Just One Mama's Quest for the Best Natural Deodorant

I hate to admit it, but I love trying new products! I'm always looking for the next best thing that's going to be a game changer. I'm a busy mom and I do have a taste for the "finer things" - a hard lesson learned when I actually took a look at the prices in the Pottery Barn catalog. But I've found that there are times when the splurge is worth every penny - and there are other times when the cheaper product is actually superior.

Not the fanciest or most glamorous product by far - but here's something worthy of discussion: aluminum free deodorant.

I was really shocked when I saw the negative consequences that aluminum can have on the body, and to think that I've been rolling and spraying it on to open pores, dangerously near my children's milk source - well that made me instantly ready to try alternatives.
This is my fourth-ish try at aluminum-free deodorant. I sought out options on Pinterest. Option A was homemade deodorant. I love homemade stuff. I've made homemade Scentsy cubes to homemade baby wipes and there are some great recipes out there. I used a coconut oil based recipe using my favorite coconut oil for deodorant and while it smelled great at first, it wore off within an hour. Not ideal to need to re-apply deodorant on the hour, so I knew that wasn't the way to go for me.

Next I tried a Tom's of Maine stick deodorant that my grocery store carried. Easy enough to acquire, but a bit more pricey than DIY. The lemongrass flavoring smelled fresh at first but did NOTHING for stink, at would simply mix the B.O. smell with what I can only describe as *scent of health food store* - and not in a good way.
I went straight to the Amazon app and searched for "all natural deodorant" - filtered for top-rated items to show up first. Love that feature! Schmidt's was the winner. The price made me want to run for the hills and reclaim my old spray bottle of Dove - but I bought it with one click and waited patiently, using my lemongrassish for two days until it arrived. The jar is fairly small and the deodorant itself is solid - not easily spread. It does come with a plastic spatula about the size of my pinky nail which is hard plastic and gave me hella ingrown hairs in the pits. My children have now claimed said spatula as a Play Dough tool and I couldn't even find it to take a pic! I followed all of the reviewers advice - used a moderate amount, moisturized my pits with coconut oil before application, ran the jar under warm water...but nothing helped with the application process so there was no way it was helping with stink. After a week of giving it an honest try, I was tired of smelling like I hadn't yet mastered puberty.
Enter LAVANILA: The Healthy Deodorant! This stuff smells delicious. I bought a 3-pack of 2.0 oz roll-on deodorants which set me back about $20 from Sephora.com, but the trio is $16.91 on Amazon.com right now! And let me tell you, I feel classy again! I wouldn't say this compares to the 48-hour freshness touted by Dove or other brands. Sure, you will want to throw a stick in your bag to re-apply at the gym or on your lunch break, but honestly they are the perfect size and price to do so, and applying deodorant 2-3 times a day isn't that bad considering that it's made with all-natural ingredients. There's no smearing with a tiny plastic spatula, it's a simple roll up stick, doesn't irritate the skin at all, doesn't cause dark skin in the pits, and doesn't stain clothes. Trust me, I've done the black sweater test - all good! ;)
If you're looking for aluminum free, good smelling, non staining deodorant...this is it. If you want to try, show me some love for putting my pits (and the olfactory bulbs of my loved ones) at risk to find the best aluminum-free deode on the market click on and try the Lavanila Trio - I know I'm going to snag myself another trio at this price right now.
What's your favorite natural deodorant or deodorant alternative? Sharing is caring!

*Super exciting news, I'm adding reviews to Mama's Little Homeschool! Yay...and I joined the affiliate program over at Amazon.com to provide links to certain products which are featured in this post.*

25 Favorite Christmas Books

Here it is! The long awaited (?) list of my 25 picks for Elphie to deliver to my sweet kids this December. I love that these are mostly new additions to our library, so they feature non-traditional titles to supplement tried-and-true family favorites such as Jan Brett's rendition of "'Twas The Night Before Christmas" which has become our Christmas Eve read-aloud tradition.

#1: The Ninjabread Man by C.J. Leigh, pictures by Chris Gall

#2: The Not Very Merry Pout-Pout Fish by Deborah Diesen, pictures by Dan Hanna

#3: Over the River & Through the Wood: A Holiday Adventure by Linda Ashman, illustrated by Kim Smith

#4: Hanukkah Bear, by Eric A. Kimmel, illustrated by Mike Wohnoutka

#5: Merry Christmas, Mr. Snowman! by Wolfram Hensel, illustrated by Judith Rossell

#6: My First Kwanzaa by Karen Katz

#7: Stable in Bethlehem: A Christmas Counting Book, written by Joy N. Hulme, pictures by Dan Andreasen

#8: Can You Say Peace? By Karen Katz

#9: The First Day of Winter by Denise Fleming

#10: The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg

#11: Christmas in the Barn by Margaret Wise Brown

#12: Olive, the Other Reindeer by J. Otto Seibold and Vivian Walsh

#13: Ten Tiny Gingerbread Men: Colorful Countdown Fun! Illustrated by Ruth Galloway

 #14: Christ the Savior is Born, written by Tim Wesemann and illustrated by Mary Ann McCool

#15: The Gingerbread Pirates by Kristin Kladstrup, illustrated by Matt Tavares

#16: Little Blue Truck's Christmas by Alice Schertle, illustrated by Jill McElmurry

#18: Elf Pets: A Reindeer Tradition by Chanda A. Bell

#19: The Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition by Carol V. Aebersold and Chanda A. Bell, illustrated by Coe Steinwart

#20: It's Christmas, David! by David Shannon

#21: The Grinch's Great Big Flap Book by Dr. Seuss

#22: Can You See What I See? Toyland Express: Picture Puzzles to Search and Solve by Walter Wick

#23: Itsy Bitsy Christmas by Max Lucado, illustrated by Bruno Merz

#24: A Christmas Goodnight, by Nola Buck, illustrated by Sarah Jane Wright

#25: Gingerbread Friends by Jan Brett

Happy Reading! :)

Elf on the Shelf Meets 25 Days of Books

Merry Christmas!

It's my favorite time of year, and I'm very excited to have a 3-year-old and 1-year-old to celebrate the joys of the season with. I can't believe that my eldest is celebrating Christmas for the fourth year. It means that he really looks forward to our traditions and is beginning to grasp what the Christmas season is all about.
Last year, we adopted an Elf on the Shelf named "Elphaba" a.k.a. "Elphie" and her Elf Pet "Rainy" as part of our traditions. This year, December first rolled around and despite my careful planning, I realized that Elphie and Rainy were still somehow in their boxes in the closet, and had not yet made their way to be seen by my children.
A) How dare they. Don't they know how Christmas magic works?
B) Thankfully my kids are young enough to not care that their Christmas friends made a late appearance.
Anyway, a little quick thinking later, and I came up with a solution to many of the Elf on the Shelf woes that I (and probably? - other parents) have encountered.

Problem: The elf doesn't move. The nerve.
Solution: A letter pouch! I used this cute little "magical" red bag as means of communication between elf and child. The child can ask the elf a question such as "why didn't you move last night?" and magically, they may await an answer, in which their not is replaced in the bag with a response from their elf or elves.

Problem: The elf promotes fear, not holiday giving and joy.
Solution: The pouch wins again. I have seen adorable things on Pinterest in which parents use their elves to instill the true meaning of Christmas in their children. Our elf writes suggestions and places them in the magical bag. Things like "make a Christmas card for someone in the hospital" or "fill a bag with toys to donate" then are the actions that the elf is looking out for. The challenge isn't about avoiding naughty behavior as much as it is about increasing the nice behavior.
*Side note: I'm not going to lie, if my children are misbehaving while our elf is about, I do like to pause and whisper "oh my goodness, did you hear that? Is that the sound of an elf taking notes?" All in good fun. ;)

Problem: The Elf takes too much effort, especially considering all 25 of the books you must wrap to be carefully unwrapped and read each night.
Other problem: All that wrapping takes a TON of time in itself.
Even more problems (have we reached 99 yet?): Young children might unwrap them BEFORE the very night that it was intended to be unwrapped!
SOLUTION!! Our very lovely Elphie was happy to assist us with our 25 Days of Books tradition. Instead of wrapping each one individually, we have a larger, perfectly book-sized magical bag which Elphie miraculously fills with a new Christmas-themed book each night. It saved the elf "helpers" lots of time, took away about 24 days of temptation from the youngsters of this household, and is pretty darn eco-friendly if I say so myself.

I used Thirty-One's Timeless Memory Pouches for the magical bags. The price was right ($5 for a two-pack of one large and one small pouch) and the quality definitely will last us at least as long as Elphie does. You can buy them here: https://www.mythirtyone.com/JasmineGonzalez/shop/Catalog/ItemDetail/3885?isSummary=False

Which books are your favorites to read at Christmas time? Comment below! I'll be sharing the 25 that we have used for our first year of beginning this special tradition, along with some classic favorites, in my next post.

-Sarah