Home Improvement: Front Porch

We have lived in our house for about 4 years now and the front porch is a wonderful place we enjoy all year. Over the last few years we have noticed how quickly the paint faded, cracked, and started to peel. To fix this situation we decided to take on the home improvement project of hiring a professional to sand the porch and finish it just like you would indoor floors but with outdoor quality materials. This solution should last for five years until we need to put another top coat on the wood again. We are also having the front two steps replaced due to the quality of those steps needing an upgrade. I am very excited about this project and will post step by step progress photos this week so you can see the transformation too!!!
Photos of the progress and final product:

Gel Nail Polish Removal - DIY

First I must say I strongly dislike the smell of acetone therefore after discussing removal of gel nail polish by sitting with my hands in acetone I was looking for a better more relaxing solution. After much research I found the golden ticket. Here is the step by step:
What you need - 100% acetone, 2x2 cotton squares, 10 pieces of aluminum foil, cuticle pusher, place to relax for 15 minutes

1st take the cotton square and get it wet with the acetone
2nd place the wet square on top of the polish
3rd take the foil and wrap it around the cotton square tight
4th leave it on for 15 minutes
5th take off foil (polish should look cracked and dry)
6th take the cuticle pusher beginning near the cuticle push up to push the polish off
7th all done but optional you could add some oil to moisturize your nails

Love gel nails they last so long! Really happy you can remove them this way! Hope this helps you too!!!

BEAUTY PRODUCT JUNKIE-NESS

I enjoy testing tons of different beauty related products. Because a lot of family/friends know this about me they always ask how I can get things cheap to try. In answering I tell them that most of the time I just get samples for free or wait till something I want to try goes on sale. Recently I've had some people ask me about beauty product subscriptions. Since I am a penny pincher I normally wouldn't dream of joining a monthly subscription for ANY reason but for my birthday I did join several that are cancel anytime subscriptions just to try them out.

Here are my conclusions from them:
1. Julep Maven - Nail colors, hand care products, pedi products, and such along those lines.
WEBSITE:Julep Maven
REVIEW: I was happy with the quiz selection for me because I got two beautiful and quality nail colors (each retails $14), an Eco friendly bag, and a hand scrub all for $19.99/month. Like I said before you can cancel anytime (which is true), you can mail a box to a family member or friend, you can skip a month anytime, and what I like is that it all is without additional charge or hassle! I really did love the products and I got a LOT more than I thought I would for the money! I would recommend this to anyone who needs a different nail color monthly because you would be saving money for sure by doing this.

2. Birch box which is my personal FAVORITE because this subscription is right up my alley! It has a wide variety of skincare, nail care, hair products, and lots more.
WEBSITE: Birchbox
REVIEW: They select several name brand tried and true new plus some old goodies and send them to you with great descriptions on use. Really loved my first box even though I did think the samples were too small because I loved each one of them. In my first box I got a nail color, face cream, body lotion tinted, hair band, perfume, and a sample note card. This subscription costs $10/month and it is TOTALLY worth it because I'm thinking now about purchasing the full size of at least two products. Again it is cancel anytime, send your monthly box to a friend, skip a month, plus other great perks as well! Thinking about keeping this one because it is something just for me that isn't going to break the family budget.

3. Little Black Bag - handbags, home decor, jewelry, ect.
WEBSITE: Little Black Bag
REVIEW: First, this one is pricey so I would only go this route if you are an extreme shopper and you need to shop but get $100 worth of products for $49.95/month. Again you can do this just one month to send you or a family member or friend a little black bag and it is really neat stuff on occasion from a few good designers. The way this one works is you pick one item you like then the designers select two more items they think you would like. If you do not like the two items they selected before you checkout you do have an option to trade someone that might want one of your products which is pretty neat. I am going to cancel this because it is more for handbags not beauty products but it was a fun one time deal plus I might use this site for good fun friend/family gifts too in the future!

4. Test Tube is a new one that I want to try but I haven't because I went a little hog wild on my birthday and spent my limit on the ones above but I'll possibly try this one another month. It is $29.95 per month plus shipping so it should be awesome but like I said I didn't try that one yet.
WEBSITE: Test Tube by New Beaty

Hope you enjoyed my reviews of my birthday testing experiment of these subscription. I am going to note that I am canceling all of these except birch box because it was my favorite plus the cheapest too!! If you want to have a subscription let me know because they do have a great referral program where we both get goodies if you use my link!!! :)

Family Tree Project

Just got a little idea to make a family tree in our baby's room. Here is the first step and I will add more as time goes on:

Watch me

Recently I started to like watches and when I say like I mean like BIG TIME. Pun is intended but it is also serious because I love Tag (who doesn't) which are swiss and I also started liking invicta as well. SO I purchased a invicta (for way less than reg price) and I must say I really like it! I even like the cute awesome box it came in too!! Take a look at my recent Hautelook purchase:

May is FUN

First let's just get this out of the way... quoted from Winnie the pooh Tigger in fact "You cannot have fUn without you in the middle"!!!! May is one of my fun months because it's my husbands birthday, my birthday, mothers day, and wedding anniversary celebration month!! During this time we do tons of family activities and of course take lots of photos! Here are a few so far:

Build a 529

Yesterday we took our child to North Carolina for a little spoiling trip! While we were there we visited a very decent mall in Winston-Salem and let him ride the carrousel, buy 2 build-a-bears, and eat a cookie cake slice!

After we returned I started to total how much we spent in gas, food, and fun till I got a little sick about the amount! Don't get me wrong most of the spoiling was ALL my idea and those are some great memories that money cannot buy! However, we setup a 529 college savings find for our sweet pea when he was born and I wish we would have stuck at least the $40+ into that instead of building 2 stuffed animals since after all we have tons of stuffed animals!

If you would like to learn more about starting a 529 visit http://www.savingforcollege.com/intro_to_529s/what-is-a-529-plan.php

Here are our current BFF's - warning this is super cute: