, just lightly dip into the glitter.

Now, lightly dab the glitter onto your nail from the base (cuticle going upwards). Dust as much as you want to get the glitter effect.

Repeat for all your nails.

Lastly, apply a top coat and let dry. If using the gel nail polish, top coat and then cure top coat. If you feel like you want to add a second top coat feel free.

Try different colors and maybe even doing the ombre effect from the tip of the nail downwards.

Until next time!

St Patty's Day Clover Manicure

Ayyy mi lads and lassies! It's that time of yer again....

Green beer, corned beef and cabbage, awful Irish accents, and lots of green! Whatever you do to celebrate  be safe and have fun!

In the spirit of St. Patrick's Day, I've added a special Clover Manicure just for you. Yes you! If you've seen or attempted my hearts manicures in the past, you will find this super easy as its just a few hearts connected.

Start by painting your nails as normal. I painted my nails green and left my ring finger a glittery gold color. This is the finger I will add my clover accent.

Once you've got your nails painted, on a piece of foil, put a small dollop of green polish.

Put small amount of polish on foil

Using a dotting tool (i got mine on amazon), create three sets of two dots next to each other. This will be the start of your leaves for the clover. I am doing three leaf clover. If you want to make a four leaf clover just make sure you have enough room.

You will want to use a medium sized dotting tool. If it's too big, the dots will run together. If the dotting tool is too small, you will not get the right size you need for the leafs.

Small dots next to each other to start the leaves

Now, put a large dot in the middle of your smaller sets of two dots.

Add large dot in middle

Start to blend all the circles together using the smaller end of your dotting tool. You don't necessarily need to add any polish, just blend the dots to look like a clover.

Blend circles together

Lastly, add a stem at the bottom of the clover. I did this with the small end of the dotting tool. 

Last step: add stem

Here is the finished product. It's pretty easy try it a few times on the foil if you want to practice before you try it on your nails. Add more accents or add some dots around the clover for something a little different. If you have black polish and a thin nail brush, feel free to outline the clover with black polish!

Now go out there and drink lots of beer, eat lots of food, and show off your new manicure! 

Heart Mani/Pedi



Cute little hears and dots. Awe, now that's better than a
Valentines Day card!

I am not a huge fan of the big Hallmark Holiday we all know as Valentines Day. However, I do love an excuse to have cute pink fingers and toes!

This called for a heart mani/pedi.

Please excuse the condition of my toes (in the pic below), I got surgery done on my arm which resulted in me being in a sling, and I have not had the mobility to properly take care of my feetsies at the moment. I am ashamed!


I messed up the lower right of this heart, but you get the point.
Use a dotting tool to create two large dots, then blend them
down to a "V" to create the bottom of the heart.

Either way, the manicure is still really cute and easy.

The dots - easy, use a dotting tool.

The hearts, use a dotting tool (large one works better) dot two dots right next to each other. Next, put another dot below the two large dots. Then use a smaller dotting tool (or a toothpick) to blend them together in a heart shape.

Try dotting all the way around with accents, or using different colors. Be creative!

Below is my attempt at some photo instructions. I hope it makes sense, it really is easy so it's hard to show how to do it!





 

Step 1: Use large dotting tool and dot
two right next to each other

Step 2: Put a smaller dot just below the
two larger dots

Step 3: Using a smaller dotting tool
(or toothpick) blend the
dots to look like a heart.

Tiger Nails - Rawr!

Tiger Nails! Rawr! 

Ok today I am posting another idea that I got from the book 'DIY Nail Art' by Catherine Rodgers. Like I said in some of my other posts, I am not clever enough to think of these ideas on my own and you should check out her book here, on amazon.

At first, I thought this one may be difficult but it was actually pretty easy and even better, the nails turned out pretty well!

I changed the instructions a little from what she posted in the book so here is my take on it:

Paint nails white first.

Then using a small make up sponge, blot 2/3 of the way with the yellow.

Then blot the tip of the nail with orange.

Use a gold or orange glitter and blot all the color.

Using a nail art brush paint black stripes.

Lastly, use a top coat!

Get creative and let your inner tiger out!

New Book = New Nails!

I got a book for Christmas and I love it! It's called DIY Nail Art. The next day I tried one of the ideas in the book, and I loved it.

I am going to try a lot of the ideas and post them on here. I first want to give credit to the book and the author. 'DIY Nail Art' by Catherine Rodgers. I am not creative enough to come up with some of these on my own so check out her book. You can find it on amazon here.

Here is the first one I tried. It looked like it was going to be super complicated but it was actually very easy. Like the author states in the book, the biggest thing is to ensure you make sure each coat completely dries.

Turned out great! I was having a little trouble with the stripes, but I think that will come with time. I will be trying another one very soon.

Pink Cheetah nails with silver Zebra stripes over black.

Ho Ho Holiday Nails #2

This one was easy. Most of my nail posts are... because I am not too good at this yet and anything super fancy doesn't seem to turn out!

I did red then topped it with gold. Then I did a green tip.

Easy and cute!

I did the red and gold with gel nail polish
then a few days later added the green tips with
regular polish so I could take it off
if I got bored of it.

Cute Wedding Gel Nail Idea

Simple, cute, and elegant. If you want something a little different than french tips, this is a cute idea. Try doing a gel polish for your wedding nail instead of acrylic. That way you won't have to get used to the longer nails, and this can give you a more natural look but give you the lasting chip free protection!

Gelish Harmony color - Princess Tiara with waterfiled on ring finger 

Stripe Tip Manicure

Blue gel with gold stripe

Again with the easy. I like quick and easy but something a little different.

Today I went with a shimmer blue and accented it with a gold stripe. I did do this with the gel polish. You can obviously do it with regular nail polish too, just carefully apply the stripe before your top coat. I would do this while your under coat is still a little wet to help the stripe stick.

Now with the gel polish, a friend and I tried doing it after the cured top coat. We did this thinking that the tacky color layer would cause the manicure to have imperfections etc. But the stripes did not stick well to the cured top coat, so this time I did this after my second coat of cured polish color. I did not spray with alcohol or do a top coat. As the color was still tacky from the color coat the stripes stuck perfectly.

If any of the edges started to come up, I just used my orange stick to put them back in place, then did the top coat over all nails and cured. Worked great!

Blue gel polish with gold stripe

Criss Cross Nails

Really easy and really cute!

OK did a manicure on a friend last night with the gel polish and decided to add a little bling to it. We did a silver ribbon and randomly criss crossed the ribbon on her different nails.

Do your normal color first. then before the top coat add the ribbons. Then top coat and you've got a little extra bling to you manicure!

Thanks Tiffany for being my hand model :)
We left the pinkies plain and crossed the rest. 

Bella's Vampire

For all you gel nail fanatics out there, I had to post my most recent gel manicure. This color was perfect because it's a deep blood red/purplish color and it's almost Halloween! The color is called Bella's Vampire. I have to admit I am a huge Twilight fan, but that's not why I bought the color. I bought it because it's a beautiful color.

It looks almost black in non-natural light. But when you go into the sun, or rooms with lots of natural light you can see the purple color start to come through.

I topped my ring fingers with a gold glitter for accent. If you are wanting instructions on how to do the gel manicure, go here.

Anyway, wanted to post my review on this color. Please excuse my messy cuticles. I was doing this manicure in room that was not well lit, thus I got color on the cuticles which I always try to avoid.

Enjoy!

Gel nail polish, Bella's Vampire topped with Vegas Nights -
Gelish Harmony brand

Easy Candy Corn Nails

In festive fashion, I have decided to post my candy corn nail tutorial. The one thing I don't like about most candy corn nail tutorials is the fact that the tip can get really thick. So I tried this one last October and it worked great. I also added a layer of gold glitter to give this some pizzazz!

This can be done with regular polish or the gel polish. I did mine with the gels. I had a bunch of neon colors, so I used my neon yellow and orange to make it stand out even more.

First things first; prep your nails as needed. (file, cuticle pusher, clip, etc)

Now, start with your base color. Some people like the white by the cuticle, I decided to have white tips to play off the French manicure.

Don't paint all the way up. Just 3/4 the way. I should have left more nail showing than I did. Because I didn't, it caused the white to show the yellow through just a tad. So don't go as far as as I show here.

The reason why I went 3/4 of the way up is so I don't have to do multiple layers of the orange.  This makes it faster and so it's not so thick.

Next stripe your orange. If you paint a stripe horizontal across your nails, it's much easier to get a straight line. It's OK if you get color on your fingertip. Use an orange stick to get anything that runs. Also make sure you don't have too much polish on your brush.



Now, repeat the above step with your last color.

If you want, top with a glitter.

Lastly, paint your top coat.

As you can see, they are not thick at all and super cute! You can do the same thing for the 4th of July with red, white, and blue!

Candy Corn nails with glitter. Easy and festive!

ZOMG! Super cute easy nail polish

I did this the other day and had to post. So cute and easy. Had to share!

Step 1: Paint your base coat.

Step 2: Paint the tip with your accent french tip color. Note: you do not have to have this in a perfect line, we will blend the tip.

Step 3: Take a make up sponge and lightly put polish on the tip of the sponge. Lightly blot and blend the color so you can't see the hard line of the french tip. Repeat step 3 until desired color is achieved.

You don't need a lot of polish on the sponge.
Instead, blot multiple coats.

Step 4: Light paint over the tip and just a little further down from the blending with an accent glitter.

Step 5: Paint with Top coat.

Note: You can do this with the gel polish as I did below, just make sure you cure each time you put any polish on.

You can see on the pinky I didn't blot as many coats and you can see the hard line.
Ensure you blot enough coats so you can blend the line.

Let's start at the tips...

Too many people have told me that I am frugal. AKA, I am cheap. That's OK, I call it smart shopping. I decided to start a blog and post about ways I like to save money. I won't go and post coupons and tell you how to get all "extreme coupon-er"  on me, but I will post ideas of how you can incorporate saving some $$  in your daily routines.

One of my favorite ways to save is doing my own nails at home. I can't even begin to calculate how much I wasted at the nail salon just to pay too much and wait too long to get my nails done. Now, don't get me wrong, I do enjoy the whole experience; especially when they massage my arms... mmmmm...,  but I would rather invest some money up front and save some dough long term. Plus how cool is it to show off a kick ass manicure to your girlfriends and brag that you did it yourself?

My first post is all about the too-hot-right-now gels. Yep the $35-$50 gel manicure you can get at the salon but do all by yourself at home. You do have to invest a little bit of money up front, but in the long run you will save so much and enjoy it much more. Also, for those of you who have never done gel nails, this manicure lasts chip free for up to two weeks! It's magic and it's awesome.

OK - here's what you will need and my recommendations on where to get the items.

A UV Nail light. I procured mine from amazon and got an amazing deal.

Picture courtesy of  Salon Edge

Salon Edge 36W Nail UV Lamp - This lamp runs about $30 with free shipping and it works great. If you are going to do the gel nails at home, this lamp is the first thing you need, because you have to cure the gel polish. This UV lamp is the way to go as it's large enough for one hand or foot, and it's lightweight and not clunky which is great for storage.

Side note: I love amazon, you may get tired of how much I reference amazon.com. I am in no way endorsed by them I just love that website. It's the best thing since toaster strudels. Oh but not quite as buttery and sweet... Mmm toaster strudels... OK anyway. So yeah I get a lot of my stuff on amazon and you should too because it's awesome. 

Picture courtesy of Harmony

Next, you will need the polish. Now in order to do gel nails you need the special gel polishes. If you are really nice to me I will tell you a secret in one of my other posts of how you can get away with using your OLD normal polishes with the gel system. But, regardless you will need the base gel and the top coat gel. I personally like the Harmony Gelish polishes. I have had great results with them and I love the color options.

Again I suggest getting your polishes on amazon, because last time I wen't to sally's they only had the mini's and they were the same price as the full one's on amazon. Here is a great deal on base gel's and top coat gels. They are about $28 for the set plus about $2 for shipping.

Now, you need a gel color. The gel polish is where this can get pricey. I suggest starting with one or two colors, and over time building up your color collection. Amazon.com is a great place to get the gel polish. You can also try ebay. They also have sites like Trade Design dedicated to gel polish and you can order from them but I find they are a little more expensive.

Lastly, all you need is a little bit of rubbing alcohol, and a nail buffer, and you can do all of this on your own. I have posted a separate blog on instructions of how to do the gel manicure here. For those of you who know how to already - I hopefully have given you some handy tips of where to find the supplies in an affordable manor for this magic manicure that lasts for weeks and does not chip!

                                                 Oh look at my pretty finished product...

This is after two weeks so ignore all the nail growth.
I used Ooba Ooba  blue and topped it with waterfield.
Instructions on how to do gel nails here.