Soap Nuts Review & Giveaway Winner

Thank you all for your comments, for linking to this site and for subscribing! Now…for the winner….

Congratuations Elissa! I’ve sent you an email confirmation…please post back here after you try these with your review!

****Original Post – January 9th, 2009****

A few weeks ago I found out about Soap Nuts and shared my excitement with you. I finally ordered 2 Sample packs…one to try and one to give away.

Since I mostly use cold water in the wash, I decided to make Soap Nut Soak to use as detergent. I didn’t have any essential oil to add scent, but I tried it anyway. My official opinion? It’s a really cool concept, they work just as well as my homemade laundry detergent and they are environmentally friendly. I’m glad I gave them a try…I still have the “nuts” to try in the hot water wash. After I made the soak, the nuts were still sudsy so I kept them for next time. I made enough soak to do 8 loads of laundry. My clothes came out of the wash smelling…clean. No fragrance, no residue…just plain clean. I used vinegar in the rinse cycle and no fabric sheet in the dryer. I think the clothes smelled like I had hung them out on the line to dry but they were super soft and the towel were even fluffy!

So…want to try? I’m giving away a sample package of 8 soap nuts. It’s the small cloth bag in the picture above. It is enough to do 6-10 loads of laundry. A winner will be randomly chosen next Tuesday, January 13th. You have 3 chances to win:

1. Leave a comment
2. Blog about this giveaway and link back here
3. Subscribe to this site

Don’t forget to check out the Colossal Clutter Clean-up (while you are thinking about laundry!)

What’s up?

Several notes of interest…

1. The Book Discussion is postponed until further notice. I only had one person express interest in doing an online discussion and she would like to wait a while also. If you are interested in this discussion beginning soon, please leave me a comment and we’ll start next week.
2. I’m looking for ideas of what you all would like to read about. Some topics of interest are Frugal Housekeeping, Shopping on a Shoestring Budget, Raising you children to be Biblically sound, Online Scrapbooking challenges, Serving God by Loving your Husband…or anything along these lines. I’m at a stand still for post ideas so your input is greatly appreciated.
3. I would like to start having one guest post a month. If you are interested please leave a comment with your email and I will contact you. All comments are moderated, so I won’t be publishing your email address.
4. Starting today, every Monday I will have a new post under My Peace. These will be biblical insights and encouragement, prayer and praise and other thoughts I have that give me Peace. If there is something you are interested in having more insight on, please let me know and I will do my best to post something for you. It may take a few weeks, depending on the topic and the amount of research that will go into it.

I think that’s it for now! As you can see…I’m stepping it up a notch and hope you will be along for the ride!

Have a Blessed Day!

My new skin care routine…

For several months, I have been using a new product call Naked Minerals. I wanted to make sure I used the same skin care routine for at least 2 months before I gave a review on it…so here’s my story.

For about 9 years I used an expensive skin care routine that I absolutely loved. It was a challenge to try something new, but my husband became an affiliate for ITV Ventures and one of the products they sell is the Naked Minerals Mineral Makeup. Ben got me a sample and asked me to give it a try. I was more than a little hesitant to give up my skin care products for what I called “Pressed Dirt” But, I watched the video about it and decided I would give it a go. My first test of the makeup didn’t go as well as I had hoped. I used my normal cleansing and moisturinzing routine, then applied the mineral makeup. What I ended up with was clumpy dry powder that smelled funny! Ok…not at all what the infomercial described! So, Ben did some research for me and I realized what had gone wrong. First, what is recommened is to use a mild soap and water to clean you face and no moisturizer. YIKES!!! Soap and water??? That’s it? No moisturizer? I have dry skin…what will happen? Needless to say…I was becoming very disinterested in this product. BUT~ my dear husband talked me into giving it another try – the right way. I did and I was very surprised at the results! When I didn’t use moisturizer, the Mineral Makeup went on very smoothly and it only had a mild earthy smell to it. Was I converted? Not yet. Over the next few days, I went through a very nasty acne breakout and I was starting to think it was the mineral makeup. But, what I discovered was that my skin was going through “withdrawal” of sorts because I wasn’t using my old cleansing products. After about two weeks of the new routine and makeup, my skin cleared up and I haven’t had a breakout since. For those that know me, this is a big deal, because I did breakout at least once a month … or more, if I ran out of the other products or just didn’t take the time to use them. Now, I will say that I do still get the occasional blemish if I eat too much chocolate or drink soda, but that it completely natural of most women that I know!

So, I guess I am now a true Naked Minerals gal…I still like the other company’s color makeup…NM is still growing and developing cheek, eye and lip colors, along with other skin care products…but, for the skin care part…I’m hooked!