December Birch Box

Hello everyone. Yes, I'm finally writing up that December Birch Box review. It's only taken me like two weeks. To be fair I did get this box really late in the month. But still, I should have written this earlier.

Whish Shave Crave Shaving Cream - View Here

This shaving cream is very creamy and thick. I can feel it nourishing my skin, however this also leads to the razor blades getting clogged up super fast. So it's kind of a trade off. You can get really smooth legs, but you'll have to replace your razor blades much more frequently. The smell is pretty nice.


Sumita Color Contrast Eyeliner Jaipur Gold - View here

Here you can see what the color looks like:

It looks goldish, but when when you apply it it looks more like a brownish black. It goes on very smoothly. However if I was going to buy an eyeliner, I would want it to look like the color I bought. I don't know if this is the same with other colors.

It looks like it has a slight goldish tint to it on the upper eyelid, but I think that's more the gold eyeshadow I used too. I do like the consistency. It's easy to apply and very creamy.


amika Perk Up Dry Shampoo - View here

I'm just starting to experiment with dry shampoo. I must say I like this one. It smells fabulous! I'm not sure I would pay $21 for a full sized can of dry shampoo, but who knows. I do like it.


Essentiel Elements Wake Up Rosemary Shower Gel - View here

I liked the rosemary smell. It smelled like real rosemary and not just a fake flavoring. I really liked it. Along with the smell it was very refreshing.


Acure Organics Lip Lush - View here

A nude moisturizing lip gloss. It's a pretty nice gloss, but it's nothing super special. I have tons of glosses like this. It's nice and handy to have around though. I'm sure I'll use it once I've run out of others.

So I just made this a quick post, I'm sure I'll write more on the next one. The January box promises to bring more exciting products to try. Apparently it's already in the mail, and I'm looking forward to it!


If you're interested in testing out Birch Box follow this link.
In the interest of full disclosure: While I don't get anything to write this review and pay the same $10 per month any US subscriber does, but if you sign up through my link I do receive points I can accumulate and trade in for free items.

Pasta Carbonara

My friend Marie asked me to make this recipe for the blog since she saw pics of it on instagram. Honestly, pasta carbonara is super easy to make, and tastes delicious. This is a dish however that doesn't reheat terribly well. It's kind of like mac and cheese for adults, super charged with bacon.

So here goes. This is what you need:

I was making a big recipe because we had 5 people eating it for dinner yesterday. You can absolutely reduce the amount!

Pasta (Any kind will work. I've made it with fettuccine, farfalle, macaroni, and in this case rotini) Bacon (I prefer the thick cut kind, I'd use about a regular sized packet)
Heavy whipping cream (In this case I used just over a pint)
Parmesan (I used 2.5 bags, each bag was about 1.5 cups)

Cut your bacon into smallish pieces:

Toss those in your preheated pot. I use a dutch oven, but you could also use a sauce pan or whatever works for you.

Render your bacon, the bacon grease will be the base of your sauce.

Now add a bunch of cream. In this case I used somewhat over a pint of cream. You can kind of figure this out by what the desired proportions are.

Now add about 2.5 bags of parmesan.

Make sure you blend the cream and cheese well. If your sauce seems too runny, add cheese. If your sauce seems too thick, add cream. Also add a lot of black pepper. Carbonara comes from the Italian word for coal. The pasta is named carbonara because of all the pepper looking like coal pieces.

Cook your pasta following directions, and then add the pasta to the sauce. You could serve the sauce on the side, but in my experience it's easier to just mix it all together and then serve.

Boom! You now have pasta carbonara. See how easy this is? If you want a vegetarian version of it you can use butter in place of the bacon and bacon grease.
As I mentioned earlier, this pasta doesn't reheat very well in the microwave. The fat separates and it becomes really greasy/oily. To counteract this you can add a bit of extra whipping cream to the pasta before microwaving it. Then stir it up really well. That should help, but it is still a dish better eaten fresh.


Quickie Summary:

Ingredients:
Bacon (1 pack)
1+ pint heavy whipping cream
2-3 bags parmesan
Pasta

Preparation:
Cut up bacon
Render bacon
Add cream
Add parmesan
Mix thoroughly
Ensure all cheese has been melted
Add cooked pasta to the sauce
Serve

Lemon Bars

Since I worked Saturday and today in addition to my regular shifts, I figured I would do a quick and dirty recipe. Lots of bang for your buck though. I learned this lemon bar recipe from one of the cooks at the retirement home I worked at when we lived in Portland. It's still one of my favorite ones. I hope you'll like it.

Here's what you'll need:

2 sticks butter (8 oz)

2 cups flour

½ c confectioner’s sugar (powdered)
4 beaten eggs

4 T flour

¼ c lemon juice

1 T grated lemon peel

2 c sugar

As you can see in the picture I am also using bottled lemon juice. If you can use fresh pressed, is always worth it, however if you're pressed for time, or just too tired to care you can absolutely use the bottled juice. Most people won't notice. If you can, the lemon zest is really worth it, and does give a stronger lemon flavor, but I have also made these lemon bars successfully without. Personal choice then.

The lemon bars are made in two layers with different baking time. The bottom part of the lemon bar tastes like shortbread and has that type of consistency. The top layer is ooey gooey sweet lemon.

To make the first layer pull out your flour, powdered sugar, and two sticks of butter.

Cut your butter into smaller pieces and add to your mixer.

Add half a cup of powdered sugar.

Blend the sugar and butter.

Next add the two cups of flour.

Start blending the ingredients slowly so you don't have a flour explosion in your kitchen. You may have to scrape some of the butter mix off of the side of the mixing bowl in between.
Shoot for this consistency:

Take all of the dough and add it to a rectangular baking dish.

As you can see it doesn't look like a lot of dough and you might be worried that you won't be able to cover the pan entirely, but you can. Put pieces in all of the corners and center and start smushing them down. I use my knuckles, and then smooth it over with a spatula. A thin layer is all you need.

Place the dish in your preheated oven at 325 fahrenheit. Bake for 20 minutes.

While the bottom layer is baking it's time to start mixing up the batter for the top layer.
Crack your four eggs. Always crack each egg in a separate bowl before adding them to the mixing bowl. This will prevent the other ingredients being spoiled if there is a bad egg in the batch.

I didn't use 5 eggs, one of my eggs just happened to have a double yolk.

Add 4 tablespoons of flour.

Add 2 cups of sugar.

Add 1/4 cup of lemon juice.

Grab two lemons. Make sure you clean the peel properly.

Now zest the peel.

This looks to be at least 1 tablespoon, and is your final ingredient.

Add the zest to your other ingredients in your mixer. I usually scrape the first dough out really well, but don't wash it before making the lemon batter. It works just fine since they are all going to be mixed anyway.

Blend it all really well until it looks somewhat like this:

Once the twenty minutes are up, pull the first layer out of your oven.

Pour your lemon mix on top.

Return to the oven and bake for another 22 minutes.

I recommend letting it cool for a while before you start cutting it into bars. You can make them any size you want. I made larger ones, but you could also cut it into really little squares and make each one bite-sized. I've made them like that before for a fancy tea party.

I hope you enjoy these lemon bars as much as we do. I posted a picture of this, and immediately got a response from a friend who will come visit to snag some lemon bars tomorrow. Jep, I'm talking about you Mary! ;)




And here is the condensed recipe:

Ingredients needed:

2 sticks butter (8 oz)

2 cups flour

½ c confectioner’s sugar (powdered)

4 beaten eggs

4 T flour

¼ c lemon juice

1 T grated lemon peel

2 c sugar

Preparation:

Heat oven to 325f

Blend butter, 2 c flour and ½ c powdered sugar

Pat into ungreased 13x9x2 inch pan

Bake for 20 minutes

Blend Eggs, 4 T flour, 2 c sugar, lemon juice and peel.

Pour over first layer after it has been baked for 20 minutes, then return to the oven and bake for another 22 minutes.

Tea Wreath

This winter out of necessity almost all Christmas gifts were handmade. Pinterest has been a godsend for that. There I found the idea for a tea wreath. I like the original poster's idea, but as usual I kinda took the basic idea and ran with it. A wreath circle with decorated clothespins and a teabag in each pin.
Here is the original idea. She made her  own wreath circle out of cardboard and decorated her clothespins with scrapbook paper. I'm more of a glitter kind of gal.

So, wanna make one of these?

What do you need?

A good selection of glitter. I have these two lovely different sets of glitter by Martha Stewart left over from some crafts I made for the wedding. A little bit of this stuff goes a long way!

A craft ring to use as the base wreath. I got this Biodegradable-Floral-Ring-Glueable-Wreath from amazon, and then painted it purple with acrylic paint.

Wooden clothespins, which I also got from amazon. These are the ones I bought.
Make sure you have some Mod Podge and a hot glue gun.

To glitterify your clothespins first put down a layer of mod podge, then cover with glitter. I would do a few of the same color at a time. Put a sheet of paper underneath them. Tap off excess glitter onto the page. Then you can pour the leftover glitter back into its vial. I liked the multicolored look, but you could make it all one color, or just two, etc.
Your clothespins should look something like this:

Once you've added the glitter and tapped off some of the excess put another layer of mod podge over it. The mod podge acts as a sealant and should prevent the glitter from rubbing off. So it's really important to use it. I suppose you could use a spray sealant instead. No one wants to be covered in glitter each time they get a tea bag.
Now here is where you get to make some choices again. There are lots of different mod podge versions. I used sparkle mod podge. It has iridescent glitter in it. I like to use this for almost all of my projects. You can use glossy, or matte, or any of the other myriad of varieties.

Here's the thing, like I said I usually love the rainbow style glitter effect from this one. I love the way the black glitter looks above, but you can see here after adding the sparkle mod podge, it overshadows the effect. For my next set I will probably test it out with regular glossy mod podge. Here I'll show you what I'm talking about:

See what I mean?

Here's the whole tray of my ultra glittery clothespins:

As I showed I painted my ring purple. You could paint it any color you want to. My husband suggested I added a layer of pink sparkly paint on top of this one:

Now it's time to use your hot glue gun to attach the clothespins onto your ring in regular intervals. Make sure when you glue them on that they have the opening, the pin bit, towards the outside. You want the tea bags to fan around the outside of your wreath. On the very top image you can see that I glued the clothespins part way through the circle. On the second one I made, I glued them on so the edge of the clothespin would be flush with the inner edge. I like the look a lot better, it seems more clean. You can however glue it on however you choose.
On this ring I used the sparkle mod podge over the purple paint.

I leave a spot free to add a ribbon to hang it up by. Again, this depends on your preference like so much in crafting. The original idea had the pins go all the way around, but left enough space between the pins to be able to use a wreath hook.

And here is another picture of the first wreath I made hanging up:

My future sister-in-law, Deedee, asked me about the possibility of being able to add Keuring cups onto a wreath like this. You might be able to get extra large clothespins, glue them on sideways and then fit them into the pin part. That's about the only way I could come up with. Wish I could be more helpful!

You can also put different things into the pins. Pictures might look really cute in a wreath like this.

November Birchbox

I signed up for Birchbox on November 30th I think. I got a November birchbox when everyone else received their December ones, and now I got the December one on Friday. I figured I'd still write up the November one as the product review can be useful, even after you could get it from birchbox. You could get it elsewhere too, so here goes.
Birchbox items come in a box instead of a bag like ipsy. The boxes are cute and I like them, but I do prefer the bags. I'm weird and like to keep all my stuff from each bag together, separate from other items I have. >_< I'm weird, but at least I know it, and own it!

The first item I tested was:
Elsor - Firming Collagen Day Cream  View here

The cream feels very thick, and left my face feeling and looking a bit greasy. I can't really speak to the firming properties, I don't doubt them though. I will keep using it though since it does feel very luxurious. It better, with a price tag of $85 for the full sized jar. That alone would prevent me from every buying it for myself.

Bain de Terre - Argan Oil & Passion Flower Color Therapy Styling Oil  View here

The oil smelled pretty good. I added it to my damp hair after a shower as suggested. It did make my hair feel sleek and manageable, however it did also make it look greasy and stringy once dried. That may not be the product's fault though. My hair has been much more prone to looking oily since I cut it short. They also suggest adding it to hair dye, I may just have to test that out. Or I'll use it later on when my hair is a bit longer.
$14 isn't too bad for a full sized hair oil. While I do recommend this, I am also a bit cheap and like products I can use for different purposes. I've used warmed up coconut oil with fresh sprigs of rosemary in it for my hair when it was long, and that stuff was awesome. Honestly though, this is not much more than getting coconut oil and it smells great. It couldn't hurt to try it if you have dry or color damaged hair.

Joie - Folle de Joie Eau de Parfum View here

Here's the little vial:

This perfume smells really great. It's very floral and sweet. I do like it a lot and will continue using it. I still like my favorite perfume, A Touch of Pink by Lacoste, better, but this does come in pretty close. However the $98 price tag is a deterrent for me. If I had a bunch of cash to blow I'd probably get a full sized one of this though.

theBalm cosmetics - Cindy-Lou Manizer View here

The packaging is really cute, and caught my eye immediately.

I enjoyed working with it and it went on pretty well. I used it as a highlighter. I applied some right under my eyebrows, on my cheek bones, and my T-zone.
Here are the results:

Not Soap, Radio - Joy Inducing Body Wash View here

I used this in my bubble bath on Friday and it was fabulous. The scent reminded me of something I used to get at The Body Shop when I was younger, but for the life of me I can't remember what it was. It made nice bubbles and smelled very refreshing. It is a birchbox exclusive and can only be purchased there. I don't think that $16 is an unreasonable price. So if anyone feels like giving me a gift because I'm just awesome, this would be a good choice. ;)

Sometimes birchbox will send and extra little goodie. I got this:
Dang - Toasted Coconut Chips View here

They were pretty good. I was surprised. I'm not huge on coconut chips, but these were really nice. They tasted sweet and had a buttery taste to them.



All in all I liked everything I received. It's so much fun to get to try out new things. I've really been enjoying my ipsy and birchbox items because it's letting me try new things I may not have thought to try on my own.
I do not get paid or receive free products for these reviews. I pay the same $10 per month that everyone else in the USA does. However if people sign up through the link I post below I do accumulate points that I can use towards free products at a later time.

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