CARA B Naturally Review and Giveaway

CARA B Naturally contacted me awhile back to try out some of their products. In case you’ve never heard of CARA B Naturally, here are a few tidbits of info about them:

• Natural Products Association Certified- the only personal care product line specifically formulated for ethnic children to earn such a distinction
• Promotes the idea that  ”Children Are Always Beautiful Naturally”
• Products are free of parabens, petrolatum, phthalates, sulfates, mineral oil, artificial fragrances and preservatives
• Available now in select Targets and coming soon to CVS

What I found to be the greatest about these products is that they worked on both my hair (3c/4a) and my kid’s hair (3a). Let me preface by saying that my children have extremely sensitive skin. My son was allergic to disposable diapers and my daughter runs the same tendency to break out with certain lotions and soaps. They both get irritated eyes from “mild” shampoos.

I was sent four different products to try out, so here is the breakdown.

First, since presentation is everything, here is how my products arrived. Cute, huh?

Shampoo and Body Wash

Price: $11.00

Ingredients: Deionized Water, Coconut Oil (Natural), Cornstarch, Decyl Glucoside, Chamomile Fragrance Blend (Natural), Vegetable Glycerin, Sugar, Vitamin E, Aloe Vera (Aloe Barbadensis) Leaf Juice, Citric Acid, Guar Gum (Natural Thickener), Caramel, Glucose Oxidase, Lactoperoxidase (Natural Preservative)

As you can see, this product is an amber colored liquid. It’s a bit thicker in consistency than water but not as thick as most shampoos. It lathers really well and it doesn’t take much, especially with the kids. I was surprised at how well it lathered because in the past I’ve noticed some natural products such as this tend to not lather very well.  It cleans the hair and body well with minimal dryness. I wouldn’t call it a moisturizing shampoo but it didn’t strip our hair either.

For a body wash, this was great for my kids. If my children ever get the suds from their body wash near their eyes, they immediately turn red and irritated. I wasn’t planning to test this out purposefully because I hate to see their eyes like that but, as luck would have it, my son was feeling adventurous during a bath and decided to dump a bucket of sudsy water over his head. No redness at all noted. The same with my daughter, who had no tears from a few of the suds getting in her eyes.

My only negative experience (and it’s a very small negative) was that I noticed after I drained the bath water that this product leaves behind a small amount of dark, grainy residue. I’m assuming it’s from the sugar in the ingredients. At first I thought “Dang, this kid was really dirty” but no, ha, it’s the product. It rinses out of the tub easily but I thought I’d mention it.

Body Lotion

Price: $13.00

Ingredients: Deionized water; coconut oil (capric triglyceride); shea butter; sunflower seed oil; cocoa butter (stearic acid); jojoba oil; natural emulsifying wax (cetearyl alcohol); natural emulsifier (glyceryl stearate); sugar (glucose); natural chamomile fragrance blend; xanthan gum (natural thickener); aloe vera barbadensis leaf juice; vitamin E; caramel; potassium sorbate; glucose oxidase & lactoperoxidase (natural preservative)

What better way to follow up our bath than with a moisturizing lotion? Lotion is another thing my kids struggle with. My baby (14 months) especially has sensitive skin that I have to shield from certain fragrances. This has been very moisturizing for their skin, as well as mine, this winter. Once absorbed, their skin had a nice, light scent. We loved it!

Leave In Conditioner/Daily Moisturizer

Price: $ 13.00

Ingredients: Deionized water; natural emulsifying wax (cetearyl alcohol); shea butter; jojoba oil; coconut oil (capric triglyceride); vegetable glycerin; natural emulsifier (cetearyl alcohol and cetearyl glucoside); natural chamomile fragrance blend; cocoa butter (stearic acid); sugar (glucose); xanthan gum (natural thickener); natural emulsifier (glyceryl stearate); aloe barbadensis leaf juice; vitamin E; caramel; potassium sorbate; glucose oxidase & lactoperoxidase (natural preservative)

As I said, my children have hair that is about 3a in texture (very loose curls) and it’s also much finer than my own. I tried this a few times in a few different ways in their hair and it just didn’t work out well. It was too heavy for the most part, especially in my daughter’s baby fine hair. I could sometimes use it very sparingly in my son’s hair once it was dry to moisturize it.

As for my hair, it was the bomb.com! I used it along with the Hair Mist (I’ll get to that next) to twist my hair recently (on wet hair). The result was soft moisturized twists. I also used it to re-moisturize my hair once I took the twists out and was wearing the twist out. Great results again! The product soaks into my hair easily which is a plus when getting ready for work in the morning.

Moisturizing Hair Mist

Price: $10.00

Ingredients: Deionized water; vegetable glycerin; coconut oil (capric triglyceride); sweet almond oil; jojoba oil; sugar (glucose); natural chamomile fragrance blend; aloe vera barbadensis leaf juice; vitamin E; potassium sorbate; glucose oxidase & lactoperoxidase (natural preservative); citric acid

This is a light liquid spray. It was a perfect leave in for my kids’ looser textured hair. It gave them just the right amount of moisture and detangling properties.

The detangling action wasn’t as effective for my hair though it did help a bit.  It worked really well when paired with the Leave In Conditioner/Daily Moisturizer. Here are the twists and twist outs that I used those two products on.

After twisting my hair, I used the Hair Mist daily to refresh and moisturize my twists. Overall, I really liked these products and found them to be very effective while at the same time being gentle. And an added plus is that they are now available (in some areas) locally.

Having said that….Here’s the giveaway info! Thanks again to CaraB for the great giveaway and letting me review their awesome products!

Finally a line of all natural, affordable, skin and hair care products for ethnic babies and kids will be available in Target and CVS!

CARA B NATURALLY has just launched in TARGET stores across the country. Newly Natural and CARA B NATURALLY have put together a fun i-spy style contest for readers! Go to the Cara B Naturally TARGET store locator here http://www.mycarab.com/target.asp and tweet whether or not the product is in the store nearest you and be eligible to win a $25 Gift Certificate! Tweet a pic of Cara B Naturally on the shelves at any TARGET location and your receive a second entry. To support Cara B Naturally TARGET is featuring a special promotion from Jan 29th – Feb 11th all Cara B Naturally product will be offered at a special price! Entry information is below:

To Enter:
· Follow @CaraBNaturallyon Twitter
· Follow @DailyCurlzon Twitter
· Check http://www.mycarab.com/target.asp to see if Cara B Naturally is sold in a store near you
· Tweet Cara B Naturally is in my TARGET! or Cara B Naturally is not in my TARGET! along with the hashtag #ILoveCaraBNaturally and @NewlyNatural
· Entrants that Tweet a pic of CBN product on the shelves at Target along with #ILoveCaraBNaturally and @NaturalKcurlywill receive an extra entry!

I will choose a winner randomly using random.org. This contest ends February 6th at noon CST. 

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