Lush Haul!

 

I recently treated myself to a mini lush haul, for no particular reason. The house we recently moved in to now has a bath, a luxury I haven't had since I moved out of my parent's home over 5 years ago, so I was keen to try out some of Lush's bath bombs.

 

I fell in love with the scent of the "Tisty Tosty" bath bomb (the white heart with rose petals), and it's just so damn pretty. Lush says that rose eases tension and stress, and gives people happy, positive feelings. Sounds perfect for a Sunday night treat. 

I also had to get the "Sex bomb" bath bomb (top left). This has jasmine-clary sage and ylang ylang, which are apparently aphrodisiacs. I don't know about that, again I just chose this one because I loved the scent. The guy at the store said this also turns your bath water pretty colours, and I'm down for that.

 

I also picked up a new shampoo bar - I love seanik, and heard that Copperhead is good for maintaining colour, so thought I would give it a whirl. 

I also couldn't go past the Rose Jam Shower Gel that was stocked at the front counters. This smells exactly like the Ro's Argan Body Conditioner (one of my favourites), and hopefully is also quite moisturising. 

What are your favourite lush products?

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What's in my travel make-up bag: Weekend Edition

A couple of weekends ago, J and I took a very quick trip down to Canberra, to help celebrate his mum's birthday. We literally weren't even in Canberra longer than 24 hours, but we were going to be going out for lunch so I did need to look somewhat nice.

I brought the bare necessities with me, basically whatever could fit into a tote bag.

 

Base: Australis Primer, the Original, Revlon Colourstay (not pictured) 

Face: NARS blush in Amour, Make Up Store microshadow in Meteor for highlight

Concealer: Maybelline Age Rewind and Revlon Photoready 

Eyes: Inglot four-pan eyeshadows (review here), MAC paint pot in painterly, Maybelline the falsies mascara, Kat Von D tattoo liner

Eyebrows: Australis Oh Hai Brow eyebrow kit

Brushes: Sigma P86, Sigma P84, Zoeva 122, Ecotools eyebrow brush, Make up Store 106, Zoeva 105, Sigma F80 (not pictured)

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My Week in Pictures #73

I am writing this from the comfort of my living room floor, in front of the heater.
I came down with a fairly nasty cold over the weekend, that left me with very little sleep last night, so I took my first sick day from work since being full-time to recuperate. Apart from a quick venture to go get some medicine, I have done a whole lot of nothing today, and I'm totally okay with that.


My scorpion is improving, slowly. I always feel so much bendier in these positions than I actually am - I was envisioning myself about to kick myself in the head. I've still got some ways to go before that I think. I'm still super stoked with my progress so far, and need to get back into regular stretching now that the craziness from moving house is over.

 

It was my birthday on Friday! This year was a lot more low-key than previous years. My boss gave me an early mark though, and let me go home at 4pm, which was really lovely! I got off the train to see a birthday rainbow appear in the sky!

 

I was given two of these Moon rose wooden wick candles from work for my birthday - cucumber melon, and vanilla flavours. I've never had a wooden wick candle before but I love the way they crackle, and they burn really evenly across the surface of the wax. This scent was perfect for the warmer weekend weather. 

 

 

To celebrate my birthday, J and I went indoor rock-climbing on Saturday. It's so funny how much our minds control our body; the first climb we did was a refresher on belaying, and the wall is seriously not that tall. But I came down and my hands were shaky, and I was actually very afraid. But then once we moved on to the courses, and I had to start thinking about the best path to take to get to the top, I had no problem climbing ridiculous heights. Climbing is lots of fun, and I wish I could do it more often. 

 

The rock climbing gym have recently added in "caving" sections, which is basically climbing through pitch black tunnels in the walls.

There were three levels of caves - we only made it to level 2 because we were under some time restraints but this was also surprisingly a lot of fun, and I want to head back and conquer cave level 3. 

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Nailpolish Storage

Nailpolish storage is one of those things that's taken me a while to work out. I've stored them in desk drawers, only to never use them because I never look at them. I've stored them out in the open but they get cluttered. 

The different sized bottles can also make storing nailpolish difficult. I've worked out that for me personally, storing by colour rather than by brand works best. When choosing what nailpolish to wear, I tend to pick a general colour, then sort through my collection to find the shade I want to wear that week. 

These acrylic shoe drawers from Howard's Storage World, and acrylic nail stand I got off Catch of the Day store my collection perfectly. 

All my miniature polishes fit in a glass vase. 

I love that I can see all the different colours, yet they're still "away" meaning they won't get too dusty and dirty. 

The plastic is quite thick and strong, so I don't have to worry about the weight from all the polish jars snapping the drawers. 

I swap out my recently purchased and favourite seasonal colours into the acrylic nail stand, to remind myself to use them. Top coats, base coats and nail strengtheners also live in the acrylic stand, to ensure easy access. 

How do you store your nailpolish?

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Week in Pictures #72

 

Found some Lego men hiding out at Sutherland train station... 

 

 

J and I made a quick trip into Canberra over the weekend to visit his mum for her birthday! Her sisters were flown in from around the country as a surprise, and it was lovely getting to meet them all. After all this time, I still have met very few of J's extended family. 

 

On Sunday we went to the Canberra Arboretum for lunch. 

I am still on the RPAH elimination diet, so could only order steak and chips. The steak was overcooked, but the chips were pretty good. 

Bonsai trees will never cease to amaze me. They're so cool - I loved getting to see so many different types of Bonsai trees. 

 

Apart from too-brief interstate trips it's been pretty quiet over here. 

Work has been hectic, and I am glad to see that it is slowing down and I can get back into a routine. That being said, it's so hard to be motivated to do anything after work when it's this cold. 

 

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Organisation Tips - Review: Erin Condren Life Planner

 

I am a total Type A personality. This is both a strength and a weakness in my personality. 

I make lists, I write things down, I like to keep track of things. When I broke my wrist last year, I tried the electronic-diary thing. I hated it. It didn't work for me. I'm a visual person yes, but I'm also a tactile person and I like having something physical in front of me to browse through. 

I have kept a day diary ever since I received my first one in year three, at the ripe old age of 7 years old. That's 15 years. I've been through primary school, high school, university and now full-time work, and each time I've had to adjust what I use my diary (or "planner" as they're called nowadays) for, and how I use it. When I was at uni, I kept track of assignments, which days I was working, what uni work I had to get done, social appointments. 

Now that I'm in full-time work, my hours between 7am-7pm Monday through to Friday are accounted for (including travel time) and I obviously don't have to remind myself to go to work each day.  That's just routine. But I did struggle with organising other areas of my life; housework, social events, blogging, to-do lists.

 

I can't even remember where I first came across the Erin Condren planner - probably on Youtube somewhere. I saw it, and thought "this looks perfect for me". I love that the layout is vertical (although they now have horizontal options too if that's what floats your boat) - this totally appeals to my list-making needs. 

I love that the days are split into three categories. The categories "morning - day - night" are not always that applicable to me, but that's where Etsy comes in; I can buy custom headers to utilise each space in a way that best suits me. 

 

There are so many planner addicts facebook groups, and youtube channels, and instagram pages around these days and so many of them are filled with photos of planners covered in stickers and decorated. I much prefer a simplistic look - I hate clutter, and can't concentrate with unnecessary images. There are still plenty of functional stickers available on etsy though, which make the weeks that little bit cuter.

I love that the Erin Condren planner is spiral bound - I can look at half a week at a glance, and the spine won't get bent all out of shape. I love that the covers are customisable (and you can change them out throughout the year if that tickles your fancy) - how cute that I can have a seahorse and my name on mine! I love the big monthly page spreads - these allow plenty of room for writing everything down. I also really like that each month is a different colour scheme. The ECLP comes with a plastic zipper pocket at the back, which is perfect for storing my stickers, and plenty of plain, lined, and decorated notes pages. I like the see-through snap-in ruler/page marker it comes with. 

I love a lot of things about the ECLP. 

What I don't like:

I don't like the text that divides the lines at the bottom of each day with the 3 square boxes. I'm not a huge fan of all the inspirational quotes and some of the colour schemes and images are a bit garish. I also don't like that the monthly calendar spreads have the week starting on a Sunday - this really confuses me. 

These are all small complaints though.

Do you have an Erin Condren life planner? Do you even use a paper planner anymore?

Would you be interested in more posts about my planning sessions and how I keep myself organised?

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Priceline Skincare Haul 2015

Priceline had their annual skincare sale + beauty bag promotion a few weeks ago. I have bought these before, and also given other years' bags a miss. Even if the free bag is valued at $X, it is worthless if I'm not going to use the items. This promotional bag though had a lot of things in it that I actually would use, so I bought in to the promotion. 

To qualify, I picked up two antipodes products I've wanted to try for a while, and another bottle of Dr Lewinn's 4 fusion cleansing oil. 

From Antipodes I got the Grace Gentle Cream Cleanser, and the Aura Manuka Honey Mask. I love manuka honey, so can't wait to trial out this mask. I have been using the cream cleanser, and really like it so far. 

So, onto what was in the bag:

Pure pawpaw ointment in watermelon flavour, Rosken intensive moisture hand cream, Jergens original beauty lotion, Sukin detoxifying clay masque; Rosehip nourising hand creme

Neutrogena deep clean facial cleanser; Palmer's shea butter formula with vitamin E; Biore' pore unclogging scrub

La roche-posay barrier repairing balm; Innoxa Organic brightening eye creme; L'oreal paris revitalift magic blur finishing cream; Dr Lewinn's multi-moisture balm; Thursday Plantation nurture oil.

Bioderma moisturising concentrate; Garnier miracle skin-cream; Orange zinc stick; Lanolips lip ointment with colour; Nivea unscented lip butter; Avene eau thermal spring water; Antipodes skin brightening serum; Burt's bees tinted lip balm; 

Swisspers rosehip facial cleansing wipes; Formula 10.0.6 facial wipes; Swisspers make up pads; le tan fast tan tanning mouse. 

Bondi Sands self-tanning mitt; Montagne Jeunesse blemish mud mask; Antipodes vanilla pod hydrating day cream.

Out of the entire bag, the only items I won't get use out of are the tanning products. I love that there's such a good mix of different types of skincare products (not all hand creams and face wipes for example).

Did you pick up the Priceline skincare bag? What did you purchase to redeem the offer? Have you tried any of these products before? 

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Lately, in Pictures #71

I've been away for a while. 

We have spent the last three weeks moving house.

We only had a week's notice to pack up everything, book removalists, and all that other stressful stuff that comes with moving. This coupled with a few really busy weeks at work have left me with no free time to even think about blogging, let alone plan and write some posts. 

But we're settling in nicely now - almost every box is unpacked, and our new house is finally starting to feel like a home. I'm so looking forward to jumping back in to blogging - I'm almost surprised at how much I've missed it! 

I returned to Wollongong a few weekends ago for Cailin's wedding. She was absolutely stunning, and it was such a fun wedding; lots of dancing to T.Swizzle. 

Elimination diet is going well. I'm really lucky that my bestie's little brother is a butcher, and was able to make up some special recipe chicken sausages for me. They have been an absolute saviour with the move. It took us a while to unpack the kitchen properly, and having these snags on hand to defrost and quickly fry up with some brussels sprouts saved me a lot of stress. 

As I was packing, I cleared out some of my beauty items. Was a bit surprised to find so many mascaras stashed in my drawer. Almost all of them went straight in the bin (way too old to use without the risk of an eye infection). I think I need to branch out from Maybelline mascaras. 

Scored a second Billy bookcase on gumtree for $5! One day I want an entire library room. 

And rounding this post off with a pole update. This move is the 'Allegra', and it's one of my favourites when done by someone bendy. Now that we're settled, I'm really going to re-focus on stretching every night - although the cold makes doing anything seem impossible.

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