University is already taking it's toll on my skin. As a beauty blogger - and one that constantly posts skincare tips over makeup... - I feel pressured to always have perfect skin. Uni though as let that slide and I'd got into the habit of using makeup wipes rather than my whole makeup removal and skincare routine I was used to at home. I simply didn't have 30 minutes to spend every night on skincare any more!
Over the last couple of days I've been giving my skin a boost and a re-cleanse to apologise to my skin for all the damage it's been through the last couple of months!
The products I used for this routine (left-to-right): Liz Earle Eyebright Soothing Eye Lotion, Planet Spa Revitalising Retreat with Chinese Ginseng Peel Off Face Mask, Etude House Happy Essential Foam in Collagen, Simple Soothing Eye Balm, Avon Care Royal Jelly Lip Balm, Simple Hydrating Light Moisturiser and St. Ives Sensitive Skin Apricot Scrub.
Starting off I decided I needed to get rid of all of the basic layer of dirt and gross things building up on my skin, I started by applying the Planet Spa Ginseng mask and left it on until it dried out and peeled off. Then simply washed my face and went to sleep.
Sleep and water are easily forgotten about in a skincare routine and due to a lack of sleep, my skin has become dull and dry from not drinking enough water. I have now made it my mission to try and drink enough water every day and sleep for a reasonable amount of time!
The next day I grabbed my Apricot Scrub from St. Ives (which was voted the UK's No. 1 scrub brand!) and exfoliated my skin to get rid of the dry skin which was starting to form around in patches due to the cold weather and poor treatment...and of course a lack of hydration!
After this I went straight over to my pore cleansing brush from porebrush.com and used my usual foaming cleanser (Etude House's Collagen cleansing foam). The Collagen helps my skin to become more firm and leaves it feeling really soft and hydrated because the cleanser contains 40% moisturisers. Of course I wanted to deep cleanse so after using the pore brush to get into my pores and clean them, I wanted to make double sure that I'd got everything so went in with my exfoliating tool from Japan to get rid of all of the small bumps on my face that was missed with the first two steps.
After this my cleansing steps were done, I washed everything off and patted (not rubbed!) my face dry. Then with the Liz Earle eye lotion I took a cotton pad and applied this over my eye area to clean the eyes specifically. The aloe vera in the lotion also relaxes my eyes and brightens them up!
Focusing still on the eyes, the Simple eye balm reduces any puffiness in my eye bags and is great for students who don't get enough sleep!
Finishing off with some extra hydration, I applied a simple Royal Jelly lip balm from Avon and Simple's Hydrating Light Moisturiser to lock in some extra moisture and hydrate my skin even further!
And that everyone was a quick crash course on how to save your skin from any terrible habits or bad treatments you've been doing recently! I'm going to try and do this routine once a week - any more and I may over exfoliate my skin!
Let's look after our skin together! Good practices will slow down ageing and give you an overall more youthful and healthy appearance, so take 30 minutes out of your day to apply some products and save your skin.
Have a great day everyone and until next time, stay milky and keep your skin pure!
Apologises! I've been missing for so long...it wasn't even intentional...I just get so busy now and honestly I'm not sure these days how blogging fits into my life so I have to just have to try and figure everything back out again! Luckily I've taken to Instagram during this time because it's so much quicker and easier to do.
My instagram username is katielouiseclark. (Yes! I managed to get my full real name! :O)
This post is going to be pretty simple...I'll just share some basic life updates via photos!
Here's my first meal of university! Sort of...first thing I consumed when I arrived was a Starbucks! :O
Shot from my hall library, this is just at the end of the corridor...they have comfortable sofas. That is all.
There's a deer park across the road that I enjoy going to...I'll restrain myself and just post one deer photo...but head over to my instagram or twitter to see lots more of them!
Of course I was at uni for bonfire night as well! So here's one of the photos from that! I took more than enough pictures of fireworks that night!
I have more than enough food pictures as well! If you want to see what I eat every day...then instagram is the place to go. I'm one of the annoying people who posts pictures of every food I eat!
And of course, finally what kind of blogger would I be if I didn't post OOTDs?
Well that's a summary of my instagram! Feel free to leave your username on instagram down below because I need to check out some new people and I'll follow anyone who follows me back as well :)
Have a great day everyone! And sorry this is such a photo heavy post!
I've finally got some free time to work through my backlog this weekend, and one of the first things I really wanted to share with you all was the Graze box from Graze.com!
Like beauty boxes, this is a subscription box that can arrive as often or as rarely as you choose.
What is it?
A healthy snack box in the most basic terms. There's 4 different snacks per box. The box itself is small enough to be able to fit through the letter box! So you don't need to worry about being home to collect it or leaving it outside.
How do they pick what to send?
As I said, 4 snacks come in each pack. You are able to rate products as to whether you "love", "like", "try" or "bin".
The "bin" option ensures you're never sent that product (I can't stand raisins, so the first thing I did when I created my account was click bin on anything with raisins in).
"Try" is the default option and basically just opens you up to everything available (except the meat options. Meat is set as bin by default).
"Like" and "love" are generally used after you've tried a product and want to rate it. If you click "love" it should send it more often as well.
Some products have a "send soon" button. This allows you to request the product in the next box!
Prices?
They have so many different offers! So far I've managed to have 3 free boxes and I have another arriving soon. I literally can't wait for it! Using coupon codes - I'll list all of mine - you're able to claim a free first box, free 5th box and free breakfast box.
My boxes cost £3.89 but by using the coupon codes I can pretty much get most boxes free! I have cancelled my orders at the moment - moving to uni and all...I can't collect them from home! - but I used to get them every 2 weeks.
Adding up the amount you get...that's 97p per snack...that's an insanely good deal if you also consider that they're being delivered straight to your door.
Why I love Graze?
It's simple. It's healthy. It's relatively cheap. The boxes are so small that I can just put a punnet in my bag just in case I need a snack.
In short. I love graze. They're the only subscription box I've bought religiously.
And also to clarify...I'm not being sponsored by them! I just love these guys so much I wanted to share.
My Coupon Codes!
Now the bit you all want to hear about right?
If you'd like a free nibble box (the normal basic style) then enter the code PH12ZMTD or follow the links I've recently put on my Facebook and Twitter pages.
If you'd like an invitation to the Good Breakfast Club (to receive porridges and breakfast materials...it's invitation only at the moment) then enter the code KATIEL9T
And finally, there's also a kids box! If you'd like to try that then feel free to use my brother's code: AARONC9PB
I really hope you enjoy these boxes and try out graze! Even if you just get the free boxes and then cancel (which after you try, I'm sure you won't!) then at least give it a chance right?
I can't really explain this sequence of "life updates" which are just excuses to make it feel like I'm still blogging right now. Apparently freshers week makes it pretty hard to blog or do anything so I'm actually sucking at blogging these days.
Luckily I've taken some pictures of my dorm room at university (I'm at Nottingham guise) for you to browse at. And that's all I'm going to say! I don't think I really need to explain the pictures do I?
Well any questions feel free to leave them in the comment section below and I'll try to get back to them when I can! Have a great day all and see you soon!
Sorry guys! I've been a little negligent recently...I don't really have any new excuses! I've planned at least 10 blog posts in my head over the past week alone, but I just haven't had any time to go and write them! Even this one I've only managed to find a free 10 minutes!
As you can tell, it's still a little hectic!
I've got everything now and I'm just starting to pack, I've already trial packed my makeup to make sure it fits in my traincase fine! Luckily it just about makes it (wow...what's going to happen when I come back then? xD I'll have more stuff!) I'm slightly worried that I'm going to be overflowing with stuff...but I've been really good at cutting down on clothes and everything so I'm pretty proud of myself ;)
I'm not really sure what the point of this blog post is, I just missed you guys and wanted to share what I'm up to! I know I share a lot on my Instagram and Twitter...but it's not the same really! :'( I'll work on trying to post something on my Facebook Page every day because that's easy to do though!
Thanks so much for sticking with me guys though, looking through Bloglovin' every morning...it looks like September is crazy for all of us with going back to school, college and university! So good luck everyone with everything you're doing! Hang in there and enjoy life!
I know this has been really short again...and I'll probably go back over these quick posts later and delete them all because they're pointless...but I'm just letting you know I'm alive! xD
I bet you can't wait until everything goes back to normal...or a new normal anyway! I'll be sure to do a dorm tour once I'm in and unpacked! And I also still have to share with you all what I took makeup-wise on holiday...that feels so long ago now! It was almost a month! The pictures haven't even made it onto the computer yet though -_-
So you may have seen that it's getting more and more hectic now... I think I've purchased all of my stuff to move out now in a couple of weeks so as soon as I have time, I'll put the photos from the hauls in a post. But I just wanted to post something quick today to let you know I'm still here!
Considering you all seem to enjoy the K-Talk posts, here's another one! (Sorry! I know it's been so long now since a review or tutorial..) Here's a playlist I made recently!
Usually I just combine two of the song titles in the playlist to create the title unless I have an actual theme to work for (Christmas/Birthdays etc ;D) so this is just Seungri's and M.I.B's songs mixed.
I'm not going to go through every song, but my favourites on here have to be Seungri's new album tracks, Henry's Trap and NU'EST's new tracks!
If you'd like any translations of songs, artists, album or anything feel free to just stick it in the comment section below or mention me on twitter because I know some of you don't read hangul!
All of the songs in this playlist are Korean...and most of them are 2013 releases.
Sorry for the short post today, but:
What are your top five tracks for September? Recommend one artist in the comment section for us all!
I'm going to apologise right now for writing this post! I haven't got a single photo prepared for this one, I just wanted to sit down and just write. It's the 1st of September and for a while I feel like I haven't actually been updating what's been happening with me...I've been so busy recently but all I've been sharing is reviews and stuff! Not even a decent tutorial (don't worry I'm still practising my aegyo-sal!)
University
The thing you're all interested in still I assume? Well I've chosen most of my modules between now and Easter, I've got my accommodation sorted and now I just need to buy things like bedding and stationary! (Haul soon? ;D) It's all been a lot to handle at the moment actually! So it'll be really strange just upping and moving somewhere else! Yesterday I got a small television/computer screen and I have lots of small things ready to go, but all of the big important things are still waiting!
All everyone keeps talking about is Freshers though! And about how much alcohol they drink...honestly, although I drink...I'm such a control freak that I don't think I've ever been properly drunk. So that scares me!
Eating
I've also been having some diet issues these days. Which is hilarious because I posted about dieting recently! I think I've just been spending too long at home to be honest! My family all eat a lot! Which is alright for them...but I'm the shortest in my family and I have small stomach so I can't eat the same as the others. (which is another reason why I'm looking forward to moving out)
Social Life? (hah....)
If you're also a blogger then you'll understand what I mean. Although I've felt like I've seen a lot of people, I do prefer to sit here and talk to the Internet sometimes! I've had a pretty stressful week overall because I think I've just been out and see more people than my brain could handle, so I ended up fainting yesterday morning. Know your limits guys and stick to them!
Beauty?
I do feel like I've been slacking off on the beauty front! I had a huge breakout a couple of weeks ago from the stress of results day and I've been focusing more on skincare recently and now have 5 different cleansers to get my skin back to normal. Because I'm using so much skincare, I've been trying not to put anything other than BB cream on most days so I can breathe ;D
K-pop
Slightly irrelevant - or perhaps not because I spend my whole life with this - but K-pop at the moment has been great! The comebacks have been amazing and my baby Kim Heechul is back so I'm finally happy again!
Maybe I'll share another K-playlist soon as well because I've been making a lot recently!
I think I've covered everything there? If I feel like it'll help I might go back and put some pictures in, but I'm happy leaving it plain like this for now really! Especially because you can just check Instagram for almost daily updates!
Now I'm off to have a bath and finally calm down. I dread to think what my stress levels have been like recently but I know I need to fix that!
Thanks for reading this boring update and I've actually got a number of clips and programs bookmarked that I'd like to discuss with you guys so I'll be doing that probably leading up to and on Freshers Week, just so I haven't disappeared! ;D
I've been meaning to do another K-Talk for a while...but I haven't had anyone in particular to write about~ some of you wanted to see my bias list...but that's honestly so long that it's a tad embarrassing to write about. With EXO's comeback finally recently and my change in opinion towards them thanks to Kate, I thought I'd quickly fill you in on my opinions and we can have a little debate if you feel up for it~ but remember no arguing! ^^
EXO's repackaged album (Growl) really has changed my view of the group. Not of SM Entertainment of course *not sure anything can really change my view on them!* I think I now finally see part of what EXOtics go crazy for.
If you're even remotely in the K-pop fandom, you'll be aware of the fanwars between BAP and EXO. Nothing to do with the groups themselves, but the fans. I was always strongly on BAP's side (if it came to it then I still would be...sorry guys). From my point of view, BAP were working really hard on their comebacks..they've had so many! Even within the amount of time EXO have been promoting their first comeback, BAP have had 3...I could never understand the fuss about EXO.
But enough about BAP because this is a K-talk about EXO!
Kai always caused so many issues in my brain. I joined K-pop through SM Entertainment groups. I've had a lot with them xD I've seen the groups come through, from Super Junior to SHINee and now EXO...the boys always have a similar look. Stick all of the people under SM in one room and I can sort every male into 3-4 categories ranging from Cute to Cute-Sexy to Sexy....(then the Comedy line - Onew, Shindong etc.) SM have a clear face.
In no way am I saying this is a bad thing. All companies have it if you look closely. YG have the same - 4 girl types and 4 boy types, I've narrowed it down to.
But Kai reminded me so much of Taemin that it was disturbing...it was like SM was saying "Hey, Taemin has grown up now but here's a clone of baby Taemin so we can do the whole thing all over again!!"
Kai being the face of EXO pretty much didn't make my dislike any easier! Sure I acknowledged the fact that he was an amazing dancer and had good vocals...I just couldn't look at his face. xD
SM never make liking a group easy for me honestly. I've followed Super Junior since Kyuhyun joined...and I've had so many issues with the group. From the way SM manage them, to the reason they were formed and the stuff they say when they're not thinking....
And of course my issues with DBSK's situation. F(x)'s lack of promotion... SHINee's Taemin constantly being dressed up in girls clothing despite saying publicly that he wants to be more manly... SM have never been on my good side. But their artists are so talented that I have to put up with it.
I swore to myself that in order to stop the vicious cycle of me supporting SM groups, that after DBSK broke up I said to myself that the next group to debut under SM...I would just ignore them. I wouldn't watch the music videos, get the songs. I'd just pretend they didn't exist.
And BAM. SM comes back to me with this.
12 members. 2 nationalities. Crazed fans. .....And only one album. Wow.
SM sure know how to market. I'll give them that. EXO fans didn't stand a chance. From the amount of teasers (I still haven't finished watching) and the crazy wait between comebacks. SM have literally driven the teenage female population of South Korea completely insane. Yet they still don't have an official fan club.
I was very worried when EXO debuted for one simple reason. China. After Hangeng's incident, I wasn't sure how long the EXO-M half of EXO would last (I'm still not convinced). Sure foreign K-pop stars are everywhere now. We've got Nickhun, Sandara and Thunder, Jessica and Krystal, Fei.... they are everywhere really. But Jay Park, Hangeng (and Chocolat - yeah, remember them? Nope? That's because they were a girl group with 3 half-Koreans...notice the lack of publicity there!) show us that foreigners walk on a crazy thin tightrope. I was worried for the Chinese members that they wouldn't last.
Let's face it, Korea does focus on it's on half a lot more than M's half. I'm not sure about how China receives their EXO but I assume that it's alright...otherwise SM would have given up by now!
I just hope that EXO stand their ground. Growl was awesome. Full stop. That's what EXO needs. Not Pre-songs...not 50 million teasers. Not strange title sequences with bad English and trees.
I'll admit it now. I like EXO. I like EXO. Not SM. Just the group. Until one of them says something insane - along the lines of Super Junior's recent incident in which they announced that Henry has never and will never be a Super Junior member. <- not a good idea guys....especially because he's on more than you these days...
Sure this post has been a bit of an SM rant...but you guys should probably have expected that by now! If you're not a k-pop fan and you've sat and read this whole post...Firstly, well done! You've managed to get through all of that and probably had no idea what I was talking about. Secondly, I apologise for what seems to be a tangent!
All I want to say is that my annoyance has left me. I now watch Kai first when I watch live stages...I had EXO hit my top played artist of the week and I'm not ashamed... okay maybe a little.
But I'll always be team BAP. Until EXO all go blond that is.
So have a great day everyone, expect my schedule *Ha, what schedule* to get a little hectic because I'm moving out in less than a month now ^^ so I'm getting pretty busy! I want to try and figure out how much I can realistically post! Let me know if you enjoy the K-talk posts or any of the types because I'd prefer to make a couple of posts a week that people actually enjoy than trying hit or miss stuff every day!
What's your opinion on EXO? Do you have a bias in the group?
Are you able to separate the group from the record label, or do they go hand in hand?
Photo Credits: SM Entertainment, SBS, KBS and any other company who owns these pictures. I do not own any of the images in this article.
I finally braved it enough to try another Lemon Sheet Mask. My last experience with The Face Shop Lemon mask left me pretty scared...and I didn't want to try another one again. But it's summer and I wanted something whitening. And what's more whitening than a lemon?
So I went for it!
Just sharing the packaging...even though it's in Korean
This pack is from 3W Clinic. (Is it just me wanting to call them Samsung ones because of the Samsung logo at the top?) I've never used anything by them before...and probably wouldn't have even acknowledged them because they're not a popular brand...but actually I definitely prefer this mask to The Face Shop one!
I forgot to get a picture of the mask with my camera... but luckily I took one on my phone!
Overall?
Definitely repurchasing! The fit isn't too bad, it's pretty whitening and it didn't break me out like the last one. Just make sure when using lemon masks - or any sheet mask - that you aren't sunburnt or have any cuts along your face because they will become irritated!
Rating: 5/5
After the mask! Everything seems pretty even (other than my spot on my head...xD)
I haven't reviewed a nose patch for you for a while! Last up I did Liole and The Face Shop and before that I did Nesura! Now we're off to Nature Republic. This also marks the first ever Nature Republic product I've tried!
I was going to put this patch on my nose like my usual ones...but then I realised...I'm not restricted to anything right? Well Instead I decided to put it on my chin. I've only tried on chin patch before (from Etude House) and that was pretty good so this has a lot to compete with.
Ingredients in English and instructions...it's all common sense really. Just make sure you've got a clean face and then stick the patch over the area. Once it dries out then remove it and wash your face. Done!
Verdict:
This one is hard. There's honestly nothing wrong with this patch. But notice the darker colours? That's when the patch literally disintegrated from wetting my face before using it. I've done the same to all the other charcoal patches I've tried and that's never happened before. But that's a very minor thing! Overall I do really like this patch. Not enough to repurchase because I'd rather stick to Liole or The Face Shop as the fitting of those was better for my face. But perhaps as more of a forehead or chin patch!
Also, I received this as a free sample with an order anyway so considering it was free...I'm impressed! ;)
Rating: 4.5/5
Have a great day everyone and...
What's your favourite brand of Charcoal/Blackhead Patch?
So apparently everyone in the UK uses this concealer if you believe the scale of the hype YouTube creates around this product. When I finally needed a new concealer after my Innisfree one ran out, I went to check out this!
Colour
We all know how pale I am. Most brands of British products don't acknowledge my skin colour...but to be fair to Collection, when I bought this I tried concealers from all of the top brands in the UK and they all came out orange other than this one!
Concealing
What's the point of a concealer? To conceal of course! Now thanks to my Cleansing routine (Click on the Ulzzang Skincare Tab at the top to follow my routine with me) I don't have many pimples or spots so I couldn't test how good it was at concealing them...but what I can test with is dark circles and blue veins!
Honestly I think it rates pretty well on this front for the price. Considering I'm not using a foundation before or afterwards, the coverage on this alone is better than most of the other concealers I've tried. I prefer the convenience of a stick but the liquid type is easier to blend...
Packaging
Sucks. Full Stop. A day after I bought it all of the writing on the sides of the packaging rubbed off, luckily I was so paranoid about spilling it in my makeup bag that I had it in a plastic bag...but then black ink was left everywhere. The packaging just seems badly designed. It doesn't feel cheap or anything, just bad.
Natural?
My issues with concealers seem to be that they're all either orange or white. The either reflect everything and then you need to apply it everywhere to avoid white patches...or they're orange and don't blend well.
This one is on the whiter side, which if I had to pick a side I'd pick that one!
Repurchase?
Honestly? Not right now. I want to try some more~ Specifically Etude House. But given the fact that it's only around £4 I might have this as an emergency concealer. There's nothing bad about it honestly. But nothing special that's drawing me to repurchase when this runs out!
This is a quick update/informational post. So there'll be no pictures in this one I'm afraid!
First of all, let's go to results day. The most awful and stressful day of my life. Everything went exactly how I wanted...yet somehow I'm still left feeling awful. Yesterday (well two days ago for when you're reading this) was results day and I went into school after waking up at about 8am-ish...turned on the tv (first mistake) and saw other people with all of their results. People sitting up logging into UCAS...
Honestly I was fine until I had to open the envelope! I opened the seal and then threw the paper at my mum without reading it. I'm so glad she looked at it first though! My results are never all of one thing. I always have a pretty big mixture of results and last year I had A's and U's at the same time. Although this year I didn't have the same variation of grades, I still failed one module and received almost full marks in the other. That's probably why I'm always calm on results days because I'm neither happy or sad!
Basically, getting to the end of it all. I'm now a university student! I'm off to the University of Nottingham to study Philosophy. That's probably an odd choice for me right? I still can't justify why I picked Philosophy! I just like it guys okay. I start in 5 weeks, so I'm off on holiday when you read this and when I get back I'll have a month. Life should get a little more interesting then hopefully! I don't know whether I'll end up doing more or less posts than I do now. I want to try and set myself a proper schedule and share everything with you guys~
Overall I'm pretty satisfied with how Thursday went down. It was all a little hectic...and unfortunately you also may have seen "Pub Katie" that day as well. I won't say I'm drunk Katie...but yep I hope you all enjoyed those tweets!
I'm going to be honest with you guys though. I'm completely unprepared for this and hopefully this week away from everything should help me get my head straight and figure out everything that's going on. Some of my friends I've known for my whole life. I've had the same room for 12 years...and now it's all going to change within the space of a month. But I'll actually go for 31 weeks, that leaves 21 weeks back at home so I'm not actually moving out. My room is going to stay exactly how it is right now...bed made and all (does that just creep me out? xD)
And now I'm writing this at 9pm the night before I travel and you should be reading this when I'm halfway there.
If you haven't been keeping up to date, I'm off down to Devon today for the week to go and sit on some beaches (and take some great photos ngl). After this post I'll schedule some more for you throughout the week so you don't miss me too much ;D
But the point of this post is actually to also let you know that although I won't be blogging - I'm not taking my laptop - I'll still be active on all the SNS.
Don't worry! I'll still have my phone and tablet and I've got WiFi connection even if my phone signal is never great out there!
So I just quickly wanted to share all of my contact details with you all here.
Just click on the icons to go to my profiles and follow/friend me!
And of course if you didn't know, my KakaoTalk and Line ID is "milkeipure" and my Snapchat ID is also "milkeipure" so feel free to add me on any or all of the three of them!
I'm going to sign off now with a picture of my buddies who also got into University!
Have a great day guys and I hope all of you who also received your results got everything you wanted! And if anyone lives or is going to be living up Nottingham way then feel free to drop me a message!
