In today's Reader Mail:

Dear BS:

I'm just wondering: Do you use any "green" household products, and if so, which ones? I'm sort of at sea with the whole thing.

Love, K.

Interesting! We do, but only because our lovely, lovely sublettor was nice enough to buy them when our toxic stuff ran out. We have Seventh Generation lavender dishwashing liquid, Seventh Generation paper towels, and perhaps the world's thinnest toilet paper. We plan on expanding to some Mrs. Meyers all-purpose cleaner as soon as we use up the rest of what we have. (It's a recession! Can't just be throwing stuff away willy-nilly these days. Or, er, any day.)

Now: again, because we believe that the group is nearly almost smarter than the individual (er, except when it comes to, say, making movies and stuff like that), we ask anyone who's invested in these or similar products to share your thoughts. There's a prize! Above: these gorgeous "Jungle" postcards from Prismera, made from 100% recycled paper. (We're thematic like that.) The winner of a set of six will be announced tonight-ish. (Tomorrow.) They are otherwise available here, at $15 for six.

We were recently in a Madewell store and thought: We could just wear these clothes for the rest of the spring. Their website is still driving us insane—function! if you have to choose one, please choose that one instead of form!—and we wish they’d get the online shopping together, but we love all the neutrals plus the pops of yellow. When the new US Topshop opens up next door the Broadway + Canal Madewell, it’s going to be our favorite shopping block ever.

Here’s a link to their locations—more now than there used to be. Now we add: We were recently in our cabinet, where we found three Madewell tees in promotional (but adorable) Madewell t-shirts in their t-shirt sacks (not good for much else—we don’t want to oversell them, though they’d be great for separating bras + stuff in a suitcase.) We’ll pick three winners from today’s commenters—just do us one favor and tell us where you’d shop if you had to shop at only that store for the next three months. And Balenciaga doesn’t count, unless you’re all trust fund-y.

So with this month’s Harper’s Bazaar in mind—and we honestly don’t remember the last time we had that thought—we “shopped the closet” of our bathroom cabinet, partly because it is overflowing with beauty products we bought and promptly forgot about and partly because we are focusing on being all thrifty-like. (The fact that we needed to take a shower and had forgotten to buy shower gel is another factor.) Anyway, we found four sample-size samples of this CO Bigelow Rosemary Mint body cleanser, and we will say: very impressed! We bought them last year during the after xmas sales, and then put them aside, where we forgot about them. We’re usually fairly skeptical about aromatherapy-type beauty\skincare products, as we’re always like: Want! More! Aroma! And therapy! But this was just the way we like it: almost overpowering. We truly did feel aroma-therapized. And: free! More or less.

We’d love to know what everyone is discovering in their own closets and medicine cabinets. Comment below and we’ll choose somebody later today to win a bright red cashmere scarf \ throw from Shopbop’s Bop Basics line!

CO Bigelow Rosemary Mint cleanser, $12

We loved loved loved the Body Shop’s Japanese Washing Grains when we were a kid – we were way bummed to see they stopped making them.  That’s why this tip from Delphine T is our winner:

Ooh, love the tips! Mine: you know
when you have a favorite face wash (or are obsessed with a delectable
new one), but it lacks that scrubby exfoliant oomph? Add organic mung
bean, soy, brown rice powder or all of the above (found in the bulk
powders aisle of your local Whole Foods or healthfood store) to your
face wash of choice — & voilà, it works double duty as your
custom-made exfoliating scrub. I keep mine in a little jar next to
the cleanser: one pump of cleanser in the palm, tip a bit of powder in,
mix, & go!

I freeze the powder beforehand as a precaution against bacteria, and
store the rest in the freezer afterward in a Ziploc. It keeps very
well. I suspect any bulk grain will do, but mung bean in particular (if
available) has the bonus of being a popular skin-soothing ingredient in
Korean skincare; a few cosmetics lines are based around its benefits.
This is also GREAT if you have sensitive skin & react to harsh
exfoliants, like me, as the natural particles get the job done but are
gentle enough for everyday use.

Bobbi Brown sells a similar(ish) product called Buffing Grains, that
you add to your face wash to turn it into an exfoliant …but it’s $40.
plus, by mixing the powder yourself you can control the degree of
graininess, and select all-natural/organic ingredients

We got so excited about this contest that we kept typing in the wrong log in on our computer, convincing ourselves that we were having some kind of mental episode. Really, we think our coffee cup got in the way of our keyboard and we were typing 3 letters over.

Oops.

Anyway! We have a simple contest! Y.E.S has offered us one of their Dynamic Duo as a prize, and we are stoked. We haven’t tried it ourselves, but we are most intrigued by their anti-aging serum and moisturizing cream. How do you win?

Easy peasy. In the comment section, post the best skincare and/or makeup tip you ever received. It can be as simple as taking your eye makeup off with something special at night (this is still something we don’t do). The one that makes us go whoa the most wins. This’ll start at 9:00am EST and end Monday at 9:00EST.

Post your comment, and then we’ll post the winner!

-LB

We always hate these ads with those little instructional quotes: “The new bell leg is the jean silhouette of the season. Wear it long, so that your hem skims the floor.” We saw this as former Gap Kids employees—the Gap basically taught us how to dress, as unbelievably worrisome as that sounds—but we do not believe the new bell leg is the jean silhouette of the season, and we do not appreciate the fib-telling.

Today’s small contest:

We love these small wipes! V. convenient. Just tell us your jean silhouette for fall, or your new favorite denim brand. Winner takes the wipes! And an array of British chocolates.

And yesterday’s winner: Jess! Be sending the delivery address!

We just sent three emails that had out-of-office returns. Either everyone in the world is on vacation, or we work for a bunch of slackers. Anyway! Moving on. It’s the week of the small giveaways: little things we (a) are bringing home from the UK and (b) can afford to buy. (This is a small subset.) Today’s small prize: Boots Botanics Cleansing Body Scrub. Hey, Elle loved it. So there we are.

Yesterday’s winner: Claudia! Who suggested Flight of the Conchords. In their honor, we share this video:

Can we say, our best money-saving tip ever is: Our cell phone bill a couple months ago was so staggering we hesitate to share it here (the first figure was a 5!) so we put our account on hold, and we’ve spent August using Skype and pay phones. We know, it’s like 1988. And 2010. Skype has a plan where all outgoing calls in the US are $2.50 a month. All we know is that our phone bill has dropped about $522.50 a month. Eventually we’re going to have to reconcile with T-Mobile, but we’re holding off on it.
Which brings us to: What is your best tip (if any) for painlessly (as possible) saving cash but still doing fun stuff? Winner takes the body scrub!

We’re convinced 90% of the people we work for are on vacation this week, so we’re having a few tiny contests. First! We announce the winner of our Jocasi competition from like nine years ago! It’s … Elisabeth D.! There is no great surprise in this, as her question had the most votes \ comments, but still, at least we have finally made it official.

Moving on: today we will give away one amazingly lovely bottle of Nivea deodorant. We love this so much, we swear, we don’t even need perfume when we’re in London because it’s so nice. It’s the last week of summer! We just can’t pull it together any more than this.

Comment your answer below and we’ll pick a winner at random tonight. Our question for the moment: What TV show’s return are you most looking forward to? Our answer is: Battlestar Galactica! Or maybe—actually, two of them are on right now, Mad Men and The Closer, and Project Runway, even if we are not too excited about this season’s contestants. Oh! The Shield! The Shield is going to be amazing.

Anyway—we thank Jocasi for the supply of their amazing bag, and we look forward to giving away one of our favorite small treats. This is still our favorite—but we can’t wait til their new fall bags come out. Jocasi Montana bag, was about $240, now about $165

And the most popular entry was … this one! Congratulations to E.!

Speaking of, this is the last day to vote for (which is to say, comment on) this Jocasi entry:

What are your favorite staple clothing items?

Finally: We remind anyone who is looking for shoes at a 20% Bunnyshop discount, Solestruck.com has provided one: F3RUU3RDR. We’re considering these boots, which is in no way in admission that summer is winding up. (It’s not. We swear it’s not.)

Above: Steve Madden slouched boots, $94.95—with discount, $75.96

This is just so much more involved than we intended it to be: last day to comment on (and sort of vote for) these two discussions:

What’s the most you’ve ever spent on a pair of shoes?

and

What is the best gift – big or small – you have ever given someone?

The winners will  either a free pair of shoes from Solestruck.com, or a fabulous new Jocasi bag.

Ooh, next time we’re going to be so much smarter about this. Moving on! We’re satisfying ourselves with a magically one-day contest that happened to dovetail, equally magically, with this question:

Dear BS:

Seeing as how I’m cutting back on my magazine-buying budget, I’m wondering: Which of these do you buy the most often: Lucky, Elle, or Vogue?

Looking for a vote.

A.

Well! We really do like Elle—we don’t need any more reasons beyond how much we love Holly Millea. But month in, month out? It’s Lucky. We know it’s a catalogue. But we love it. Maybe we’re in a very functional life segment. We have no idea. In any case, we bought UK Vogue more than we bought the regular one—we like their cover choices better (Gwyneth + Gisele = not interested).

So this will hopefully be the best +-$10 we spend all week: Comment below with your choice and why, and by tomorrow morning (we swear) we’ll name a winner for a one-year subscription at your choice. We’re just so over the delayed gratification of the madness above. Share your fave, we ask humbly.