ShopYourWay Personal Shopper Program

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of ShopYourWay Program for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

The economy goes up and down, but one thing never changes: those of us who enjoy shopping will always love shopping, whether or not we love footing the bill. Ever since I was a little girl, I loved going to Sears with my dad, and our family's loyalty to the store (and my love for shopping) has remained steadfast for decades. You can imagine, then, how thrilled I was when I found out there was a way to be rewarded for that loyalty and to share my friends.

 

ShopYourWay Personal Shopper program is not your average loyalty program. This social network of shopping rewards allows you to create your own catalog or search through members only deals at stores like Land's End, Sears Auto, Sears Outlet, Sears, and Kmart. You can uniquely engage with brands and provide feedback so your opinion as a customer gets heard. The coolest part about ShopYourWay, though, is your ability to network with friends.

Are you the fashionista, tech genius, or appliance aficianado of your group? You can actually make money putting those skills to work as a personal shopper, with no extra cost to you or your friends. When you sign up for the program, you can invite friends from Facebook, email, or other social networking sites as "clients." When you recommend items through your Personal Shopper homepage, your clients will be able to see your suggestions and buy them on-line or in-store. If they use their ShopYourWay Rewards card, you will receive 1% of their purchase price--that's mega money for items like appliances! Once you earn $20, you'll be mailed a check; it's easy to make hundreds of dollars a month just for loving to shop!

The true wonder of ShopYourWay Personal Shopper Program can't be truly comprehended without signing up and trying it. Not only is the program free, it's SO easy to sign up for! All you need to do is Request an Invite to ShopYourWay and click "Get Started."  Once you've provided your contact information, you simply need to agree to the Terms and Conditions before you can start inviting friends! ShopYourWay makes networking easy by allowing you to invite friends via Facebook, Yahoo! mail, Gmail, or your other email account. Once you've invited your friends, you can fill out your W9 form or go straight to the tour. It only takes five minutes, so what are you waiting for?

My Clubhouse - Hours of Pretend Play Giveaway!

Mom to Bed by 8 and Mom Does Reviews are happy to bring you this fun My Clubhouse giveaway!

Do your children love to use their imagination? For children over the age of two, My Clubhouse is the cutest playhouse on the block, so we're super excited to be participating in this giveaway! I know my godson would love one of these-- we're willing to bet that the children in your life will love it too!

• Play make believe in this unique backyard edition perfect for multi-child play
• Features a peephole, chalkboard, picnic table, and secret hiding compartment
• Fabric roof is durable and weather resistant
• Personalize the clubhouse by writing your child's name on the doorway
• Opening side wall for hide and seek fun
• Dining accessories not included
• Adult assembly required
• Clubhouse can be used all year long. Bring it inside in the winter so the fun can continue.

Giveaway is open to US residents only ages 18 and over. Giveaway starts June 4th and ends June 25th.

Enter on the easy rafflecopter below. Remember, you can't win if you don't enter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I received no compensation for this publication. My opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own. The Educated Beauty is not responsible for sponsor prize shipment.  

The 28 Days of Self-Improvement Project(s)

Here at The Educated Beauty, we love to do our research about health, beauty, and wellness. Unfortunately, we're just as much human as we are scientist, so we don't always follow the lifestyle that we know we should. We've done a lot of self-improvement projects to obtain a healthy, practical lifestyle; some stick and some don't, and it's usually all about timing and motivation. Recently, a family member we have tons of respect for made an incredible lifestyle change that inspired us to change our own in a way we've never been inspired before. We'd love to share our journey with you, but we also wanted introduce a new aspect to this site: four week self-improvement projects that are small and manageable enough for everyone.

Why four weeks? Depending upon where you look, it's said to take between 2-6 weeks to develop a habit. Two weeks is just too short to be sure, and six weeks seems like a long time to commit; four weeks, on the other hand, is just enough to get you into the groove without feeling too daunting. While you can make resolutions to change your life for the better any time of year, it is infinitely easier to feel optimistic during the sunny summer than in the dreary winter. And if you think you want to make a permanent change after your 28-day trial run, your habits (and willpower) will be fortified by the time the tempting winter holidays arrive.

Starting everything at once can be intimidating, but for those who like to throw themselves in to new habits, we'll be introducing a new, worthwhile one each day. In addition, we'll update daily (or every other day) about our progress for each goal. We're working ourselves into the Paleo Diet--while it's our ultimate goal, we're crafting our self-improvement projects to be attainable for anyone with a healthy lifestyle.

We'd love to hear your own progress each day or whenever possible-- reaching goals is easier with a support group. Feel free to start each "mini-program" whenever you'd like; there's no time table, and we'll be checking in regularly!

Tomorrow: Project #1: Get Hydrated

Losing the Shampoo: Why You Shouldn't Be Scared

If you've never heard of the "No 'Poo" movement, chances are you don't hang around too many beauty blogs. As squeamish as the name itself may make you, you'll probably be even more revolted by the real meaning behind it.  It took me a long time to warm up to the idea, but once I did, my first thought was that it was totally revolutionary. My second was the realization that it was absolutely the opposite- which is why, after the 'gross' factor, it makes so much sense.

As far as I have found, the movement's roots (pardon the pun) can be traced back to the book  Curly Girl by Lorraine Massey. The "No 'Poo" concept itself is quite simple: ditch the store bought shampoo and use only conditioner or natural concoctions to wash your hair. As disgusting as this may sound, it actually has a solid scientific foundation. Shampoos rely on nasty ingredients like Sodium Laurel Sulfate-- which is actually a detergent-- to clean your hair.  By definition, detergents are used with water to clean away oil and grease particles. While this sounds great in theory, it isn't just the dirt that's being washed down the drain. The natural oils in your hair, which are necessary for its health and luster, are washed away too. This hardly leaves for glamorous tresses: really, have you ever tried shampooing without conditioning afterwards? 

So (if you've made it this far) we've established we don't want those nasty ingredients in our hair. How do we stay clean?!?  There are actually a surprising number of answers to this conundrum, but before we get to that, there are a few things you should know about going shampoo-free:

1) You WILL go through a transition period. This means that, for a span of a few weeks to a few months, your hair will be more oily and greasy than you have ever seen it before. The duration of this period differs for everyone: my boyfriend's hair adjusted to the B.S. method in a matter of days, while the same method took my long hair a month to fully adjust to. This transition is completely normal. Your body is used to producing oils at a high rate to compensate for your frequent shampooing.  As long as you stay away from the bottle, your scalp will slowly adjust and begin producing those oils at a much slower rate. My recommendation? Invest in hair bands and cute ribbons to tie your hair up with (braids are especially good at hiding greasy-looking hair).

2) You WILL be tempted to go back to shampoo once, only to immediately regret doing so. This says nothing of your strength of character. Just know that once you step out of the shower and feel your hair post-breakdown, you will be so disgusted that it will only strengthen your resolve to go 'poo-free. Really, quitters never win.

3) You WILL save money. A lot of money. And even more than a lot of money if you go with the W/O or sebum methods.

4) Once you have adjusted, you WILL wash your hair substantially less than ever before.  As much as I  love saving money, this was THE selling point for me. I used to have to wash my hair daily if I wanted to avoid a greasy, waxy look. Now I'm washing my hair every three days or so, though I can go substantially longer without it being noticeable. In fact, my hair looks better five days after a wash (it was an experiment...) as it used to look after twelve hours. If you adhere to the rules (which we will get to in the next post), this will never cause your hair to be dirty or smelly.


Sold yet? Of course not, but for all of the benefits, you'd be crazy not to at least try it. I'm hardly an eco-freak, but when something is so good for your body, the earth, and your wallet... it's really a no-brainer.