Blurb Book

A couple of months ago, I purchased a new digital SLR-style camera and memory card. With that purchase, I received a coupon to create and purchase a free photo book from Blurb.com. As always, since it was free, I was all over it.

I'll start by saying the final product is beautiful. You can hardly tell thanks to the terrible (playing with a new but crappy iPhone photo app) picture I included. But regardless, it really did turn out quite amazing.

Having said that, creating it was a tremendous pain. I will admit, I waited until the 11th hour before the offer expired to start creating it. Word to the the wise, plan ahead and commit the time to designing your photo book. Carefully choose pictures and organize how and where you will place them in the book. Unlike me, I was downloading and placing pictures everywhere in a rush to get the order in before it was too late.

I'd like to say the process of pulling the book and it's pages together was somewhat frustrating and cumbersome. But, I was rushing. Maybe had I started sooner and committed an appropriate amount of time to the effort the process would have been easier.

Overall, I like the final product. It would make an incredible gift for someone. The design and theme options are endless. In terms of price, they range anywhere from about $11 (plus shipping and handling) to $60+ depending on size, number of pages, binding options, paper options and so on.

I'd certainly recommend it and actually plan on designing/purchasing more....when I have time.

Shutterfly Notecards

So I was offered free Shutterfly.com notecards about 2 months ago and jumped on the opportunity to get them. The value was almost $20. I previously posted the image of the notecards I designed and ordered and have finally gotten around to reviewing them. I'm sorry, "freeviewing" them.

Overall, I think they are very nice. The cards are one sheet (not folded like traditional cards) and are made with a nice heavy stock of paper. The envelopes are a decent quality as well. I have already used them to write a few notes to friends.

In terms of the process of ordering, I'm not going to lie....for me personally, there were not a whole lot of card options that appealed to me. I felt like the selection was very limited. Granted, I have very limited tastes/expectations (purple, purple and more purple), so this may be a problem only I would encounter. Ultimately, I did find a customizable card with purple. But it kind of seemed like in addition to a low variety of card options, the opportunities to customize were limited as well. Once I placed the order, it took a while for the cards to arrive, but I would imagine that maybe they gave priority to paying customers.

Beggars can't be choosers...the cards were free. And they are great quality. So ultimately I am glad I got them. However, should I want to pay for an order of notecards, I'd probably explore other options that provide more variety and opportunities to customize.

Coastal.com - Free Pair of Prescription Eyeglasses

Just happened to be perusing my FaceBook newsfeed one day when I noticed a friend had accepted a "deal" for a FREE pair of prescription eyeglasses from somewhere. I was intrigued and wanted to learn more, but was a little skeptical considering there are a lot of "too good to be true" offers on FaceBook. I pursued it anyway, and wouldn't you know....it was the REAL DEAL. The offer came from a Coastal.com promotion where with a code used at checkout, your eyeglass purchase is free. Granted, you have to pay shipping and handling (which ended up being about $16) and you have to choose from the selection of glasses they give you. BUT...the selection is a good one. I found several pairs that appealed to me before deciding on these. And for $16, that's a good price considering my last pair of glasses cost about $200. With prescription glasses being so expensive, I only had one pair. However this deal offered me the opportunity for a back-up pair in case one of them breaks...and a little variety. I like to switch things up every once and a while.

You'll have to have your prescription handy for checkout, which I did having just gone to my optometrist in July. Besides that, the process was incredibly smooth and quick. Once I narrowed down my choices and figured out which ones I wanted, checkout was super easy. And the glasses arrived literally 2 days later! Two days!

Needless to say, I am very pleased with the glasses and my experience with Coastal.com. Prior to the FaceBook deal I had never heard of them. Quite honestly, I may purchase all of my eyeglasses from them here on out. Browsing their website, I came across some pretty good deals and styles I may want to take advantage of in the future.

The FaceBook promotion has since expired. However, they do have an ongoing deal for first time customers where all new customers can order their first pair of glasses for free. Again, you are limited to a specific selection of frames, but there are over 600 choices so one is bound to find at least one pair they like. And for heaven's sake....they're free!

Shutterfly

Just ordered this stationery for free courtesy of Shutterfly. I'll have to review them once they arrive. 

View the entire Shutterfly collection of cards.

Simple

There is a new line of products that just hit the US markets called "Simple." Evidently it is the #1 skincare product line in the United Kingdom and they are looking for a similar following here in the US. They are currently in heavy promotion mode as I have seen countless commercials for their products in addition to social media campaigns signing people up for free samples and more. There's even a Klout perk to receive some of their products, but I for once didn't get mine through Klout. I actually used a different social media connection.

Bottom line, I wasn't all too impressed. My skin is probably what one would consider "normal," not oily or sensitive. However after using the cleanser, my skin felt really dry. I prefer it feel clean, refreshed and "normal." Therefore, I'm not planning on investing in this line of products. Think I'll just stick with my "tried and true" brands. At least until something else free comes along.

Domino's New Artisan Pizzas

This week Domino's pizza is offering a free Artisan pizza to 75,000 Facebook fans. The first 25,000 were offered up today and rest assured, I got one of them. You have a limited amount of time to redeem the free pizza as it expires in 2 weeks so I decided to go ahead and get mine today. So I placed the order online 30 minutes before leaving the office so I could pick it up on the way home.

I ordered the "Italian Sausage & Pepper Trio" artisan pizza. And....it was FANTASTIC! The other artisan options are "Tuscan Salami & Roasted veggie," "Spinach & Feta" and "Chicken & Bacon Carbonara." They're $7.99 per 13" pizza and worth every single solitary cent. This one was free but I'd gladly pay for one of these artisan pizzas and am looking forward to trying some of the other flavors over time.

I have always been a Papa John's kinda girl, but Domino's has been a close second. Maybe now they're tied.

Tide & Downy

This fall, Tide and Downy both held Facebook promotions for two of their new products. The promotion offered Facebook users who "like" their fan pages the new products if they were among the first to sign up. Tide offered up its "Stain Release in-wash booster" which promises to aid in the removal of stains from laundry, in addition to keeping whites white, brighten colors and prevent dinginess. Downy offered up its "Un-Stoppables in-wash scent boosters."

I of course signed up for both. The free Tide sample pack came with about 10 boosters which is AWESOME. Love when promoters provide you with enough product to really get to use it and experience it over time. And as can clearly be seen by the photo, I have since used up all my Tide stain release booster samples. The instructions for the boosters are pretty simple. You just add one booster to your laundry in the washer at the beginning of the laundry cycle when you add the detergent.

Not going to lie...I really didn't see much difference in the "quality" of my clean laundry from before I started adding the booster to after. Granted, I don't often experience stains on my clothes to really be able to tell if the booster was quintessential in removing them. I think the laundry detergent alone does a great job of doing the very things the booster promises. So ultimately, once I ran out of the Tide stain release boosters, I didn't run out to buy more.

This however was not the case for the Downy Un-stoppables Scent Booster. The photo depicts the REPLACEMENT products I have already purchased because I loved it so much! Downy sent a sample package that contained one use. Same simple instructions as the Tide boosters. Sprinkle a cap full of Un-stoppables directly in your laundry at the beginning of the laundry cycle and that's it. Once the clothes have finished in both the washer and the dryer, they smell divine. I love this product. So much so, I not only bought it in the "Fresh" scent (which is the scent Downy offered for its sample), I also purchased the "Lush" scent.

Bottom line, I totally recommend the Downy Un-stoppables. They are worth it for how great they leave your clothes smelling and subsequently your closet, dresser drawers and YOU when you're wearing the clothes. As far as the Tide stain release boosters are concerned, I think detergent alone, at least for me, is enough.