I decided to pen down my monthly favorites across various categories e.g. food items, skincare, make-up products, books and even home decor stuffs. So here is a list of my January 2021 favorites.
Looms and Weaves Dry Kerala Ginger powder – I do not take sugar or any artificial sweetener in my tea. It is also little difficult to grate ginger every time I am pouring myself a cup of tea. So this dry ginger powder is a quick fix. I tried spices like cinnamon and cardamom from the this brand called looms and weaves and they were of amazing quality. So, did not hesitate to order the ginger powder from this brand. The flavor and smell feel authentic to me. It is organically grown and free from any preservatives. I bought the 50 gm jar first for just Rs. 140 and then later bought a 100 gm jar for Rs. 230 from Amazon. Sadly, the 50 gm version came in a glass jar but the 100 gm version came in a tin jar but anyway the product does its job. You can also use it for cooking or baking purposes.
Organic India Tulsi Mulethi Tea bags – My entire family loves the Organic India tea because of their health benefits. I have influenced a lot of my friends to buy them and they were pretty happy after using. The Tulsi Mulethi is a new variety that I found on Amazon. You can also get it from Fab India Stores. There are 25 tea bags inside the packet. It is particularly useful for reducing stress and to boost immunity against cough and cold. I just love the aroma and it instantly relaxes my nerves. Definitely worth a try.
Nykaa Own it like Masaba Nail Polish – I bought 2 shades from the Masaba Range of Nail paints in the shades – Savage 293 (color- leafy green) and Unfiltered 292 (color- Teal). I love both of these 2 shades which come for around Rs 199 but I got them at Rs179 for 15% discount which is a pretty good deal. The colors are bright and fun with a glossy finish.
Brown Kajal/kohl Pencil – I tried 2 brown Kohl pencils. Brown Kohls gives a softer look to the eyes as compared to black ones and I prefer to use them for my lower lash lines. So the ones I tried were Nykaa Glamoreyes Color Eye Pencil in the shade Bronze Beam and the Sugar Kohl of Honour Intense Kajal in the shade Brown Bag. The Nykaa Eye pencil comes for Rs 450 for 1.2 gms of product and the Sugar Kohl Pencil comes for Rs 249 for 0.25 gms of product. I liked both of them and will do a detailed review in a separate post.
Books – My current reads are Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely and Calcutta Chromosome by Amitav Ghosh. Predictably Irrational is a book on behavioral Economics and has been a very enjoyable read for me so far. The Calcutta Chromosome is a fictional novel which has been very popular but I didn’t get a chance to read it earlier. I am hoping to complete both of them by next weekend and will share a review soon. I know I really hate to read a book with multiple breaks but my current schedule has been crazy and I even hardly got time to write a blog post here.
Just today I was thinking of getting into a train and set out for a long unplanned journey. How exciting that would be!! Can’t tell you how much I am missing the mountains given that I have been stuck at my home for 7-8 months now. Hence, thought of completing the blog on my Munnar trip. Atleast this way I will get to recap my memories. We visited Munnar in February 2020; just a few weeks before the lockdown started in India.
Munnar is a hill station in the Western Ghats mountain range in Kerala, India. The entire town is surrounded by luscious tea plantations. It is also a very popular tourist attraction because of its diversity of nature. You will get to see mountains surrounded my misty clouds, enjoy the serene views around the lake banks and also soak your eyes with the greenery around.
I am not someone who likes to put a tick mark on all the tourist spots recommended in Google when I visit a place just for the sake of it. I like to take my own time to explore, relish and cherish the beauty of a place. So please expect the travel guide to Munnar to be written in a same tone 🙂 Here we begin!
How to reach Munnar: Munnar does not have an airport. The closest airport is at Kochi. So anybody can take a fight till Kochi and then take a cab till Munnar. Kochi to Munnar takes almost 3.5 – 4 hours by road including the time to explore a few roadside tourist spots or just for a quick stop to enjoy the freshness around. Also, you can take a bus directly till Munnar from Bangalore or nearby cities but the bus journey is around 11-12 hours which can be difficult for elderly. In our case we visited Alleppey first. So we took a cab from Alleppey to munnar. We started sharp at 9 am from the alleppey boat jetty and stopped 3-4 times to visit the beautiful spice gardens on the way. We had our lunch at a place called ‘Rasa’. If you are looking for authentic Kerala thali or want to eat on banana leaves please pay this place a visit.
Crispy Dosa at Rasa
Finally we reached our hotel in Munnar at around 4 pm. Usually Alleppey to Munnar takes 3.5 -4 hours but because we stopped at many places on our way it took us more.
Where did we stay: We stayed in Le Celestium which was pretty close to market yet at a relatively quieter place. The staff and managers were very helpful and they gave us a room at the top floor with a mountain view and also quickly arranged for a local taxi for sight seeing and airport drop at a reasonable price. The room and the washroom was very clean and came with 2 balconies where you can just sit and enjoy the view.
First Day at Munnar: Our hotel was at a walking distance from the KDFC Floriculture Centre where you will get to see loads of beautiful flowers, exotic cactus, rare plants etc. Since we reached Munnar at 4 pm we just walked around and found this place within 1 km radius of of our hotel. There was a very minimal entrance fee (Most probably 40-50 Rs per person; not sure).
KDFC Floriculture Centre
We came back to our hotel and ordered some snacks. For dinner we just went out and found a decent place called Gurubhavan and ordered a kuttu paratha which was mentioned as a special dish of the restaurant. Now let me warn you here; it is nothing like a usual paratha or bread rather it was like paratha crumbs along with egg and chicken chunks and I guess you can spot the chillies from the photo itself. It was SPICY; so eat at your own risk :p
Kuttu Paratha
Second Day at Munnar: So the hotel arranged for a sedan for entire day sightseeing at INR 1500. After breakfast we started our tour. Now I need to mention that the taxi driver gave us tour packages of 3 types but we could not visit the Eravikulum National Park as it was February and the park was closed for some reason (They said it was the animal’s mating season but I am not sure. So do check before planning in case you want to go to Eravikulum for sure).
We saw plenty of tea plantations on our way and the view of the mountains, occasional clouds and the greenery was just breathtaking. Munnar’s weather is really unpredictable. It can look all sunny and bright and suddenly it can get cloudy and start raining. We stopped here and there and clicked some pictures.
Munnar Tea Plantation
Our first stop was at Blossoms national park which is again a botanical garden with lots of exotics cactus, flowers, plants. They also had a shop inside the park where we bought coconut oil, spices, tea samples, homemade chocolates etc. I must say the price was cheaper if you compare it to online prices. I have been using the coconut oil and spices and all of them are really good.
Next stop was the Mattupetty Dam. The car dropped us outside the dam and we took a walk around the place. The dam is used to conserve water to create hydroelectricity. The view was really serene and the cool breeze took away all my stress. The great part was that on the other side of the dam you can see the tea plantations as well. We went a bit uphill inside the tea plantations. There were also boating activities available.
Taking a walk around Mattupetty Dam
We next visited the Kundala Lake which also offered a very relaxing view on our way towards Top Station.
We did a lot of souvenir shopping in between. One tip to share here. The street side shops outside the Mattupetty dam were particularly delightful as they offered us good discounts and I found some knick-knacks for gifting which I didn’t see anywhere else in Munnar:)
We also visited Echo point which was basically a valley where people were screaming just to hear their sounds back. We saw a lot of college goers there enjoying with there friends. I probably have surpassed that age and hence quietly sat there for a while :p You can give it a skip if you are not interested in hearing Echo of your own voice.
Echo Point
One thing I wanted to mention is that Kerala is a very popular tourist attraction and hence they have actually a very strong selling strategy for all their locally produced products of small sellers. So you will find that the drivers or guides or hotels will always push you to take you somewhere where they can sell you stuff. So be careful and use your own judgement.
Now we started for Top station which is little far from the Munnar town (around 30 kms). It falls between Tamilnadu and Kerala Border. It is famous for the Neelakurinji flowers which blooms once in twelve years. As mentioned earlier weather is Munnar is rather unpredictable and our driver told us to visit top station before 1 pm otherwise it will get too cloudy. Sadly when we reached it was very cloudy. We could only get a glimpse of the panoramic view. The clouds surrounded us and we couldn’t move further.
Now again we started coming down and stopped at the Kannan Devan Hills Tea Museum. We had to buy a ticket to enter the place and see how tea leaves gets processed and also got some useful tips on how to brew different varieties of tea like green, black and white which I had no clue earlier. There were some entire day tea planation tour available as well where they will take you to the plantations and show you how they do it but we did not have time for that. If you want to buy some tea you can buy it from their store outside the museum. Before buying we tasted a few options as well. Again it is worth mentioning that the tea we bought were cheaper than what we get in market for same quality.
Kannan Devan Hills Tea tasting
We stopped for lunch at a traditional Kerala Home style Food. It was pure veg and they gave us a thali with rice, sambar, curries, papad, some sweet for INR 100.
And that was the end of the day for us. Rest of the day we just took a lazy walk around the markets and had dinner at the hotel.
Next day after breakfast our driver came. We booked a sedan for Munnar to Kochi airport drop for INR 3000. It took us around 5-6 hours to reach the airport. Usually Munnar to Kochi airport takes around 3 and a half hours but we stopped in the mid way, clicked pictures around the tea plants and a few waterfalls which were almost dry. We also stopped at a spice garden again and went inside for a jeep tour of the entire spice plantation. We saw amazing spice plants like cloves, cardamoms etc. and even the neelakurinjee plant (without the flower). You can see the green cloves in my mom’s palm (in the pic below) which turns black after getting sun dried. We bought a bottle of Kerala special herbal hair oil from their shop. The oil turned out to be great later.
So yeah that’s the end of my Munnar trip. Hope you enjoyed reading about it. Happy Sunday 🙂
I got my hands into the Laneige Cream Skin Refiner finally after hearing rave reviews about it. When I first checked out the product on nykaa I was little confused about the ‘Skin Refiner’ part. As per the product description it was written that it is a “Miraculous skin fortifier, deep hydration repairs and strengthens skin barrier. It is a toner with new formula in which a whole bottle of cream is dissolved with safe ingredients to keep the skin hydrated and healthy. Leave your skin moisturized at the first step of your skin care routine with Cream Skin Refiner.” From the description I felt this is a toner but may have a moisturizing effect as well and decided to give it a try. So here is my review of the product.
Price and Quantity: The product comes in 2 sizes. The 150 ml bottle retails for INR 1850 and the 50 ml bottle retails for INR 750. I bought the 50ml one just to try the product first. It comes in a simple translucent white sturdy plastic bottle with a white cap. You just need to simply pour the product on your palm. There is no pump or anything like that; very standard packaging as expected from a toner.
Laneige Cream Skin Refiner
Laneige Cream Skin Refiner
Features:
– A two-in-one formula that preps and softens like a toner and moisturizes like a cream
– With Cream Blending Technologyâ„¢ exclusive of Laneige, a jar of cream is dissolved in skin toner
– With White Leaf Tea Water having content of amino acid enriched through the specialized shadow-growing method
– It strengthens the skin barrier and provides a lasting moisturizing effect
– Cream Skin Refiner is filled with mild and safe ingredients which provides moisturizing effects for dry and sensitive skin
Price point wise I feel the product is pretty reasonably priced if we compare it to other K-beauty toners.
The packaging is on-point. Whenever I think about Laneige packaging all their products are packaged in a way which is user friendly with high quality material and muted yet beautiful colors. Their lip sleeping mask comes in pink tubs, water sleeping mask comes in blue tubs and hence cream skin refiners come in white bottles. No surprise. They want to visually send a message to the customers of their product’s intended usage. I dig that.
Now coming to the ingredient list. Obviously I do not have any professional qualification about this but I do check the ingredient list and do my research. The first ingredient is water as this is a water based toner. Their ingredient list mentions Meadowfoam seed oil which acts as an emollient that creates a protective seal over our skin to lock in moisture. It contains butylene glycol which is a Conditioning agent that add a layer of softness or improved texture to our skin. 1,2-hexanediol is used as a synthetic preservative and moisture-binding solvent which creates the clear liquid consistency and also helps to dissolve other substances. This does not contain any nasty chemical like paraben or phthalates.
When I first pour the product onto my palm I saw a milky white water like/ runny consistency which is what a toner is supposed be like. I simply applied the toner on my face and pat it dry slowly with my fingers. It got absorbed quickly and instantly my skin felt very moisturized and hydrated as well. This is not exactly how we feel after applying a toner right. This is where the cream skin refiner part is coming into play. It looks like a toner and feels featherlight on skin but leaves the effect of a moisturizer. This product is supposed to work great for normal and dry skin. However, it worked really great for my oily skin in relatively cold and dry weather. Not sure how it will feel in a hot and humid weather though. Laneige claimed to use a whole bottle of cream inside a bottle of toner using their trademark cream blending technology. That sounds scary for someone who has oily skin but it felt absolutely nourishing and hydrating for me without having any greasiness or any discomfort to be precise. This is indeed a magic bottle.
Coming to how I added it to my skincare regime, I firstly washed my skin with a cleanser and then applied this toner and after that applied the Laneige water sleeping mask before going to bed. When I woke up my skin looked super glowing and felt moisturized. This toner works great with a night cream or a light moisturizer and it will not make your skin heavy or greasy for sure.
Am I going to repurchase this? YES! for sure 🙂 It won my heart.
Hope you found this review useful. Please keep following the blog. Happy Sunday 🙂
I decided to buy a planner for myself (Finally I know!) after looking at the numerous bloggers and influencers and how they always talk about how useful a planner is in their life. So yeah I got ‘influence’ and bought one for me. All my efforts to read behavioral science books to control my splurging went in vein. Till now my planner was my brain but given that I am 29 and taking more than 2 minutes to remember people’s names; I thought it is high time I maintain a planner and show people how busy I am :p
I have been following Alicia Souza for 4-5 years on Insta and I love her cute and quirky designs. One of her selling point is her relatability and unassuming personal brand. I bought the planner from her website directly. There was an offer going on that if someone buys products worth INR 3000 they will also get freebies(Mystery Bag) worth INR 2500. So I jumped at the offer and bought my first planner along with a few other things. Here I am going to share my reviews of the products I got.
What I bought :
The Undated Ultimate Planner with Free Undated Pocket Planner + Sticker Book – INR 1799
Happiness Notebook (Hardbound spiral)- INR 350
Humming Bird Notebook (Hardbound spiral)- INR 350
Savasana Phone Cover
The Planner came in a cute cardboard box as you can see in the pics. I am using the box to keep my knick-knacks. I chose the undated planner because I was not sure how disciplined I will be and hence for proper utilization chose to go for the undated version. What I have understood is that the undated version is very similar to the 2021 planner. So I did not lose much in terms of features. Here is a list of things you will see in the undated planner. Overall the paper quality and usability wise the planner is awesome.
Alicia Souza – Undated Ultimate Planner
It has some extra sheets of stickers
Monthly Budget and Planning Pages
Habit and Period Tracker
Shopping list /Task list etc.
Space for detailed daily entry and notes
Extra pages for notes at the end with folder to store loose papers/cards etc
Beautiful Bookmark
Colorful Monthly Dividers
The pocket planner is something you carry while travelling/shopping. The notebooks are A5 size and hardbound. In terms of paper quality I expected better for the price I paid. It is not suitable for writing with a gel pen. You will get the impression on the next page. Of course the cover is very cute. The phone cover is something which I really liked. The color looks even better than the picture and it is sturdy.
Alicia Souza Savasana Phone Cover
Humming Bird Notebook (L) and Happiness Notebook (R)
What I got in the Mystery Bag :
Things I see in India that are super endearing (Hardbound Journal with 1 sheet of sticker);100 Pages – INR 799
PAPA Coffee Mug – INR 399
Keep Away Cotton 2 Ply Face Mask – INR 299
You are my Rock Magnetic Photo Frame – INR 350
I hate that I really Love You Magnetic Photo Frame – INR 350
The ‘Things I see in India Journal’ is part of Alicia’s doodle series posted on Insta. I wish the journal was spiral bound. However, paper quality of the journal is better than the notebooks. The coffee mug was a sweet surprise for my Dad. The Face mask is super cute and made of good quality cotton. The magnetic photo frames are super cute as a fridge magnet but honestly they are too small. Also, I noticed that I received products worth INR 2200 whereas they promised to give products worth INR 2500 but anyway overall I really loved the mystery bag.
Hoping to start 2021 in the right way armed with my planner 🙂
2020 has been all about skincare for a lot of us owing to lockdown. I really feel good about this aspect that I became aware of my skin and what it loves and what it doesn’t this year. This is a big achievement for me. I also made some informed decision while buying good skincare products. Thanks to all the research I did this year 🙂
So here is a quick recap or you can say “my recommendations for 2021 skincare products to look out for“ as well. For most of these products I have already posted my reviews in my blog. So I will just post links to the reviews.
Face Mist / Toner: Facial mists are something which I use all the year around; at home, at office, while traveling (obviously before quarantine) especially in summer and even in winter as well for that quick touch of freshness. I prepared a couple of DIY face mists at home which are super easy to make and great for our skin too. Please check the post here and here where I have shared some quick tips. I also loved the Lavender Mint Facial Spray with clay sage from the brand Urvija.
Face Masks : I specifically used 2 face masks this year. One is from the the brand Plum. I love their Green Tea clear face mask which makes my skin look very smooth and clear instantly . The second one is the Super volcanic pore clay mask from Innisfree. This one is obviously very popular and needs no introduction. While the tea tree face mask costs almost half of the volcanic one but I want to mention that it really makes my skin bright and refreshed after every application. Also, one extra point to Plum for being a Made in India brand as well :p
Serums: I invested quite a lot on face serums this year. In general I really like the concept of serums. My most liked serum for this year is the Hyaluronic serum from the brand Dot and Key. Absolutely loved how light and refreshing it feels on my skin and also for that glow. I have tried Dot and Key’s other products but this one is hands down the best. A special mention to theirMorning awakening serum. Check out my review for ithere.
Hand-creams: Tried and tested quite a lot of hand creams. I reach out to my hand cream almost every hour owing to my dry hands. The one and only thing that have worked for me is the Bodyshop shea butter hand cream. Absolutely love the smooth and soft hands it gives me.
Hair Care : Mostly used virgin coconut oil that I bought from Kerala and the Kama Ayurveda Bringadi Intensive Hair Treatment Oil through out the year. This year I started using herbal Henna for the first time. I specifically used the Khadi Natural Nut Brown Henna and the Shahnaz Husain Henna Precious Herb Mix. I will do a separate review on the henna later as I am not using them in winter.
All of these mentioned products are going to be part of my beauty bag in 2021 as well. Hoping to discover some amazing skincare stuff next year as well. Thanks for following the blog!
Given the fact that there are not many retinol serums available in Indian market I decided to try the Time Reverse Retinol Serum from the brand Dot and Key. The decision to use retinol serum was based on the numerous great reviews I have got from famous youtubers and bloggers. However, some of the most popular ones are either very expensive or not available in common platforms. I guess Dot and Key is one such brand which is trying to create a lot of different types of serums which have high public demand in India. I have tried their Hyaluronic acid serum and Vitamin C serum and I liked them. Now let’s give you my review on the retinol serum.
Price and Quantity : The product comes in a 30 ml bottle with a dropper and it retails for INR 1195. You can buy the product from Nykaa or from the official Dot and Key website.
Description :
This supercharged anti-ageing serum promises a three-pronged action :
Reducing fine lines
Fading dark spots
Enhancing skin’s elasticity.
The retinol serum contains Tripeptides and Retinol, that slows down skin ageing by capturing free radicals and promoting collagen regeneration.
Infused with a botanical blend of Rosehip, Ylang Ylang & Geranium Oils, and highly moisturizing vitamin E & A
Let’s first talk about why we do need retinol. You will find plenty of blogs to understand what Retinol does and why people are going gaga over it. However, I did some digging into actual scientific research papers and found some interesting facts. First of all let’s understand that ageing of skin can be of two types. Chronological ageing is an inevitable process whereas photo ageing is the premature ageing of skin occurring due to exposure to ultraviolet radiation. Â Photoaging is the superimposition of photodamage on intrinsically aged skin generally bringing about premature aging. This specific damage occurs by chronic exposure of the skin to UV light. Hence, the skin becomes coarse; epidermis thickens initially and then thins resulting in loss of elasticity. Hence, our skin can experience wrinkles, irregular hyperpigmentation etc. The pores of the skin become larger. Although retinoids show promise in the treatment of skin aging but it can cause irritant reactions such as burning, scaling or dermatitis. Other retinoids mainly represented by retinaldehyde and retinol are considerably less irritating. The importance of retinol (vitamin A) was discovered during World War I. The modern history of retinoids, however, began in 1909 when an essential factor in the fatty extract of the egg yolk, called vitamin A, was discovered. Vitamin A cannot be synthesized by the body; hence it needs to be supplied to the body. Various studies have confirmed that retinol should be effective in the treatment of aging and photoaging. Another research was conducted on usage of retinol with other anti-ageing products and a successful study published that repeated topical application of a preparation containing both retinol and vitamin C could reverse, at least in part, skin changes induced by both chronological and photoaging.
So, before using the product I knew that my skin will take some time to adjust to retinol serums. There will be skin purging or break outs. Thankfully I did not experience any breakout but I experienced dryness and a few bumps here and there. I have been using the product for 4 months now but not everyday. I have limited the usage to twice a week with a 3 -4 days gap. Another important point to note that retinol serums must be used at night as they can react in sunlight. After applying the serum I apply a cote of a light vitamin c based lotion to restore the hydration.
Now coming to the ingredient analysis of this particular product; Dimethicone crosspolymer is a silicone derivative that is used in skincare and cosmetic formulations to improve texture and help condition the skin and hair and it is considered to be safe for skin. Methylsilanol Mannuronate is an anti-ageing agent and is an organic derivative of seaweed that binds moisture in the epidermis therefore firming and strengthening the skin. Palmitoyl Tripeptied -5 is also another known agent for anti-ageing. Vitamin A Palmitate is the source of retinol in this product. They also have added some essential oils like rosehip (known for anti-ageing) and Geranium (to dilute the consistency of serum and also for removing wrinkles). They did not mention the exact percentage of these ingredients in the product.
Because I have this bad habit of rubbing my eyes; I noticed a few lines around my under eyes. Although I used an eye cream/gel separately earlier but they did not remove those lines. I put a small amount of the serum around my eyes and around my lips. These two areas I feel show the early signs of ageing. The serum is little runny and looks transparent. I did not feel any heaviness after applying it. It got absorbed quickly. After using it for the third week I suddenly realized that the fine line that were showing up in my under eye area completely vanished. I should have clicked a before and after picture as a proof but I myself could spot the difference. However, it did not remove any blemishes and I experienced dryness after applying. So may be in winter we need to supplement this serum with hydrating moisturizers. Please note that I did not use any expensive under eye cream in these 3 weeks but used a vitamin c based lotion on my face. That’s it.
I know there are some very good retinol serums but they are crazily high priced. So at this price point I really liked this serum given the result and will continue to use it in future as well. So a few key points I want to reiterate
Do not apply retinol serums during daytime
Do not use it everyday. Use it at a regular interval.
Listen to your skin. If you feel dryness use a natural/organic moisturizer which is hydrating.
A break out is common while using retinol products for the first time.
Hope you found this review helpful. Have a nice day 🙂
I have been trying out well known sleeping packs/masks for quite some time. This is actually the 3rd one in that order. Please check out my review on Laneige Water sleeping mask here and Etude House Moistfull Collagen sleeping pack review here. So I bought the Tony Moly Magic Food Banana Sleeping Pack first for their super cute packaging ; second for the 50% discount I got on Nykaa and third obviously because of the quality standard of Tony Moly products.
Packaging : The product comes in a cute banana shaped packaging. The packaging looks super adorable but I really struggled to take out the product out of the tube. It is super hard to squeeze out the product. 85 ml of the product retails for INR 850.However, I got it at INR 425 during a sale in Nykaa. So look out for the sales.
Description :
Hydrate and soothe your skin while you sleep with this nutrient-rich Magic Food Banana Sleeping Pack! Wake up to a supple and brightened face that smells delicious!
Key Ingredients:
10,000 ppm of Banana Extract – Potassium and Vitamin A helps hydrate and protect skin.
Milk Protein – Nutrient rich properties help replenish lost moisture in skin.
Consistency of the product is thick and takes time to get absorbed. It feels heavier on the skin. I have oily skin and I started using it in Winter. So I did not experience any break out but I am not sure how it will feel in hot and humid weather for oily skin. However, this should work well for dry and normal skin.
It has a strong smell like banana. Since this is a sleeping pack and supposed to be used before bed I personally don’t like such strong banana smell on my face. It does get fade out after some time.
Now coming to the actual result. The skin looks super tight and glossy in the next morning. Did not notice such instant clear result with the other 2 sleeping packs that I tried. So super happy with the results.
Am I going to repurchase this? Only in Winters and although I really love their packaging I feel they need to change the tube as it is really hard to squeeze out the product.
When I was very young I used to see my mom applying thick night creams before going to bed and sadly there was no product like a feather light sleeping pack in the market in that time. Luckily our generation has plenty of products to choose from. My first sleeping pack was the Collagen mask from the brand Etude House and I am absolutely in love with it. You can check the review here. However, I wanted to test the Laneige Water sleeping mask because I have heard so many good things about it and love their lip sleeping mask. So I kind of knew I am not going to disappointed with this one as well.
Price & Quantity: It comes in 2 sizes 25 ml and 70 ml. I bought the 25 ml version at a base price of INR 700 and got additional 10% discount on it on Nykaa. The 70 ml version retails for INR 1850. I will recommend to buy the 25 ml version first for trial. Most of the time on Nykaa and on Boddess you will find complimentary deluxe samples if you make a certain amount of purchase.
Laneige Water Sleeping Mask -25 ml
Description: Overnight mask that gives the skin the lively well rested appearance the next morning thanks to its sleep-tox purifying effect.
Now that I have used the moistfull collagen sleeping pack I will review this product in a comparative mode.
Price – Price wise Laneige is definitely more expensive.
Packaging – Both of them come in cute sturdy tubs. So extra points for hygiene. I would have preferred a tube like packaging.
When I compared the ingredient list atleast the first 6-7 ingredients are totally the same. For the moistfull collagen sleeping pack the second ingredient is hydrolyzed collagen which of course Laneige does not use. The 7 th ingredient for Laneige is sodium hyaluronate which is used for restoring moisture of the skin. After comparing the ingredient list I was little surprised because Laneige is quite expensive and I actually can get more or less the same thing at a cheaper price. I might be wrong but I have heard this so many times that only the first few ingredients matter in a skin care product. Rest of them are used in a minuscule quantity.
Now coming to the texture. This product is definitely feather light and looks like a gel. Gets absorbed into the skin like magic. Loved the baby blue glossy color of the mask and the soothing aroma. I used it after cleaning my face and applying the night serum. It was the last step of my night time skin care. When I woke up the next morning my skin felt hydrated and soft even in a cold weather in November.
Am I going to repurchase it? Only if Etude House stops the production of their Moistfull Collagen Sleeping pack. Yeah that is my honest answer.
Hope you found this review helpful. Please let me know in comments if you used this sleeping pack and what is your take on it. Happy Sunday 🙂
It is 1st September today. Another month of staying indoors and working from home is successfully completed. One good habit that I picked up during the COVID times is reading a few pages of a book regularly. Magazines or random internet articles do not count. So I decided to write a monthly series on the books I have read and what I felt about them. This will motivate me to keep the momentum going.Initially my aim was to complete at least 4 books in a month but I could read only 3 but all 3 of them were pretty good in their own ways. Let me give you a mini review of my reading list in August.
All the books that I mentioned above belong to completely different genre.Let’s start with the review.
My take on the books:
Nudge by Thaler & Sunstein
Review ofNudge: Nudge is a book on fundamentals of behavioral science and belongs to non-fiction category. I read my first book on a similar subject – ‘Thinking Fast & Slow’ by Daniel Kahneman long time back and recommended that book to everyone interested in behavioral psychology/Economics. Nudge is written by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein. Thaler is a very prominent name in Behavioral Science and Kahneman and him were friends as well as colleagues.I could see a conspicuous similarity in the examples provided in both the books but Nudge is a quicker and easier read than Thinking Fast & Slow in my opinion and ideally I should have read Nudge first and then Thinking Fast & Slow. Nudge is around 250 pages read excluding appendix etc. and is divided into 4 chapters – Humans and Econs, Money, Society, Extensions and Objections. Although I am a student of Economics this book is written for all and the language is pretty lucid. They have used a lot of daily life examples of people across different walks of life to make things more relatable. It talks about effective choice architecture to improve a person’s decision making ability.These kind of books actually make anybody be it politicians, Bureaucrats, students or just any human more aware about every smallest decision we are making about our health, money, food or even at a bigger level like national policies. For me personally it just made me to stop for a moment and reflect and then there was this moment like ‘Ahh right; this is what I do and I actually should do this in this way to make it a daily habit.’ These books on behavioral sciences are not just another self help book.These are well researched and written by credible authors to make us think and make important changes on the ways we think or we choose our words or make our financial decisions.
Now let’s move on to my next book.
Ladies Coupe by Anita Nair : Review
Review ofLadies Coupe: Ladies Coupe is a fictional novel by Indian Author Anita Nair. The story starts with a 45 year old income tax officer, Akhila who is the sole bread earner of her family and had to ignore her own happiness and desires to make her family survive the difficult financial times. Akhila’s father’s sudden demise pushed her to be responsible to provide for her and to put up a strong face in front of the world so that nobody can understand her vulnerability.Her sacrifices were not acknowledged by her siblings and they continued to use her for their own benefits. Getting really tired of their behavior Akhila could not tolerate anymore and bought a one way train ticket to Kanyakumari (the southernmost point of India). She met another 5 women of different age groups(all from southern India) and societal structures in the ladies coupe and tried to seek answers of many questions she had from these women.They opened their heart to her and let pour all their vices, longings, insecurities and vulnerabilities. For the first time in her life Akhila found a sense of camaraderie in that overnight journey with these five unknown women and gathered her courage to live her life in her own terms. All the 5 stories are very different from each other and very intricately woven and it showed a gradual transition in Indian women’s thought processes and their willingness to have equal say in decision making of their families. I also liked Anita’s attention to details about clothes, Indian household designs and every little emotions.Her love for food (I stalked her insta account) is also very visible in her writing. The only complaint is that the ending was little predictable.
Suheldev by Amish :Review
Review of Suheldev : Amish Tripathi’s Shiva Trilogy was something that I absolutely loved and treasured during my college days. I used to warn my friends whoever borrowed them to take care of them properly. I did not get a chance to read the Ramchandra series but bought the legend of Suheldev quickly as it was just a single book and will be easy to complete. Coming straight to the point it did not leave that mark on my mind.I really adore Amish’s knack for writing on mythological or historical protagonists and then weaving an enthralling fictional tale around those characters but Suheldev was a miss.If his aim was to make his readers be familiar with Suheldev’s bravery which was not really highlighted in the history we read; then definitely he did a great job but this book lacked his exceptional storytelling ability.It felt like a formula book which first fixed a few concepts and characters and then just linked them somehow.I noted that this was not his work entirely and actually a writer’s block assisted him and I guess this is why I did not feel attached to the character or his story as much as I did for Shiva trilogy.
Hope you liked these mini reviews of the books. Of course these reviews do not have any literary value and not crafted with carefully chosen words.This is just a series that I am starting to keep my reading habit on.
I always wanted to try the Jeju Cherry Blossom range from Innisfree because of my love for the word ‘cherry blossom’. How silly… I know!! Whenever I think about cherry blossom it transports me into a beautiful picturesque world full of colorful flowers :p
Okay I need to come back to reality and do a proper review of this product.So as many of you already know Innisfree is a very popular Korean brand and I have used many products of them and liked them as well. So I obviously had a certain amount of expectation from this brand.Usually their products are little on the higher price side for Indian skin care market but if you compare it with other luxury skin care brands their products are affordable.
Price and Quantity: This lotion retails for 1200 INR and you get a 100 ml tube.I got it in a sale for INR 870. Also, I discovered a new website Boddess which gives pretty good discounts/freebies on Innisfree products.
Innisfree Jeju Cherry Blossom Lotion
Product Description:
Innisfree Cherry Blossom Lotion delivers abundant hydration to dry and dull skin for a moist and revitalized look.
A lightweight creamy lotion goes on smoothly without feeling greasy or sticky
Adds ample hydration and glow to the skin
Cherry Blossom extract helps heal irritated skin, even out dull skin tone, and lighten dark spots
My take on the product: I am not a dermatologist and have limited understanding of the chemical effect of the ingredients in the product.Whatever I could make out was that this a water based product with Glycerin and it also has Niacinamide and Betaine. I have recently seen a lot of influencers cum reviewers praising Niacinamide a lot. So I did a little research and found that it is basically a type of Vitamin B3 and it is quite a multitasker when it comes to deal with skin pigmentation or inflammation like redness reduction or giving our skin a bit of extra hydration.Some of the researchers actually praised it more than retinols or AHAs/BHAs or even hyaluronic acid because of its diverse skin healing properties.Okay so I am impressed.Also, just a little tip, we can include niacin into our diet by eating fish/meat/pulses which will then be converted into niacinamide inside our bodies.Quite cool!
Now the next ingredient is betaine. This is also good for anti-ageing and has skin healing properties.So much knowledge I gathered today! Happy puppy 🙂
But, sadly this product also contains fragrance which I am not sure why they included.I am absolutely fine to use a lotion without any smell and to be honest I did not like the smell at all.It did not remind me of cherry blossom atleast. It also includes various alcohols like C14-22 alcohol and Arachidyl Alcohol but I looked for them and found that these are fatty alcohols and mostly used as an emulsifier or like a waxy material to maintain the natural moisture of our skin. So they are not bad for our skin.
Moving on, let me talk about the product itself.It is a very light textured white colored serum like lotion which blends into my skin easily.It did not make my skin look oily or sweaty even during the hot summer. Even when I am working in an air conditioned environment I did not find my skin to be drying after application. So I felt this will work for both dry and oily skin in summer and in winter. It does not contain any SPF which is good actually. Not every lotion or face moisturizer needs to contain SPF. A small amount is enough for your face. A 100 ml tube will go a long way. It did not give me any acne and definitely I can see a glow in my skin. I haven’t noticed any impact on reducing my old dark acne marks. This range has other products as well which I haven’t tried. Yeah so that’s it.This is a travel friendly tube.You can just throw it in your bag and whenever you feel like a little hydration for your skin you can go for it.
The Peach Diary 