kegel balls

Review: Lelo Luna Beads Noir

Kate Sloan

Someone please explain vaginal balls to me. I don’t understand.

I mean, I understand the theory behind them. They’re supposed to give you some weight, some resistance, with which to exercise your vagina. It’s supposed to be difficult to hold them inside you, forcing you to use your muscles and make your twat stronger. And some of them are also supposed to give you a fun bouncy sensation that’s sexually pleasurable, I guess as a motivator to exercise your vag more often.

But this is never how vaginal balls work for me. It’s never any effort to keep them inside. They never feel heavy or challenging. They just stay put. Am I an anomaly, with a freakishly tight and strong vagina? Or have vaginal balls, as a category of sex toys, just totally lost the plot of what they are supposed to do?

I don’t know the answers to these questions. Please feel free to answer and explain in the comments if you have any theories. For now, I’m going to talk about the latest I’ve tried in a string of perplexing vag balls: the Lelo Luna Beads Noir.

I was sent these balls last year, after having a chat with a lovely Lelo rep about the effect that the Fifty Shades of Grey phenomenon has had on the sex toy industry. Apparently (and I can’t vouch for this because I could only force myself through the first half of the first book), at some point in the trilogy, Christian Grey gives Ana Steele a set of vaginal balls to use, and it’s sexy, or whatever. So as a result, this type of product saw an uptick in sales, and Lelo decided to jump on the bandwagon and make a black/grey version of their Luna Beads Mini.

I will admit that the whole reason I ended up owning the Luna Beads Noir was that I told the Lelo rep how beautiful I thought they were. The smokey grey, the stark black… I dunno, man; I guess I’m a sucker for black sex toys.

Each ball weighs 37 grams and is 1 ¼" in diameter. So, yeah, these are small, but not so small that I can’t feel them. Lelo recommends this size for women who are under 30 years of age or who haven’t given birth. I don’t know how I feel about that type of recommendation, given how much variation there is among vaginas. Let’s just say, you should find out the diameter of your favorite dildo(s) and compare if you’re undecided about which size Luna Beads to get. (The regular size is 1.4" in diameter, which really isn’t that much bigger.)

Unlike the Luna Beads proper, the Noir version only comes with one set of balls, so you can’t swap them out if you want something heavier.

As I mentioned above, my vagina must be a Chinese finger trap because there is no moment during the usage of these balls when I ever feel like they might fall out. I suppose it might be a challenge to keep them in if I were to slather them in handfuls of lube before use, but like, who wants to do that? (Speaking of lube: you should use the water-based kind with these balls, due to their materials.)

The balls themselves are smooth plastic, and the removable girdle that houses them is slightly grippy silicone. This combination of textures feels sexy in the hand but I can’t really perceive it once they’re in my vagina.

The signature bouncy sensation provided by vaginal balls is just dandy with this set. Minimal movement sets them off, which is a plus as far as I’m concerned. I am always very aware of their presence, and they make me want to move my hips around and run up and down staircases.

The looped retrieval cord on these is one of the best things about them: it’s very sturdy and has no stretch whatsoever. Many a good pair of balls have been ruined by an insubstantial or overly stretchy string. When I want to remove my Luna Beads Noir, I just pull the cord – no finagling or fretting required. These will never get stuck in my vagina.

So, as far as vaginal balls are concerned, the Lelo Luna Beads Noir are some of the best I’ve tried. If you want a pair, and like the dark aesthetic of these ones, you should get them – especially since they’re just $23.20 with the code “LELO” on PinkCherry. For a high-quality, body-safe, comfortable and functional pair of vag balls, you won’t find a much better price than that.

But I still don’t really “get” vaginal balls. Maybe it’s my body. Maybe it’s the way they’re made. I don’t know. They confuse me. Oh well…

Thank you, Lelo!

Cheap Orgasms, Anyone?

Kate Sloan

I usually believe that a more expensive sex toy has got to be better than a cheap one. After all, my all-time favorite toy costs $140 plus a $40 attachment; runners-up cost anywhere from $79 to $139. These toys are pricey for a reason, and that reason is: they’re good.

However, some quality sex toys are, indeed, cheap. Here’s a few solid and inexpensive options…

1. California Exotics’ Turbo Glider is a popular, classic, traditional vibrator. It’s made of hard plastic, the only sex toy material I’m aware of which manages to be non-porous, body-safe, and cheap. It’s waterproof, has some very pleasing texture, and is also the strongest battery-operated vibe I’ve ever come across. At $16, you can hardly call it an investment, but if it was, it’d be a worthwhile one!

2. Don Wands’ Bent Graduate is a wonderful glass dildo that goes straight for the G-spot. It’s double-ended, easy to get clean, and comes in cute colors. What’s not to like?

3. Tantus makes a dildo called Acute which is tiny but hits my G-spot like a mofo. Seriously, I’ve switched over to this toy many times mid-wank because the dildo I was previously using just wasn’t cutting it in terms of G-spot stimulation. It would also be fabulous for pegging, though I don’t currently have a willing partner for that one! At only $32, it’s an absolute steal for a toy I use as often as I do.

4. Another California Exotics toy! (See, they’re not all bad.) The Eclipse vaginal balls are one of the best kegel toys I’ve found – lots of delicious bouncing, sturdy retrieval cord, cute design – and they also happen to be made of body-safe materials. Plus they cost $23. I recommend these all the time to people who are looking for balls to put in their vag, because I’ve tried several and these remain my favorites.

5. The RodeoH briefs harness is arguably not that cheap on the whole, but as far as harnesses go, you’re not going to find a better one for any cheaper. It retails for $45, looks foxy on just about anyone, holds dildos in place for sexytimes, and doesn’t have a million straps you have to snap and adjust and fiddle with. This is the only harness I own and I don’t have any desire for another, because this one does its job so damn well.

What are your favorite toys for under $50?

Review: Luscious Playthings glass vaginal egg

Kate Sloan

The Luscious Playthings glass vaginal egg comes in many different sizes, ranging from extra small to extra large. Normally this would be a good thing, but for a kegel product with no retrieval cord, I can only recommend the extra small size… and only to people who are comfortable putting at least half their hand into their vagina.

I was sent the small size, which isn’t that small: 1 ½” in diameter, the same width as some of the bigger dildos my vagina can handle.

It’s a beautiful product: totally smooth all over, softly pointed ends, high-quality glass. As an object of beauty or a paperweight, it’s flawless. However, as a vaginal product, I can’t recommend it.

I inserted it with only a minimal amount of lube. (Don’t do this. Trust me.) I stood up and bounced around, checking how well it stayed in. It didn’t move or shift at all, which should have been a warning sign; the mechanism by which vaginal eggs exercise the PC muscle is by feeling like they’re almost slipping out, thereby forcing you to clench your muscles to keep the egg inside. There was none of that feeling with this egg, because it’s too big and I’m too tight, evidently, even when totally relaxed.

After noting that the egg’s shape and dimensions fit my vagina so well that I couldn’t even feel the damn thing inside me (disappointing), I tried to push it out with my vaginal muscles.

Nothing happened. I reached inside and tried to pull or push it out of me, and again, nothing happened. This is when I started to panic.

My boyfriend was there at the time, luckily. I laid on my back with my legs pulled up and instructed him to lube up two fingers and try to extract the egg. He did, and we spent a good fifteen minutes like that, him fishing around in my vag and me trying to bear down with my muscles. Let me tell you, it was not comfortable. (Irrelevant sidebar: my boyfriend was hard the whole time. Not because he found my pain arousing, but because he gets hard easily and he was touching my vagina. If I hadn’t been in so much discomfort, I would have laughed.)

We even tried inserting the Magic Banana as a sort of makeshift vaginal lasso, but by then, the egg had gone up fairly deep into me and I didn’t want to push it in any further by accident.

Then I remembered that there is a position in which the contents of my vagina (e.g. a menstrual cup) tend to slip out, even when I don’t want them to. I know this because it’s the position I usually sleep in, but can’t when I’m on my period, lest my cup fall out and ruin my bedding.

The position involves lying on my stomach, with one leg (usually the right one, though it probably doesn’t matter) pulled up and bent. Imagine a flamingo or a person hopping on one foot, except lying down on their front. That’s basically what it looks like.

I laid in that position and pushed out rhythmically with my muscles while my boyfriend looked on. After a few minutes of that, I finally gave birth to the egg. And then immediately vowed never to try it again.

The product itself isn’t a bad one. Having no retrieval cord isn’t a big deal if the toy is shaped and sized in such a way that it can come out easily with a little pushing. But if the “small” size was big enough to get lodged in my vag, I have to wonder who would possibly want to use the medium, large, and extra large sizes. True, they’ll stay in all day if you want ‘em to, but a) that defeats the purpose of a kegel product and b) you might need an excavation team to get them out of you.

Thanks so much to Luscious Playthings for letting me try out this product!