December 2011 Birchbox

If you love getting to try new products out (especially cosmetic products) then I suggest jumping on the Birchbox bandwagon! I’ve been getting the boxes for a few months now ($10 a month) and have found a few products I really enjoy (and have become purse staples).

I thought I would just do a quick post on what I got for this month’s box and by all means if you’re interested go and sign up! I would love it if you did it via my affiliate link: Birchbox Affilate because I can then earn points. I’m all about reward systems!

The products are (in no particular order):

• Harvey Prince — Yogini fragrance
• Jouer Lip Gloss — Custom Birchbox Pink
• L’Oreal Pro — Mythic Hair Oil
• Befine — Gentle Cleanser
• ShowStoppers Fashion Tape
• Eboost — Orange Natural Energy Booster

I have to admit, for not only the last box of the year and the “Holiday” box at that… I’m very disappointed. I love the lip gloss because I love the brand Jouer and the color pink (it applies quite sheer!) but that’s about it!

I am VERY picky about my fragrance and Yogini is dominated by sandalwood. The L’Oreal hair oil (I used barely three drops) left my hair feeling just… odd. Not greasy exactly but overly slick. I have no use for the cleanser so I gave that to my husband to try. I have ZERO need for the fashion tape, I won’t be wearing any tops where I need to tape my breasts (not to mention this is probably only going to work for the small-breasted). Aside from the lip gloss, the Eboost looks interesting because it reminds me of my husbands favorite energy boost mix, ZipFizz. I also gave that to him to try and see which is better, Eboost or ZipFizz.

So overall, this is a miss, however last month’s box was very nice, especially the Zoya nail polish mini so here’s hoping they really WOW all their subscribers in 2012!

If you have any questions about any of the products or anything really, let me know!

December Julep Box

If you love getting to try out new nail polishes then I suggest you sign up for Julep’s Maven Program! I’ve been getting the boxes for a few months now ($19.99 a month) and have found that I love their polishes and hand products!

Here are some photos of the polishes I’ve received the past few months:

I’ve also gotten full size hand care and nail care products and samples of other hand/nail care products.

I thought I would just do a quick post on what I got for this month’s box and by all means if you’re interested go and sign up! I would love it if you did it via my affiliate link: Julep Maven because I can then earn rewards. I’m all about reward systems! Once you become a Julep Maven, you get a personalized 20% code that you can use on any/all of your Julep purchases.

So this is what I got in this month’s box!

• nail polish in January (a retro, tomato red)
• fast dry top coat
• pomegranate body cream
• nail sequins (they say glitter but it’s much too big for a glitter)

Now I right away put the polish on (I mean it, RIGHT away, I didn’t take my normal time as we were making lunch heh). I really like this red and believe it or not, this is ONE COAT. My husband also really likes the color, he says it’s very “50’s housewife”. So ignore the sloppy job!

If you have any questions about any of the products or anything really, let me know!

{just a member of the program, no freebies given to me!}

Answering Your Questions: Blogging

By Ronni: How does one TEST the WP themes without making it go live or taking the site down forever with maintenance mode?
I never ever use maintenance mode. I test themes one of two ways.

• I run WordPress on my Windows 7 laptop — How to Install WP on Win7
• After uploading the theme to your wp-content/themes folder, log into your WP dashboard and go to Appearance -> Themes. See where it says Preview? RIGHT CLICK that and have it open in a new tab/window (whatever you normally prefer). Then you can make changes in a semi-live state that only YOU the admin can see!

By Ronni: I am planning to use a very customizable theme… but do you have any tips for someone who is branching out?
Before starting to think about design, focus on the backend. Make sure you have your permalinks set up properly. Get Akismet set up properly (by default it’s uploaded with WP, but you need to activate it). Set up all the plugins you’ll need. I’ve written quite a few posts on plugins but here a couple good suggestions:

• Favorite WP Plugins April 2011
• WP Plugins I Use and Adore

I also suggest finding a good SEO plugin and then focus on the design. Too many clashing colors or patterns are way too distracting for the reader. Not having enough white space between the content area and the sidebar makes it hard to define any one area.

Figure out what the purpose of your blog is. Generally I find people fall into one of two areas. Those who have it as a basic online diary or those who (like me) do it to help others and have a specific amount of traffic/subscribers/numbers in general. I’ve found that generally it’s hard to do both. Also finding a niche will help when it comes to traffic.

By Lise: Any general advice on running a blog? Etiquette? Ways to boost followers?
Yes! I’ve written about this a ton actually!

• 5 Ways to Improve Your Blog
• Q&A Part One
• 4 More Ways to Improve Your Blog
• Archive: OSN Blogging Category