I am very serious about my quest to travel light without sacrificing style. I often go through a couple of countries when I travel, and it saves me a lot of time in customs if I can just bring a carry-on.

That said, I feel I have to squeeze a hair dryer into my carry-on somehow. No way am I going to let my hair be subjected to the lameness of hotel hair dryers. I have bad memories of having just washed my hair and needing to get ready fast without my own hair dryer. After searching the hotel room's closets and drawers (assuming there wasn't one of those truly awful wall hairdryers), I'd dig up a cream-colored standard-issue hotel hair dryer, only to find it wasn't worth the search. It was usually low power with a high pitched whine, and I'd give up and just leave with my hair wet.


It's hard to believe that there are companies that specifically manufacture these hair dryers meant for hotels. How are they still in business?

Anyway, those days are gone, thanks to a friend who told me about this tiny travel hair dryer available from Amazon for $20.99 (price may fluctuate) and I'm thrilled with its tiny size. The dryer measures 8.7 x 2.8 x 5.5 inches and weighs only 12 ounces.

The manufacturer doesn't skimp on settings despite the tiny size. There is a warm and hot setting, and a cool shot button (the type you hold down).

Now Let's talk about the fancy features, the ceramic and ionic claims.

Ceramic is a compound most often made from clay. It is used inside the heating element of the hairdryer, or a coating of ceramic is placed onto the heating element of the hairdryer. The ceramic produces an even far-infrared heat, with less chances of hot and cold spots. To put it simply, far-infrared heats from the inside out. Beauty companies claim that this is good for the hair, but there is no science to back this up.

Ionic: Companis claim ionic dryers emit negative ions which break up clusters of positive ions on wet hair, causing them to evaporate faster. I couldn't find anything in the scientific literature to back that claim. I did find one article stating that since ions are more reactive, they might cause oxidative damage to hair over the long term. Also, the ionic element generates ozone, which is a lung irritant.

So, the hairdryer comes with these elements, but I'm not convinced they are actually helpful, and that's why I'm not pining for one of the more expensive travel dryers that charge a lot for these bells and whistles. I think it's just marketing pseudo-science, but it would actually be difficult to find a hair dryer these days that isn't advertised as ionic. Since I don't blow dry my hair that often or for that long, I'm not going to put too much thought into it. And let's not forget, the best way not to damage your hair is not to blow dry it, no matter how much beauty marketers try to confuse us.

The biggest negative about this hair dryer is it works at 100-120 volts, which means it doesn't work at 220 volts, the standard European current, so keep this in mind!

My hair is about medium thickness and The Berta gets its job done well all while only taking up a small amount of space in my suitcase. I'm not in love with the super-girly pink color though - hopefully someday they'll make a black version.

The Amazon seller lists The Berta's technical details as:
- 1000 watts
- perfect choice for travel as it is small, compact.
• The DC motor provides lightweight body, low noise signature.
• The cool shot button releases cool air to lock-in the style, makes this a versatile styler for unique hairstyles.
• Multiple heat and speed combinations(II-O-I) to provide ample and even heat.
• Ceramic Tourmaline air outlet grill
• Double safety net to prevent hair from being sucked into the dryer
- removable lint filter for easy cleaning
• 1.8m 360 swivel power cord with hanging loop.

That's all! Thanks for reading and I hope your travels are happy and your hair is smooth!

C o / Ava Everheart

Most of us are looking for ways to cut time out of our beauty routine, right? Saving if you precious moments can make a big difference in the mornings, but we don't want to spend a lot on time-saving gadgets. Well, the people behind the Wish app hear you loud and clear. They've got a slew of tools, big and small, that you never knew you needed, because you don't, not really- but where's the fun in that?
For those who think they've seen or heard about every time saving beauty gizmo on the market, I'll bet I still have some surprises for you in this off-beat list. There are unusual, sometimes weird and sometimes cool, thingamajiggers for your skin, hair, nails, brows and beyond.

Here's a sneak peak: A double-sided glasses cleaner, silicone heel socks, lighted tweezers, a double-sided eyebrow stencil, an upside down make up brush holder for drain your brushes, an eyeliner pencil guide, a self-guiding bung trimmer - I hope they meant bang trimmer!, a blush guide, nail art stickers, an eyebrow curling guide, a heated eyebrow curler, a foundation palette with the shades you need to turn your face into one of those Kardashian lion-face makeup shading jobs, nail art soak off clips, eyeliner stickers (don't laugh, pastel versions of these were actually used at a Dior runway show), a nail polish airbrush kit, stud nail stickers, eyelash glue finger ring holders, clip on your shields for hair dye, a home piercing machine, and more!


My favorite items are the hair cutting capes. Wish offers capes with a see-through panel so the person getting their haircut can look at their phone the whole time. They also have another cape that curves up at the bottom so hair clippings don't fall to the floor. I'm going to get that one- it may be the greatest invention of all time.

The bottom line is if you are lazy, but you still want to be beautiful, do not despair- whatever beauty shortcut you're looking for, there's a gadget for that!


C o / Ava Everheart

A gorgeous true red

To me, this color looks light gray when dry.

This buildable color is my absolute favorite. One coat dries to a sheer, natural looking blush. Two coats and the shade is more opaque. The bottom picture is two coats plus two acrygel dips.

photo credit Ava Everheart

Heard of the Wish shopping app? It's free and it currently has a five star rating on ITunes.
I'm trying it out now, and was surprised to find several items I've seen at other online Chinese shopping sites, but at even cheaper prices.
I saw several items there I'd seen on Pinterest. So, is shopping from this app worth your time? I'm currently investigating and I will let you know.

This gets my C&G rating - Cheap and Great.
It's a simple twist-on attachment for your sink faucet that glows blue when the water is cold, red when it's hot and green when it's warm. I bought mine from Alliexpress. Several sellers have the same product, so just search the site for LED faucet. Inexpensive, easy to install, bright at night and still visible during the day. The kids love it!

I never thought I'd be obsessed with the specifics of water quality. Yet, here I am.

One thing I cannot stand is when a seller claims their shower head water filter softens water when it doesn't. I have seen so many vague filtering descriptions and a couple of downright lies.

As far as I'm aware, all that a shower head filter can do is reduce chlorine- which is NOT what most people understand to be softening water. According to my research, the only way to get soft water throughout a house is to install a large and expensive filtering system that uses salt packets. Electronic and magnetic pipe descaler attachments exist that supposedly remove hard deposits from your pipes, but these are not backed by science, so I cannot recommend them.

Are shower head filters still worth it? I think so, if you have chlorine in your water.

Before you buy this type of filter, first check to see if your water district adds chlorine to your water supply. If the answer is no, you don't need one of these filters. If the answer is yes, some of these filters are great- the only two I recommend are Culligan and Aquasana.

These filters will remove chlorine from your water, which helps a lot of people suffering from dry skin and hair. My son's eczema cleared up after I installed a filter (I use Culligan). Of course, it's impossible to prove causation, but I believe the cure was getting rid of chlorine in the bath water.

It's frustrating to buy a product when you really can't tell if it's working or not, which is why I recently purchased a water tester. These are available on Amazon and they're not too expensive, if you want to get some visibility into what's actually going on with your water.

If you can't afford a home water softener, but you want to wash your hair in beneficial water (not soft, sorry) try Googling rice water. It's easy to make a bucketful of rice water, and it really does have benefits for your hair and skin.

If you have a difficult-to-buy-for gifted child, the annual search for interesting Christmas presents can get pretty desperate.

My young kiddo became bored with those expensive circuit kits within a day of receiving them last year. I'm not naming names because this is not a knock on those kits— they make fabulous presents.

So, this year I'm trying LED circuitry kits as a gift. Some kits involve soldering, so your child will have to be supervised or old enough to do this safely.

The first kit I'm trying out comes from Alliexpress. It's a small Christmas tree kit with all the parts to light it up LED style. I can't tell you more about it, because I'm not as smart as my son, unfortunately 🤓. I'll update this review later to tell you whether or not I have a hit on my hands.

I'm also going to be checking out Arduino (sp?) if anyone has bought one of their starter kits for their kids, let me know.

There are a few things in life we shouldn't have to tolerate—for example, the crappy bike light accessories that some of these big box stores have the nerve to sell for $10 and up.
If there's one thing that Chinese online suppliers excel at, it's lights, and their bike lights blow all the commonly available products in the US out of the water.
Check Aliexpress (again I made sure to buy mine at the 11.11 price) for the 3000 lm Cree bike lanterns and also the super cool attachable brake lights that shine your own laser bike lane on the road, in stable or flashing mode.
These lights are not only awesome, they are a safety game changer. The shipping can take a long time (one month), but I find it's worth it.
Below are pics of the products I bought and the price I paid.

c o / Ava Everheart

Forget the old-style string Christmas lights – even the energy saving kind! They are expensive, take up room to store, and it's a pain if one light goes out. Yes, you can fix the light, but I can never find the extra bulbs that come with the kit—even if I told myself the year before I would NEVER forget where I put them (famous last words). Maybe you're better than me. But the thing that's better than all of us is RGB LED strip lights. You can buy these cheaply on Aliexpress, Banggoods, or a lot of other Chinese supply sites. The best prices I found were on Aliexpress' 11.11 sale (the 11. 11 sale is Black Friday 2.0, Google it if you don't know about it yet).

I got two 5m reels of LEDs, a power connector (check to make sure you're getting a US plug if you're ordering from a Chinese site), and a multi- button infrared controller. These LEDs initially shine white (all colors), and you can remove colors with the remote to create whatever custom color light you want. You can also create sequences of colors, sequences of flashes – whatever you want, just go for it! You can also cut the strips and attach angle connectors to make a flat square- useful if you want to backlight a TV, etc.

The strips usually come with a tape backing, so you literally just slap the lights on any surface and you're done. (I hang my lights under a covered eave, but if your lights will be exposed to water or snow, check to make sure your lights, connectors, etc., are all waterproof).

My young children got the hang of programming these lights in a matter of minutes, so don't be intimidated. Of course, if your neighbors ask how you made such a cool Christmas light design, feel free to pretend you're a lighting genius—I won't tell.

c o / Ava Everheart