My sister has found a new hobby, It's nail art. Every time I see her she has a new beautiful design on her nails. Whether it be a new flower print for Spring, fireworks for Independence Day, stitches for Halloween, or some cool geometric design, it's always something new and fun.
So for Christmas we got her a set of nail polishes and some nail art brushes to go with them. This particular set of brushes is found on Amazon for a little over $5. They comes in eight different different shapes and sizes, including one metal tipped dotting pen.
The brushes are pretty cute, they are white all over with black swirls wrapping around the handles. The handles are thick on the base and narrow out toward the tip. They would fit well in any typical make-up brush bag.
The brushes are made to make thin designs or cover larger areas, some are made to be more pointed whereas others make more blunt shaped marks. The dotting pen does just as it sounds like, it creates dots.
The only thing that I found less than desirable about these brushes was that one of them fell apart when I took the rubber cover off. So it does make me a little worried that more might break. I'm sure it would be very easy to fix with some super glue though, and the price is nice. So that's just one of those things that you have to weigh and decide for yourself if it's worth it. It's also possible that I got a dud, which can happen with any product you get.
While I don't necessarily think that this set is anything overly special compared to other sets out there, it is an option and it's not a bad option. So if you're interested, you can find more info by checking out AStorePlus on Amazon. Do you do any nail art? Except for the product(s) given to me for the purpose of reviewing, I received no compensation for this post. All opinions are 100% my own.
My kids are short, most of them will always be short. And that's okay. Personally, I do wish things (specifically store shelves) were designed with short people in mind. Like seriously, how awesome would it be to have a step run the whole length of the aisle, so use short people could MAYBE reach the soda... just saying. Things will always be challenging for us. Reaching the pedals, kitchen cupboards, bathroom mirrors, all things we struggle with. And for kids, it's worse. They can't even reach things like the middle shelf on a bookcase or the TV buttons without help. Poor little guys.
One thing in my home though, is about to become a little less harder. That thing is reaching the water when the faucet is on. Poor Baby Bee... when she goes to brush her teeth at our sink, she has to come in from the side of the sink and reach for all she's worth to get her brush wet. I feel for her. Luckily we have a set of faucet extenders now, What are they?
They're cute little creature like pouts that attach to the end of the faucet and propel the water forward so kids can reach the water stream. It's pretty nifty I think. The creature's head and ears are made from silicone, so it's soft and won't hurt your faucet. It's also grippy, so it won't move much or come loose and fall off. It's a different color than the spout.
The spout is made of a harder plastic and helps guide the water to a place further forward, closer to the front of the sink. This is helpful in lots of situations. Obviously if a child can't reach the faucet, they can't reach to turn the sink on, but when you are standing at the sink with them, when siblings are, when another parent is... this has lots of applications. For instance, Baby Bee and Boogie brush their teeth when I do, so if they can reach the water by themselves, that's a lot less work for me. No more grabbing their brush and wetting it two or three times each, they can do it themselves now! Check out this video of how it works:
Pretty neat, huh? I would recommend this extender for anyone with smaller kids. To learn more, check out Straught Edge Innovations on Amazon. Except for the product(s) given to me for the purpose of reviewing, I received no compensation for this post. All opinions are 100% my own.
I miss my van. My van was awesome. We've had so many adventures in that van... now the motor is gone and I don't know if I'll be getting it back. Broofy wants me to have his van, but I've told him that I would only have it for a month tops before we all die in some horrific accident. He'd be all alone, regretting the decision to make me drive it. I can't drive it... it's like driving on ice, it terrifies me. I don't think he believes me when I tell him that van will kill us. I want MY van back. My van that handles like a dream, has built-in car seats and a DVD player. My family van... the one with a working glove box, factory stereo, and stickers on the windows that scare me half to death every time to look over my shoulder to change lanes. The van with a cigarette outlet, dashboard that tells me which door the kids left ajar, and grey interior with custom denim flooring. We did everything in it, we lived in it. I miss my van.
I miss being able to go places whenever the mood struck. We went soooo many places last summer. We went to playground, beaches, parks, tracks, trails, events, and stores. We went wherever the roads took us. We had so much fun. We ate new foods, explored new places, and tried new things. One of our favorite things was also one that was pretty practical for our on-the-go lifestyle.
They're these pretty nifty food pouches that really help with taking food with you. They were pretty essential if we didn't want to pay out the nose for fast food or have sandwiches every day. There's no worry about who got more than the other, containers tipping over in the car, or the kids not quite shutting the container properly. We used it to eat mashed potatoes in the van, dress our salads at the beach... we could even fill it with hot soup, provided the soup didn't have large chunks. They were perfect for yogurt, baked beans, syrup drink mix, you name it.
These ones by Basics Best are 8 oz. each, which is on the bigger end of things. It holds enough food to fill babies and toddlers up and to hold over big kids and adults. It's perfect for my family. For Boogie and Baby Bee, I can fill a pouch with mashed potatoes, baked beans, oatmeal, or cheesy alphabet noodles. They can feed themselves, even traditionally messy foods, without making a mess in my van. It's a great way to know exactly what's in your baby's food and make sure they are eating well or avoiding allergens.
For the big kids and myself, I can bring along bread, a can of ham patties, and fill a pouch with mayo. Or maybe bring chips and fill one with nacho cheese and one with chili... whatever will go with what we're having that day. Or I could just hold us over with whatever the little kids are having, maybe add some bread sticks and chopped veggies to it to make it more filling for all of us. No knives or other dishes needed, nothing to clean up until you get home!
To fill the pouches, you open the bottom zip lock area when the cap is on securely. Then use a funnel, spoon, or pour spout to fill it (leaving enough room to compensate for when it's closed), then zip very carefully and very firmly. Turn upright over a sink or bowl to be sure it's locked well, then wipe clean and that's it! You can bring them in a plastic food storage container, in a lunch bag, small cooler or such.
There's a few cool features worth mentioning. One is that it has an area on the pouch for you to write what food is in it and when it was made. Or if you know you're only going to use it that one day, you could write who's it is.
Another pretty cool feature is that the box comes with a nice recipe on the side. It's the little things, you know? This recipe is for Pumpkin Puree. Yum! It also has a link to other awesome recipes for you to try and where you can also find ideas for adult food to put in it. Yes, please!
These pouches come in several designs, are BPA and PVC free, Phthalate and Lead free, Dishwasher and Freezer safe, and reusable! Do you have a really busy week coming up? Maybe a week that you're dreading because you have lots of appointments or a trip to take and you don't know how you'll manage it all? Make ahead and freeze! Cold breakfasts like smoothies, chai pudding, applesauce, etc. Or even warm breakfasts... the night before, thaw them out. The morning of, just place them in a bowl of very hot water to warm them up while you get dressed. Breakfast can be had in the car with no need of rushing the kids or cleaning up the table!
I can honestly see a neverending list of uses for these and they are all helpful to a busy mom like me. To learn more, check out Basics Best on Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, or on their website at BasicsBest.com. Except for the product(s) given to me for the purpose of reviewing, I received no compensation for this post. All opinions are 100% my own.
This is me a week or so ago. My hair was horrible, I had almost given up on it. In fact, I had asked my husband if I could shave it off. Every time I turned my head, it seemed like the area at the nape of my neck would snarl right up. Of course that's the most painful area to brush and every morning my hair was a rat's nest all over again. If I didn't brush my hair for the day, I'd wake up the next morning with actual mats. If I did brush, it was painful, took forever, and was for naught. It was AWFUL. The worst condition my hair has ever been in in my adult life was what you see in that photo above. Messy ponies were it for me. All hope was lost.
Well, through my job I get to try out some pretty interesting things. This week I tried out a revitalizing shampoo from Keeva (LOVE them... remember them from before?) with Argan Oil, Coconut oil and Tea Tree Oil. To be honest, just the word "oil" in a shampoo seemed unnatural to me. Isn't the point of shampoo to REMOVE oils? My hair gets oily fast, but I do love coconut oil and tea tree oil... so I gave it a try.
Oh. My. Golly gosh, gee whiz. This stuff... there's no words that could do it justice. My hair is silk. When I woke up the morning after using it, I could brush my fingers through the underside of my hair without a single snag. Not a single one! My hair has been completely transformed with just one washing!
Okay, so it comes out white and lathers only a little. It feels amazing. I used it just like regular shampoo, just lather, rinse, condition. Same old conditioner as always, nothing special. I have this insanely huge gallon jug and I've been using it for months, so the change definitely came from the shampoo. After my hair dried and I brushed it, it wasn't puffy, wasn't frizzy, wasn't hard to brush, wasn't dry or stringy, it was just hair. Beautiful, silk, soft hair.
What's even better about this shampoo is that it comes in a big 28.2 oz/ 800ml bottle. It's a brown bottle to protect the oils, in case you were wondering 'Why brown?' It has a pump top and you don't need to pump it a million times, just a few. I find the pump tops to be really helpful. I hate closing covers with soapy or full hands.
I just can't say enough about this shampoo. It's a game changer. No other shampoo will ever live up to it. Ever. Is it the Argan Oil? The Tea Tree? The Coconut? I don't know. And I almost don't care, so long as Keeva keeps manufacturing it. Oh, and it's organic. To learn more, check out Keeva Organics on Amazon or on their new website. Also, check out their sister company, Essential Oils Informer. Except for the product(s) given to me for the purpose of reviewing, I received no compensation for this post. All opinions are 100% my own.
My kids love art. In fact, I'm pretty happy to say that everyone in my family enjoys art. We enjoy looking at it and making it. Mostly making it. We do scrapbooking, sculpting, sewing, drawing, crafting, painting... we just LOVE doing art. It's who we are. I'm so glad my kids all have that love.
So in our home, I like to try to keep lots of art supplies on hand. I don;t want the kids' creativeness stifled because they don't have a means to create. They have things that I never had access to when I was a kid... chalk markers, pastels, canvas, charcoal, paint... things I would have dreamed of having at their age.
One of Punk's newest supplies is an acrylic paint set by Soul Art Studio. I feel like she's big enough now to be able to use them without making a big mess. So she has an easel, a canvas, and paints. Brushes are kept and given by me when needed. But she has all the other essentials at her disposal.
These paints are a perfect size for a beginner artist. They aren't the full size you'd get if you were used to doing lots of large canvases, but they are quite bigger than other tubes that you get in art sets. As you can see in the photo above, they are pretty nice sized, more than big enough to create many masterpieces and to get a real feel for how the paints work.
This set came with 12 colors. The colors range from primaries to secondaries and even hues that have no real "color". I honestly would have loved to see a second green in there, a lighter one perhaps. But the colors that are in it are beautiful when put on paper, or anything else really.
One thing I did notice is that the white isn't actually white, it's more like a very light grey called "Chinese White". It helps it to stand out on a white canvas and it's pretty close to white, so when it's in a painting you won't be able to tell it's not white. I just thought it was interesting.
We tried this out on cardboard and wooden objects and found that they cover nicely. They did a good job and not too much was needed. Those streaks you see was due to my terrible choice in brushes. This is my "Dracula Snowman" that Punk made for me *HEART* We enjoyed these and I would get them again if I needed paints. To learn more, click the link above or check out Soul Art Studio on their website, MyKarmaSoul.com. Except for the product(s) given to me for the purpose of reviewing, I received no compensation for this post. All opinions are 100% my own.
