Nail Mail: Julep Red Tag Sale & Birthstone Collection

Julep Maven had their Redtag sale about a week ago, which was not a huge success in where their Facebook event time did not match with the opening of the actual online store sale. The link was up and working by 10 p.m. PST. I placed two orders one in which still has not arrived and that was the one I placed that very same night around midnight. The second order which was placed the next morning arrived yesterday. The smaller order included nine nail polishes.

The first five from left to right: Diane, Fiore, Clio, Adele, and Karen.

Left to right: Cara, Nellie, Taylor, and Alice.

The only polish that was not in the redtag sale was Alice, I used the promo code "POLISHPERK" to get a free regular priced polish, the rest of them were priced between $2-$4 each.  

My other order was the birthstone collection of the first six months. They recently released the entire collection for hitting the halfway mark of the year, so I ended up grabbing all of them!

Left to right: January "Betty", February "Rosa", March "Aretha", May "Priscilla" 

Left to right: June "Kathy" and April "Coretta" 

The last two have to be my favorite from the collection so far. They both go great with just about every color! 

If you're interested in trying Julep you could go here and get your first box for free by typing FREEBOX in the promo selection!  

Vitacost - A Cheaper Healthy Lifestyle

Stress eater, emotional eater, light night snacker are the few things you can say about my eating habits. Lately I have been looking into getting into a healthy lifestyle where my process food intake isn't where it is now. In today's market it is easier and cheaper to pick up fast food then to go to the local whole foods or trader joes. When I ran into the Vitacost website it felt like a relief! The prices weren't out of my price range and there was hundreds of items on there. I decided to place a small order to sample a few things here and there, and also it does not matter the weight of your package after spending $50 shipping is free!

My mini order came in about a week and a half ago giving me enough time to sample everything in the box, and boy am I pleased! 

The website offers certain discounted deals when you purchase a certain amount, so for about .89 cents the minimum for these Nature's Bakery blueberry fig bars were 6. I regret not buying more. I have never been a big fan of fig but you could hardly taste it in these, they're sweet but not overly sweet and go hand in hand with a nice hot tea in the morning or as a to-go pick me up snack! 

These were another one of those minimum buys offered. You had to get two prices at $1.29 each. I have to say these were A LOT smaller than I thought. I was not paying attention to the ounce/gram size just the flavor. For the price and how small they were I do not if I will re-purchase, they were so rich which I loved with the sweetness and the tartness of the raspberry but the price has me looking for other dark chocolates to snack on. 

Another minimum buy of two for each was these. I have always been a huge tea drinker so I didn't mind this buy two deal. Each box was $2.99 which was a huge steal for Yogi tea which ranges from $3-$7 around me. The positive energy really is a mood elevating tea, the sweet citrus is a perfect way to start your day and wake you up, and it's even sweeter with a touch of honey. The green tea is a typical green tea not too grassy and not watery so I can't complain. 

Another tea buy that I am still trying to figure out what goes with it, so far adding it to cold smoothies I lose the taste. I need to play around with warming liquids and flavoring as in honey and such. The 50 gram container was $8.99 and another was added to my cart for $4.50 for a B1G1 deal. 

And with all this tea talk, you have to have something to sweeter it so I wanted to try out raw honey for the first time. The jar is a decent size for $6.39! Now, I have no idea what to say about this other than it is beyond amazing. It is so yummy just on its own but it does sweeten any tea! It's a win and I recommend anyone to try this. 

Now these were a buy for the little one. Where if I'm going to eat better he will as well. And these will be there to help potty train! 

Now on to the beauty part of my order. 

When I said healthy lifestyle I meant my body as well. It is a big change so little by little I will try to get to where I know I can be. So slowly I wanted to try different items, shampoo and conditioner. I have never heard of this brand  but each bottle came to $4.99 which is typical of drugstore prices so I am happy with the combo, plus they smell great! 

The infamous Aztec Secret Indian Healing Clay, this stuff is amazing and it does help with my dark spots. I have only used it once but I know I will fully review this item! The clay deserves a post of it's own. The 1 pound container was $4.99 which is great since it is a powder that you add your choice of liquid to. The Vitacost eye cream was another sample item which I accidentally got two for the B1G1 so I'm still sampling it and I know eye creams don't magically change anything overnight. One tube would be $8.99 so it was a decent price! 

If you've been wondering about purchasing from Vitacost I hope this post helped with a few items to look into. And you could also get $10 off a purchase of $30 with this link.

June Ipsy Bag

The thought of a mystery bag full of goodies for a decent price was the main reason I decided to join. At first it took about 2-3 months to go from the "wait list" to actually receiving the mini bags. I was not impressed to say the least about this month's bag. 

  The bag itself was adorable with the pineapples and being a dark color. 

The contents of the bag seem as if they were a joke! 

I have never heard of essence of beauty, but I am open to trying new brands, which was the whole idea of the ipsy bag. Boy do I find this scent unpleasant. It smells strong but very laundry detergent like. I need to find good use for this that doesn't involve my body! 

The Marc Anthony spray I did enjoy. I don't have much to say for this as in I'm not that big into hair products, I'm more of a 'my hair is always up or tucked away' kind of person. 

Now this is where it becomes an evil joke. I found this product to be useless. The mascara was already dried out in the tube, so it made me wonder how long have they had this. The tube went straight into the trash! 

The last two items in the bag weren't anything great either. The lip gloss was a nude pink color that I don't usually wear and the liner had a fine point but the consistency of it was watery that it wouldn't work on my oily eyelids.

This bag was a complete failure for and it makes me question what goes in the actual bags. I do not know if I will keep up the subscription or not! As for now I will it another month. 

Nail Mail: Start of Stamping

Recently I have been into nail art, nail tricks and all around nail care. I was in the market for a few stamping plates and stampers. I looked into a few companies and decided to go with the konad stamper set and a few plates from bundle monster. eBay being the first website I looked for these items I was happy with free shipping and the price I was given. I placed my order almost a week ago and got my goodies in today! 

The konad double stamp set went for $7.99 with free shipping. 

The bundle monster (create your own series 2013) were priced at $14.99, and were free shipping as well. 

I started to play around with the stampers and didn't nail polishes to see what works best, so far it has been a failure on my collection of polishes. The stamper works great, plus the smaller end is a bonus in helping place smaller images on my nail bed! 

The set of plates were a wonderful mixture of girly, fun and classy for a pop of design. 

As you can see there is 26 plates in the set, with an array of different sizes to choose from. A small warning, regular nail polish remover will not work in removing the nail polish. The plates ended up showing where I had cleaned them, so a trip to buy 100% acetone will be in the making! They also came with a removable blue plastic sticker on top of each plate to prevent anything from damaging the plates and I was very pleased about that. 

All in all I am happy about this purchase, it'll just take some time to get the hang of it and to find the right product that will work for them. 

Influenster #VowVoxBox

Recently I came home to a mini Tiffany blue box on my doorstep, I could not wait to open the box and see what surprises I had inside.

At a first glance I was overfilled with joy! I love the eco tools brand and recently had been hunting for the complexion sponge. 

The contents of the box included:

•  Pure Silk shave cream (5 oz.) $1.49 
• Tide-To-Go Pen which a 3 ct. go for around $7.99
• Olay Regenerist Luminous Tone Perfecting Cream valued at $30.99
  I can't say how much in love I am with this box!

• EcoTools Pure Complexion Sponge $5.99
• Sally Hansen in Barracuda $7.99

I have used the sponge as a gentle scrub for my face and I have no complaints about it. It's gentle but it does get the job done at buffing away dead skin. I am currently using the Olay cream at night, and so far there isn't much to say about it. The cream itself smells light and fresh and is moisturizing!  I have yet to use the other items but I have thrown the tide pen in my purse for on the go stains! 

I did receive this box complimentary from Influenster for testing purposes.