The skinny on skin

I mentioned earlier this year how being in my last twenties (gulp) got me more serious about taking good care of my skin. Though maybe I should have started earlier, I made a commitment this year to wear sunscreen on my face all the time and to develop a healthy skincare routine.

Every day now I wash my face with an oil-free cleanser and moisturize with oil-free SPF 15-35 lotion. At night, I wash my face with the same cleanser, add a round with a pore cleansing lotion if I’ve gotten particular sweaty or grimy, and apply anti-wrinkle cream to my forehead, eye areas, and where my smile lines (not frown lines!) are.

I’ve just started using a cucumber and vitamin eye treatment as well, to reduce puffiness and circles as the worst of my seasonal allergies flare up.

Once I week, I add onto this routine a more thorough cleanse, which removes built-up impurities over the week, especially exfoliates, and leaves my skin feeling baby smooth. I use a Biore nose strip and a pore mask, especially over my most oily spots.

The result is a routine that is manageable, skin preserving, and fun!

Song for spring

Grab me

Take ahold

Don’t let me go

Wasted hours in the semi-shade

Seedlings dropping down

Grab me

Take ahold

This world keeps turning

Take ahold

On being merry

As the light streams in through the windows of my home, I am thankful for the simple things, like having a home and being surrounded by the beauty of nature, family, friends, and of course God's grace and love.

I know that not all days will feel like good days, but that all my days are a gift.

Hope this week has been a gift for you as well, and if there are hard times in your present, please know that there is joy on the other side of sorrow.

With the band

It’s hump day, which means it’s half way through a work week and time for a little in-between-the-daily-grind fun. For S and I, that means getting together for band practice. We are in the less-than-renowned Guitar Hero band The Chubby Chasers.

Yes, we know this isn’t a real band, and yes, we know what the name means. We happen to like promoting a healthy body image for our young, impressionable, and often-eating cat child. In our band is D, me, or “Chubbette” on lead vocals, S, or “Chubby,” on the guitar, and O the cat, or “Chubs,” band mascot, on the floor swiping at the microphone cord or nipping at our ankles while we play.

If our band ever put out an album, which is low on a list of all-time possibilities, but never say never, the following songs would be on it. Not all of them are Guitar Hero tunes, but they are all highly likely to be belted out sporadically by any member of our family in the car, upon walking in the door, or out very much in public somewhere. How else can we expose our talents?

If you’ve got the mid-week blues, enjoy the below playlist, which will be sure to cheer you up!

The Chubby Chasers – Greatest Hits of the Living Room

  One Direction: What Makes You Beautiful

  Taylor Swift: Mean

  Adele: Someone Like You

  LMFAO: Yes

  Gotye: Somebody that I Used to Know

  Jimmy Eat World: The Middle

  Queen: Somebody to Love

  Don Henley: Boys of Summer

  Lynyrd Skynyrd: Sweet Home Alabama

Clothes with a cause

There aren’t all that many things we do on an everyday basis that show the world what we stand for as clearly and simply as wearing clothes. Clothing is a fashion statement for some and just basic necessity for others. “Clothing with a cause” is an incredible hybrid between those two poles.

I think it is truly inspiring when people are able to incorporate their values into all aspects of their lives, like a “green” person who lives in a home with solar panels, recycles mercilessly, bikes to work, and eats local and vegan. While we might not be able to do it all when it comes to living our values out like this each day, I think clothes that support the causes you’re all about are a wonderful way to spread positive messages to others, and to look pretty groovy doing it. Here are a few of my favorite clothes with a cause:

She Dances Tees

She Dances is an organization that provides holistic restoration for young girls who have been trafficked and sexually exploited in Honduras. Profits from their clothing sales support the operation of a safe home for these girls.

She Dances believes that every girl deserves a life of love, opportunity, family, and a hopeful future - that every girl deserves to dance in freedom.

She Dances tees are dreamily soft, and carry the important message of She Dances on them either through printing of the She Dances name on the shirts themselves, or the printing of the She Dances motto “Freedom is here.”

Tom’s Sun Glasses

Most people know about Tom’s shoes, but the idea of one-for-one at Tom’s has been carried over to glasses as well, which is wonderful.

Not only are the sunglasses Tom’s sells some of most attractive pairs out there, but the purchase of a pair equals eye care for someone else in need.

Knowing a child or adult out there has sight in part because of you is a beautiful thing.

Five Bamboo Dresses

Many of us hope to leave the world better than we found it, but with our constant consumption of the earth’s resources, it’s hard to keep this promise.

Five Bamboo clothes are made from a vastly renewable clean, green resource with hardly any waste produced in the manufacturing process.

Let’s hope that more and more companies will have the vision and heart to consider mother earth as they create for its people.

Restaurant review: Acapulco's

This weekend S and I went south of the border, or if we're being honest, south on I-95 just a bit to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants - Acapulco's.

Though it's a chain and nothing too fancy, we were glad to find this place last year when we came to the shocking realization that our quaint/not-all-that-cultural little New England town had no Mexican food. This was before the Fat Cactus Catina opened up, and we were hungry for chips and salsa in the worst of ways.

Acapulco's gets too thumbs up for multiple vegetarian options, huge portion sizes, a pleasant bustling atmosphere, and of course those complimentary fresh, hot chips with homemade salsa.

Our wait staff was also very friendly and called us "señores," which added nicely, I thought, to the kitschy feel of the place.

It is so nice to have the opportunity for a date night on a beautiful spring evening, and fun to visit a favorite place where we're sure to come away stuffed to the brim with guacamole and leftovers for the fridge. It's good times like these that make the harried Mondays of life easier to take!

Sprouts!

It’s been a week since the world turned into spring all of a sudden, and I decided it was time to become a farmer.

Last Sunday, I rushed out to Target, loaded up the cart with planters, MiracleGro and little seedlings, and I got down to digging.

A week later, with some pretty routine watering and a little bit of warm weather here and here - sprouts!

I am so excited to see that at least some of the plants (tomato, bean, and wild flower) I’ve tended to have not yet died.

I am anything but a green thumb.

I’ll keep you updated as my DIY balcony-turned-plot-of-farmed-land project continues.