The $2 Challenge: Red Patent Pleather Journal

Five Below is a store aimed at the wallets of tweens and teenagers, but in this economy, it's just as appealing to their parents and is often the first place we check when we need to buy anything.

As you'd guess from the name, everything in the store costs $5 or less, and they have a wide range of merchandise, from toys, books and software to makeup to crafts to sporting goods to tee shirts to fad items like Kooky Pens and Beanie Babies. Some day I'm going to come up with a fad like that and be able to report on purchases from Neiman Marcus again, but in the meantime, Five Below satisfies. In fact, I'd go as far as to say it's the new Target, because it presents truly stylish merchandise at 1/4 the price at which you would get it anywhere else.

For this reason, Five Below was the natural choice for the next installment of the $2 challenge. I came SO close to winning; the price tag on this item is actually $3, but it's so close that I just had to write about it. After all, $3 is only 12 quarters. Anyone who's fairly diligent could scrounge that from behind the cushions of their couch.

This faux patent leather journal has 200 pages, comes with stylish hardware, and also features a zippered pocket that you can stash stuff in if you're going to the park or the beach to write. It comes in two versions, red and black. I chose the red but I think I'll have to go back there and get the black too...maybe one will be for my racy tell-all memoir and the other one for emo poetry. At this price, you can buy SIX of them and spend less than you would for one journal at Barnes & Noble. Available at Five Below while supplies last.

The $2 Challenge: Torrid Triple Changer Earrings

Hieu Tran is an occasional contributing writer to Ten Pretty Girls, freelancing and living in San Francisco.

A globe. A star. A ring. They sound like mythical elements, but we can get these Torrid earrings all together for $1.99. Granted, they’re on clearance among other earrings and necklaces, but not far away from this clearance display are other similar items for full price. For whatever reason, Torrid has decided to move these items to make space for other products. So while these Torrid earrings have probably seen their last days in the store, they make great deals for bargain hunters and $2 challenges.

There were a number of serviceable designs to choose from, but the one offering I chose furnishes us with three pairs of earrings: blue globes, pink stars, and silver hoops. So, for $2, one may pick up a few additional variables in fashion coordination, each different playfully in color, shape, and size.

I suppose one may call them cute. But a guy such as myself wouldn’t know how to apply that term properly to fashion item. Nonetheless, from $10.00 to a mere $1.99, these Torrid earrings show that even in this economy, we can still pick up a thing or two—or three—that won’t break our wallets.

The $2 Challenge: Cute Slippers

This challenge grew out of a couple of experiences I had this weekend that opened my eyes to exactly how bad the economy is. The first was when a well-dressed man with a nice car came up to me at a gas station and begged me for money. His car was almost out of gas and he wasn't reaching anyone on his cell to help him, but he had not a dollar in his wallet or any card that worked where he could get money from an ATM.

I am a well-dressed woman who drives a nice car but I had exactly $2 in my pocket, and no way of getting money from an ATM. I gave him the $2 and hoped he'd find four more people to help him and be able to drive home, and thought about how the face of poverty is sometimes well-hidden by the mask of affluence-- ie, all those things we bought that we couldn't afford. Poor isn't just the guy who's shuffling down the street in a robe and slippers with his hand out anymore.

Yesterday I went to the mall to hang out while waiting to pick up my daughter from religious school. Once again I found myself with exactly $2 in my pocket. Since I needed the exercise and the mall is large, I gave myself a challenge...find something fashionable or attractive for $2.00 and under. That gave me a reason to pop into stores all over the mall (it's about 1 1/2 miles from end to end) and, since I was feeling down and out in Short Hills, if I found something for $2.00 that cheered me up, I was going to buy it.

I failed, but I'm extending the challenge here. I'm on the hunt for a fashionable item for under $2.00, and Hieu's extending the challenge to find something that's useful and well-designed. I ALMOST hit pay dirt today-- cute slippers for $.79!-- until I realized that's a wholesale price and this is a site who supplies to dollar stores. Nevertheless, the slippers are cute, and you could buy hundreds of them and sell them for $2.00.

Readers, if you come up with cute, fashionable, functional or creative $2.00 items, please post in the comments and we'll feature your pick in a future post.