Body Shop Tea Tree Mattifying Toner.

I am not at all flawless. In fact, I am flaw-ful. So, since I was a teenager, I have tried all sorts of facial products. The years of trying has actually brought me to where I am now -- uneven skin texture and a very oily face.

I do actually have a hormonal problem which I found out during my twenties... after years of experimenting. And that was the root cause of my imperfect skin.

Now that I am in my 30s, I have made a few adjustments to my lifestyle that have made me a bit more healthy. I should've done that years ago... but it is never too late to start taking care of your health.

As for my skin, I do not try so hard anymore, accepting my fate of having an imperfect, flaw-ful skin. And then I changed work and met new people. An officemate convinced me to have another go to taking care of my skin more. I does not really hurt to take care of a part of your body... only on the pocket!

My first plunge into the beauty world was the Body Shop Tea Tree Mattifying Toner.

I use this every night, after washing my face. Body Shop recommends this to be used both in the morning and at night but I resorted to just to do a thorough cleansing at night.

The product lives up to its promise of lessening the oiliness. I have indeed been less oily especially on my T-zone. It kind of smells like medicine -- but I think that is how Tea Tree smells. After several use, I was able to get used to it.

I think I may have found the right toner for me after years of experimenting.

(Not a paid entry)

Making Tea.

Growing herbs is my on and off hobby. I buy herbs, plant, grow them. They sometimes stay with me, they sometimes die. And then I have those that almost died -- but got rescued. There are also who are just so fit, I am able to propagate.

The best thing about growing herbs is when you get to use (or harvest) them.

Take for example my taragon and my mint. 

My sister M was the one who started it -- making tea from the dried herb leaves.

It's not really rocket science. I just cut the dried leaves from the plants.

Taragon

Mint

Dried leaves

I place the leaves on a coffee paper filter... paper filter placed on a teapot, poured hot water on it.

After around 4 minutes, voila.

Your homemade tea.

Learning Again.

My last post was back in February. Happy that it did not take me a year before writing another entry.

I have no other excuse but that life is indeed hectic. Every now and then, I find time to relax but the time is spent either sleeping or bumming around.

Yes... a lot of things has happened already. Big things. I hope to enumerate them in several posts. I might end up not actually blogging about them but will try my very best.

One recent thing that has made me be in touch with my creative self again is baking.

I had my kitchen re-done which meant buying a new oven. Of course, the idea is for me/us to use it.

But the inspiration really came from Gemma, a UK-based colleague from my ex-office. She was here on a 6-month assignment and had been baking whilst she was here in Manila, sharing her finished products to everyone in the office. She grew up in a place where baking is like cooking, anybody can just do it without any degree or extreme passion. All you need is be interested, a bit of research, some tools and ingredients.

I have attempted twice already. Both successful. I don't think I am a talented baker but I can do this, just like cooking, and come up with decent products that will certainly satisfy the diners inside our homey home.

My first legit baking - Chocolate Cupcakes. The recipe, I found in this link.

Ingredients 
Serves: 16 

• 1 1/3 cups (170g) plain flour
• ¼ teaspoon baking soda
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ¾ cup unsweetened cocoa
• pinch salt

• 50g butter, softened
• 1½ cups white sugar
• 2 eggs
• ¾ teaspoon (7ml) vanilla essence
• 1 cup (250ml) milk

Directions
Prep:25min  ›  Cook:15min  ›  Extra time:5min  ›  Ready in:45min 

1. Preheat oven to 180 C. Line a muffin pan with patty cups.
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition, then stir in the vanilla. Beat in the flour mixture alternately with the milk. Fill the muffin cups 3/4 full.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 15 to 17 minutes or until a fine skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Ice with your favourite icing when cool.

And after, Choco Banana Cupcake which was a big success. All consumed in 5 hours by the kids and adults.

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups mashed bananas

1/3 cup oil

1 egg

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 cups of flour

1/4 cup cocoa

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp baking powder

1 cup mini chocolate chips

sugar for sprinking on top

I added: 1/4 tsp vanilla and a pinch of salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. In a large bowl, combine bananas, oil, egg large mixing bowl.
3. In a separate large bowl, sift together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder (and the pinch of salt). Add to banana mixture. (Add the vanilla). Stir in chocolate chips.
4. Spoon batter into greased or lined muffin tins. Sprinkle the tops of each muffin with 1 teaspoon of sugar.
5. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes at 350 degrees F.

The second time felt easier with me baking much faster. I think I will be doing this for a while. 

Butter or vanilla cupcake, next?

Idioms.

It is the 2016 GREAT British Festival weekend so do not forget to drop by the Bonifacio HIgh Street grounds.

I thought of writing about the one thing that constantly amazes me while working with colleagues from the UK... their idioms.

It has become a topic of conversation recently in the office so one of my colleagues volunteered to write an idiom for the week in our board with the definition and give examples of how to use it. But even before that, whenever I hear something new, I would google the meaning then send a quick email to my husband -- maybe we could use them in our conversations (not really)!

Here are some and how I understood them.

1. "throw your toys out of the pram" - You make a big deal out of a small problem.. therefore you act like a baby.

2. "running around like headless chickens" - You quickly do things with no control or no aim. Or doing things without a plan, very disorganised.

3. "can't see the wood for the trees" - You are unable to see the big picture and there is too much focus on the details.

4. "cut off your nose to spite your face" - You purposely go through an inconvenience just to annoy someone else.

5. "pull up your socks" - You double up your efforts to improve.

6. "in a pickle" - You are in a pretty big mess.

7. "handed a hospital pass" - A term in football where the ball is passed on to someone who will more likely be hurt... apply this to everyday life.

8. "the jury is still out" - There is no decision or answer yet.

Filipinos do have idioms - we call it "kataga". While writing this entry, I did some googling and was surprised that we use quite a lot of idioms in our daily conversations, too. Perhaps, if my UK colleagues can understand Filipino, they will also scratch their heads when we say "bukas palad" or "mababaw ang luha". And they might also make us write the kataga for the week in our office board.

The #GreatBritishFestival is only until tomorrow. Please join the fun.

Art, Science, Toddlers and Sleep.

It has been more than a year since I had AC. More than a year of having two kids.

I had been a mom of one for six years before my girl came. I think I have raised a well-mannered, healthy, smart boy.

But nothing prepares you 100% for another new child.

The drills I have concocted on JG when he was a baby did not all work with AC. I had to find other ways to make her stop from doing something short of a disaster, make her sit on the car seat without any fuss and, yes, make her sleep.

It has been a year of theories, experiments, success and failures.

While I am no expert mom (again I only have two), I hope to share some of the ways I found to be effective in making my babies, actually toddlers, sleep... so the Mom can sleep well, too.

The Science of Pattern. This other moms swear by. And it has been effective on my two kids. Babies need to understand that there is a time for everything and having a pattern signals when the next activity is coming up. If you give him/her a bath or read a book before s/he sleeps, repeat that every night at about the same time leading to that quiet hour when they need to close their eyes.

Now, the tricky part is to deal with how your kid reacts to the signal for sleeping. My JG took it as it was - a segue to sleeping time. AC dreaded it.

The Art of Isolation. It is indeed challenging to have their playmate be in the same room while it is sleeping time. By playmate, I refer to their Dad. The sight of Mr. Mascot/Clown/Magician does excite these little creatures so the dad really needs to get into the program.

Again, JG with one stern look managed to simmer himself down. AC, on the other hand, does not back down while her father is within reach.

I have managed to be in control by putting the daddy (and AC's bro) to sleep first - which he, of course, welcomed wholeheartedly. Further to that and even if I love the feel of our bed, I have moved to the sofa bed with AC so she has no distractions but me. I missed my bed but I love my sleep more.

The Science of the Expensive Diaper. This worked for both kids. I am a cheapskate so I stock on cheap diapers used for the day and then stock on the expensive 12-hour dry feeling ones for the nighttime sleep.

Weighing the pros and cons of the expensive diaper was an easy one since as you may have realized by now, I value my sleep more than a pair of diamond earrings. So netting it all off, I think I have gained.

The Art of Suggestive Selling. This goes hand in hand with setting a pattern. And has worked with my little girl. She, as with other tots, always wants to have a bottle before sleeping. A few hours before bedtime, I bombard her with our codename for bottle - "didi". She laughs, I say "Didi?". She shouts, I say "Didi?". She dances, I say "Didi?". And then finally, she gives in and says, "Didi?". Sold.

The Art of Pretending. Worked well on both of them. I wanted my kids to sleep, my kids wanted me to play with them. It's all mind games - whoever is stronger in mind, wins. Of course, there were days when I was tired from office work and I just wanted to be still. These are the best times to pretend - pretend that I am asleep. Eyes should be super shut because of the serious eye poking attempts.

And because I have the stronger mind (and eyelids), the little critters just give up. And sleep. 

The Art and Science of Letting Go. If all else fails - where my cognitive and physiological strength cannot handle things anymore (we have our days), either I go ahead and sleep, or I do a bit of drama. With both kids, it has never failed, the Daddy wakes up and intervenes.

Peace and quiet.

This is how I am surviving two kids of different sleeping personalities.

Fishy. Fishy.

A few minutes after I published the entry about our house pets, I found Red Star lying on the his tank on one side. He died.

I was not devastated. I just had to re-live my failed attempts at taking care of an aquatic animal. My little boy, JG, was not sad but was quite scared - it was his first time to see a dead pet. And it did not help that our dinner that night was fish.

I went through a very short period of mourning while I tended to Red Star's vacated tank the next morning. I fixed the plants, cleaned the small cave, brushed the sides of the tank in and out thoroughly.

While I was at it, I realized that it was time to be serious about having a pet fish... thanks to my son's friend who gifted the fish, Red Star the fish and his therapeutic effect during my fish watching time.

That evening, we went to the Pet City in Bonifacio High Street. It has become my favorite store actually - very helpful and very patient to my endless questions and my piecemeal purchases.

We got five -- 3 Pink Danios and 2 Neon Tetras.

Aren't they cute?

And yes, I finally bought a tank filter.

When Red Star was around, I also found out that aquarium planting is relaxing. So I got myself into it. It does not take a lot - pruning and re-planting here and there. Sometimes, I re-position the plants and then, I think about the next plant to add into the small ecosystem.

The tank filter made the water quality even clearer -- I now have a nicer view of my pets and plants.

Extra Housemates.

I grew up with animals around. At one point, my parents' house had tons -- dogs, cats and chickens. Dogs, we had a lot until I grew up. My parents still have dogs until now. Then, there was the time when I attempted to take care of a few goldfish (they all died after two weeks), not to mention the snails I brought home from school (they all crawled away and got lost)! 

I have not seemed to outgrow pets. We did get one three years ago. Our yellow lab named Percy. Here he is now.

We got another dog two years later. This time a chihuahua. We named him Jake. Here he is the day I brought him home.

And now look. All grown up and playful as ever.

And then just recently, my boy got a gift from a classmate for the National Pet Awareness Day. He got a betta fish and named him Red Star.

He was in a fishbowl for a few days. Then, we upgraded his tank!

Red Star now has another companion - a snail named Garri.

I have been contemplating getting some more fish but my strong obsession about conserving electricity has been getting in the way. I know at some point my desire of seeing more fish in the tank will overcome me. Or perhaps, I will end up adopting birds instead.