APPtastic I

So who isn't glued to their phone lately?  I try to make my time productive especially with all of the time that is sucked up by sacrificed to Facebook and Pinterest.  There are pages of apps on my phone but today I just want to talk about those that keep chemicals, free radicals and other unknown nastiness out of my home and out of my life.

Think Dirty:  Iphone & Android

This is one of my if not fast becoming my only GO TO app to check skin care, health & beauty products I'm thinking about buying.  While this company is seriously lacking in the cosmetic department they make up [pun intended] for it in the rest of the bathroom sink department.

What the app does:  it allows you to scan a barcode or enter the text of a product in order to receive a Think Dirty proprietary rating from 0-10.  0 being you could eat this stuff and it won't harm you to 10 being why don't you just paint nail polish on your eyeballs.  Initially I had problems with their ratings because the Environmental Working Group's rating could often be vastly different from TD.  However, I've come to love and trust TD ratings more because of the plethora of information to back up their decisions.

Features:

• Along with the number, their scores are color coded because green is good, yellow is questionable and red is best not to indulge. 
• Every harmful and not harmful chemical found within the product is categorized and explained in detail.
• They update their info more frequently than EWG's Skin Deep & they include "potential contaminations" if a certain product was in the news (the news being the science geek daily they receive somewhere secret) outlandish eg:  lavender from a factory in England which this particular body wash has sourced in the past was recently shown to have traces of arsenic. 
• Bathroom Shelf:  A fun roulette where you round up all the products in  your bathroom, scan them into the system and TD tells you just how dirty your life is.
• Our Picks - The option available on most products where the advisory board recommends alternatives to your chosen product in case you love your eyeliner but no longer want to subject yourself to hormone disruptors - they will give you a handful of healthy alternatives.  I'm fairly certain since the list is so random in terms of brand that they haven't yet received kick backs in order to promote certain brands.

Cost:  Free!