Mom’s Night In With NIVEA

When was the last time you got together with the girls and just hung out? No kids, no agenda – just moms hanging out. My guess is that it has been a while. A few months ago, I realized I had no idea what was going on with some of my closest friends because we were so busy that unless it directly related to the kids we didn’t have time for it. I was becoming a slacker friend, and I didn’t like it. So I sent out an email to the gang initializing a new monthly mom’s night.

One of the reasons we tend to overlook hanging out is that it always seems like it takes too much planning. So my proposal was simple – no planning. From that month going forward the second Thursday of the month was our night. We would meet at someone’s house after the kiddos were in bed and hang out. Nothing fancy, no cooking, no cleaning — just hang out. Doesn’t that sound ideal?

Of course, we wouldn’t all be able to make it every month, but that’s the beauty of my simple idea. If you can come, super! If you can’t make it that month, we’ll miss you and see you next month. No moving things around to try to get all six of us there, just have fun with everyone who can make it that night.

This month, I decided to spruce things up a bit. I didn’t want to go over the top and set a bar for future get together, but I did want to add a little fun.

I teamed up with NIVEA to host a pampering party. My thought was a spa party – you know nails, facial masks, etc. Finding the NIVEA was easy, in fact Sam’s Club sells NIVEA in two-packs of giant pumps of Essentially Enriched lotion with a bonus tube of Extended Moisture for $8.79 (awesome deal). But when shopping for other pampering products, I was less than inspired by options. If you are a frequent Sam’s Club shopper (like myself) you know that available options change frequently, and you never know what you will find to inspire you. See my entire shopping trip in my Google+ story.

Then I saw it, and in one second all of my plans changed. Rolls of deco mesh in red, green, silver and gold. Pampering suddenly shifted from skin care to mom time — we were gonna craft!

My girls know I have a craft bug, and a number of years ago I used to host a monthly craft night. That fell by the wayside as we all got too busy, but I knew the moms would love chit-chatting over making something beautiful to decorate their homes for the holidays. It’s a different kind of pampering, to be sure, but I knew it would be a hit.

Of course the bottles on NIVEA, which served as a centerpiece for our arts and crafts were sure to be talked about as well. And I learned that several of the moms rely on NIVEA regularly, so they were all happy to take home some lotion to keep their skin feeling smooth this winter. (Plus our little project was a little rough on the finger tips, so everyone sampled the hand cream!

We chatted and we crafted for three hours, and it was wonderful! Not only did we have a great time catching up, but everyone was able to take home a completed Christmas wreath and a full-size NIVEA lotion. (I might have set the bar a little high on this party!)

Best of all – we all felt pampered just being together.

*Tutorial coming soon.

I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community.  This content has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Beiersdorf for NIVEA, however all thoughts and opinions are my own.  #NIVEAmoments #CBias #SocialFabric