New Arrivals, 3/23/15

Post by Little Oak Creations.

Saturday Steals! {3.21.15}

Good morning, readers! I'm back with a vengeance. ;) Since early childhood, the allure of getting a good deal and passing it along to others has been one of my favorite things. What began as a hobby is now a full-time gig for me, and now I sell and resell full-time. So now I am sharing my other passion besides cooking, baking and DIY with this blog! Keep your eyes locked here for the best deals, rare finds, and more!
----

Now, on to Saturday Steals!

Anthropologie Yoana Baraschi Dress, size 4

Anthropologie has some of the most high quality, desirable and attractive items. From the Anthropologie website:

"Yoana Baraschi, Born into a family of artists, designer Yoana Baraschi was formally trained as a sculptor in her hometown of Bucharest before entering the Paris fashion scene to work in some of the most famous couture houses. Her delicate, feminine designs reflect her fine art heritage while incorporating vintage references and a sense of humor."

I have this gorgeous, lilac, semi-sparkly dress starting at $4.99 this week! In fact, mine is the lowest priced one as of this moment. Other dresses by this designer on eBay start much higher. See it and get it here, on my eBay.

Victoria's Secret Sexy Little Things Bra, size 32C

 I love all things Victoria's Secret. This bra is no exception - and pictures just don't do this one justice. This one is in excellent condition too - a great addition to any collection. As we all know, VS things are not cheap to buy new.

I have this bra starting at only $9.99 this week! See it and get it here, on my eBay.

Spartina 449 Cell Phone Wristlet, in pattern "Chaplins Landing"

Spartina 449 is a new brand for me... as soon as I grabbed this wristlet, I knew it was high quality. Plus, I'm a suck for navy and emerald... what can I say. Mine's new without tags - comparable models start at $36+. As of the time of writing, mines the only one on eBay with this gorgeous pattern.

I have this wristlet starting at only $17.99 this week! See it here and get it here, on my eBay.

See more steals and deals in my eBay store!
------
Find my Finds: eBay   |   Etsy

My Refreshing Refresh VoxBox!

In early February, Influenster contacted me and said that I would be receiving another box filled with goodies for my review. Enter the Refresh VoxBox!

Filled to the brim with goodies, I was looking forward to this one.


1) Beanitos Nacho Cheese and Restaurant Style chips. I can truly say that these were one of my favorite products from the entire box. I've actually had a Chipotle BBQ chip from this brand and they were DELICIOUS. But the restaurant style white bean chips? WOW. They have everything a "normal" chip would have but no MSG, gluten free, vegan, on and on... absolutely will buy again. The nacho cheese one - it was okay. I only had about 7 chips in the entire bag, so kind of a bummer, but still very good. Would rate 5/5.

2) COVERGIRL UltraSmooth Foundation. I can say that I'm on the fence for this one. I think the applicator is awesome, and it's smooth enough to drag all over your face. The foundation itself is lacking, though. It tends to blob on and read really heavy in certain spots even after "blending". The applicator doesn't really do a great job of moving the product around, it tends to just smush it farther into your face. With a more mousse-type foundation, I think the applicator would work well. 3/5

3) L'OCCITANE Shea Butter Light Comforting Cream. As a lady with no babies, the baby powder smell didn't do it for me. Nobody really WANTS to smell like baby powder, I'm pretty sure. The formula was light enough, but nothing is different enough about it for me than regular lotion. Unfortunately, just another lotion for me. 2/5

4) Listerine Pocketpaks. I remember when these came out... am I putting an age on myself?? These are really, really awesome and a quick fix for stinky breath. While not new to me, I think they're a much quicker fix than a regular mint. 5/5

5) SkinnyGirl Tasty Nutrition Bar: Chocolate Peanut Butter with Sea Salt. You'd think this winning combo of chocolate and peanut butter would be a win/win. But sea salt with peanut butter? I feel like you usually see sea salt with caramel, not with peanut butter. I actually made a mistake when I tweeted that the bar I had was with caramel. But the reason is... I couldn't tell that it was peanut butter. I couldn't really tell if it was chocolate. It had no taste except for the spike of sea salt every few bites or so. What a bummer. It did keep me full until lunch though, so 2/5.

6) Montagne Jeunesse Manuka Honey Peel-off. I can say that I've always been a fan of this brand. I always remember them being a grab-and-go product, sometimes even in the impulse buy area of a check-out line, with their bright colored packages and promises of spa-like treatments right out of the pouch. This product smelled delicious and made my face feel great - it was also nice to have a mini "spa" session too. 5/5

7) Orgain Organic Shakes. I have not had a moment to try and locate this in my store yet, but Influenster and Orgain provided us with a coupon for a free bottle, so I definitely will give it a try. -/5

 8) DenTek Flossers. DenTek and Influenster provided us with a bag of Comfort Clean Floss Pics and a small sample of kids Fun Flossers. I love the idea of being able to reach for a little piece of floss, and I think these are actually pretty handy to carry around in a purse. I will say, it's pretty easy to push the floss down pretty far into your gums - good if you can control it, if you push too hard, they'll hurt. The pick part on the Clean Floss Pics is pretty sharp too, so watch your hands if you're reaching into your purse blindly for them. 3/5

Influenster is always keeping me looking good and feeling good, thanks to their highly successful and highly rewarding program, where I review products, give my honest opinion, and tell you about it. I received everything you see in this post for free, thanks Influenster!


Disclaimer: I received these products complimentary from Influenster for testing purposes. I was not compensated monetarily or otherwise to provide a positive or negative review.

#HelloKeurig! My Keurig 2.0 Review

In late August, I received an e-mail from Influenster, and I could barely believe my eyes - I had been selected out of 1,000 lucky participants to participate in reviewing the Keurig 2.0! Soon, I would receive the Keurig 2.0 brewing system for free from Influenster.

I love coffee, but had never jumped on the Keurig bandwagon. Nothing else gets me going as the day starts and nothing else keeps me going all day, so coffee is a very important part of my day. I believed my little $14.99 4 cup coffeemaker was just fine for me, thank-you-very-much... or so I thought...

The Keurig 2.0 arrived at my doorstep and I could barely believe the size of the box. It was huge!

I took it into my kitchen and got it opened. I have to admit, I was pretty awe-struck that this was happening at this point.

I've never had another Keurig to compare it to, but the Keurig 2.0 is awesome. What makes it so different from other Keurig's is that it answers that question that I even had - what am I supposed to do when I want to make more than one pot of coffee? How will I serve all of my guests without brewing them individual cups... which will take forever and will get expensive and wasteful with all of those cups?

The Keurig 2.0 answers that all with a carafe and slightly larger K-cups. The slightly larger K-Carafe Cups make 4 cups of coffee per cup, and all fall into this carafe that sits perfectly under the Keurig spout.

Included was this very large instruction manual, which I was very grateful for. Seeing as though I've never had a Keurig, I knew I had to do things like run a pot of water through first, etc... but I had no idea how. This big instruction manual was very helpful and well-designed to be easy to flip through and store.

Here it is, out of the box! It's large, but not as large as earlier versions of the Keurig machine. They've made it much more compact while still delivering the same great tastes. They've successfully made it more compact even while adding a carafe option!

Touchscreens are everywhere, including your Keurig. The Keurig 2.0 boasts the largest touchscreen they've ever put on a Keurig - and it's customizable even, including backgrounds and down to the LED color of the water.

Say #hellokeurig! This all came in my box - a sampler of the regular sized K-Cups, the Carafe cups, and another box of Carafe cups in Hawaiian blend, and the carafe (not pictured... it was getting washed. :). The Keurig 2.0 works for me because I'm the only coffee drinker in the family - but whenever we have friends or family stay over, it's handy to provide great tasting coffee for all. And that's another thing... I never knew what I was missing out on taste-wise before the Keurig. So many flavors to choose from, my favorite so far has been the Nantucket blend of coffee. Coffee tastes bolder and more complex with my Keurig, and is that much more enjoyable.

So are there any cons? I would say there are a few cons, but nothing that is ultra detrimental.

• One of my biggest cons is that with the Keurig 2.0 is that it uses scanning technology to scan the lid of your K-cup to determine the best size and strength for taste. Great, but this limits the Keurig usage to only Keurig brand cups with scannable lids - no utilizing a mesh cup using your own coffee grounds, and no off brand. The off-brand doesn't bum me out too much, but it would have been nice to use your own grounds when you're out of K-cups. This has lead me to keep my 4-cup coffeemaker out as well because I am almost out of the samples, and will keep it out until I get a stockpile of K-cups.
• Weird noises. I'm used to the brewing/bubbling/boiling of the water, but when it's using a cup, it makes weird gurgling noises and squeals like it's trying really hard to squeeze water through. 
• Lifting to get the spent K-cup out. I chalked this one up to user error the first time I did it... but now I realize it's not. but when you lift the spent K-cup out of the machine, you have to lift the cup out and then close the lid. The system recognizes this as "You must want to make hot water!" because it doesn't sense a cup in there and lifting and shutting the empty holder is how you make hot water. So no, after making a cup of coffee, I don't want to make hot water... and have to cancel the hot water out. Not the end of the world, for sure, but this could have easily been remedied by making it so that hot water had to be selected from the home screen vs. just lifting and closing the lid.

But really, the Keurig 2.0 has been an awesome thing and I've had a blast reviewing it and using it. My "pros" are:

• Easy to use touchscreen. The touchscreen is large enough where I am not hitting other things as I push buttons, and it's not covered in buttons, either. 
• Taste. The taste alone had me sold. The Keurig makes a solid, bold cup of coffee and is a world of difference from what I had been drinking before.
• The carafe option. This was something that stopped me from buying before - now that Keurig has addressed this, I'm all in!

All in all, I love it, and even my non-coffee drinker husband thinks it's pretty cool - he's enjoying the teas and the lemonades! The variety of K-cup options is amazing now and I am planning to buy a large variety pack so I can keep trying them all out!

Thank you Influenster and Keurig for letting me review the Keurig 2.0!

Disclaimer: I received the Keurig 2.0 for free from Influenster for testing and review purposes. I was not compensated monetarily or otherwise to provide a positive or negative review.