Love Mama, Love Baby, Love Fluff!

LOVE is in the air this month, and I thought I should show my readers a bit of love, too! While February is known more for jewelry, chocolates, and flowers, I know quite a few mamas out there who would like something a little more practical.

ONE lucky winner will win a prize package that has goodies for mama and for baby. These prizes are pretty nice, too!

Mom's Milk Boutique has given a $50 gift certificate to be used towards the purchase of a nursing bra or nursing tank.

Teething Bling is giving away a gift set in the winner's choice of colours!

Thirsties has offered one of their new One-Size Pocket diapers!

Rock-a-bums is giving away a cover, 2 inserts, and a wet bag (winner's choice of colour/closure)!

Mama Bird's Place is giving away a J.Chew teether, an amber teething necklace (for baby), an Earth Mama Angel Baby lip balm, and an Earth Mama Angel Baby lotion!

This prize pack is sure to make for one very happy mama (and baby)!

Thanks to all the sponsors for helping put this event together! Good luck, everyone!


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: Thoughts of Fluff is not responsible for shipment of prizes. Some links above include affiliate links.

Earth's Best NEW Sleepytime Lotion

Many parents have a routine for bedtime and/or naptime with their little ones. Some do a light baby massage with lotion just before bed to help soothe/calm their child, while some parents do this right after bath time. We never got into a routine that involved massage when Bobble was little, but we have started a little lotion massage lately after receiving the NEW Sleepytime Lotion (Chamomile) from Earth's Best.

The Chamomile Sleepytime Lotion is lightly scented with chamomile to help with calming your child, and it's a very pleasant scent too. I've got a very sensitive... well, everything! Needless to say, I have trouble with scented items that aren't naturally scented or if they are overpowering. This lotion has the perfect amount of fragrance that even my nose enjoys it!

The lotion is made with oats to help nourish dry skin, and also has:

• Contains 70% Organic Content
• Hypo-Allergenic
• No Sodium Lauryl/Laureth Sulfate or Sodium Myreth Sulfate
• No Mineral Oil or Petrolatum
• No Parabens or Harsh Preservatives
• No Synthetic Fragrances, Colors or Phthalates
• 100% Vegetarian, No Animal Testing 

Hard not to be happy about that! Bobble has been asking for this lotion, too. He enjoys the quiet time we spend together rubbing the lotion on him, and it does seem to help him quiet down in the evening (which can really be a challenge!).

If you are interested in purchasing this new Sleepytime Lotion from Earth's Best, you can look for it locally using the store locator on the Earth's Best page. You can also order it directly from the Earth's Best online store for $11.79 for a 16 oz. bottle.

 Disclosure: The product mentioned above was provided to me by Earth’s Best for review. This did not influence my opinion of the product in any way. My opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Baby Spa Skin Care Products

A few months back I was contacted by Baby Spa to do a review of their lotion. I gladly accepted after reading a bit about the products, but was then stuck for a while waiting for the weather to cool down. I wanted to focus on skin care during the winter months because, let's face it, you need extra lotion to help combat the dry skin caused by winter chill/wind! Of course, being in Ohio, the weather couldn't decide if it wanted to get cold or not. I was able to tell it was finally turning to winter when my hands started drying out around the knuckles!

I was sent a sample of both the Stage 1 and Stage 2  Face Cream and Body Lotion. Stage 1 is formulated for newborns - crawlers, and Stage 2 products are designed for toddlers on up. Keep in mind, my pictures are of the samples I received which are travel-size. They definitely have bigger sizes!

I was actually thrilled these were travel size containers, as it I quickly snagged the body lotion (stage 2) and whisked it off to work to keep in my desk. I wash my hands a lot at work (it gets so germy there!), and they dry so easily during the winter.

My hands were already starting to get the dry, slightly sore skin around the knuckles and in between my fingers, but Bobble was still good-to-go... which is surprising for a toddler that loves to play outside in the cold but will not keep mittens or gloves on his hands no matter what we do! My face has also had lots of patches of dry and flaking skin (thank you, pregnancy hormones!), and I had very chapped/dry patches under my nose from the 2 week long sickness that I had over the holidays. This actually worked in my favour (hey, silver lining....) for the product testing!

I've been applying the Stage 2 face cream to both Bobble and myself (Bobble as a preventative measure against drying/chapping, me for the flaking skin), and I've been using the Stage 2 lotion on my hands. I let my husband use the Stage 1 lotion, and we've tested the face cream out too. Since we don't have the super delicate skin a newborn would have, I can't really give too much of a review of that product other than to say it worked just like the Stage 2 did for us.

The face cream has worked great for us. When I use it, my face is nice and smooth, and I don't have the weird dry patches that this pregnancy has been causing. It's very gentle on my skin, gets absorbed well, isn't oily, and doesn't have a strong scent to it. Bobble's face is still nice and smooth, and he hasn't had any issue with chapping or drying out. Yay!

The body lotion is much of the same.... great results, not oily, soft skin, gentle scent. While I still have some of the dryer skin around my fingers, it's worlds better now than it was before! It also would be better if I remembered to put some lotion on today. *sigh* We've used the body lotion all over on Bobble, and we've had the same great results. His feet  and knees tend to dry out the most because he loves being barefoot, and he loves crawling around making cars and trucks "drive". The lotion worked beautifully on him as well.

My husband had good results with the lotion he used as well, but thankfully he's not the one doing the majority of the testing, as he only remembers to put it on when I mention it. He needs a lot of lotion, however, as he works a lot on our house and he also washes his hands a lot. His hands tend to get worse than mine in the winter, drying and cracking to the point of bleeding. When he uses the lotion, they get noticeably better... but, like I said, he doesn't think about it. What can ya do? *shrug*

All of BabySpa's products are 98-100% natural (remember, tearless shampoos aren't 100% natural!), and they are free of Parabens, Phthalates, SLS, PEGS, and Mineral Oils. They use also use 5 Ethobotanicals in the BabySpa collection, which isn't used in any other baby skin care line.

So, from the products we tried, we loved BabySpa! I would love to try out more of their products like their Bubble Bath Milk, their Tearless Baby Shampoo, or their Massage Oil! Actually, I'd definitely want to try the massage oil.... hubby being a licensed massage therapist and all, he would have plenty of use for it!

I'd definitely recommend the products if you are looking for some natural skin care products! I love that the smell of them isn't that fake perfume-y scent, but more the simple "lotion" smell. (Hey, it makes sense to me!) I'm very sensitive to different scents, but these products didn't bother me at all. Also really cool: even though my hands were super dry in some spots (to the point where warmer water hurt them), the lotion didn't sting. I liked that a lot!

Are you interested in trying out BabySpa products yourself? Check out their Online Store to see what they have, and get free shipping on orders over $50! They also have some great deals on gift sets if you're in the market for one!


Disclosure: The product(s) mentioned above was provided to me by Baby Spa for review. This did not influence my opinion of the product in any way. My opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Blogger Beach Bash!

Welcome to week 5 of the Blogger Beach Bash sponsored by Kelly’s Closet! I’m honoured to get to participate with all the other lovely bloggers, and to work with Diapershops.com! Don’t forget to head on over to the Diapershops.com blog and enter the prize package of sunscreen, a reusable swim diaper, and a medium wet bag! You can also enter to win a $15 gift certificate to Kelly’s Closet at the bottom of this entry!

I thought long and hard about what to post, and I was torn between summer traveling tips and making a long list of must-haves for the summer time…. So I am doing both, but a shorter version! I have my top 5 summer must-haves on Pinterest, and a little tidbit about travel too!

Traveling with Pocket Diapers

We never travel more than 4 hours to get to our destination (well, we haven’t yet, anyway!), so please keep that in mind if you’re going to use this for a travel guide! We also normally do NOT wash diapers while we are gone, as we are normally only gone 3 days/2 nights. Yes, I have that many (pocket) diapers. That aside, Bobble is now 18 months, so you need to adjust any amounts to take into consideration that he does not mess as many diapers as a newborn, or even a 6 month old.

When traveling for an extended period of time (read: over 2 hours), I always use a “night time diaper” on our Bobble. A “night time diaper” is really just any pocket (aplix) diaper that I have double stuffed, or a double-stuffed Rump-a-rooz diaper. Since Bobble likes to peel at aplix, we generally cannot put them on him unless he’s either sleeping, or in a carseat. I always pack enough “night time diapers” to get me through however many nights I’ll be away from home, however many naps he’ll take in that time frame, and one for each leg of the journey. That normally equates to 5 diapers since we try to travel during his nap time to make everything easier on us. Our favorite diapers to use as “night time diapers” are:

• ·         BumGenius 4.0
• ·         Rump-a-rooz
• ·         Blueberry Deluxe Pocket

We also make sure to bring a FuzziBunz hanging pail to use while we are at our destination because this is easy to transport and the elastic at the top, while it doesn’t seal anything, helps keep some of the smell inside. I also take a medium wet bag (either Bummis or Blueberry) for each leg of the journey, one of the non-traveling day, plus one more (one extra one to sit in the diaper bag in case we end up with wet clothes that don’t need to be with smelly diapers). Since they are size medium, I am able to fit all dirty diapers for that day (while out and about) into the bag.

We made our own liners from a yard of anti-pill fleece (just cut them into rectangles!) to use for non-clothdiapering safe creams, but they also work great for traveling! I almost always place one of these liners in the diaper while out of town so any messy diapers keep most (or all) of the mess from staining our actual diaper. This is great since we often don’t get to do diaper laundry while out of town, and I’d much rather have a discoloured piece of fleece than a discoloured diaper, and I’d much rather have any leftover particles stuck on a liner than my diaper!

I’m not very squeamish, so I had no problem taking the liners and holding them under the water in the toilet (hey, that’s clean water anyway! Well…. It was clean!) and folding the material of either the diaper or the liners and rubbing it together to break off any particles. It works pretty well for those messier diapers! In an ideal world, my mother-in-law would let me hook up a diaper sprayer at her house to leave there.  I tried explaining how much easier it would make cleaning her entire bathroom (mostly tiled), but she was convinced her water (heavy on the calcium) would ruin the sprayer. I would definitely recommend providing a diaper sprayer to your family to keep there if they will go for it. I just explained how great it was for helping clean toilets, providing water for mopping (seriously, no bucket!) and more, and it was pretty convincing for them. It would make cleaning more convenient for them, and spraying diapers more convenient for you when you visit!

We do our diaper laundry as soon as we get home, especially in the summer time since the heat doesn’t help the smell of those dirty diapers!

Top 5 Summer Must-Haves On Pinterest

Speaking of summer heat, I wanted to share with you my must-haves for summer! Best of all, you can find 4 of the 5 items on Kelly’s Closet! So what are the top 5 Summer Must-haves?

1.       Episencial Sunny Sunscreen

Source: kellyscloset.com via Thoughts on Pinterest

Everyone needs protection from the sun, so why not go natural with Episencial Sunny Sunscreen SPF 35? Great for all ages (and water-resistant, too)!

2.       Imse Vimse Swim Diapers

Source: kellyscloset.com via Thoughts on Pinterest

Looking for a great swim diaper? Imse Vimse Swim Diapers not only come in adorable prints, but they are super trim! (Sizes run a little large, so size down if you're unsure!)

3.       Planet Wise Wet Bags

Source: kellyscloset.com via Thoughts on Pinterest

Planet Wise Wet Bags are fantastic for storing wet clothing in, and have great prints/patterns like Tropical Retreat (shown above).

4.       Episencial Soothing Cream

Source: kellyscloset.com via Thoughts on Pinterest

Re-moisturize your skin after playing in the sun with Episencial Soothing Cream-4OZ. Safe for all ages, and all-natural!

5.       EnviroSax Reusable Bags

Source: envirosax.com via Thoughts on Pinterest

Looking for the perfect beach/pool bag? Check out Envirosax (pictured: Sydney)! Many different prints to suit your style, large enough to hold everything you need, but with a wide strap to prevent it from digging into your arm! Rolls up to be compact for storage!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I am part of the Kelly’s Closet Blogger Beach Bash.  Kelly’s Closet sent me Super Undies (size Medium) for my participation in the campaign.  To see a complete list of bloggers who are participating visit the Kelly’s Closet blog.

Episencial 3-step system review & giveaway!

With the summer sun growing seemingly hotter by the day, many mothers are looking for a natural sun screen to protect both them and their little ones. This is how I found Episencial. Episencial makes natural products for your whole family, and is great for those with skin sensitivities. The company was kind enough to send me their 3-Step System for review. This 3 pack contained their Soothing Cream, Playful Wash, and Sunny Sunscreen.

The first item we used was the Sunny Sunscreen since it has been very sunny and my little Bobble loves playing outside.  The sunscreen doesn’t really have much of a smell other than normal “lotion” smell. It’s not strongly scented like when someone walks by you in the store and you get a sudden whiff of sunscreen. (That actually happened to me this morning!) The sunscreen rubbed in very easily, and it didn’t leave you feeling (or looking) oily or greasy. I liked that I could apply it to my son and not rub it in all the way (so his skin was still white from the sunscreen) to make sure I didn’t miss any spots, but that it rubbed in super easily once I was done applying it. We’ve tried this sunscreen while just playing outside, while playing in the hose, playing in a kiddie pool, and playing in a big pool. Here in the Midwest, we’ve been pounded with scorching hot temperatures and sun, so when I saw the SPF on the Sunny Sunscreen was only 35, I was a tiny bit concerned. I’d been using higher SPFs for our little one, but hated the chemical-laden products. Now I’m wondering if that higher SPF was even necessary as none of us have gotten burned (or even dried-out skin!) since using Episencial’s Sunny Sunscreen. Not one burn! Very impressive!

The Playful Wash is a 2-in-1 shampoo and body gel. I decided to test this on myself since Bobble doesn’t really have much hair to test it on and my hair is VERY thick. I loved the scent of the Playful Wash immediately. It was a subtle orange scent (it has tangerine oil in it) that didn’t overpower you at all. I am very sensitive to scents, and I quite often find myself sneezing at anything and everything… even my deodorants! I have found that natural scents don’t really aggravate me, and this held true with the Playful wash. Episencial doesn’t use fragrances, just fruit juice extracts. I thoroughly tested out the wash, using it every way possible. This includes shaving, washing, and using it as my shampoo. Normally I use shampoo and conditioner. My hair is gets difficult to comb or brush if I don’t use conditioner, but it tends to get greasy looking fairly quickly too. I was pleasantly surprised that my hair was so soft and shiny, and no tangles! While my hair is short now, it still can be difficult to comb if no conditioner is used. Thankfully, this was not the case! I also put no styling products in it and let it dry to see what my hair did. It looks soft and shiny… just like if I used conditioner! I can’t guarantee this would be the case for all hair types, but this mama is definitely pleased with how it turned out for her! As for the shaving and body washing, it did a great job. I really didn’t have any issues. I had no razor burn, no dry skin, no weird/itchy feeling (I sometimes get that with body washes)… just a nice, refreshing wash with a touch of orange in the air.

The Soothing Cream test was my absolute favorite. That may be, of course, because I talked my husband into massaging my legs and back with it after my shower! Hehe. That aside, it was great. It’s a full day later and my legs are still feeling super soft and smooth. It didn’t leave any oily or greasy feeling, and the extra lotion washed off my husband’s hands very easily. The Soothing Cream doesn’t really have a scent either, so it would be great for use at work where you could be around people with lots of sensitivities (or if you have sensitivities yourself!). The Soothing Cream is also non-staining to cloth!

I also took a sample of the Soothing Cream to a coworker that has lots of sensitivities. She commented how soft her hands felt after using it, and a while later commented that she loved how soft her hands were even after she washed her hands. It’s definitely a winner!

The above is a smear of sunscreen (left) next to the lotion (right).

If all this fantastic stuff about these 3 products were not enough, Episencial goes and makes it even better by packaging their products in containers that are recycled, food-grade, non-leaching, with no residues of dioxins, BpA, phthalates, or other xenoestrogens. Need more? They use botanical, sustainably farmed, and certified organic ingredients. The products are also manufactured under solar power. They also use all natural ingredients, many of which are organic. Go check out their ingredients to learn more about what they use in their products and why these products not only prevent damage and sooth damaged skin, but also support skin immunity!  From what I’ve tried, I’ve fallen in love with these products, and the lengths the company goes through to be green and offer natural products makes me love them even more. I would love to list pros and cons on these products for you, but I couldn’t find any cons. The only thing I might want to change is offering a Soothing Cream with the same lovely orange scent that the Playful Wash has!

These products are only a couple of the products that Episencial has to offer, so head on over to their page to check out everything else! You can shop by product or shop by skin concern.  The products are for ages 0+, so they are safe for everyone in your household, including your newborn.

To learn more about who Episencial is and what they believe, visit their About Us page. You can purchase your own 3-step system for $30 (saving $5!) on their web page, or you can enter to win one below.  Episencial was also nice enough to offer my readers a 20% discount at their store if you use the code EPIFLUFFY, and they have free shipping on orders over $45. Happy shopping!

Surprise! Episencial is going to offer a SECOND 3-step system to one of my readers! Enter to win in the new rafflecopter form below!



 a Rafflecopter giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I receive sample(s) for the purpose of testing and review. These opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own. Thoughts Of Fluff is not responsible for shipment of the prize(s).