Hello everyone!
I was at Walgreens a few days ago, and I saw this kit on clearance. Im terrible with the nail polish strip things, but I figured id try it with regular polish. I read some reviews, and it was 50/50 on good and bad, but with the clearance price why not.
Heres my review of sally hansen insta gel strip starter kit.
I painted my left hand last night and let it dry overnight, my right hand I painted this morning, that way we can see how it would work if your trying to do a quickie mani versus taking your time. I'm a take my time person btw, I feel quickie mani's don't turn out well in the end.
I painted my nails with wet and wild disturbia, I did a base coat as I always do when painting my nails, did one coat of polish and waited for it to completely dry, then the second coat. I had to do a third coat on 3 of my fingers because my first one was so light on those fingers, it required an extra coat, as well as banging one on the counter required a fix. I waited about 10 minutes for the 3rd coat to dry before doing the gel topcoat and curng it with the uv light
I did my left hand first and it came out quite well, however, I feel like if you dont put enough gel on the brush it will create air bubbles/dents. I had a slight air bubble on the middle finger of my left hand, so I did another coat to try to fill it in, and it worked to a degree. I have a little tiny dent now. After you cure all the nails, you are to wipe your nails with an alcohol pad that they include in the kit, they give you 2 along with a file and cuticle stick. The alcohol wipes help take the tackiness away and give it a nice shine. I'll be honest and say that I didnt like how they looked after wiping with the wipe, and decided to do another gel coat. I decided they looked a tad better, waited 10 minutes ,and went on to the right hand.
On my right hand I did the same as my left. I only did a second coat of gel on the nails that had air bubbles/dents really bad. I feel that doing my nails quickly in the morning caused alot more issues, I had more air bubbles and I dented them easily even after waiting 10 minutes.
I tryed this with a less expensive polish, i plan on trying it with a variety of polishes to see if it will cause any issues. I also went and grabbed a cotton ball put some rubbing alcohol on it and wiped all of my nails down. I honestly think wiping them down this way was better, the shine was better and took tackiness away better; one of my nails on my right hand stil had a bit of tacky reside on it till I wiped it with the cotton ball.
My verdict? So far so good. I do alot of typing at work and typically after one day of work my nails are chipped. After one day of work this time my polish was intact. I plan on seeing what happens by weeks end, then changing my polish for my trip next week. Overall i like it alot, i think with time I can minimize the air bubble thing. I do believe doing my nails the night before worked better, and some reviews I saw said even after wiping with the alchol pad their nails were still tacky, they didn't have the full circumstances of their polish adventures on their review so I had to take it into my own hands. I definitely recommend this to try at the clearance price, if it were full price I wouldn't have. I say if you dont rush your polish, try it. Hopefully next time I do better, I think ill use one of my julep holos to see if it puts a damper on the color. i do have a few photos they arent very good but they will do for now, the side nail pic is of some air bubbles I tryed to take better photos but my tablet was not cooperating. Ill do an update in about a week.
Until next post!
*ill try to get my September ipsy bag in before October's bag comes*
