How To: Drink More Water

Water is essential for us, but what’s the bet you’re not drinking enough? I know I definitely don’t, but I try to as hard as I can. For a couple of months now, I’ve been consistently hitting my goal of 2L / per day (excluding teas, etc) and so, coming from someone who was lucky to drink a glass a day, I thought I would impart my (not so great) wisdom onto you all. We all know the benefits of more water; more energy, better skin, overall health, etc etc, so this is an important one! Enjoy!

Water Bottles
Considering the hype about health, there are always new water bottle fashions. Voss was one, then we all had to have that flat A5 water bottle, then a metal eco bottle…
Get a water bottle that you like. I know I never promote buying something as a good way to start a habit you’d like to make consistent, but this one does work. I have a couple of different water bottles that I use, but I always make sure I know EXACTLY how much water they hold so I can track how much I’m drinking. I mainly use a cheap plastic water bottle that’s 1L from the supermarket, and keep refilling it until it falls apart. I aim to get through two of these a day.

Task Measure
Drink every time you have a task – every time you check your phone, open an email/text, a new scene plays on TV, you watch a new youtube video – whatever. Even set it as on the hour every hour, you have to take a drink. This can be a sip or more, but set that habit for yourself to just keep going. This is what builds the habit.

Apps/Trackers
If you need to, use apps on your phone to track how much water you’re drinking. I tend to remember (two of the same bottle is pretty easy) and mark off in my bullet journal at the end of the day if I reached my goal or not, and at work I used to make little check boxes for each 500mL bottle I went through. There are heaps of ways to track water intake, just go through them till you find the one that works for you.

Flavouring
If you hate the taste of water, flavour it with fruits or even cordial if you must. Just get it into you, and figure the logistics of it out later. Flavoured water is better than none at all.

Challenge Yourself
It might be useful to challenge yourself if you’re competitive (or even a friend), by doing a week or two where you have to drink a certain amount of water per day. Challenging/games are very effective tools! Treat yourself at the end of it to a brand new water bottle, or maybe just an ice cream.

Deadlines

Give yourself deadlines – for example, if you’re really struggling, try to get down 500mL in half an hour. We manage to get water down before some types of ultrasounds, blood tests, etc, so it’s possible. Use that.

I hope this helped!

Zoe x

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Makeup For Bad Skin Days

When we have days where our skin isn’t looking the best, it can be so easy to want to load on the foundation and hide away from the world. Doing this, however, tends to worsen the breakouts and prolong their life span. Also, the last thing you want when you’ve got spots is to spend an hour looking at yourself in the mirror. So, I’ve developed a fast makeup routine for my bad skin days that makes me feel more confident but also helps my skin breathe a bit. It’s very simple, and all it does is even my face out a bit and help my confidence. I’m not trying to cover anything up, as spots are normal and if anyone thinks otherwise, they’re not living in the real world.

So, let’s get started!

After applying my usual skincare (updated skincare routine coming soon!), I use a combination of primers. One is the Elf blemish control primer to help my skin recover, but I will also use a pore filling primer to help even out the bumpiness of my skin.

Products Used:
-Maybelline Baby Skin Pore Eraser
-Elf Blemish Control Face Primer
-Chi Chi Super CC Cream
-Smashbox HD Concealer in Fair
-Collection Lasting Perfection Concealer in Light
-Maybelline Green Concealer Stick
-Tarte Amazonian Clay Pressed powder
-Benefit Hoola Bronzer
-The Balm Hot Mama Blush
-ABH Brow Pencil in Medium Brown
-Chi Chi Eyeliner in Bronze Ambition
-Two Faced Better Than Sex Mascara

Because I like to let my skin breathe, I use a CC cream, then concealer. If my breakouts are really bad I’ll use a green concealer first, but I’ll just dab a bit onto the back of my hand then press it onto the spot with my finger. I don’t go too heavy as you can see, I don’t really mind that you can still see I’ve got spots – everyone gets them. All I’m doing here is trying to make them appear a bit more calm while also helping them heal on their own.

I like to use a good quality powder on days like these that’s quite finely milled, as it sits nicer and makes all that concealer last longer. For bronzer, I will only use a matte as to not emphasise any texture, and for blush I like one with a sheen to it so I don’t have to apply highlighter for the same reason.

I’ll then fill in my eyebrows, throw some eyeliner in my tightline and load on the mascara – nothing fancy, just a basic look. I choose to have nothing on my lips except lip balm for two reasons:
a) I never really wear lipstick anyway
b) a lot of my breakouts are hormonal on my chin, so I don’t want anything near them to aggravate them. You can’t really tell in the images, but I have a split lip as well, so lipstick wouldn’t have worked even if my skin was clear!

Here you can see the before and after’s for yourself – there’s nothing fancy going on here, no heavy coverage or cake face. All I want to do when I’ve got some spots is not wear makeup and cover my face in spot cream, but I’ve got to go to work and therefore look somewhat presentable. So, unless I have a huge event on, I’ll stick to my theme of letting my skin breathe, while also eating well and drinking a lot of water.

Don’t forget your hair can also play an important part. Although it might be scary to tie your hair up when your skin is looking bad (we tend to hide behind our hair), if it isn’t the cleanest you might want to consider doing so to not antagonize your skin! Luckily in these photos I’d washed my hair the night before, so I was fine to leave it down – but it’s definitely something to consider!

*Disclaimer: I know that my skin isn’t the worst out there! I am lucky with relatively clear skin and I work hard at eating right, drinking enough water and using a good skincare routine to keep it that way. However, I still get the odd period where my skin says ‘fuck that’ and decides to ruin it all for me, and this is how I cope with it. Not trying to say you need to cover up any imperfections or that my skin is the worst there is*

What do you do when your skin decides to be ~problematic~?

Zoe x

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Meal Prep With Me: Lentil & Veg Stew

I’m such a big fan of meal prepping – they not only save money and time, but they also give you no option to eat like shit. I’m going to be sharing with you my favourite meal prep recipes! They keep well (I do 5x portions at a time for storage) and taste great in my opinion, whilst also being good for you. Bone app the teeth!

Lentil & Veg Stew

Ingredients (as much or as little of whatever you want!)
-sweet potato
-potato
-onion
-red onion
-leek
-garlic
-lentils
-diced tomatoes
-olive oil
-lemon juice
-cumin
-paprika

Chop up the potatoes and carrots into chunks and steam them until soft.

Finely chop the leek, onions and garlic, and sautee with olive oil.

When those are cooked, add the rinsed lentils, tinned tomatoes, spices and a dash of lemon juice and stir through.

After that, add the steamed vegies!

Divide up and store! I heat mine up and serve as is, or with some rocket, parsley or maybe some crumbled up feta.

Zoe x

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Healthy Blondies Recipe

Yesterday I found myself craving something super sweet, but I’m trying to cut back on my sugar intake. After some searching, I found this great recipe from I Quit Sugar, and made my own adjustments to it. Happy baking!

Ingredients

-2 eggs
-1 tbs rice malt syrup
-1/4 cup olive oil
-1tsp vanilla extract
-1 1/2 cups almond meal
-1tsp baking powder (I forgot to photograph this oops)
-1/4 tsp sea salt
-anything you want to put in them (I left mine plain, but you could use blueberries, raspberries, nuts, chocolate, whatever you want)

Method

-preheat oven to 180C
-grease and line a baking tray
-whisk wet ingredients together
-add dry ingredients and mic
-add in any extras
-bake for 20 mins (keep checking on it)
-let it cool, cut up and enjoy 🙂

 

Zoe x

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