Today, more and more companies are helping those in need and protecting the environment, by selling unique, clever stuff.   Some of these companies like Warby Parker, Smile Squared and Two Degrees Food give back to the world by helping needy children.  Ecojet and Alchemy Goods are focused on recycling existing stuff to make original art and fashion.

Four friends started Warby Parker while in business school, to give customers an alternative to expensive glasses.  They provide limited edition boutique level eyewear directly through their website to consumers, no middle men.  For every pair of eyeglasses they sell, they give one to someone in need through their partnerships with nonprofits like VisionSpring.

You can also help out children when you buy from Smile Squared, They sell Bamboo toothbrushes for children and adults, in 100% recyclable products boxes.  For every toothbrush a customer buys, Smile Squared donates one to a needy child.

The next time you want a snack, check out Two Degrees Food, Founded to help  feed the hungry kids of the world, they offer delicious vegan, gluten free snack bars made of ancient grains, like quinoa, and chia.  For every bar the company sells, they donate a meal to a hungry kid through one of their world-wide partners.

Looking for some more ideas?  Check out Ecojot, They have beautiful, sustainable stationary.  Whenever possible their stationary is 100% post-consumer waste.  In addition to stationary, they have wrapping paper, journals, pretty much anything to meet your paper needs. In addition to being a sustainable company, they give workbooks and pens to children in need from Haiti to Zimbabwe.

Alchemy Goods, upcycles bike inner tubes to create messenger bags.  The tubes are found locally. The bags are cleaned and assembled in the same neighborhood.  They also offer belts, and wallets all made out of the same material.  They are eco-friendly, turning something used into something new.

Fortunately there are countless companies like this now, and you can choose to buy from them.  They are easy to find too, just a quick internet search, and you are you way to helping out the planet and your neighbors. You may want to try search terms like: local, sustainable and eco-friendly.  Try to buy from the local bookstore as well as companies that give back instead of the big chain alternatives, and you will be helping out more than you know.

© Sophistishe 2013 | Permalink | No comment - Oh, I see how it is...

Spring usually means a new beauty routine. Mine has pretty much stayed the same, but I’ve been pampering my feet and shaving more. I mean who really shaves during Winter? I start the day by washing my face with a mixture of tea tree oil face wash and black soap. I used to exfoliate each day with a face scrub, but now I’ll exfoliate (home scrub here) maybe once a week or as needed… depending on how often I use tinted moisturizer or makeup.

After a shower, I moisturize with whatever lotion and face moisturizer I have on hand. Lately, I’ve been working on my glow by using Jergens Natural Glow products. I LURVE them. I don’t use the face moisturizer as much as the moisturizing lotions because I prefer using something lighter (in consistency) on my face. On my lips, I use Carmex and whatever lip color tickles my fancy. I like to keep it natural on most days. If I’m feeling adventurous, I’ll apply a bold lip color or on the rare occasion, a colorful eye shadow.

Jergens makes it easier than ever to glow with the NEW Natural Glow Moisturizers that provides great color, year-round, without the sunless tanner odor.

Share how natural-looking skin color makes you feel for a chance to win $500!

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Jergens. The opinions and text are all mine. Official Sweepstakes Rules 

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I’m at it again. I’m doing doing another DIY project in Jayden’s room. This time, I’m spray painting some frames and bookshelves for his walls. Lately, I haven’t had as much time as I’d like to complete projects so it’s super important that the projects that I do start aren’t too complicated. Walmart just started carrying a new spray paint by Rust-Oleum that offers twice the coverage as other general spray paints. When offered the opportunity to try them, I jumped at the chance. Rust-Oleum Ultra Cover 2X (say that twice as fast) covers twice the square footage of other general purpose spray paints. It contains up to 44% more solids so just one can of paint performs and covers like two. Score!

Here’s a little sneak peek of everything before I got started. I may or may not spray paint a few extra items/use the orange spray paint. This is a work in progress that I’m sharing and I’ll share the final results in a separate post.

 Here are the bookshelves. They’re actually BEKVÄM spice racks from IKEA ;-).

 This is just one coat Lagoon. The color is amaaaaziiiing!

 Here’s a set of frames I found at Family Dollar. Coinkydink? The first coat of Flat White looks very fresh!

Having only used one coat of Ultra Cover 2x paint so far, I am sold! At $3.77 per can, you can’t beat that! The coverage is great and it dries pretty fast (outside) too! Stay tuned as I will be revealing how these pieces look in Jaydens room!

As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© Sophistishe 2013 | Permalink | No comment - Oh, I see how it is...

To celebrate Strawberry season, Walmart asked me to come up with a recipe using… wait for it… strawberries! I really wanted to share a strawberry pound cake recipe, but it failed horribly. I may post about that disaster later. To recover, I decided to make something fool-proof… strawberry salsa! Salsa and chips is one of my favorite snacks and I love me some strawberries. This strawberry salsa came out absolutely perfect, although I really didn’t know what to expect. I honestly like it better than traditional tomato salsa.

Ingredients

1 1/2 cup diced strawberries
1/4 cup onions
1/4 cup cilantro
1/4 tsp lime juice
1 sprinkle of orange peel granules
1 sprinkle of black pepper
1 tbsp diced jalapeno peppers

Directions

In a small bowl, combine the strawberries, onions, cilantro, jalapenos, and lime juice. Stir and top with orange peel granules and black pepper. Serve with tortilla chips.

Keep Strawberries Fresh In The Fridge

To keep strawberries fresh in the refridgerator, rinse them only when you are ready to eat them. You can also spray them with citrus juice or any juice that has a high acidity to keep them fresh.

As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© Sophistishe 2013 | Permalink | 3 comments - Let's chat!

Being a mom requires me to be on my feets nonstop. Both Jayden and Jaxon keep me on my toes! For Mother’s Day, I want nothing more than to rest my tootsies and I know many of you can relate! If you are scrambling to put something together for the special Mother’s in your lives, then I have an AH-MAZING homemade foot soak to share with you. The recipe includes epsom salt, chaMOMile and peppermint teas, as well some peppermint extract… all of which you can find at Walmart. This combo of ingredients will breathe life into Mom’s tired feet, leaving them soft, revitalized and happy!

Ingredients

1 cup epsom salt
4 bags of peppermint tea
4 bags of chamomile tea
4 drops peppermint extract

Instructions

Pour epsom salt and salt in an 8 ounce jar. Slowly mix ingredients using a fork or close the jar and shake. Add peppermint extract and give the jar a shake.

Each 8 ounce jar is good for foot bath. Of course you can whip up a larger batch for a larger container and use as much or as little as you’d like per foot bath.

Happy Mother’s Day!

As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© Sophistishe 2013 | Permalink | 1 comment - Let's chat!

I don’t know how to knit or crochet, but I sure did try to do whatever it is that yielded a mini ruffle scarf. Sashay Yarn made it somewhat easy. Let me explain… Red Heart sent me a care package with a few skeins of Sashay as well as some knitting needles and crochet hooks. They challenged me complete a fun project using the yarn. A popular choice was a ruffle scarf so that’s what I attempted, only I took a wrong turn and somehow lost my work trying to end the scarf. All I had left was a ruffly puff and a family emergency to tend to (all’s well now), so I improvised.

Sashay ($4.67 per skein at Walmart) is a unique yarn with a touch of metallic that creates beautiful ruffle lovelies with just one ball. The yarn is like a fishnet, making it easy to create amazing pieces with little effort. Using a crochet hook, I attempted a longer ruffle scarf using a no crochet method (see video below). I attached a soothie pacifier to the end of my crochet hook (clever huh?), but I accidentally let most of my work unravel as I was trying to loop my stitches around the first stitch… if that makes sense. There was no way I was starting over, so I took a piece of regular yarn and tied it around a separate crochet hook. I then, threaded the yarn through my Sashay stitches. I made a knot with the regular yarn to create a ruffly puff and then tied it around a wine bottle. This made for a nice way to display flowers on our night stand. Not too bad, eh?

No Crochet Sashay Tutorial

As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received samples and compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© Sophistishe 2013 | Permalink | No comment - Oh, I see how it is...

Hey Ladies!

Emily Schuman

Realsimple.com offers their input on this year’s hot trends and they think the ladies will be hip in anything floral! Rebecca Daly helps with tips on how to wear prints and patterns. She advises:

- For a bold print top, choose a solid color cardigan to go over it.

- With big stripes on top, keep your pants to a simple color like white, or a something kind of muted.

- Offset dark colored polka-dot pants with a brightly colored top.

- If you’re really brave you can mix dots, and stripes or patterns. Just keep to the same color hue, and make sure the prints are smaller in size and not overwhelming.

Just for Men

This Fellow

Men from all walks of life and every age group are becoming more aware of how they look and what they wear. Jim Moore of GQ.com shares his opinion of what is trending this year for the gentlemen who want to look good, and be plugged into what’s going on today. In his article entitled “Tie One On” he states, “One trend emerging this season (that’s also carrying over into fall) is 90’s grunge. We saw the once-rebellious aesthetic brought back in subtle ways, most notably in the shirts tied around models’ waists that added pattern and color to already layered looks.”

Other trends you will see in men’s fashion this year:

- Orange!

- Stripes and plaids.

- The layered suit.

- Neon!

- Classic looks, like cricket sweaters.

- Did someone say ‘seersucker’?

- Printed ties.

- Loafers.

Couture Kiddo’s

yellOkids

Kids tend to have it the easiest because they can be cute in almost anything and often don’t feel the need tobe trendsetters. But fashion doesn’t stop for anyone and if you’ve got a little person at home, or even a teen looking to fit in with the crowd, you might want to know what’s going on with kids’ fashion trends for this year. Whitney Ferrall of kidsfashion.about.com records tips from kids’ trend expert Nicole Yee.

- Color palettes:

- Emerald greens mixed with blues.

- Berry purples and pinks.

- Bright poppy red and turquoise blue.

- Fabrics:

-“Rich” fabrics like tapestry jacquard and brocade.

- Leather alternatives.

- Quilted fabrics.

- Neoprene.

- Updates to familiar styles:

- Tailored jersey sweats.

- Plush styles.

- Colored camo patterns.

Yee points out that she see kids’ fashion heading in a “gender neutral” direction. She states that this can be good for the consumer because gender neutral pieces “tend to be more timeless” and they’re better for ‘hand me downs’.

Fully Accessorized!

BaubleBar

Accessories will always be a part of fashion, and in fact it is not fully fashion until it’s fully accessorized. A few trim trends for 2013 include things like sunglasses! Eye wear is definitely hot, whether it is sunglasses, or just the non-prescription wear that hipsters use to set off an outfit, you can’t go wrong with a good look for your eyes. Blue diamond engagement rings are all the rage this year too as brides are starting to add more color in lieu of traditional diamonds and white wedding dresses. Big watches are hot for men and especially for women. And you don’t have to break the bank to keep up with this trend, just go online and check discount manufacturers for deals.

Following the latest trends isn’t just about being a fashionista, but it is a fun way to be a part of the current culture, and maybe even save money by finding things that’s hot and plentiful right now!

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