Lifestyle: Live the Lovely Life

Lifestyle: How to live a lovely life ... in style!

Fashion and beauty trends, home dÃ©cor, food, and recipe ideas, travel and reviews.

Skincare: Herbal Choice Mari SPF-15 Day Cream

August 26, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Herbal Choice Mari SPF-15 Day Cream

If you are even a sporadic Style Chicks reader, you know how strongly we feel about the daily use of sunscreen, 365 days a year, rain or shine.

I have become increasingly concerned about chemicals in sunscreens being absorbed transdermally into my system. A lot of chemicals such as oxybenzone are readily absorbed into your body and have been shown to cause allergic reactions in some people and cause toxicity. Synthetic fragrances and dyes can also get into your system, and can cause topical reactions as well. Trading sun protection for a rash or toxic chemicals in your system doesn’t sound appealing, does it?

That is why I like Herbal Choice Mari SPF-15 Day Cream. It is oxybenzone and octinoxate free. It is also free of chemicals and nano-particles, which can penetrate the skin and get into the system. It is also free from petroleum based ingredients. And from the Herbal Choice website, all the other things it is free of: “free from synthetic fragrances or dyes. Free from gluten, dairy, soy, corn, no GMO. Free from phthalates, parabens, preservatives. Free from beeswax, insects or animal ingredients”. And it is also Cruelty-free, vegan and vegetarian. Covers all the bases, doesn’t it?

While it comes in tinted shades (like a tinted moisturizer or a light BB cream), I selected the transparent shade. It does leave a bit of a white film. However, I’m finding of late that if you apply a sunscreen that leaves a white tint, then foundation is truer on my skin. I’m quite fair and have a cool skin tone, so consider one of the tinted shades if you aren’t quite as pale as I am.

So, the big question is, if it doesn’t protect the skin via chemicals, then how does it actually work? It contains Non-Nano Zinc Oxide, a well-known sun shield. It is a full-spectrum sunscreen, so you are protected from both UVA and UVB rays. It also has lovely skincare ingredients such as organic olive oil, organic lemongrass, organic lavender, and organic sage.

It has a delicate lemongrass scent that dissipates on the skin. The formula itself is incredibly emollient and makes my skin feel smooth and supple. It comes in a lovely purple glass jar to protect the formula, and it is quite pretty on its own.

I’m very happy to have found a sunscreen that not only protects and nourishes my skin but is also free of so many dangerous ingredients! I often hear absorption of chemicals as a reason women don’t choose to wear sunscreen, but there are alternatives, and this is a great sunscreen that won’t harm your body and is great for your skin! It also comes in an SPF 30, which is recommended by many dermatologists.

Find this great sunscreen at Nature’s Brands.

[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XPTiXi78-0[/embedyt]

I received this product for testing and review purposes. If you have any questions about my experience with it, leave it in the comments section below, and Iâ€™ll do my best to answer it!

Smarson Bluetooth LED Light Bulb

August 24, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Ever thought your makeup was perfectly natural looking at home, only to be shocked at how garish it looks in the bathroom mirror at the office?

Me too.

To prevent such shocks and actually know how you will look during the day, it is good to check your makeup in different kinds of lighting. Hopefully, you will be in more flattering lighting, you will likely be in worse lighting sometime during the day, but your vanity lighting is likely a more flattering light than you will encounter during the day. So an adjustable light is a great thing to have on a makeup table.

I like Smarson Bluetooth LED Light Bulb for this purpose. As the name would indicate, it is a LED Light Bulb with Bluetooth connectivity. Better yet, it can be used in any standard socket – I’m able to use it in my great-grandmother’s table lamp that is already on my vanity table.

Smarson Bluetooth LED Light Bulb

The features of the bulb are controlled by the Smarson App, which is available for both iOS and Android. It is a free download, and it is both easy to set up and highly intuitive.

I have the Phillips Hue system, but there is so much more flexibility with the Smarson Light Bulb system. Additionally, the quality of the light is much better: with the Smarson system, the colors are deep and rich, and can be subtly tweaked to whatever lighting scheme you are seeking.

First, you can pick the color from a color wheel of 16 million colors, and then change the brightness of the colors. There are pre-programmed functions like cross-fade for dynamic color shows.

Smarson Bluetooth LED Light Bulb

Second, there is a programmable timer feature. Want to fall asleep to a certain soothing color? Want to have a bright light in the house when you get home from work? You can program all of that quickly right from the app.

Third, this is an energy saving bulb. I am amazed that so many features and such powerful lighting are built into an energy efficient device!

I adore the camera feature, which allows you to take a picture of an object, and the light will match it. It is great if you are looking to coordinate your outfit, or you want to check how you will look in a particular light.

I am impressed by the amount of deeply saturated light that the one bulb produced. For events such as a wedding, consider purchasing enough of these bulbs to illuminate your venue if you can decorate the space yourself. Find a friend with a good eye to control the lights throughout the event. Since each light can be controlled individually from the app, you can create different lighting schemes for different areas, or change them all at once (the app can control five lights at a time.) You can change the lights through the night, with various colors for the meal, dancing, cake, etc. A professional lighting team would cost thousands, and you can use these bulbs yourself after the event. You can even sync the lighting to your music, which is a great feature.

Find this handy lightbulb at Amazon.

I received this product for testing and review purposes.

Travel in Style: GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack

August 21, 2016 · Leave a Comment

I was pleased to have the opportunity to use the “GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack”. The ten piece pack consists of an aluminum card wallet that measures approximately 4 3/8″ by 3″ by 7/8″, and comes with six top-loading card sleeves, two side-loading card sleeves, and one Passport sleeve. The top-loading card sleeves include five extra slim design for regular wallets, and the side loading cards include one extra slim design. Amongst these cards, are RFID sleeves, which provide additional protection for your card in and out of the GECKO wallet. The top loading cards and the Passport sleeve are imprinted with useful information to have on hand while outside the home or to travel, such as a tipping guide, a medical information card that can be personalized, a map with time zones, along with other helpful information. The wallet is a sleek, attractive chrome, it easy to carry, fits into a schoolbag, backpack, purse, pocket or briefcase. Suitable for men, women’s, teens and kids.

GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack

The technology is that the aluminum coating creates a “Faraday Cage”. This is named after a British scientist who discovered a way to create a grounded metal screen surrounding a piece of equipment (in this case the RFID information on your credit cards) to exclude electrostatic and electromagnetic influences (such as unauthorized scanning devices used to swipe credit card info). In layperson terms, it is a way to block nefarious thieves from using scanners to get to the RFID on your cards to get your identity, credit, and debit card information without you even being aware of it. Not just any metal box creates a Faraday Cage, so storing your credit cards in an Altoids Tin, for example, cannot prevent digital theft of RFID information via an unauthorized scanner.

I will have a use for all pieces of the pack and have already utilized everything but the passport sleeve.

COMPETITOR RFID PROTECTION WALLETS
Previously, I had purchased an aluminum wallet that looked very similar to the one in this set but this Gecko wallet is heavier, sturdier, and much better constructed, inside and out. The other one I bought quickly broke. I’d thought perhaps it was defective and returned it for a replacement, but that soon broke as well. A broken case can be held together, but won’t offer any protection.

THE GECKO WALLET
With eight credit sized card sleeves and the aluminum wallet, at least fourteen cards can be protected. To use both the sleeves and the wallet together for extra protection, I place the sleeved card in the middle of the wallet pockets. Then any non-magnetic strip cards, such as my ULTA and Sephora Insider Rewards Cards and hotel and restaurant and museum loyalty program cards, I put those in the outer pockets of the wallet. This gives the most protection and space for sleeve protected cards in the center. If you have a wallet you already prefer to use, such as a checkbook wallet or french wallet, the sleeves can offer some protection to your individual credit cards in your existing wallet.

GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack

The GECKO kit also comes with a Passport Protector. Newer passport books have RFID chips in them like a credit card does. Which unfortunately means that all the information on your passport is insecure. For those who travel, this Gecko passport protector is an excellent security measure. It is durable and easy to use. There is so much to worry about when traveling; a secure passport takes one thing off your mind.

GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack

CONCLUSION: Higher quality durability and ease of use than competitor’s RFID wallets, the GECKO wallet, and passport holder are both useful and effective. Though it is unfortunate we need to protect our cards; I feel much more comfortable having a high-quality product like the Total RFID Theft Protection Pack to address the problem.

GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack

Find the GECKO Travel Tech Total RFID Theft Protection Pack at Amazon.

[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKwaaWk6lxo[/embedyt]

I received this product in exchange for my unbiased review and received compensation for my time and effort. However, my experience with the product and the opinions expressed in this review are 100% mine.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

August 18, 2016 · Leave a Comment

Here at StyleChicks, we consume lots of tea. And like clockwork, every six weeks we make a large loose leaf tea order. This order consists of our favorite greens; some whites and oolong, a matcha and a vanilla black. It would be easier to be on an auto-order to keep our favorites coming and try some new flavors, but to date, we haven’t found a tea of the month club that meets our needs. An issue we have experienced with monthly clubs is not having the option to select the kind of tea you want.

There is some potentially appealing Tea of The Month offers out there, but when it comes down to it, there are three factors we particularly value that are make or break for us choosing a tea club:

The quality of the tea itself
Being able to choose the type tea you like
Terms of service that are acceptable to live with and not a hassle to change, pause or even cancel.

With these three criteria in mind, we examined the Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club. You may know them from their quaint Cafe in Troy, New York, or the Ballston Spa that serves their teas. Or Whistling Kettle may be new to you. When we had a chance to taste many of The Whistling Kettle teas, we were so excited to try them all, because all the teas smell truly knock your socks off fantastic! It was hard to decide which tea to brew first!

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Endurance Flavor

THE QUALITY OF THE TEA

Whistling Kettle Teas are loose teas. The inclusions such as nuts, berries, dried fruit, or other petals are large or at times, even whole pieces. The tea leaves fresh are the full leaf or larger leaf pieces, not dust or remnants. The close up photos show the teas as they came out of the package: colorful, full and fresh quality. And as soon as you open the tea container, the first thing you notice it smells absolutely delicious. As we tried each flavor, one was better than the next. Even the black teas smelled delicious. For example, one black tea, the flavor “SnowFlake” had wonderful scents of cinnamon, vanilla, and almond. And the almonds pieces in the black tea were full almond slivers or larger chunks of almond, not ground up almond powder or just an almond flavoring. The color of the brewed tea as a lovely dark golden amber hue and the tea tasted delicious, even on a second brew. That is another nice feature of these teas, most of them can do a second brew as tasty as the first.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Snowflake Flavor

THE WHISTLING KETTLE TEA FLAVOR OVERVIEWS

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

In addition to the Snowflake black tea described above, we tried several varieties of The Whistling Kettle teas to assess the quality of their products. Some of these teas included:

BANANA DULCE: I am not a fan of the scent of banana, but the aroma of the Banana Dulce in the container reminded me of these tasty candied banana chips I ate as a child and the brewed tea both smells and tastes like fresh baked banana bread, with flavors of coconut and graham cracker. It is a testament to a tea product that even a not well-liked flavor can be tasty if done right. Whistling Kettle Banana Dulce is an organic decaf blend and brews to a lovely pale shade of gold.

VANILLA SILK OOLONG: I am particularly fond of Oolongs, sort of a bitter but sweet champagne kind of taste. This Oolong has a delicate orange cream scent and has a mild sweetness to it that is not too sticky or overpowering.

SCOTTISH CARAMEL TOFFEE PU-REB: This is unlike other teas I have had, it has a pleasant toffee aroma and good sized toffee chunks that balance out the earthy tones of the pu-erh. It is sweet, but not overpoweringly so. Pu-erh is an aged, fermented red tea that is sometimes mistaken for a black tea. This one smells like a bakery or candy store; the aroma is fantastic. It is an energizing tea and a good alternative to coffee or colas for an afternoon energy boost.

EAST FRISIAN BROKEN TEA: This is a breakfast tea, it is malty, not sweet or flavored. It brews to a wonderful, dark color.

ENDURANCE: As the name implies, this organic tea is energizing and is intended to increase stamina. It is also a Pu-Erh tea and has fruity inclusions such as Organic Cinnamon, Organic Goji Berries, Organic Schizandra Berries, and Organic Nettle Leaf. The berries are whole, and the tea blend makes for a lovely looking brewing process, especially if you brew them in a glass teapot. Medium caffeine content and it smells absolutely delicious.

GOLDEN STARFRUIT: This green tea was one of my favorite of the bunch, with a notable aroma that is worthy of serving guests when you want to spoil them a bit with a delightful treat. There are big chunks of starfruit, and it has a wonderful tropical taste without being sugary sweet. If you want the benefits of green tea but you dislike the taste of green tea, this is a delicious way to enjoy the benefits of green tea. Lovely light golden hue upon brewing smells delicious to the last drop.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club Golden Starfruit Flavor

LEMON SOUFFLE HONEYBUSH: A caffeine-free creamy Rooibos blend suitable for drinking at night and winding down and relaxing. A beautiful yellow-gold with a mildly tart lemon flavor that has lovely bright blue and yellow inclusions in the tea. If you are avoiding caffeine at night but want to drink tea, this is also tasty as a cold iced tea beverage.

I liked every tea I tried, and some of them such as Snowflake, Golden Starfruit, and Endurance I loved! These teas were amongst the best we have tasted, and after years of loyalty drinking the same brand, we were convinced to drinking The Whistling Tea Kettle teas.

The Whistling Kettle Tea of the Month Club

THE WHISTLING KETTLE TEA CLUB TERMS
While these teas and other flavors are sold individually on their website, there are 15 types of Tea of the Month Clubs available.

Something that sets this tea club apart from the others:

You select the types of tea you want, not a variety or mystery pack selections – unless you ask for a variety selection.
Amongst the 15 types of Tea Clubs, choose all green, all black, all chocolate, Endurance teas, Herbal teas, Discovery packs, amongst others. The Tea Tasting Club is a club for tea lovers who want to try as many types of tea as possible.
Get 2-4 oz of each of the Loose teas with big pieces of inclusions of nuts berries, and petals, not pre-bagged tea dust or remnants with artificial flavoring instead of the real thing.
FLEXIBLE TERMS:
Choose 3 or 6 months and your shipment dates.
You can cancel at any point
You can change the type of club whenever you wish. Drink Green Tea in the summer and switch to the endurance and stamina teas during the cold, dark winter months.
Free shipping
You won’t be billed on signup, rather just before shipment.
Reasonable prices without hidden fees

SUMMARY:
I enjoyed all The Whistling Kettle teas I tried, and The Whistling Kettle offers several rare, hard-to-find, and exotic teas within their subscriptions. It ‘s hard to locate an organic, fresh, tasty tea brand with lots of variety amongst their loose leaf teas. I also love seeing when a tea has a generous inclusion of berries, nuts, petals, and other flavorings. The teas look so attractive, smell divine and brew to beautiful golden hues. There was no “dust” or remaindered teas, everything was fresh, not an overstock. They have tea flavors I have never tried before, and the Endurance teas are surprisingly energizing. We would recommend giving them a try; the Tea Clubs offer a great way to drink your favorites or try some new teas!

Find the Tea of the Month Club at The Whistling Kettle.

[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-V43l8MJkc[/embedyt]