May, 2015 - sparkleshinylove

Roxymandy May 22, 2015

Review of Luxurious Cariloha Resort Bamboo Bed Sheets

I feel like I’m always in the middle of redecorating! We moved into a new house 4 years ago, and all of our decorating projects have been ongoing. One of our latest projects has been the master bedroom. We painted it a great grey, and we recently picked out some new lamps, pillows and bedding set.

One thing we were lacking was a new set of sheets to match it all. Previously we had a green color pallet, so we had to start fresh.

Our new sheets are from Cariloha – all of their products are made from bamboo! The sheets we now have are called Resort Bamboo Bed Sheets in Shoreline Gray.

The packaging was great – I felt like I was opening up a present with the big box the sheets came in!

I have never owned any bamboo products, so I was intrigued! I really loved the color of these sheets we picked up, but we had always purchased jersey sheets in the past so I wasn’t sure how I would like these new ones.

They are 100% Viscose from Bamboo, and are made from luxurious 320 Thread Count Bamboo Sateen (classic sheets are 230 Thread Count).

Bamboo fabrics are three degrees cooler than cotton, naturally anti-bacterial and hypoallergenic, moisture-wicking, and softer than cashmere.

Usually by the end of the night I am kicking off our duvet because it’s just too hot. I remember waking up in the morning the first time we used these new sheets thinking, wow – I still have the covers on!

They really were nice and cool! It was pretty awesome. I was surprised they were so much cooler than our jersey sheets. I really didn’t expect there to be much a of a difference. Sure they felt great when I first got into them, but I really felt a difference when I woke up. I didn’t break a sweat while sleeping – I was nice and cool.

They were also very soft too – they almost felt like satin. It was a super luxurious feeling to sleep in them. And I loved that they were a little oversized so I could actually fit them on my queen sized bed! Usually I am performing acrobatics to get the fitted sheet on my bed, but in this case it fit perfectly on my mattress with a bit to spare.

Even after countless nights sleeping in them, they still feel so comfortable to get into – that it really surprised me. I’m hooked!

Would you like to own a set of these sheets yourself? Cariloha even has a whole line of men’s and women’s clothing made from the same bamboo fabrics as well. I really liked my experience with Cariloha and bamboo – I was very impressed.

Use code ‘SPARKLE20’ for 20% off Cariloha’s entire online store! You have to use it soon though – you have until 11:59 pm MST on May 24th, 2015 to use this code and save! Visit their website here to see everything that Cariloha has to offer.

Disclosure: I received this product for review, but all opinions are fabulously my own.

Roxymandy May 20, 2015

Vichy ProEVEN Night Review for Chick Advisor

You have heard about my love for Vichy ProEven Advanced Daily Dark Spot Corrector, but I recently got the chance from Chick Advisor to try out Vichy ProEVEN Night as well!

This product is a little different then the ProEVEN Daily Dark Spot Corrector formula because there are a few ways to apply it to encourage results.

The first way is to use every evening as a night treatment by applying a thin layer on your cleansed face. The second way is to use it once or twice a week as a mask. This method involves cleaning your face, then applying a thick layer of the night cream and allowing it to infuse into your skin for 5 minutes before removing the excess with a cotton pad.

I decided to try both ways to see what results I would experience!

The concentration of LHA is 3 times greater in the night cream than the day cream, and it also includes Ceramide Bright and Vitamin C.

Over time the cream is meant to visibly reduce dark spots, sun spots and brown spots, and even out skin tone with improved skin texture and radiance.

I really loved the smell of this product – it was refreshing! I came out more like a gel than a cream, but went on smooth and I didn’t need a lot for coverage. Just putting it on at night was very soothing, and I didn’t wake up with oily skin the next morning.

When I used it as a mask it was very interesting because normally you would wash a mask off with water! This time around you were just to use a cotton pad or cotton ball so the night cream was still on your face. My skin felt very moisturised when doing this. It was like having a spa treatment done on my face.

Since using Vichy ProEVEN Night, my skin has felt a lot smoother. It feels light enough to be worn during the day, and it feels so good to put on!

Because I am so tired at night, I felt like it was easier to use nightly instead of twice a week for 5 minutes as a mask. My skin tone seems much lighter now, and my skin just seems to be glowing a bit more.

I didn’t notice a big difference visually on my skin when using the night cream as a mask twice a week, or nightly instead. Both methods seemed to produce great results at the same rate. I did love how my skin felt after using it as a mask, but since I am strapped for time at night I thought using it nightly was more for me.

For more information on this product, please visit their website here, or to see more Chick Advisor reviews on Vichy ProEVEN Night click here.

Roxymandy May 19, 2015

BALMAIN X H&M is Coming November 5 2015

I have never been so excited for an H&M collaboration before!

Like most girls, I could only dream of owning a Balmain piece. H&M is actually giving me a shot at owning a coveted piece of one of their collections.

H&M has announced that their autumn guest designer collaboration will be with the Parisian house of Balmain.

At the Billboard Music Awards this weekend creative director Olivier Rousteing walked the red carpet with Kendall Jenner and Jourdan Dunn to announce the upcoming collaboration.

You can join the movement with the hashtag #HMBALMAINATION on social media.

Available from November 5th, in around 250 stores worldwide, the collection will feature clothing and accessories for both women and men.

The first thing I did was go to mark my calendar so I could be one of those crazy people who lines up the night before in anticipation of shopping this collection first, but I realized I will be out of the country! Please please please let this collection be shoppable online – I need everything!

For more information visit www.balmain.com and www.hm.com/press.

#HMBalmaination

INSTAGRAM TWITTER FACEBOOK
@hm @hm @H&M
@balmainparis @balmain @balmainparis
@olivier_rousteing @orousteing @orousteing

Roxymandy May 19, 2015

Winner of the One Year Supply of Minute Rice!

Congratulations to our winner of a one year’s supply of Minute Rice – Brenda Penton! Thank you to everyone who entered, and Brenda we will be contacting you shortly so you can claim your prize!

Roxymandy May 19, 2015

Creating a Lego Themed Party Table

Anyone who has given their child a birthday party knows that when you ask them “what type of party do you want?”, it changes daily. Spider-Man, Jake and the Neverland Pirates, Big Hero 6…..every day I asked, the party theme seemed to change. Finally my son and I settled on a theme he luckily didn’t change his mind on – Lego!

My son loved The Lego Movie, and he’s been loving putting Lego sets together so the theme stuck long enough that I could have the party.

We had the party with family at our home, and I wanted to do a great cake table with the Lego theme.

To start, I wanted a fun tablecloth. Of course I couldn’t find what I wanted anywhere, I decided to go to Fabricland and have a tablecloth cut! It seemed a bit easier to look through a store full of fabrics to pick out my favourite pattern instead of finding a pre- made table cloth online.

Next up I decided to make my own backdrop for the table. I purchased three poster boards that I taped together for only a few dollars at Walmart, amd then I got to work on making paper fans. There are plenty of Etsy shops online selling paper fans, but I decided to make them myself for this project. They were super easy to make, and all I needed was some paper and a glue stick! I used scrapbook paper so they were a bit more sturdy. I also purchased a fancy hole punch from Michaels to give some of the fans a pattern.

I ordered the invitations, water bottle labels, and thank you notes from Lucky Little Prints on Etsy. They had a whole package which also included personalizing their Lego party themed items including cupcake toppers and a welcome sign!

A Lego cake was in order for the table, and I wanted it to have some height so it was actually two cakes stacked on top of each other. I also wanted cake pops as a treat as well, amd I made my own cake pop holder.

I used two pieces of styrofoam as the base, and to make each look like a piece of Lego I cut styrofoam balls in half, and glued them onto each styrofoam block. I pained each red to finish it off.

I used Lego stickers to theme the popcorn tubs and cady bags for the candy jars, and used some colourful paper straws to decorate the table.

As a thank you gift I had Lego cookies for each of our guests from Sweet Treats by Franca P.

How adorable are these cookies? And they tasted AMAZING! I was so happy with the way they looked, and they tasted so good we didn’t want to give them away. Sweet Treats by Franca P. will create custom treat orders for sugar cookies, Oreo pops, chocolate marshmallows, chocolate strawberries and even caramel corn! I loved the way they packaged these cookies as well – they looked amazing.

Some of the finishing touches on the table included large Lego blocks from Toys R Us, and also a gold “3” balloon to finish off the table.

I had a few other themed items around the house like this soap dispenser I made with Legos floating inside.

Catering lunch was easy with help of Panera Bread – they had customizable lunch boxes which included either a sandwich, pickle, a cookie and chips, or half a sandwich, salad, cookie and chips. They made passing out lunch really easy!

Overall I was really happy with the table, and my son had a great time at his party!