November Birchbox Man and FFA Fundraiser

The same day I got the Birchbox Man in the mail I also got the package from Maddie's fundraiser. It was a great day for guy stuff.

 Manly scents; a cologne sample from English Laundry was clean and spicy and Apolis candle was cypress fig scented and smelled like a man's cologne.

 A matte moisturizer from the same brand of an earlier shave cream. I gave them both to my nephew. We also got another shave cream sample from Vitamin and Sea. I was going to save this one for Danny, but one of their friends had a shaving emergency Halloween night.

 I was excited to try these wipes, but they burnt my face so I gave them to my sister to use to remove Halloween make up from the boys. I had had Charles and Ricky test them for irritation first so there weren't many left.

 Meat sticks from Maddie's FFA fundraiser. Probably the most welcome item of the day. They did not last long.

 I had also ordered some girly items from Birchbox. I ordered the Brush Guard brush cleaning kit. This will come in handy.

 I also ordered a black soap cleanser/exfoliator and a sea salt spray for my hair.  Both products work well. The soap is different, it goes on like chocolate syrup, burns a little at first, and does not lather. It seems to work though. You have to be careful not to use too much sea spray as it will build up and flake off, you also need less shampoo the next day.

Survival Loot Crate

October's Loot Crate had a great theme, survive the zombie apocalypse. It included a filled marshmallow eyeball, pixelated zombie theme buttons, a zombie card, infected/not infected tattoo, zombie survival guide, a zombie hunter badge, and a Ewoking Dead T-shirt.

I love the bite mark tattoo. I would have used it for Ramon's zombie costume but I had left it at home. I drew one in instead.

 The card is fun, I'm not sure what I will do with it, an envelope would have been nice.

 I had this on the Nook, I guess in a real zombie apocalypse you would need it in paper.

 I used the $5 off code from the survey on the Dead Pool Aid T-shirt. They sent me a small instead of a large though and it isn't Danny's style. He still loves his coffee T-shirt though.

Halloween Boxes from Julep

I ordered two boxes for Halloween because I wanted both scarves. The brown was my favorite and when Alex said she liked the black one I gave it to her.

The brown scarf and box

It seems the picture wants to be side ways. The items listed in the box were the brown and cream scarf, Fiore- brown cream and Karen- peach pearl nail polish colors. I ordered the mystery add-on for this box. The add-ons were the lip scrub in the gold dish, and Karen and Zora-peachy cream nail colors. The also threw in a few treats, the nail decals and a nail polish ring. Yes, this box has two Karens and if you remember from July this make three of this same color for me. I guess that means there are more to share. I noticed this happened to a couple other people who were less pleased. 

Black scarf box

This box came with the black and cream scarf, Tracy- blue glitter sea salt finish, and Amity- a white, silver metallic. They also included the same treats. Tracy and Amity are also duplicates to my collection. I really wanted the scarves. I gave the extra decals to my nieces and the ring to my sister, so eventually this whole box will be gifted. I love the scarves. I painted my nails to match using Debra and Fiore. I later changed it and used a lighter brown for the scull.

I painted my ring to look like either a cats or a dragon's eye.

Since I finally got my zigzag stickers and my Fiona- ogre green in the mail I thought I would tack it to the end.

Zag Max Mystery Box, Avon Haul, and Challenge Entry

I walked down to the post office to check on my Avon order and found my  Julep mystery box was waiting for me as well. I had to ask if I had any packages as they are not very good at passing out slips. Since I was not receiving emails from Julep I had no idea when it would come. The postal worker was nicer today.

I opened my mystery box first, it was a large box with two smaller boxes inside. When I opened the smallest box I was confused. I first noticed the loose candy corn. This is my fourth box with a pack of candy corn and I've passed the others off to Danny. He won't mind that a few escaped their packet. The color selection of the polish was off some how. I had Charlie- bright yellow cream, Madison- bright pink jelly, Marion- turquoise shimmer, and a silver blue? It seems they sent me Fina instead of Fiona- ogre green. I really wanted that green.

I then opened the larger box and found my mystery items. I had peeked at others boxes so I knew I was going to get the dry shampoo, sea salt spray, beach tonic, and one step. I even know Nellie- fushia and Clara- peach cream, were some of the colors sent out. Nellie was the only duplicate this time and I was thrilled to get the hair products. I did not notice at first, but I was missing the zigzag stickers.

I called Julep and they said they would send out Fiona and I could keep Fina as it was their mistake. I was not on the list for missing stickers, but they would be sending those out as well. She also fixed the email problem and checked on an order that had given me an error message. If they had not sent the wrong polish I would probably not called them.

My Avon order came with my eyebrow kit, a eyebrow pencil, eyeliner in plum, navy and pewter, and finally a cuticle cream. I had bought a cuticle scraper as my polish was looking uneven and I thought the cream would help too. I tested out the eye brow kit and pencil. The colors are good, the application needs work. The brush in the kit is junk. It is too small and stiff. It doesn't smooth out wax neatly and just digs into powder. The pencil needs a careful touch so they don't look drawn on. I used short strokes but used too much pressure for one stroke and had to blend it in. I think these could work well as a team if I use my other angled brush.

I was playing with my frankenpolish. Today is the deadline for crafster.org nail art inspired challenge. I entered this post:

http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=428440.0#axzz2iOHIl81i

There were only two other entries at the time. One used her snakes shedded skin as a nail applique and the other matched her nail stamps to her henna tattoos. 

Fun with Becky

Last week I spent a day with Becky. It started with a morning cup of coffee and ended with take out and a late movie. We watched World War Z, I loved the book and this is a truncated version of it. There was so much in the book that it would make a better tv show than movie if you tried to put it all in.Mom came over sometime after coffee and my make up. Becky wanted to give her a makeover as well. I decided to try kitten wings with my look.

I think Mom looks very pretty. The close up on me is scary. Mom said the make up made her eyes itch the next day. She has a lot of allergies that I am starting to have myself. 

After that the boys found a cabinet in the garage that they wanted to paint for Ramon's room. Grandma took Ramon to buy paint for it. He chose royal blue and she picked up the beige color to calm go with it. I decided it also needed to be aged so that the blue did not look like plastic. We sanded it down, we really should have used a finer grit, and then rubbed it with brown acrylic paint. Since his walls are a more country blue, distressing it helped it fit into his room. He plans to use it to replace the large tv console taking up one wall of his room. 

Cellphone Micro and Macro Lenses.

I have received my first macro lens (4x) and tested it out before sending it with Joyce as part of her birthday gift. Mine will come later. I also received  both my micro lenses (15x). My cellphone also has a 4x zoom, so I tested with that in conjunction with the lenses creating 16x and 60x. Getting the best focus is difficult as you have to get the perfect distance and maintain it without moving.

normal zoom for macro test

 16x zoom and macro lens

4x macro lens

normal zoom for micro test

15x micro lens

 60x zoom and micro lens

I decided to try a few different things to zoom into using the micro lens as suggested and then multiplying it with the zoom as above.

glitter nails 15x

 60x

back of hand 15x

 60x

 fingerprint 15x

 60x

 fabric 15x

 60x

I would love to try something fun from nature, maybe leaves or bugs. These lenses are from two different kickstarter campaigns. They are not meant to be used with zooms and are limited due to the need to be within one inch of subject which can block light needed for photography. Since I have two micro lenses and another macro lens coming I may be using some as Christmas gifts. I will keep one micro lens for myself. There is talk of making a 150x lens at some point and I would like to get in on that if it is available.

October Birchbox

I forgot to get pictures before I started putting away my items. I was really excited to get the Stainiac in beauty queen. I have not tried a product like this before and found it interesting. The Chapstick will come in handy and I like that it conditions without being shiny. This will make it better for guys and work well under lipcolor. It does not however add anything when worn over the lip stain. I will have to use one of my shiny balms over that. The 12Benefits was a complete surprise. It leaves my hair very silky, which is not an easy task. Most products tame it but still leave it coarse. I've tried the Dr. Brandt microderm abrasion cleanser once. It recommends you give it at least three days between uses. I used the moisturiser from the man box afterward as it has aloe to sotthe and speed healing. I realy liked the scent of the cleanser though. It smells like my Victoria Secret Lemon Sugar Coconut perfume, that seems to fade too quickly. I'm torn on the exfoliant, I like the idea of fresh skin cells but am afraid of damaging my skin in the process. The supergoop is a larger sample of a product I got in a mystery sample. It is a good product, but redundant whith my BB cream. Perhaps I should keep it and the stain in my purse for when I am not wearing make up.