Gōng xǐ fā cái! The year of the rabbit...

I taught in China for a few months quite a lot of years ago and have been back a couple of times since with work. Unfortunately I've never been there for Chinese New Year  (or Spring Festival as they usually call it) however one of my students kindly found some moon cakes for us to try (traditionally eaten at Spring Festival). They were a VERY acquired taste, very dry and heavy and apparently very high in calories!

This year, it is the year of the rabbit and it is apparently going to be a placid year of calm reflection after the year of the tiger.

D and I love to cook chinese food together so I'm planning a bit of a cookathon at the weekend. For special occasions or when out to dinner, Chinese people (in my experience) generally have a banquet of lots of different meat/fish and vegetable dishes followed by rice or noodles at the end. D and I usually try and cook at least 3 dishes (2 meat, 1 vegetable) but have some fried rice or noodles alongside.

We have a few cook books but the blog Sunflower food galore is my absolute favourite place to get authentic chinese recipes. My favourites so far are fish fragrant pork (not fishy at all before you start to worry!) and Chengdu chicken. I love spicy Sichuan dishes but there are loads of non-spicy dishes there too to try.

Skincare trial, take 2...

Following on from this post trialing Soap and Glory fab pore hot cloth cleanser, my skin really didn't improve at all. In fact, it remained resolutely utter rubbish - spots, blackheads, open pores etc etc. I do think it does some good, it leaves your skin feeling soft and smooth but I don't think it is especially suited to my skin.

For Christmas, a friend got me a trial size of Clinique 3 step system. Now, I've heard bad reviews of this so had never really considered using it. Also, I have used the Clinique acne products before and didn't find they helped much (I believe they contain salicylic acid which doesn't seem to do anything for me anyway). Still, I duly started using it, partly as it was easier to do a quick lather up with a face wash than go through the whole S&G hot cloth thing. I had the set for type 3 (oily) skin. I could feel it dry out my skin a little but it has also improved it no end, in just a short space of time. If I use it every day (as I have been for just a few days) I have no squeezable spots on my face at all.

So, I bought full size versions in Boots and the package has just arrived so I'm looking forward to using them every day and hoping that my skin improves. I also bought these:

LA ROCHE-POSAY EFFACLAR K

Soap and Glory Greatest Scrub of all

So, this time I will come back and review these. I'm hoping they will do the job and last a long time. The trial sizes of the Clinique products certainly have.

New jeans and Saturday casual outfit

I picked up some khaki cargo jeans from the Mint Velvet sale and I really love them, I hope the pockets don't make my thighs look tooo big! I could do with a slightly longer top to wear with them. They were reduced to £29 so a great buy, really nice denim and a lovely dull grey khaki colour. I'm wearing them with flat boots at the moment but think they will dress up nicely with my black wedge ankle boots.

So today, I've just been mooching around, cleaning, walking the dog and I'm about to make a pork vindaloo. This is the casual (fairly boring!) outfit I'm wearing:

Khaki skinny cargos - Mint Velvet, black l/s top - Gap, biker boots - New Look, red leopard scarf - Sainsburys

I also did my hair with a Babyliss Big Hair styler which is fantastic. I really like it with a few curls added by a 1 inch barrell curling tong. In the photo above, it is just rather windswept after walking the dog. I'll add a few curls if I go out tonight. I love how it gives a natural smooth look without being poker straight.