Gee, My Hair Smells Terrific!

I am IN LOVE with Paul Mitchell's new(ish) Wild Ginger line of Hair Products.  First of all, they smell heavenly.  I mean, if you like the smell of ginger, they smell amazing.  Second they are made with Awapuhi protein rich products that give you strength shine and silky hair so their great for damaged and frizzy hair, but careful, careful not to over protein your hair or it can get funky!

My favorite product has to be the mousse or what they call the Hydrocream Whip.  It's super dense and not like a normal mousse.  You don't need a ton because of the density, but it doesn't weigh down your hair and it makes nice defined curls without the 80's "crunch" going on there.  LOVE IT.  I'm also digging the finishing spray.  It has some really great hold, but doesn't make your hair hard.

At first I wasn't sure about the shampoo because it seemed thick, then I realized I just don't need as much and it makes crazy amounts of lather!  I'm now using the shampoo and cream rinse regularly and once every week or two I use the Keratin Intensive Treatment instead of the cream rinse.  There is also a KeraTriplex Treatment that comes in little tiny containers and you leave it on for about 10 minutes, follow it up with the Keratin intensive Treatment for another 10 minutes and then rinse it all out.  I only do this every couple of months because I don't want to over-protein my hair and that stuff is PRICEY! 

I use the mousse to style over the Styling Treatment Oil.  The treatment Oil makes sure you got no frizz going on there and it smells yummy and really gives off a nice shine.  If it's not shiny enough for ya, you can always finish your look with the Shine Spray.  I love this stuff, too, but my spray applicator thingy stopped working!  Not so happy with that.  It's a very fine mist that leave a pretty shine all over your hair.  I hope to figure out how to get mine working again!

I've also used the Blow out Spray and tend to use that when I'm blow drying it all straight and I tried the Texturizing Sea Spray, but I hate it.   I am not a fan of texturizing sprays in general because I don't like how it makes my hair feel.  It's feels like I have dirty sea water in my hair.  Yuck.  But that is the only product I haven't liked.


Overall, I love this line of products and I highly recommend them.  So glad I branched out.  They are not the cheapest hair care products out there, but I'm really happy with them.  I've always been a Paul Mitchell snob in general, but the Wild Ginger is AMAZING.

Draftmark: The New Way to Drink Beer? No.

Bzz Agent hooked me up with a $55 coupon for the Draftmark System introduced by Anheuser Busch/InBev.  It covered the cost of the system, but not the $20 I had to drop for the refill.  The refills only come in Budweiser, Michelob Amber Bock, Bass, Shock Top Belgian White, and Shock Top Wheat IPA.  Not a fabulous selection, but I do like Bass.  Unfortunately, the Albertsons I bought mine at only had Michelob and Shock Top, so we ended up getting the Shock Top IPA.  For the cost, you'd think you'd get high end beers.  I can't imagine Budweiser drinkers dropping this kind of money for beer.

For starters, the Albertsons we went to in Clairmont had a piss poor marketing scheme going for this project.  First, the actual three boxes of the tapper system itself were just tossed on the floor next to a post.  I walked past several times before I even saw them.  Then the refills aren't even in the refrigerators, they are in the back and you have to ask for them, so I can't imagine anyone who wasn't specifically there to buy it would even know what to do.  It's terrible marketing.

Once I got the system home and the battery to the tapper charged, I put it together, loaded the refill and gave it a little time to make sure the beer was settled.  After about 15 minutes I poured my first glass and unfortunately ended up with a glass full of foam.  I waited a few more minutes and when the foam settled, I  re-poured that glass and a second and there was less foam this time.

After our toast, I have to say I was disappointed.  I wasn't a fan of the taste and don't know if this was related to the beer itself or the delivery system since I hadn't tried this beer before.  One thing I did note was that it seemed like it wasn't as carbonated as it should be.  Two days later, it seemed even less carbonated. Overall, I'm not a fan.

1. It's expensive.  I would never pay $20 for less than a 12 pack of beer unless it's excellent beer.  This is not and none of the available beers are flavors I care for.

2. I think it lacks carbonation.

3. There is no dating on the refill packaging so how do you know if the beer is even fresh?

It's not that it's a bad idea.  I could see instances where this would really be awesome, but it would need to have better beers and work better.  I don't think I would recommend.

CRAP: Bosch 300 Series 24-in Built-In Dishwasher (Stainless Steel model SHX33RF5UC)

My parents bought this dishwasher for me as a birthday gift because my dishwasher had died and I hadn't gotten around to replacing it. I was pretty excited and my dad even brought it over and installed it. I didn't use it immediately, but when I did, I was pretty disappointed. It is true that it is quiet. That is probably the one feature that I could care less about. What is important to me is clean dishes. It cleaned most of them okay, but the plastics were filmy and the silverware was spotty and the knives even had some rust on them! I figured out that this has no dry cycle and that it is supposed to use high heat water that then evaporates to dry the dishes. Yeah, that doesn't work. The dishes stay wet and a side benefit is the stench. It smells seriously bad in there. I have to open the door and leave it cracked to keep from having that smell. I've used it four times with the same results.

The other problem is the beeping that occurs when the cycle is over. It doesn't stop, so no washing dishes before bed because you have to wait for it to be done - could be hours - so that you can open the door to make the beeping stop. It's awful.

I was super disappointed and didn't want to hurt my parents feelings, but I realized that this dishwasher was so awful that I just can't live with it so we're returning it this weekend. Looks like I'm going to go with the Maytag. It gets a ton of really great reviews.

I cannot recommend this machine. Really, do not do it.

Pros quiet

Cons small, smells, doesn't dry, doesn't clean, beeps forever, special soap

I would not recommend this to a friend

Kellogg's Fruity Snacks - SERIOUSLY????

Well, I decided, after a long hiatus here... oops, that I needed to get my butt back to the blog to do a review on these Kellogg's Fruity Snacks. Why? Because I am HORRIFIED at how awful these things are for you and they don't even taste all that great! Today, at an event, I was given three packages of these guys, cherry, berry and strawberry. Sounded yummy... cherry fruit snacks? YUM. Then I read the nutrition label. First, this is a 2.5 oz bag of these little guys. Decent size snack, except that this bag, contains 2.5 servings. Maybe that wouldn't be so bad either, until you see that ONE serving is 80 calories, 19g of carbs and 13g of sugars (a diabetic's nightmare). Oh, there is one gram of protein and no fat. You'd think with nutrition facts like that, I'd just throw these to the wolves, but no I had to try them. They aren't even very tasty. =( It's basically a cherry gummy and not even a good one. It's not a fruit snack, it's CANDY. Call it what it is, Kellogg's! C.A.N.D.Y. Boo! Bad product. Only redeeming quality is the Vitamin C and we can get that from other sources.

Garnier B.B. Cream

So, Bzz Agent sent me something to make me beautiful! What luck! The past month, I've been trying out Garnier's B.B. Cream which is a tinted moisturizer with SPF 15.

When I first tried it, I liked the look on my face. I've used tinted moisturizers in the past and I do like them. I'm not one that wears face make-up so this is a little like that, but it's not quite so much as using a regular foundation. It does come in two colors, light to medium and medium to dark. I'm using the light to medium.

I noted at first that I didn't LOVE the feeling of it on my face. So the next day I tried it over my regular moisturizer and I liked that a lot better. On it's own, it's just not as creamy as I prefer, but someone else might like it very well. I like that it has a mild SPF to it and the color looks great. It works very well to even out the tone on my face - I've even gotten compliments since I started using it!

This is one, I might keep using in the future and you can pick it up from Amazon for $9.99!

Light to Medium:


Medium to Dark:

Oreo's Birthday Cake Cookies

Being a huge fan of Oreo's, I was excited to find out about their 100th birthday and even more excited about the prospect of trying their Limited Edition Birthday Cake Cookies with sprinkles in the filling!



I searched all of the grocery stores in my city to no avail. There were no birthday cake cookies to be found, although we found our way through a couple packages of Double Stuffs! Then one morning I stopped in a Food For Less grocery store across the street from my job and when I walked through the door, right in front of me was a whole display of Birthday Cake Cookies! I was so excited. I bought two packages and that day I finally got to try one... and was totally disappointed. The filling did not taste like regular Oreo filling with sprinkles added. It was actually just frosting flavored which changed the whole dynamic of the Oreo.

Ah well... I got to try them and now I can go back to lovin' good ol' Double Stuffs.

I'm NUTS for Orowheat's New Healthful Nutty Grain Bread... WOW!

I'm not certain when the Healthful line came out, but I grabbed a loaf of the Nutty Grain style to give it a try when I saw that it had 5 grams of protein AND 5 grams of fiber per slice! Healthy breads often taste like cardboard, but no! Not this one. I love it. It has great flavor, is soft and a sandwich made with two slices has more than a full serving of protein and more than a third of your daily fiber. That can't be beat.

I'm always trying to find foods with protein and it's hard, so this is a big help. I won't lie, there is a ton of carbs: 17 grams per slice, but the fiber and protein really help to offset that when you're trying to stick to a diabetic diet.

This style has nuts in it, including a trace of walnuts. I normally do not eat walnuts because I can get an unpleasant reaction, but this hasn't been a problem so far, so there must not be much in there. I am looking forward to trying the other styles.

I highly recommend this bread if you're looking for a healthy style wheat bread. YUM!