Product Reviews - Pocketful of Joules

Reviewing Darby Smart: Making Soy Candles

I consider myself kind of a crafty person. I mean, I rocked the crap out of making my own lip balm and painting a pretty tote bag, right? So when the nice people at Darby Smart contacted me asking if I’d like to try out one of their kits, I only hesitated a few minutes.

Then, they sent me this video….

I’m not even kidding when I say I watched it a few times and giggled nonstop. It’s SO me!

So that is the story of how I came to try my hand at candle making.
You think that this isn’t going to go well, don’t you?
Well, you’re a little bit right.

When I received my box, I was super excited to try it out. However, you can’t exactly throw together some hot wax candles while also chasing after an active toddler… so it took me almost a month before I was able to even open the box.

The instructions seemed pretty straightforward. Well, except for the part of using a “microwave safe glass container.” I don’t have one of those fancy glass containers, but I figured I could use an old Tupperware and it would be fine. {insert ominous music here}

They provided me with four different scents to try: bacon, spiced pumpkin, a dozen roses and French vanilla. I decided to mix the spiced pumpkin and French vanilla for my first try…

So, I grabbed an old plastic bowl and threw in a few handfuls of wax. Yeah, that’s right I’m living on the edge with the whole ‘not measuring’ thing.

Then, I put it in the microwave for the instructed four minutes and wandered around munching on candy corn. When the microwave dinged, I realized that I might have misjudged the awesomeness of my plastic bowl.

Oopsie. So, after cleaning out the entire microwave… I started again with a thicker plastic bowl…

I put that big ol’ boy in the microwave for just ONE minute this time and started shaving my colored wax (while eating a few more candy corn).

The wax wasn’t quite melted yet, but after just 45 more seconds it was fully liquid AND my bowl was still intact! I grabbed the scents and splashed in some spiced pumpkin, followed by some French vanilla. Nope, I didn’t measure. Just splashed in a generous dollop of each.

Then, I filled up a few of the provided votives, added the shaved colors (a mix of the yellow and red) and stuck in the wicks.

I left them on the kitchen counter for a couple hours while I did other stuff (which may or may not have included eating more candy corn) and when I came back they were BEAUTIFUL! And they smelled darn good too.

So besides my initial mistake of melting an entire bowl in my microwave, I think I did a pretty darn good job at my first attempt at candle making! I have plenty of leftover supplies in the kit to make more candles and think I’ll try the bacon scent next.

If you are interested in making your own candles or trying out another fun kit, stop by the Darby Smart website and poke around a bit.

Disclosure: I was provided a Darby Smart kit to review; however all thoughts and opinions in this review are my own. I am not rewarded or compensated in any way if you click through to purchase a Darby Smart kit.

Reviewing Citrus Lane: The October 2013 Box

I haven’t reviewed a Citrus Lane box for 6 months now… because frankly it’s kind of boring to just keep saying how awesome they are. However, just because I haven’t been blogging about the service doesn’t mean I haven’t been enjoying the boxes. We’ve been receiving them every single month since March 2012 and I’d say that 95% of the time I’ve been really happy with our monthly surprises.

Occasionally I’ll get something that we wouldn’t use, but that’s really the luck of the draw. Most of the time if we won’t use something I add to my ‘future baby shower’ pile to give away next time a friend gets preggo.

Only once have I been furious with an item in the box, which was when Citrus Lane included a ‘free outfit’ from FabKids, an outfit subscription service for children. After repetitively trying to contact them to make an order (with every single item in Jack’s size being sold out for the entire time the promotional card would work), I finally gave up and was left with a horrid feeling about FabKids. BOO FABKIDS! Luckily, that was the only time I was disappointed in what Citrus Lane had to offer.

For the October box, I tried something new. Citrus Lane sent out an email offering some special items that you could add to your box:

One of the items, was a set of Green Eats snack bowls that we had gotten in a previous box. Jack has decided that he likes his food to be on plates and in bowls (rather than just scattered around his highchair tray), so we get a ton of use out of these. In fact, I’m pretty sure we use them every single day, so I thought it would be great to have a few more on hand!

Adding the item to my box was simple and the $6.95 was charged to my account (if you have any referral credits, the money can come out of that stash instead of charging it on your credit card). A few weeks later and our box with the extra goodies arrived!

Here’s what we got in addition to the Green Eats bowls:

Water Bugs from Boon: I LOVE this bath toy! It gives Jack something fun to play with during bath time (or pool time in the summer) and I don’t have to worry about any gross mold ending up inside the ‘bugs’. The best part is that this is something I didn’t even realize I wanted, so it was the perfect sort of surprise gift!

Bops from Good Boy Organics: I appreciate that they threw in a healthy snack that could work for mom or kid, but um… yuck. I’m not a huge chip eater, but when I do eat a chip I want it to be a YUMMY chip. Not necessarily a healthy chip.

BabyBug from Cricket Magazine + 3 month digital subscription: We love books in our house and I always welcome some new kiddo reading material. This magazine is quite nice (and well made), but if I had the choice between the magazine and an actual book… well, I’ll choose the book every time.

Boat Whistle from Green Tones: This is a super cute toy/whistle that is really well made. In fact, it is made from smooth, sustainable rubber wood and has a not-too-irritating toot when you blow into it. Jack enjoyed pretend-play with the boat, as well as slobbering all over the place to blow the whistle.

So that brings us to the question that I ask myself each time I receive a Citrus Lane box: is it worth it?

My answer is a definite “yes”. I love the convenience of receiving age appropriate items for Jack each month. I really like that it introduces me to new products and companies each month too. Having the ‘add an item’ option is GREAT and I’m so glad I was able to add on the Green Eats snack bowls to our box order without having to go out and find them on my own. I will definitely be keeping my eyes open for future ‘add an item’ specials so I can get even more benefit out of our Citrus Lane subscription.

My typical disclaimer: I was not rewarded by Citrus Lane for reviewing their box on my blog. I review the boxes, because I feel like other mom’s would be interested in seeing what they’ll get if they sign up for the monthly service.

However, if you decide that you would like to sign up for your own subscription and use my link, I will receive credits on my account. Click here to access the Citrus Lane website with my special link and you will receive $10 off your order!

If you are interested in reading any of my other Citrus Lane reviews, go ahead and give a little clickity click to this link to check them all out.

Do you use any children’s subscription box services – whether it be Citrus Lane, Bluum, Kiwi Crate, or something else? What are your thoughts on the value for the items received?

Celebrating our 5th Anniversary in Hershey Park

Each year on our wedding anniversary, we like to take a little vacation away. We’ve previously gone to Jamaica (honeymoon), Deep Creek Lake (year 1), Universal Studios (year 2) and a Caribbean cruise (year 3). We had planned to go to Atlantic City for an Oktoberfest last year (year 4), but that trip was cancelled at the last minute because everyone got sick.

This year, we decided to do something that was fun for the whole family… Hershey Park. So we left town on Friday after work and spent the weekend in Hershey, Pennsylvania. The park was opened especially for their Hershey Park In the Dark celebration, so the whole park was decorated for Halloween!

Instead of giving you a play-by-play of each moment of the weekend, let’s just talk about some highlights and share some pretty pictures…

The Good
We had an awesome time at the park and Jack LOVED the rides. I had dressed him up in a lion costume (from TJ Maxx for less than $20) and we could not go 5 feet without someone complimenting him. What can I say; I made a pretty darn cute kid!

It was nice to just spend a weekend together as a family, without work, DIY projects or any other distractions hanging over our heads. It was really great watching Jack experience rides for the first time and the weather on Sunday made it the perfect gorgeous fall day. A lot of kids were in costume and they even had Trick or Treat activities in both the park and the Hershey Story museum.

Also under the “good” is our dinner at the Hershey Grill. So. Darn. Good. I had the Crème Brulee Martini and if I could have licked the glass, I would have. Actually, I DID lick the edges of the glass where it was dipped in deliciousness… but that’s totally acceptable behavior.

The Bad
Tantrums. So many tantrums. Because of the excitement of being in a new place and the lack of privacy in the room, Jack didn’t get any naps over the weekend. So yeah…there were tantrums. And tears. And instances of head-butting. You know…normal behavior for an overtired toddler.

This isn’t a tantrum… Jack just likes licking things.

Even worse than a grumpy toddler is a grumpy mommy. When we tried to go to sleep on Saturday night (around 9:15), we found out how THIN the walls are at the hotel. Every 10 – 15 minutes from 9:30 to midnight or so, another family screamed their way down the hallway, many times stopping right outside our door to make their plans for the next morning.

Loudly.
With lots of yelling.
LOUD yelling.

I strongly considered calling reception to have them do something about it, but each screaming conversation would last about 5 minutes until they moved on…only to be replaced by another family’s yelling 10 minutes later. I have no idea how Travis and Jack slept through this, but I’m really happy they did because I had NOTHING left to give at that point.

So there you go, our 5 year anniversary celebration. It was a big change from previous year’s, but fun in its own way. I remember 5 years ago we thought that a trip to Hawaii would be the perfect way to spend our fifth anniversary. Now I’m thinking that might be a great 10 year anniversary spot… for a GROWN UPS only trip.

We haven’t actually been away without Jack since he was born. Since my mom helps us out by watching him three days a week, we wouldn’t want to ask her to do more on the weekends. There will be a day where we can go away alone though… right?!

How old was your kid when you were able to go away for a weekend on your own? Do you have an anniversary tradition that you keep up every year?

Just so you know, this was NOT a sponsored post. All thoughts, comments and complaints are my own. However, we did get free tickets for Saturday’s visit to Hershey Park in the Dark. We liked the experience so much that we purchased additional tickets to go back on Sunday.