Skin: when I hit 30, went off the pill, and all of a sudden started getting pimples (The Oil Cleansing Method)

I'd been on birth control since I was 16.  I came off the pill now and again for a few months at a time in the 14 year period between then and now, but always went back on because my periods were never regular and there's nothing worse (in my opinion) than not having a clue about when your period is next due.

I went off birth control (for obvious married person reasons) in February of this year.  Beyond all of the mental, hormonal and emotional issues that will prevent me from taking it again, about 5 months after getting off the pill, I started to break out. 

Having been a pill taker for so long, I breezed through high school with great skin.  I didn't know how to deal with the fact that, all of a sudden, I was going to have to come up with a skin care regimen.

My new-found aversion to the bad things they put in lots of products these days had me surfing the 'net to find some alternatives.

I decided to start with the Oil Cleansing Method.  It made sense, and everyone seemed to say that it was the BEST THING EVER.  After a long search (ending with Amazon) I got some castor oil and started giving it a go.  Crunchy Betty has a great bit of info on it including a "Trying and Troubleshooting" guide found here. 

I *really* like it.  I use about 50/50 castor oil and sweet almond oil, with a few drops of tea tree essential oil thrown in.  I don't have a pre-mixed container so just mix as I go.  Once I get a small empty container I think that will be a better method.  I found that the key is HOT (without burning yourself) water on your steaming cloth.  If the water isn't hot enough, you won't get clean enough.  Some websites suggest steaming in the shower but the one time I did this, I ended up with a super oily face.  I think the shower just doesn't get hot enough. 

It is actually amazing how well this cleans my pores, and my blackheads are greatly reduced.  It also helped the super freaky bizarre extra oil extravaganza that started going on on my face a couple of months ago.  My skin is soft and hydrated without being oily, and it's super clean.  I follow this with a toner.  I have no idea if it's needed but it's my special made-it-myself toner and it's not doing any harm.

If I was less lazy, I would do this every other day.  I agree with Crunchy Betty that it's probably not required every day, but I don't do it enough.  I use OCM once or twice a week, and make extra effort if there is an event coming up.

Some people have reported an adjustment period for their skin, and others broke out and stopped the OCM altogether.  I guess we're all different, though this could be down to not steaming fully and/or using an oil that's maybe not great for your skin.

I would highly recommend giving this a try for a week or two, and would be interested to hear what people think.  

DIY wedding reception on the cheap - part 2

In between cleaning and decorating the house, I got on making the food.  We were 22 people in total and I reckon we could hace accomodated 30 with the amount of food we had.  

Food
My girlfriends provided the salads and desserts, and I spent my time baking breads and meats.

I made:
Paul Hollywood's garlic baguette ( so doesn't look like a baguette, but tastes great)
Jamie Oliver's rolled bread (though it was just the inspiration, in one I put salami, basil, cheese, olives and peppers, and in the other I left otu the salami and swapped tomatoes for peppers).  If you only want one bread, or enough food for about 5 decent sized portions, half the recipe.  The first time I made this I used the suggested olive oil and ended up with a greasy mess.  Now, I skip that part.
Smitten Kitchen's brisket - which I cooked for 10 hours in my warming oven, and seved with the reduced sauce.
Finally, I cooked up some pork loin with a marinade recipe that my mom gave me and which people go mental for.  They say it's the best pork they've ever had. 

Pork Loin Marinade

1/4 C soy

2 T red wine ( I used Pinot Noir because it's what I had in the house and it was too thin.  You want a merlot or some other kind of deep flavoured wine)

1 T Br Sugar

1 T honey

1/2 t cinnamon

1 garlic

1 green onion sliced

mix all together - pour over pork loin - turning pork occasionally let sit in sauce for at least 2 - 3 hrs 

This recipe is seriously amazing.  I have no idea where it's from, but it's like omg never need another pork marinade ever again kind of amazing.  

Beer

We served homebrew exclusively.  I made 4 brews and we had a friend who made a keg.  Homebrew is a revelation.  It's easy and CHEAP and amazing.  And no, it's not super strong.  Why do people just assume it's super strong?  Most of my brews are betwen 3.5 and 4.5%.  I like to drink my beer, not get wasted from it, thanks.  

I *love* the new Festival range of homebrews, available from several different retailers but I buy from BrewUK because they have sales quite a lot which makes them often the cheapest. 

Trust me, this beer is amazing. 

DIY wedding reception on the cheap - part 1

We got married in April of 2012.  We were meant to have our reception in California in December, but then my visa didn't come through in time and we were stuck in the UK over Christmas.  Then we were going to celebrate in the States in September, and my brother went and got himself engaged.  So, we sacked the US celebration idea and focused on the UK.

We decided to plan the reception to coincide with the work on our house being more or less done.  Well, even building in lag time the work was NOT more or less done, but we went ahead anyway because I knew it was now or never.

We lost a lot of money on the failed US reception and honeymoon plan of 2012 so this party was on a pretty tight budget.  We originally talked about marquees, portable toilets and the works but scaled it right back and, honestly, had a better time for it.

Decorations
I had some decorations that I bought for the US reception that I was able to use for this.  My favourite purchase was fabric flowers from Jane Joss on Etsy - they're not your grannie's fake flowers, they're creative and colourful and look fantastic, and of course the best part is that they can be kept forever.  I got a friend to bring me some of his empty swing top beer bottles, put a bit of sand in the bottle to bring the level up a bit, and voila!  I scattered my funky vases and flowers around the house.
(note how construction-tastic our house is)

Felt balls and felt ball garlands are all the rage these days (on Pinterest and Etsy, anyway) and I thought it looked like a fun project, so got myself an assortment of felt balls on Ebay, some twine, a big needleand a friend and had at it.  Our husbands referred to our crafting as "kids' corner" but we had a blast and created some really pretty super easy to make felt garlands.  As with so many of my pictures these days, ignore the construction going on in the background...

Food and drink coming soon in part 2...

Experimenting with Natural Deodorants - part 2

So in part 1 of this post, I talked about my motivation behind wanting to switch from antiperspirants (ap) to a more natural deodorizing solution.

I tried Tom's of Maine and thought it worked great.  But, because I like concocting things in my kitchen, I decided to try making my own.

If you do a search for home made deodorant you will come up with a LOT of people talking about their experiences.  You will also see a lot of the same ingredients listed:

Coconut oil - if the internet is right, this stuff is basically magic
Baking soda/bicarbonate of soda - have you ever put it in a dish in your fridge to keep it  from         getting smelly?  Same idea.
Cornstarch/arrowroot powder - some people say this is a thickener, but they will also act by absorbing some of the moisture
Essential oils - if you want to scent your concoction

I'm in pretty early stages of experimentation.

I have read a lot about how the baking soda causes irritation - especially if this is put on right after shaving. 

Protip: shave at night.  I shower in the morning but I'll give myself a quick shave at night so my skin has time to heal before putting on the baking soda in the morning.

I used a small empty plastic hand balm container for this, which I put into a pan of boiling water so I could eat and mix everything in its final resting place.  I learned quickly not to use my measuring cup for these type of experiments.

My container fits about 1.8 oz and in it I've put:

1/2 teaspoon of  baking soda 
1 1/2 teaspoon of cornstarch
(about) 15 drops of tea tree essential oil (it's antibacterial so will combat smell)
3 grams shea butter (for a bit more stability than just using coconut oil alone)
2 tablespoons coconut oil 

I melted the oil and shea butter together, took the mixture off the heat and added in the powders and the essential oil. 

So far I've had no irritation, but I find the prescribed "pea sized" amount to be too much, creating a very oily surface, so I use less.  I also find that I do get a bit smelly by the end of the day, but if I don't put my shirt directly into the wash, the smell will be gone by the next day.

Next time I plan to add in a bit more of a stabilizer - maybe some beeswax, and up the amounts of baking soda and cornstarch. 

For now, though, my mixture is totally fine for days I'm not in work but if I'm going to have a bit more of a high-stress day, I'm sticking with the Toms.

Carrots and Baths

Did you know that carrot fly can only fly at a certain height?

I have no idea what height that is, but basically the theory is that carrots are best put into raised containers to that they're protected from carrot fly.  Plus, then you have better control over the type of soil they're grown in.

So, in the spirit of upcyling and preserving some of the history of our house, when we ripped out the old bathroom, we kept the old cast iron bath:

We even kept the taps!

It makes a really awesome planter for anything because it also keeps out the slugs and snails.

For drainage, and so we didn't have to use a huge amount of topsoil to fill it, we put broken bricks in the bottom of the bath, covered them with sand, and then filled up with topsoil.  In the first year we split it between salad greens and carrots, and the salad survived the Great Slug and Snail Massacre of 2012 completely untouched.  But, we loved the carrots so much it's all carrots now. 

Now, this thing is HEAVY.  It's cast iron, filled with bricks, sand and soil.  There was NO moving this thing.  Until we realised that it was in the way of the forklift for our extension...

Fortunately, the guys doing our extension are awesome.

Healthy eating on the cheap - this week's revelation

I hate wasting food.  I hate buying something and then either not using all of it before it goes off or, more commonly in my household, the fridge freezes it (we really need to get a refrigerator that doesn't freeze produce and yet somehow manage to leave the drinks warm).

In order to combat that, we used to make a list of meals for the week and do a big "weekly shop" at our nearest big grocery store.  Then we discovered the the Lidl nearest to our house is actually really quite good.  The problem with Lidl is that you can't walk in with a list and expect to be able to buy everything on it, they just don't have that kind of selection and a lot of the freshest food changes often. 

This week we did a version of the weekly shop in Lidl.  I still had a list of a few essentials that we were out of, but didn't have a weekly meal plan so concocted food plans as we walked through the aisles. 

I always thought that you could limit waste live more economically if you plan meals.  The problem with planning meals is that you have to think days in advance of what you might want to eat and, if you're me, you often end up making the same types of foods week on week.  These foods are good but it's nice to mix it up a bit.  

Amazingly this week's shop in Lidl, topped up with a few mid-week items from Tesco, came to about £35.  This covered the two of us for lunches and dinners and (due to us often buying lunches at work) ended up being nearly half of what we would normally spend on food in a week. 

Now, we did eat a lot of produce from the garden, but veggies tend to be the cheapest part of a weekly shop anyway so even if we had purchased everything I can't see it being that much more expensive.

This week saw me creating two new dishes that were super easy and healthy, which I'll post on here. 

Thumbs up to the Lidl shop.