For the last couple of months I have been posting reviews of each box that I have received as part of my subscription to Citrus Lane. This is the fourth box I have reviewed. There are also reviews of my boxes I received in December, January, and February. If you are unfamiliar with the format of my reviews, I give detailed product information for each item included in the box along with pricing in order to determine if the box is worth the subscription price. A three month subscription costs $25 per month, while a six month subscription costs $21 per month, and my subscription was $16.50 a month because I used a Black Friday/Cyber Monday discount. I should mention that everyone’s subscription is different based on your baby’s age and gender. Baby Girl received an eight month old box, and I designated that I wanted gender neutral products.
March 2013 Box
This month I tried to open the box with Baby Girl, and at first she seemed excited. She kept pawing at the box, waiting for me to open it for her. Once it was open though, she was confused. Oh well, guess that has to wait until she’s a bit older.
What was in the box:
Item 1: Art Cards (Farm Collection) from Wee Gallery
Retail Price: $12.95
Bought it Anyway? Yes
Notes: When I first pulled these out of the box, I was unsure. Flash cards for baby? I’ve also never been a true believer in the black and white contrast for baby thing (high contrast doesn’t have to mean black and white, after all). Then Baby Girl and I opened them. She’s teething pretty heavily right now, so I didn’t hand them over to her, but I held them up and told her what the animal was and made the corresponding animal sound. She seemed to think it was a fun game. She would stare at the card and smile wide when I made the sounds. This is something, because normally when I try activities like this she just stares at me, but this time she was actually paying attention to the cards! They’re really attractive looking too. Perhaps when she’s grown out of them they’ll make awesome framed wall art for her room! Wee Gallery offers several other art card collections, and I’m so sick of farm animals that I sort of wish we’d gotten a different pack, but these are still great!
Item 2: Peekaboo Lovey from Cloud B
Retail Price: $7.99
Bought it Anyway? Maybe
Notes: Another lovey?! I’m kidding, sort of. The reason I’m giving this a maybe is because we already own and use the heck out of two very similar items. We only have two so that I can wash them without Baby Girl being without one, as she sleeps with them and loves them to death. We didn’t need another one, and this is not my favorite. I can’t even really find them for sale anywhere, which is interesting. The photo I’ve posted is of the blue turtle one that’s for sale on Amazon, but we got the giraffe one. I’m not a huge fan of the embroidered text. I would give it away, but as I was going through the rest of the box Baby Girl decided to eat it and completely soaked the head of the giraffe with spit. Gross. Eh.
Item 3: Organic Socks from iPlay
Retail Price: $5.50
Bought it Anyway? Yes
Notes: You can never have enough baby socks. Since Baby Girl doesn’t wear shoes (she doesn’t walk yet), cute patterned socks are even better. These are cute. They don’t go with a ton of her outfits right now, but they’re sized 6-18 months, so they’ll cycle through a few wardrobe sizes before they’re finished. Thanks for the socks!
Item 4: Powdered Baby Food from NurturMe
Retail Price: $2.50
Bought it Anyway? No
Notes: I hate powdered food. I hate powdered drinks. I hate the grainy texture that seems completely unavoidable when you use this kind of stuff. On top of that, Baby Girl gets all homemade baby food. While I found some of the pouches we received in a previous Citrus Lane box to be helpful in a pinch, I’ve now gotten into a rhythm where I always have some frozen baby food stashed in the freezer for that day when I didn’t go grocery shopping. The only time I can think of when these would be remotely useful is if you were going somewhere that you couldn’t practically take homemade baby food or space was an issue…like camping, or an all day wrestling meet where you aren’t allowed to bring in food (I’ve been to a few of those)…babies can’t eat nachos after all! Actually, these would be great for camping…I’ll save them and see if we use them. I don’t like the suggestion that when your baby outgrows purees you should just mix these into your toddlers food to add nutritional value. Just give the toddler the nutritional food! Why are you mixing powdered peas into their macaroni? I hate that type of attitude. If we don’t get around to using them I’ll give them away. The price listed is based on the fact that they only sent two pouches, not an entire box of eight, which sells for $10.
Item 5: Calendula Weather Protection Cream from Weleda
Retail Price: $12.00
Bought it Anyway? Maybe
Notes: Baby Girl gets really chapped cheeks. I have no idea how this happens, since we hardly ever go outside in the winter, but it does, and if she keeps sucking her bottom lip like she has been lately, that is going to get pretty chapped too. Providing this stuff works, it would be great…but I just bought a pot of Episencials Cheeky Salve with a Citrus Lane coupon for this exact problem, and it has really made a difference. Love the idea, just wish I hadn’t already thought of it. I guess I’ll stash it in the closet with the eight million bottles of baby wash and shampoo that I might use in this lifetime. If we don’t use it, like everything else I’ll just give it away. It’s great for babies and kids though, so maybe we’ll get around to using it.
**I should note that Citrus Lane also included a coupon for JUSTFAB, a shoe subscription website. I didn’t include it as a separate item because the coupon wasn’t actually worth anything…it was the exact same discount that they give to ALL new customers, and it isn’t valid for existing customers…making it essentially an advertisement flyer. I get it as an informational type item, maybe some Citrus Lane moms don’t know about JUSTFAB and think it’s a neat service, but I don’t buy my shoes online (I have odd shaped feet), and I never spend $39.95 on a pair of shoes. Ever.**
In Summary: Is It Worth It?
Items I would definitely have bought before the box: $18.45
Items I love now that I have them: $19.99
Total value of stuff I’m glad I got: $37.44
Answer: YES
I’m on the fence about this box, to be honest. This is one of the lowest values of YES items that I’ve gotten so far in my subscription, and my overall impression was very “meh”. I could have done without a lot of the pricier items in this box, so the value seems off to me. That said, I got a lot more out of this box than I put into it, and if you average the YES items from all of my boxes, the value is still pretty great.
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1. Slide and Sleek Safari from Melissa and Doug
2. Calming Cream from Circle of Friends Organics
3. Spill-Proof Cup from Lansinoh Momma
5. Carrot Cake Luna Bar by Luna Bar
6. Toddler Meal Bowl from Happy Family Brands
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Happiness is Now 