Appearance

I have to admit, I've not been taking that much care over my appearance lately. I think it was a combination of the flu/throat virus tiring me out, the optician telling me I had to stop wearing contact lenses for a little bit, and maybe just my own apathy/lethargy/depression (apparently this plays a factor and I can understand that - when I'm feeling low I sleep more and so have less time or can't be bothered to make myself look nicer).

I shouldn't let that stop me though. Fact is, when I've put a bit more effort into what I'm wearing or how I look, I tend to feel a bit better about myself. I know it's silly that make up can have that effect, but it does.

I think my ankle has had a lot to do with it in the last couple of weeks. Because of the pain in my ankle, I can't stand still for very long - even standing at the sink to brush my teeth or wash my face was too much: I ended up sitting on the (closed) toilet while I brushed my teeth and switched to skincare that didn't need water (Lush's Ultrabland, which I was using to cure the red blotches on my skin), so I could take care of my face while lying in bed with my ankles propped up.

I'd even been skipping showers/baths cause it's too painful standing in the shower trying to keep my balance, and sometimes I just didn't want to be lying around in the bath.

But I decided to push myself into having a bath and washing my hair - even redyed it this weekend, before my roots started majorly showing! And tonight I'm gonna wash it again, after doing my laundry and hoovering my room. Not been able to hoover it and every time I want to do laundry the machine is either being used, or people are coming to view the flat so don't really want my delicates on display for strangers...

Last night for the first time in a while I painted my nails (subtly sparkly powder blue) and looking at them today makes me feel better. I'm also wearing little pumps instead of my trainers, which I've been wearing constantly for nearly 2 weeks. Hard to feel nice and ladylike when wearing proper trainers!

Tonight I hope to do a bit more pampering/preening and maybe tomorrow I can finally put in some contacts and put on some make up. I've just been neglecting myself a bit lately. I've been indulging in resting when I can, and of course can't do much with my ankles, so it's made me feel a bit down lately - the rest I'm getting because of my ankles actually bores me cause I'd rather be doing other things before I leave the country in 12 days...

I'm looking into some new haircare too, cause, despite having my hair cut recently and conditioning it regularly, I've got split ends and they just look tatty and frizzy even if they're not splitting...

Lush: Product Review no.1 - Cosmetic Warrior

Last year I came off my contraceptive for a little bit, thinking my acne had gone away and it was safe to be extra-hormone-free. Unfortunately I ended up having to go back on a different contraceptive, for my mood rather than my acne. I don't know if it was that or stress, since the spots came up along the jawline which is the "hormone" area, but either way, I had some horribly red and painful spots around Christmas last year. The Liz Earle products I reviewed last entry didn't do anything to help, so I asked a fellow acne-prone friend if she had any good cures.

She swears by natural masks and cleansers you can make from ingredients found in the kitchen/larder.

I was mortified!

I can't put food on my face! It's food - the objective is to get it into your mouth without getting it all over your face! Plus, I have an OCD-suffering brother and whenever he eats when I'm around he asks me if he has food on his face or on himself and then I wonder if I have food on myself and I don't want food on myself because it's messy and doesn't belong there!!

So I pouted away for a few days when I suddenly remembered my colleague used to work at Lush - it's food designed to be put on the face!! And so like a happy little schoolgirl I plodded along to Lush with a friend - he also adores Lush products so was glad to take me along~

We went to their Covent Garden branch, which is still my personal favourite to go to, although I have to admit that as far as I can remember, I have only been to two in London. The shop assistant who helped me was lovely, but sadly she doesn't work there any more.

She recommended Cosmetic Warrior, one of their fresh face masks. I forgot to take my own pic of it so I'm borrowing the one from the website in good faith:

The main ingredient for this one is - as I'm sure you can guess - garlic, though it also contains white grapes and raw egg. As such, it has to be stored in the fridge and has a relatively short shelf-life. I think the expiry date on mine was three weeks from the day of purchase, and I did actually manage to use it all up in that time. Handily, somewhere on the packaging for all their products, there's an expiry date.

Now, if you want something that smells like roses or a spring meadow, this isn't for you. But neither does it smell like garlic or rotten eggs or anything like that. To me it just smelt faintly like clay, or just something very natural, but I like that - it means they definitely haven't added something chemical just to make it smell nice.

It goes on dry skin, should be left for 5-10 minutes and then washed off. I used it once a day since I had a lot of spots, but even after the first usage the spots had decreased in size, colour and pain - miraculous! And, once the spots were gone, there was no scarring. So many products/spots have left scars when they disappear, even if they don't pop. I was so happy to not add more scars to my face!

So, in short (since I appear to be quite rambly today):

• all natural
• fresh
• smells like...nature
• keep an eye on the expiry date and keep it in the fridge.

My score: 9/10. I took off one point for the shelf life, even though it's not that big a deal. And yes, I definitely recommend and a friend has taken me up on that advice (I need to check in with her to see how it went).

I'm ecstatic that I can get this in Japan - colleague who used to work at Lush also lived in Japan and warned me that not all the UK products are available there.

Liz Earle Facecare

I keep meaning - and mentioning - that I'm going to write various posts and then never get round to it.

I mentioned a while ago, back when I first moved into my current place with my sister, that I was going to try out Liz Earle's face-wash and toner. I went through two bottles of toner and one and a bit bottles of face-wash before switching (I'm about to go back to the left over face-wash though as I need to use it up before I go, or at least, use it up so it wasn't a complete waste of money).

The method for the face-wash feels nice, but really it could be applied to any face-wash or face soap. Fill the sink with warm water and soak a muslin cloth in it. Rub the face-wash all over the face and neck. Squeeze excess water out of the cloth and buff the soap off the face. Rinse the face and pat dry. The soap itself feels nice and silky, but I didn't feel like it was doing anything for my spots when I had them. Sure, my face felt exfoliated, but that was just cause of the cloth, not the soap itself. In fact, when I used it in the shower and didn't use the cloth, it didn't feel nearly as nice afterwards. It does smell nice though, and is very good at removing make up.

The toner is lovely, refreshing and cool with a beautiful floral fragrance. But again, I didn't feel like it was doing much. In fact that's all I can really say about it. Cause of the nature of the dispenser, you end up with a lot of it on the cotton and consequently it runs out quickly. I hate this, cause I'm used to toners that last ages. Granted, these toners are expensive, but because they last for so long, I don't feel like I'm being ripped off.

Summary: 

• Products smell nice
• Not overly expensive either
• The soap lasts a really long time.
• Toner runs out quickly
• Not effective against acne

I give both products 5/10, and I would recommend them to a friend, but warn them I didn't feel like it did a lot if anything for my acne.

At the moment I have one spot above the bridge of my glasses near my right eyebrow and it is driving me mental...

Accident-prone

I fell down the stairs on Friday on my way to work. What happened was I cause the end of my boot on the edge of the stair and fell a few stairs with that foot twisted under me, so the ankle, bent at the wrong angle, took all of my body weight and I banged into the radiator at the bottom of the stairs.

I shouted out but my sister was asleep with earplugs in so couldn't hear me. The cat came running up to me though and ran up to my face to make sure I was ok, and even tried to leave the house with me. So cute of her~~

I managed a day at work and a contact lens check up, where I got more bad news. My lenses are fine, but the ophthalmologist said there's something stuck in my cornea and I have to go to hospital to have it taken out. I'm putting it off a little though to see if the problem resolves itself cause I can't feel anything and my eyes aren't watering or painful for anything like that.

My sis said her ophthalmologist told her to go to the eye hospital too when she had abrasions on her eye but she didn't bother and it fixed itself, so I'm going to take a break from contact lenses and add eye drops daily and go back and see them on Thursday morning. If they tell me then that I need to go to hospital, then I will.

I've been giving my foot a lot of rest. My sister taught me how to bandage an ankle (pretty easy but I'd never done it before) and we iced it and put some freeze gel on it and it's already so much better with much less swelling. I still can't walk properly, but at least I don't have to use my umbrella as a walking stick any more.

Full of pancakes

Less than one month til I move to Tokyo!

Don't really have time to say much more than that, just waiting for a document I need to proofread and then I'm getting ready for bed.

Happy Pancake Day! I'm stuffed.