Kiwi Crate April 2014 Review

My son Hudson's 6th birthday was in April and he chose to put his birthday money towards a Kiwi Crate subscription (www.kiwicrate.com). Kiwi Crate is a monthly children's craft subsciption box. For $19.95/month you receive a crate with around 3 themed activities/craft projects geared towards ages 3-8 (themes include Wild Safari, Secret Agent, Fairy Fun). Hudson had the option to choose the theme for his first month (other months are a surprise theme), and he chose Medieval Fun (that's my boy!). Here is everything that came in the crate:

The kit came with supplies to make a knight's face mask, princess hat, banner, and catapult, as well as instructions to turn your crate into a castle and make puppets.

First, we made the medieval dress-up items. We used to Kool-Aid in water to dye the silk scarf (for use in either the princess hat or as a banner).

While we let that dry, we worked on the mask and princess hat.

The mask and hat were very simple to make. Only the princess hat required cutting, otherwise everything was perforated. Ribbons were attached to the hat and mask to fasten on each kid's head.

Hudson's completed mask:

Aislinn's completed princess hat (minus the silk scarf - still drying):

We next worked on the catapult. It was also really easy to make, mainly just a matter of assembling the pieces. Here is the completed catapult:

The crate came with small pom-poms, a large pom-pom, and a ping-pong ball to try in the catapult. Here are the little pom-poms in action:

I was happy that the crate came with enough supplies so that both of the kids could do the crafts together. I also really liked that the activities required a variety of skills to complete. Each activity had an accompanying book with a difficulty rating, which is nice to see in advance so you can be prepared with how much the kids will need your help to complete the activities.

Hudson's rating of this month's Kiwi Crate was "Awesome!".  His favourite thing to make was the catapult. I'm excited to see the next month's activities, and so are the kids :)

One other great thing about Kiwi Crate is that they have a referral program. When you refer someone, they receive $10 off their first month, and you receive a $10 credit! It's a win for everyone! Here is my referral link, so if you are interested in subscribing, please use this link to receive your discount. :)

Spring 2014 Sample Source Review

It's that time of year again - spring! And that means it's time for the Spring Sample Source! In case you don't know, Sample Source is a program that sends out a box of free samples twice a year (Fall and Spring). You just register on their website (samplesource.com), fill out a short questionnaire, and they send out an email when the sample boxes go live!

This spring's box had the most samples ever! Let's take a look:

I received:

• Jergens 3 Days to Glow Moisturizer + coupon (www.jergens.ca)
• Jergens BB Body Perfecting Skin Cream + coupon (www.jergens.ca)
• Armor All Ultrashine Wash & Wax (www.armorall.ca)
• Tabasco Chipotle Sauce + coupon (www.tabasco.com)
• Sunlight Dishwasher OxiAction Power Pacs 
• Colgate Total 12 Hour Mouthwash in Peppermint (www.colgate.ca)
• Aquafresh Extreme Clean Toothpaste in Peppermint Blast (www.aquafresh.ca)
• Tropicana Farmstand Juice FPC (www.tropicana.ca)
• Quaker Harvest Warm & Crunchy Granola in Cranberry Almond (www.quakeroats.ca)
• John Frieda Frizz Ease Thermal Protection Serum (www.johnfrieda.ca)
• John Frieda Frizz Ease Dreame Curls Shampoo/Conditioner/Calming Cream (www.johnfrieda.ca)
• Hershey's Whole Almonds Chocolate Bar (www.hersheycanada.com)
• Burt's Bees Intense Hydration Night Cream (www.burtsbees.ca)
• Quaker Harvest Crunch Quinoa Granola Bar in Chocolate Nut Medley (www.quakeroats.ca)
• Twistos Baked Snack Bites in Asiago (www.twistos.ca)
• Snuggle Scent Boosters in Blue Iris Bliss (www.snuggle.ca)

Whew! I'm tired just from typing that! Overall, a lot of brands I know and love. I've previously tried and really liked the Aquafresh toothpaste, Hershey's chocolate bar (Mike quickly stole that!), Burt's Bees night cream, Quaker Harvest Crunch bar, and Twistos. The new item I am most excited to try is the Tropicana Farmstand. Tropicana makes some of the freshest tasting juice that you can buy in a grocery store, so I'm def excited to check out their new line. My favourite new thing that I tried from this box is the Frizz Ease Thermal Protection Serum. My hair is SO soft after using it, like ridiculously soft. I will definitely be going out to buy this. Other good things - the Snuggle Scent Boosters smell really nice, and left our laundry smelling lovely. The Quaker Harvest Warm & Crunchy Granola was yummy, but sadly did not come with enough :( The Jergens 3 Days to Glow moisturizer is a self-tanner. It's actually quite dark (considering I have naturally pale skin), and after using only 2 of the 3 days I have lots of people asking if I've been on vacation. Pro tip - it says not to put any on your hands, but you're going to want to put some on your hands anyways, lest you want to look like Mickey Mouse.

This was an awesome Sample Source! I can't wait for the Fall 2014 box! Did you get a Sample Source box? What was your favourite item?

Honest Company March 2014 Bundle Review

First off, I'd like to apologize for the lack of posts lately. I'm right in the middle of exams so there's won't be much activity for the next week or so. Now to the review!

The Honest Company is an eco-friendly subscription service that specializing and baby and household products that was founded by Jessica Alba. They offer 3 bundles - Diapers & Wipes, Essentials, and Health & Wellness. The bundles start at $35.95/mth, depending on the bundle.  My first experience with the Honest Company was last November when I ordered two of their free trial bundles from their website www.honest.com. I received the Diapers & Wipes trial for my sister-in-law who was visiting with my baby niece and the Essentials trial for home. I really enjoyed the products I received, but with Christmas shortly after, money was tight and I kept pushing the shipment back (a really great option the Honest Company offers). I finally had March's Essentials bundle shipped out (and I am now finally writing about it!).

How the Essentials bundle works is that you can choose 5 household items for $35.95 + shipping, and add up to 3 additional items for a discount. The other bundles work a little differently - The Diapers & Wipes bundle is a month's-supply of diapers and wipes for $79.95. The Health & Wellness bundle is 2 vitamin products of your choice for $39.95 + shipping, plus your choice of up to 3 additional items for a discount.

I received in my Essentials bundle:

• Stain remover
• Dish soap in White Grapefruit
• Laundry detergent
• Dryer clothes
• Kids toothpaste

I was impressed by the quality of the products. All of them worked very effectively. The kids loved the toothpaste, and normally they don't care for any natural type toothpastes. Everything smelled so nice, especially the stain remover which is French Lavender scented, so relaxing.

What I really liked about the products is on the ingredients list on each bottle, each ingredient is explained beside the scientific term (e.g. Caprylyl/Myristyl Glucoside [Sugar-Based Cleanser]). It's nice knowing what is in each bottle and makes me feel more confident about the products.

Finally, a great feature of the Honest Company is their referral program. For every friend you refer that makes a purchase, you receive a $20 credit! That's half a month's shipment paid for! So to get started, here is my referral link and use coupon code INVITED10 to save $10 on your first order.

Sephora Nail Polish + Goodies Review

I finally placed an order with Sephora a few weeks. I've been meaning to order from Sephora FOREVER, since my birthday (last November) when I received the Beauty Insider birthday offer*. I really like going into their stores, but I now live an hour away from the closest store so it's not very convenient. But they recently had an offer to receive 6 samples instead of the 3 they offer with every order, so I decided to take them up on it. What I really only needed at the moment was a gold sparkle nail polish, and look!:

A really pretty one from the Sephora + Pantone Universe collection! And it's on sale! XD

Here is my package from Sephora:

And here are my goodies:

I received (clockwise from left):

• Fresh Black Tea Instant Perfecting Mask (sample)
• 2013 Benefit Real Birthday Turn-Ons Set (birthday gift)
• Sephora+Pantone Universe Elemental Energy Nail Lacquer in Gold Glitter
• Algenist Genius Cream (sample)
• Hourglass Immaculate Liquid Powder Foundation (sample)
• Dior Hydra Life Pro-Youth Protective Creme (sample)
• Marc Jacobs Beauty Genius Gel Super-Charged Foundation (sample)

I loved everything! First, let's look at the nail polish:

There's a good concentration of sparkles and I love the variation of sizes. 

The 2013 Benefit Real Birthday Turn-Ons Set had obviously been sitting in my cart for awhile. I am glad I was finally able to get it. The set consists of small tubes of Benefit's They're Real! mascara and Watt's Up! Soft Focus Highlighter for Face. I really like both products. The mascara has a really good brush to it and applies well. The highlighter is like a champagne-coloured cream eyeshadow. I used it as a highlighter with my eyeshadow and I really liked the look.

I really enjoyed all of the samples I received. The mask was the first thing I used, because I love masks, and if worked great and smelled lovely. I would definitely buy that. I would say my favourite face cream was the Dior. It felt really luxe going on and I noticed a difference in my skin the most with that one. My favourite foundation sample was the Hourglass one. It had the best texture and matched my skin the best (the sample I received on the Marc Jacobs was too yellow).

I definitely plan on ordering again and you should definitely check out Sephora. They have a wide variety of brands and *if you join their Beauty Insider club, you can receive a gift for your birthday like the Benefit kit I received. Visit www.sephora.com to start shopping!

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Healthy Surprise March 2014 Review

ethicalDeal is currently offering a deal on Healthy Surprise subscriptions, $5 towards a $30 credit. Healthy Surprise is a subscription box service similar to Snackbox. The company sends out one of three types of boxes each month, starting at $40/mth for the Starter Box. Each box contains a variety of healthy, natural snacks. I used my credit towards the Starter Box, so it only cost me $15 + shipping ($10 in Canada).

Let's see what's inside:

There's a $25 gift card for Healthy Surprise on top! Awesome!

Lots of goodies, let's see what we have:

• VegThisWay Rawr Bar in Super Sweet Potato (www.vegthisway.com)
• Oskri Peach Bar (www.oskri.com)
• Happytimes Veggie Pals Carrot Orange Apple Chews (www.happyfamilybrands.com)
• Freeze Dried Crunchies in Mixed Fruit (www.crunchiesfood.com)
• Buddy Fruits Pure Fruit Bites in Orange (www.buddyfruits.com)
• New York Date Bar in Fruits & Nuts (www.newyorkdatebar.com)
• Materne GoGo Squeez in Appleberry (www.gogosqueez.com)
• Just Strawberries 'n Bananas Freeze-dried Fruit (www.justtomatoes.com)
• Oskri Dried Cranberries (www.oskri.com)
• Lydia's Organics Rawkin' Spicy Beet Chips (www.lydiasorganics.com)
• Alive & Radiant Foods Kale Crunch in Quite Cheesy (www.kaiafoods.com)

There are a lot of great products in this box, and I'm glad there are so many kid friendly products. I have 2 small complaints - one, the box is 90% fruit. I kind of wish there where more savoury snacks. Two, I wish there was a product list with information about each product. Snackbox encloses a leaflet in their boxes, Little Life Box posts their's online. I personally like seeing a blurb about each item. Still, receiving the $25 gift card was awesome, and they also included some recipes!

To get the $5 for $30 credit deal, go here.

For more info on Healthy Surprise, visit www.healthysurprise.com (referral link).

Good Things in the Mail - March 25, 2014

A few nice samples and a good coupon came in the mail today!

From left to right:

- Shu Uemura Lightbulb Foundation samples (from their Facebook giveaway - over)

- Biotherm AquaSource sample (from their Facebook giveaway - over)

- Chapman's coupon (from their website - no longer available)

I'm excited to try the samples and I will share my reviews shortly - maybe with a pint of ice cream!

January Snackbox Has Arrived!

I found my January Snackbox in front of my door when I returned from dropping the kids off at school - finally. I was sent the tracking info when it shipped, but the tracking stopped somewhere in Richmond, BC (I'm in Ontario), so I wasn't sure where my box was (thanks Canada Post!).

This was my first Snackbox (http://www.getsnackbox.com). It is a subscription box of healthy snacks, and is priced at $39.95/mth + tax ($33 + $6.95 shipping) or less per month if you buy a 3 or 6 month subscription. I received mine for $15 less with a coupon code for new customers, and they sent one with my box for me to share with new customers as well: HEALTHYSTART967.

Let us open the box, shall we?

Not as pretty as my Little Life Box, but I WAS spoiled by that. On top there were coupon cards for Snackbox (as already shared) and Panty by Post (save $15 using coupon code GIFT15), as well as a mystery gift card to Trend Trunk (referral link) that could be worth up to $250 (mine, sadly was worth $5).

Now for what's inside:

Things are looking good! Let's line things up a little better so we can see everything:

Lots of tasty treats! This is what came in the box:

- HomeFree Mini Vanilla Cookies

- Larabar ALT Fruit and Nut Bar in Peanut Butter

- Annies's Homegrown Bunny Grahams in Chocolate

- Nature's Bakery Stone Ground Whole Wheat Raspberry Fig Bar

- Veggie-Go's Mountain Berry Spinach Fruit & Veggie Snack

- Brothers-All-Natural Apple Cinnamon Crisps

- Beanitos Original Black Bean Chips with Sea Salt

- RW Garcia 5 Seed Rosemary & Garlic Crackers

- Kiju Organic Juiceboxes in Mango Orange and Pomegranate Cherry

- Theobroma Organic 72% Dark Chocolate x2

- Nature's Path Organic Dark Chocolate Chip Chococonut Granola Bars (box of 5)

- Guayaki Brand Yerba Mate Drink in Revel Berry

I just want to say yay! Everything is milk protein-free! I can actually eat it all, even the chocolate!

There's a lot of great stuff there for the kids as well, which makes me happy. I'll be packing them the Kiju juice boxes in their lunches tomorrow. We've had them at Starbucks quite a few times and they love them. We are also a big fan of Annie's and Nature's Path, as well as HomeFree's cookies since they had them in the Little Life Box. I'm hoping the apple crisps are good, I'm usually a fan of apple crisps but I bought some terrible ones at Shopper's Drug Mart recently (the brand is ThreeWorks as a heads up), so I'm a little tentative. I'll have Mike try them first. :)

I have one complaint -  the yerba mate drink came dented.

I was not super impressed. Mike has me freaked out that dented cans have botulism, though I don't know if that's true or not. Wiki Answers had mixed responses on that. I will be firing off a complaint email to the company though.

Despite the can, I was really happy with the food selection in the box. One thing worth mentioning is that according to fellow blogger Canadian Subscription Box Addict (cdnboxaddict.blogspot.ca), this month's Snackbox was valued at less than the regular monthly subscription charge. I will probably hold off on ordering more boxes until I see if the next few boxes are higher valued. I don't really want to be losing money on what I order.

SURPRISE UPDATE!

I heard back from Snackbox regarding the can issue and they had this to say:

"I'm so sorry about that! We will send you a new Snackbox today."

What-the-what?! How awesome is that! They really went above and beyond as I was totally not expecting that, maybe a credit at the very most. It was way better than Ipsy's generic response to the face-burning towelettes:

"Thank you for your email. We're so sorry you didn't love the towelettes in your Glam Bag. We do appreciate your feedback and encourage you to review this product and all of the other products you received by visiting your "Glam Room" on ipsy.com. We will certainly take it into consideration as we continue to plan our Glam Bags for this year."

Snackbox even sent me a coupon code to share with you guys:

 This feels like a real blog now! My own coupon code :). Anyways, based on Snackbox's fabulous customer service response I will continue to subscribe and look forward to sharing future goods.

HomeFree: http://www.homefreetreats.com/
Larabar: http://www.larabar.com
Annie's Homegrown: http://www.annies.com/
Nature's Bakery: http://www.naturesbakery.com
Veggie-Go's: http://www.nakededgesnacks.com
Brothers-All-Natural: http://www.brothersallnatural.ca
Beanitos: http://www.beanitos.com
RW Garcia: http://www.rwgarcia.com
Kiju: http://www.kijuorganic.com
Theobroma: http://www.theobromachocolate.com/en/home
Nature's Path: http://www.naturespath.com
Guayaki: http://www.guayaki.com

Product Review: Euro Cuisine Yogourt Maker

As part of my Boxing Day shopping spree (not to be confused with my Cyber Monday shopping spree, post-Thanksgiving shopping spree, or Yay! It's (insert day of the week)! shopping spree), I picked up a Euro Cuisine Yogourt Maker from Well.ca (http://well.ca/products/euro-cuisine-yogurt-maker_62419.html?gclid=CIi72ZyI8LsCFeYWMgodwnkAJw) for around $30. One of my New Year's Resolutions is to stop eating the dairy that I love so much but makes me so sick (I'm milk protein intolerant). So yesterday I finally got the supplies I needed to make yogourt I can actually eat without getting sick (yay!) and actually tastes good (double yay! - soy yogourt is terrible). To make yogourt I needed milk (I used lactose-free) and yogourt or cultures (I know, I know, yogourt to make yogourt?) - I used plain coconut milk yogourt that contained active cultures. For flavour I added that lingonberry jam you can get at Ikea (essentially Swedish cranberries). You actually do most of the cooking on the stove and once the ingredients are cooked pour the mixture into the jars that come with the cooker (like larger babyfood jars). It takes a long time for the yogourt to sit in the cooker and do it's thing (8-12 hours depending on the type of milk used), but the yogourt I made was actually really good! It was a bit chunky but I probably didn't mix it enough when cooking on the stove.

The machine was quite compact and overall I'm quite happy with it. It was yummy and the kids even liked it! I've never made yogourt before so I don't have much to compare my experience to, but I will definitely be making more. Now I just need to work on getting a cheese maker. :)