FUNkins – Reusable Napkins that are super FUN!

I would like to extend my gratitude to Funkins for sponsoring this post. 

As the mom of school age children, trying to make lunch exciting every day could send even the most creative mom into a tail spin.  Next year, when my daughter starts school I plan on venturing into the world of Bento Boxes.  That should be fun right?  Not only do I like to be fun, but being green doesn’t hurt either.  I wouldn’t classify myself as a “crunchy” mom, but I cloth diaper, we recycle and try to be conscious.  Most of everything I use in my son’s lunch is in reusable tupperware.  But one thing I haven’t thought about was cloth napkins!  We use them at home, so why not in the lunchbox?!  It’s just another way to have fun with the kids in the kitchen.  I love the concept, and its a fun and easy way to teach kids about reusing items.  It’s more than a napkin though, its like a little mini-table cloth, keeping their food off those lunch tables.

How can you use Funkins?

 

  • In a lunch box
  • As a napkin or a placemat
  • Cupcake or cookie decorating stations for school parties – replace those throwaway table cloths
  • At restaurants or on airplanes
  • To wrap around freezies, popsicles and ice cream cones
  • At the office
  • As a party favor
  • As a burp cloth
  • As a hostess gift
  • As a Teacher’s gift
  • Baby blankets for dollies
  • To brighten your festive holiday table
  • At theme parks
  • Tie one to your purse, diaper bag or backpack – looks fun and great for easy use

The founder of Funkins, a mom of three, created Funkins out of necessity.  In an effort to help her children’s school create a low-waste lunch time, she aimed to find herself some kid-friendly cloth napkins.  None could be found.  Out of that Funkins was born.

Today Funkins is so much more than reusable napkins.  You can find Art Smocks, Art Aprons for both adults and children, insulated/machine washable lunch bags and wet bags (Hello Cloth Diapering fans!!).

Pink Butterflies

Funkins makes all these items in cute and super kid friendly patterns!  The napkins are soft and a great size (13×15).  There are so many patterns to choose from, tons of pages, it was hard to narrow down.  They even have a camouflage/military themed napkin! Funkins are reasonable priced at $10.00 each.  If you think about how much waste is made, and how much money is spent on reusable items like napkins its a steal.  It’s truly so easy being green!

 

 

You can follow Funkins on social media to learn more, find out about deals and giveaways!
Funkins also has a great Pinterest page.  They have great tips for green living, fun recipes and even creative school lunch ideas (I need those!!)
 Disclaimer: I am a member of The Social Media Panel, LLC. who was given the opportunity to review this product. However, the brand or company has not influenced me in any way to provide any type of review other than my true and honest opinions. I am disclosing all information provided in this review according to the information provided in Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

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Sing Into Spring with Last Minute Easter Basket Ideas from Disney!

Having small children in my house it would only stand to reason that Disney would have a significant place in my house.  Disney Soundtracks are a rather new addition to the repertoire, but a very pleasant one.  For as long as I can remember music has been a huge part of my life.  Music is attached to memories, sometimes in a very emotional way.  Music is the way I connect with a lot of things, places and people; and as silly as it sounds, it speaks to me.  Thankfully Disney always has good music, because it really makes the movies, and the tv shows.  You can’t go wrong with good music.

These great Disney Soundtracks would be a great addition to your Easter Baskets!  Bringing music into your home is wonderful for you and your kids.  We get up in the morning and instead of turning on the TV we turn on some music!  Get our blood pumping and start the day off on the happy side of the bed.

These are some of the best albums and my kids love all of them!  On the top of their list would be the Frozen soundtrack and the DJ Shuffle.  The Disney Jr, DJ Shuffle album has the perfect mix of all your favorite Disney Jr songs, including two songs: a new Disney Jr. Anthem and a song performed by Sofia The First cast, Sofia and Clover; and who doesn’t love Doc McStuffins or Jake and the Neverland Pirates!

If your Easter Basket is already full, definitely keep this in the back of your mind for your stocking stuffers (don’t worry I’ll remind you!!!).

You can purchase all of these albums on Disney’s music site right now!

Disclosure: I received this “Sing into Spring” Disney CD pack in exchange for my honest opinion, review and product statement.  I was not compensated in any other way.  This is in partnership with Entertainment New Media Network.

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BA Star Make-up ~ Two Looks *Review*

BA Star Make-Up is professional make-up designed to stand out and stay put; specifically targeted towards dancers and cheerleaders.  Why, you ask, am I talking about it with you, as I am neither a dancer or a cheerleader.  However I once was a dancer, regularly performing and sometimes competing.  Having the proper make-up and making sure you don’t have to continuously reapply it is very important.  No one has time for that nonsense.  Cameras, whether video or still, have a remarkable effect on what people look like, especially if a professional flash is used.  This is a huge goal for those of us that have spent any amount of time in theater, competitive dance and any performance arts.  Recently however I have begun to appreciate the value of this type of make-up and application.  Occasionally I have the opportunity to spend the day at press events, either behind or in front of the camera.  I meet a variety of people and I want to look my best.  Having quality make-up that lasts is important.  So, I was curious whether or not this make-up would work with an everyday look as well. 

BA Star make-up gets that; and by providing deeply pigmented make-up and a eye-shadow glue accomplish that.  BA Star has everything you could need for competition kits to create a uniform look that judges like.  You can order from them in bulk and create custom kits that include all you need, including mascara, eyelashes and bronzers.

The colors in this palette is remarkable, especially the blue.  They are bright and deep, and frankly I couldn’t resist trying them out for everyday.  The perfect colors to create a smoky eye.

I decided to create the look recommended for a competition look, created by the BA Star team and uploaded on YouTube.  How easy would their suggestion be to recreate without having a professional make-up artist on hand to do it.  The look was very easy to recreate with the brushes I had on hand, aside from the glitter, which I didn’t have.  I decided to use the shadow glue on one eye so that you could see the difference.  

The glue was used on the left-side.  You can see that the color is remarkably different with just one swipe of the glue.  The color, regardless of using the glue, is beautiful and bright.  
And here’s your everyday look, which lasted remarkably well, and looked good over a period of time.

it’s going on five hours and still going strong
~stay tuned for this tutorial on YouTube soon! (you can subscribe to my channel by clicking the link)
**I received this product in partnership with BrandBacker.  I was not compensated in any other way.  As always my opinions are my own.

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Fall in Love with Some Jewels *Majestic Jewelry*

Disclosure: I received this product as part of an advertorial. 

Like most girls I love me some jewelry, mixing and matching them up with each other, with outfits and all that fun stuff.  When given the opportunity to check out some new jewelry and share that with you guys, well…what’s a girl to do?  Majestical Jewelry sent me these absolutely amazing earrings.  They are absolutely beautiful to look at and make quite the statement.

                                     

 

The stones on these are beautiful and flawless looking at them.  These are their Beaded Drop Earrings and would set you back about $6.50.  Yes, that’s what I said.  What is so great about these earings is that they feel really high quality.   The earings aren’t flimsy and the stones are set well.  They hang about two inches off your ear.  Since they are such a statement all by themselves I decided to pair them with a simple necklace with diamonds.
                                     

 

I thought they went well together and you definitely do not want to overdo with with all your jewelry at one time, especially in a daytime look.
One of the reasons why I love the idea of companies like Majestical Jewelry is that they bring trends to everyone by making them affordable.  Majestical Jewelry was started by a small group of jewelry lovers in South Carolina that strive to bring amazing jewelry to everyone, at a cost people can actually afford.  High quality jewelry none the less.   After purusing the site I found so many thing that I would love to have, and tons of things I had seen in magazines and on tv.
   

 

These are just a few of the amazing pieces you can snag, and all for twenty dollars or less.  Now that is something that I can get on board with.  I see myself making a swing by Majestical Jewelry in the near future.  If you visit theirwebsite and sign up for their newsletter there just might be something in it for you.
Did you pay a visit to their website?  I wanna know what really cool thing you found!  Are you an earring girl or a necklace girl?

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

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Finding Your Inner Writier with Now Novel *review*

Disclosure: I got this product as part of an advertorial. Writing a book has been something that has been on my “list” for several years.  Ideas have come and gone, pages have been written, tossed, and written again; but nothing has ever stuck.  Whether it be the kids, another kid, crazy Mr. Air Force work scheduling issue or just life in general, it just hasn’t happened.  Then I came across Now Novel.  It is perfect for someone who wants a little something else in their writing experience. 

Some people have been known to go old school, write on a type-writer, some can hole themselves away in their office, or bedroom, and type out their thoughts on their computer.  Now Novel does it a little differently.  It’s like a full-fledged support group, on top of being a place to write.  It keeps track of your word-count and overall progress right there on the side panel.  There’s a blog, forum and even a place to get some of your worked critiqued, and no one would have to know who the heck you were.  That is pretty cool.  That is one of the parts I absolutely dread about writing.  Submitting that work to someone to edit it.  I know that I’ll have to do it eventually, and submitting it to someone I know has both good and bad points.  For one, its kind of nerve wracking to basically soul your perverbial soul to someone (okay, maybe not that dramatic).  I’d always be wondering what they thought of me, if they thought I was crazy, whether it was awful…would they really tell me the full truth?  So much stress right?  For those you ( like me!) who enjoy watching things being explained, here’ s short video about the Now Novel process.

Some other cool things about Now Novel is that it really helps almost anyone to write a book.  Some people, like myself, don’t have extensive training or a college education that has to do with writing.  However, what many people do have is a story to tell.  You want to be able to put all your words on paper in a way that reads well to a large audience.  Not everyone will like it obviously, different strokes for different folks, but you want to be able to put your words down in the right way.  A way that will get the most out of it.  With this very cool website they can help you develop your book with a blueprint and expert guides.  Help you get that jumble of thoughts out and looking organized. 

All that being said, Now Novel doesn’t come cheap.  You did get a portion for free, you can create your mood, find your central idea and test that it is the way you want to go.  After that you have to pay for the program.  With that you get access to everything, all the time, as well as a mentor to help you through the process.  There are different levels of programs you can purchase, based off what you believe your needs will be.  For the DIY Writer ( knows what they want and doesn’t need a lot of support) you are looking at $99 for six months, no editing and no mentor.  The programs go progressively up to $599.00 for six months which gets you your mentor, phonecalls with them and editing of up to $3,000 words a month.  So there’s something for everyone.  The FAQ section has a lot of information in it and answered many of my questions about the program.

All in all its a super neat and very unique program.  I could see purchasing something like this if I was super committed to writing and knew that I could finish it in six months; or maybe if I didn’t have three small children running around and was litterally watching my time and money disappear before my eyes.  But you get what I’m saying.

If you’re serious about book writing, and have the cash to do this program I think it would be an awesome opportunity.

Any of my readers writing or considering writing a book?! I’d love to hear about it.  What genre?
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If you like what you just read please click to send a quick vote for me on Top Mommy Blogs- The best mommy blog directory featuring top mom bloggers I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

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