Frugal Nail Care Ideas

Is your nail care routine frugal and beautiful enough for you and your lifestyle? Luckily, nail care products are not too expensive, except for acrylic nails which fell out of my budget and lifestyle long ago. 

My current frugal nail care regimen consists of these 2 principles:

1. I don't polish my fingernails except for special occasions

2. I keep my toenails polished pretty much all the time

This regimen proves to be frugal and beautiful enough for me and my lifestyle.  While I really do love the look of nicely polished fingernails (especially since there are SO many scrumptious nail colors out there!) the hassle and time of keeping polished fingernails looking good just isn't worth it to me.  I hate how polished nails look when the color starts to wear off the tips, and I just don't have the time to be fixing it and waiting for it to dry on a daily basis.

I wash dishes (without a dishwasher - poor me!), scrub toilets, have a garden and plants, scrape chicken poo from nesting boxes, put oil in my car (I was doing this WEEKLY until we finally got the car fixed)...you get the picture.  My lifestyle is rough on my fingernails, so NO polish most of the time is the best frugal option for me.

However, toenails are different - for me, anyway.  I don't know if it is because they are further from my eyes, but I don't notice the polish on my toes starting to wear off on the edges nearly as much as I notice it on my hands.  It seems my toes can stay looking pretty good without constant polish maintenance.  So I happily keep only my toenails polished and am happy with how cute they make me feel.  Call me silly, but polished toenails just make me feel feminine and pretty.

If I had to have a nicer look for my hands than my ‘a la naturel’ look, MY choice would be to use a clear, sheer, very light color or French manicure look, and remove it only once a week.  In fact, I would even give my fingers a break over the weekend if possible.  And I say ‘light’ color because it would be less noticeable if it wears away or chips on the ends of my nail tips.

I heard recently that Dr. Oz (LOVE that guy!) considers nail polish remover to be very toxic (even non-acetone types) and he recommends using remover no more than once a week, AND to do it outside because of the fumes.  Apparently he recommends that you repair your chips all week so that you only have to use the remover once a week.

I used polish remover a few days in a row recently, due to taking off the polish that I put on my daughter’s toes and fingers for a wedding we went to recently.  And then I used some on myself the following day.  The skin on my fingers that were holding the remover soaked cotton pads were dried to a flaky crunchy yuckiness by the day following, and stayed that way for days and days.  Lotion did not help the damage to my skin very much at all.

So, I believe Dr. Oz.  I will try to keep from using the remover more than once a week.

I haven’t been in the polish wearing market for my hands in quite awhile, so I haven’t been keeping up with the top coats that are available now, and how well they work.  Perhaps there have been great improvements in past few years.  I mean, look what mascaras can do with our lashes now!  :D  So, I am going to experiment with a few frugal brands of top coats (especially the fast-drying ones), and report how they work out for me.