How To Wear Bold Lipstick

I have always admired people that can wear a bold lip colour. They always look so beautiful, not to mention it gives off an air of confidence. Lipstick has never really been my area as I have small lips and feel like the colour just looks wrong. Lately I have been wanting to experiment a little more and change up my makeup routine, so this weekend I took a step into the lip world with a baby pink colour that has been tempting me for months.

The secret to wearing lipstick lies in the rest of your makeup application. A colour like baby pink is going to pop out and having strong eye makeup will contrast this and make your face look too crowded. I went for a ‘no makeup’ look by using as little as I could on my eyes and skin. First I used liquid eyeliner between my lashes to fill them out and give them a more consistent look.

Then I lightly applied mascara to the tips of the lashes, just enough to even out the colour and give them a little volume. This was followed by a light covering of foundation, just enough to even out skin tone and get rid of any blemishes.

As for the lips, I followed my lipstick with a small dab of blush. This is a tip I learned from a friend a few weeks ago which helps keeps the colour in place while also giving it a nice shimmery 3D effect. The end result…

 

Aside from the weird thing my eyes are doing in this picture, I really like it. My face looks so different and I feel a little more confident – plus a change up in routine is always fun. Maybe next time I will go all out and wear a bold red…

I Just Love Food

Good morning!

This Saturday has started off wonderfully as I got all the crappy parts of the weekend out of the way and can now sit on my ass, paint my nails and binge watch Gilmore Girls. Yup, I’m 25 years old and that’s my ideal night 😀

I woke up early to get in a workout, still rocking out the Jillian Michaels 6 week 6 pack. This has been my go-to workout for over a year and need to keep reminding myself to make it challenging or else there is no point. Right now I have taken it up a notch by adding in some more cardio, a few new ab moves that I took from Shaun T’s workouts and adding in weight. I finished up good and sweaty.

Thanks to my lovely fiancé the boring cleaning was done in no time as we both felt motivated early in the morning and just got it all done. Such a good feeling having all the housework done before midday! The last thing on my list was grocery shopping which I had to do myself today. Usually I had this because the stores are crowded and I get frustrated being unable to find things that I can back home. But as I walked to the store I realized that doing it by myself means that I can get all the tasty food I want, it was awesome.

I love food. The one thing my fiancé and I disagree on is eating. I like to make food as tasty as possible and use different flavorings, cheeses and new ingredients. He has planer tastes and is happy with eggs on toast for dinner. So knowing that I was alone all weekend made me a little crazy, (btw that bacon is his, not mine).

I got the best bread (hard to find in Korea), Monterey Jack Cheese, pumpkin and beetroot to roast into amazingness, greek yoghurt, cream cheese and baking ingredients. I see mocha muffins on the horizon.

There was also a new find, pre-made iced coffee.

 

 I was skeptical as Korea isn’t really known for making good coffee, but it was on special so I grabbed a bag. It’s…. interesting. I think most people would enjoy this but it is too sweet for me. I might use it to make popsicles or in baking. Oh well.

It took a long time to get through the store and didn’t help that I ran into four of my students! I love them, but generally on the weekends I would prefer not to see students and their mums. It makes me feel so self-conscious, like they are checking out what I wear and what I buy. Silly I know.

After making it home I was starving so cooked up a yummy lunch of white beans, onions, tomato and mushrooms seasoned with some basil and served on toast.

It was fabulous. Now I am going to have a nap, it’s all exciting over here!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

End of a Long Week

Hey there how’s it going?

I am feeling my age right now, I think staying out so late on Saturday caught up with me bad because my body was hit with a cold this week. It sucks working when you are sick, especially with kids who scream and want to play. Whenever I am sick I focus on two things – sleep and food. Workouts were pushed aside for more rest and my meals have involved a lot of greens and roasted garlic. So delicious, I could eat a disturbing amount of garlic when it has been roasted which may or may not be a good thing. The rest of my diet consisted of nectarines.

Korea is so seasonal with it’s fruit so I am eating as many as I can before they disappear.

I also munched on some vegetarian raymen because sometimes you just want some junk.

I pimped mine up by chucking in a few veggies and topping the bowl with a couple of fried eggs and a ton of hot sauce. Raymen is such a good go to meal! Usually I only use half the noodles so I can add some healthier things and still get my fix. On a side note, how’s this for adding more protein.

This weekend I plan on staying in with my book (sad), grocery shopping (sadder) and cleaning (the saddest). On a bright side I have the house to myself which means grocery shopping will involve splurging on good food that only I get to eat and I am hoping to get started on my wedding planning as it is getting closer! I leave you with what is possibly the best worksheet I have received from a kid, he had to draw his ultimate fantasy transportation. He chose an alligator train.

Have a lovely Friday night!

 

 

 

 

Mini Goals Round 3

Hey there,

I think I was pre-mature with my bragging yesterday about not being hangover. Today I felt queasy all day and really struggled to get through the classes. Moral of the story – no one is invisible to countless shots and jagerbombs.

Last week I did okay with all my mini-goals except for the protein. Why is this so hard! I drank a lot of water, did way less worrying, tried some new exercises and gave myself more time of working out. Overall pretty good but I looked at My Fitness Pal and my protein was way under. It is so frustrating when I am made an effort to eat more yoghurt, eggs and chickpeas all week long. One of my problems is probably that I count calories and end up worrying about that more then the protein.  So with that in mind here are this weeks mini-goals.

1) Try to lay back on the calorie counting and focus more on the quality of food.

2) Pure Barre three times a week (trying to get something new in, it leaves my legs quivering like Bambi’s which must mean it does some good).

3) Start writing again, just drafting one or two articles would be fantastic.,

4) Eat damn protein!

That’s it from me. I’m hoping for a good week, it was off to a nice start as one of the girl’s mums bought in doughnuts for the teachers today. I ate one and don’t feel guilty about it 🙂

Baby steps people.

 

Weekend Happenings

This weekend was a busy one, so much for my mini goal of saving money!

Yesterday I had to go to the orthodontist to get a wire in my mouth fixed which was just a pain in the ass. It wasn’t too expensive, but left my mouth feeling irritated and sore which made me grumpy all day. I did have one of those moments while I was lying there with my mouth open where I marveled at the whole situation of being in Korea and finding an orthodontist, making an appointment and having something so mundane done. People always think I am travelling through Korea and that it is terribly exciting but in reality I just live here and end up doing menial things like this.

Speaking of menial jobs, the orthodontist was followed by shopping for new underwear and shoes (don’t get worked up, boring ones for work), before finally relaxing with a coffee and a kebab.

Bliss.

Last night I was determined to go out as I haven’t had a date night in forever! With my mum visiting and my being away last weekend it had been a long time since we did dinner and drinks on a Saturday. So we headed out so innocently and unknowing about what the night would bring…

It started out find. We ate burgers and had a couple of drinks before going to see Begin Again at the movies. It was actually much better then I thought and I enjoyed it despite Kiera Knightly being in the cast (not a fan). Afterwards it was midnight so we headed to a bar for a nightcap with a friend.

This lead to darts, countless shots, dancing and crawling into bed at 5:30 this morning. Why do I do this to myself!

Thankfully I wasn’t really that drunk so today hasn’t been full of a horrible hangover, but I have been extremely tired all day. To make it worse, this afternoon was the first meeting of a book club I just set up so I had to head downtown to talk to people about books when I really just wanting to by lying in bed watching Gavin and Stacey re-runs. Somehow I got myself downtown and ended up having a great time meeting some lovely people. It is so rare in Korea that I meet other girls and just click with them but we spent a coupe of hours talking non-stop about absolutely everything. It’s going to be a good book club 🙂

The conversation must have motivated me as when I got home I went on a meal prep extravaganza. Not only did I chop veggies for the week, but made my lunches for the next three days, cooked lentils then turned them into vegetarian mince, boiled and mashed potatoes, roasted pumpkin and potatoes and finally cooked dinner.

The fridge looks good but I am exhausted!

And with that I will crawl into bed and collapse for the night. I know I should talk about mini-goals for next week, but it can wait a day, I am too damn tired.

 

Full of happy

This week I have felt so happy!

I’m not too sure why. There is nothing special happening, the weather has been gross and humid, and I have an orthodontist appointment this weekend filling with me dread each time I think about how much it might cost.

If anything, I can put this new positive attitude down to small changes I have made. Namely with stressing less about the little things and getting too caught up in having everything perfect. Usually I work myself up each day worrying about how I am going to fit in exercise, get jobs done for work and have a clean house. This week I have been more laid back about everything. We had a lot on at work but instead of trying to get it all done I sat down and did one thing at a time. My usual process is to start one job then halfway through remember how much more needs to be done so I begin another task. Then I end up with unfinished jobs and feeling even more overwhelmed.

After changing to this one thing at a time mentality I got everything done pretty quick and felt a million times better at work. As for exercise, I have really been trying to stress less about working out twice a day. Yes, you read that right, twice a day! I have talked before about how exercise obsessed I can get and taking a break from it when my mum was here was a really good way of forcing myself to see that the world doesn’t end if I don’t work out. I have still been waking up to work out, but am not spending the day thinking about how I need to get home and jump into my gym clothes. Instead I am listening to my body and trying to relax more in the evenings. I even skipped this mornings workout as we had a friend staying the night, and this evenings so I could Skype my mum on her birthday. It may sound silly, but not working out once during the day is a big accomplishment for me and it means a  lot that I can do it without freaking out. I actually think I feel better for it.

Similarly I haven’t been worrying so much about the house being clean. It can’t look perfect all the time, and waiting a day to clean out the fridge wont kill me. It really is the little things that change how you feel!

These may sound like dumb insignificant factors, but having this more relaxed attitude to work and exercise has made me feel so happy this week. I feel relaxed, carefree and glorious 🙂

Plus there is still the weekend to look forward too!

 

Mini Goals round two

Good morning!

I enjoyed making mini-goals for last week so much that I decided to do it again this week. This is probably because I am a nerd and like things like lists and being able to cross things off them, just makes me feel so accomplished.

Last week I did okay. I drunk more water up until the weekend when I went away and didn’t always have a full water bottle with me, same with eating more protein. When I was home it was fine but going away to the beach meant I ate out a lot and didn’t have much protein with my meals or snacks. But I guess that;s what happens on vacation.

Other then that I was happy with myself. I did more yoga, only bought one coffee during the week, and definitely relaxed more!

 

This week my goals are…

– Change up my workouts. No more 6 week 6pack and 30 day shred, they aren’t challenging me anymore and can’t be having much of an effect on my muscles. I downloaded pure barre and am scared/excited to get that going.

– Keep track of my money. I need to stop spending a few bucks here and there!

– Make protein and water my best friends!

and of course, relax and stress less. That is always a goal of mine.

Here’s hoping for a good week, what are your goals?

 

 

 

End of Summer and Beach Weekend

Summer seemed way too short this year.

But already the weather is changing and the crazy heat is slowly fading away. Not to mention it has been pouring in Daegu lately – autumn is coming y’all!

To end the summer I went away with a few friends for a beach weekend to soak up the sun, try to tan and just relax. My vacation was so busy with my mum visiting and while it was awesome, I really didn’t feel rested afterwards. This and the public holiday we had on Friday meant the beach was a perfect place to visit. I took the train over to Busan on Friday and arrived around dinner time. There were drinks, Mexican food and norebang!

My norebang song is ‘Baby got Back’ by Sir MIx A lot. It took a long time but I know all the words and can pull off a damn good rap, if your going to have a norebang song then you gotta commit to it right 😉

Saturday we woke up and headed to the beach where we rented a few umbrellas and set up for the day.

The weather was so unbelievably perfect. After a few days of raining the sun was out and there was just enough breeze for the heat to not be killing me. We lay there all day, did some swimming, ate some quiznos and I even had a beach nap. It was glorious!

I feel like I should also mention that this was the first time I have worn a bikini in public – ever! After years of feeling so self-conscious I am happy to finally be at a point where I can just accept my body for what it is. I felt good, not only because I have been working out, but also because having my body with its flaws and all on display was kind of liberating. I kept reminding myself of the phrase which has been going around the internet this summer ‘how to get a bikini body, step 1 have a body, step 2 put bikini on.’ I love this!

We were on the beach for about 7 hours then headed back to get all dressed up and check out the night scene. I have to say that Busan in the evening is where it’s at! There is so much to see on the beach like fireworks, carnival games and performers. I loved just walking around and watching everyone enjoy the evening.

Of course it was a girls weekend so we had many a margaritas and girl talk. I didn’t take any pictures of that because what happens on a girls weekend stays on a girls weekend right?

Despite being a little sunburn I took the train back yesterday feeling so good about myself. I don’t get much of a chance in Korea to spend a lot of time with other girls – even meeting them is hard! But being around such lovely ladies and making new friends was fantastic. It’s so hard to move to a new country and put yourself out there, but when you do it is always worth it 🙂

Here’s to the end of summer!

 

 

 

 

 

Exercise, Food and Mini-goals

Hey there, this post is really random so I do apologize! I am still adjusting to being back at work and having my mum leave (saying goodbye seemed so much harder the second time around), so my mind is pretty all over the place. With that said here’s what I’ve been up to lately.

Getting out of my Exercise Rut

I have such an addictive personality and this usually means that I will find a workout that I like and religiously stick with it for months. Last year I was obsessed with zumba, Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred and more recently it was Shaun T’s Insanity; lately it has been 6 week 6 pack which I am doing every damn day like my life depends on it.

While it is good to be this commit to something, I know that it is also stupid. For one thing my body has adjusted to these workouts so 6 week 6 pack is no longer making me looked awesome. Instead the muscles have reached what they can and now each time I do it I hardly sweat and just whiz through it. Not only is it not benefiting my body as much, but I am getting bored and that makes it much harder to wake up and get my sweat on. While I was in Seoul and had no weights (or sports bra) to work out with, I did a lot more yoga and really enjoyed it. I reminded myself that exercising should be fun, who cares if one workout burns more calories then another, it is all about enjoying myself and always challenging my body. So I have been getting more yoga into my day and tried some of fitnessista.com’s barre burner workouts.

These hurt – in the good way – and made me realize that there are muscle groups I have been neglecting. My legs are still quivering like Bambie’s and I definitely feel like changing it up is going to benefit my body in the long run.  

Random Eats

I ate so much goodness when I was away and am trying to continue it here.

Some vegan Korean BBQ.

Greek salad that I managed to find at Seoul station. It had feta! and olives!! Something I haven’t eaten in 16 months so excuse the excitement.

A mega salad from The Blue Flying Pan in Seoul. Oh my goodness this was amazeballs! So good that my mum and I actually went back two days lately and I ate it again :S This baby had roasted pumpkin, greens, ricotta cheese, grapes, maple caramelized pumpkin seeds, rosemary dressing and pesto bread. I am dreaming of it now…

I baked some carrot and banana muffins yesterday that are disappearing fast, But they have carrot in them so that makes it okay right?

And so much bibimbap. Seriously I think I have eaten this almost every day lately. It is just so hard not to love it! Carbs, protein and fresh veggies – comfort in a bowl.

Mini-Goals

It might be the change in season, but I have been feeling motivated to change things up a bit so made a few mini-goals for myself over the next two weeks.

– drink more water. Always important but I tend to forget at work and then end up feeling snacky and sleepy as a result.

– Limit coffee buying to once a week. Not every day or two as is the trend at the moment, that ish is getting expensive.

– Do more yoga.

– Eat more protein. I am so bad at this, I need to get into the habit of making sure there is protein with every meal I have, especially with my snacks. I kicked that off today with a bowl of nectarines, yoghurt and a little pb after work, not too shabby.

– Stop stressing. When something is bugging me I need to ask myself, ‘does this need to get done right now?’ if it doesn’t then who cares. I spend way too much time worrying about making lessons, writing reports and cleaning the house. This week I want to stop and take a moment to relax.

So that’s me, how’s your week going? Any mini goals you have?

Vegeterian Eats in Korea – Balwoo Temple Cuisine

When I was in Seoul last week I finally crossed something off my list of things to do in Korea – temple meal!

I have wanted to experience a temple meal for two reasons

1) I love food and the idea of having ten or so courses for one dinner is just awesome.

2) Traditional Buddhist temple food is all vegan, which means that I can actually sit down to a big meal and eat everything in front of me.

In my searches for vegetarian restaurants I came across Balwoo, a restaurant located in Insadong right across from Jogyesa temple. The price is a little more then most dinners in Korea, but as you are getting to try a variety of dishes and have a new dinning experience then I do think it is worth it. They have a lunch special which is 29,000won for ten courses, but I was there at dinner time and went for the 12 courses for about 32,000won.

This restaurant is really beautiful, we were seated on the floor and got to look out over the temple. Within minutes of sitting down the first dish came out – along with a handy list of what each course was. The portions are small but I found that this was just enough to taste everything without stuffing myself.

I wish I could remember what each course was, but there were too many!

In the mix were some small pancakes.

 

tofu and mushroom dumplings (mandu) – it made me so happy to finally be able to eat mandu in Korea!

 

Spring rolls with fresh veggies.

 

Gingseng root with citron jelly. I was very skeptical of this as I am not the biggest fan of gingseng, but it was surprisingly delicious. The root had a parsnip like texture and the citron jelly pared really well with it.

tempura style mushrooms with a spicy BBQ sauce. This was hands down our favorite part of the meal. The mushrooms perfectly combined sweet, spicy and crunchy, I could have eaten more then one bowl of them.

Soybean soup with spinach and rice cakes.

 And of course side dishes!! The main part of the meal at Balwoo is sticky rice served wrapped in a lotus leaf which comes out at the very end. I didn’t take a photo of this because, well frankly, It looked so unappealing when photographed. But peeling back leaves to find a hot, sticky rice was one of the high points of the meal. As if this wasn’t enough food we were given dessert – Korean dessert that is.

 Fruit chips and kiwi jelly. This wasn’t very sweet but as temple food is knowing for being a little bland and more unseasoned then other cuisines, I found that it was a perfect way to end the meal.

All up this was a fantastic experience and the food was amazing. I would recommend it to anyone who wants something different or just loves the idea of having multiple dishes. I thought the food was coming out a little fast but we were there for an hour and a half in total so it ended up being a great evening.

Balwoo is easy to find. From exit 6 of Insaong walk straight to the intersection and turn left. Keep walking until you see Jogyesa, the restaurant is directly across the road from the temple in the temple stay building on the fifth floor. Enjoy 😀