5 Things I like about February

It's been a while and it's been a quite busy week and a half! School is back on (full schedule), Valentine's Day just passed and I've just been passing time with friends & fam :)

I love little house ornaments and found this item last week, had to get it:

I was shopping house stuff w/ my future mom-in-law and saw this..

5 Things I LOVE about February:

1. Valentine's Day

It's one of my favorite holidays and I love the "love in the air" -feeling. Especially in the US it is really popular and all the restaurants are full of couples celebrating this holiday. I also love chocolate, and that's associated with this day, so it's awesome!

2. It's the shortest month of the year

Even though winter is not real winter in California, I can't wait for the hot, summer weather, so the faster the winter goes by, the faster the summer can arrive!

3. Spring Semester begins

This is a good and bad things, but mainly good. Even though after a really relaxing Winter session at school, Spring semester feels really busy with a full schedule, BUT it's my last semester at my current school so I'm excited about moving forward in my scholarly journey!

4. Presidents' Day

Presidents' Day just passed here in the States, it was the 20th of Feb and it was a holiday, so no school and a lot of sales! I bought a lot of clothes for sooo cheap, which is great!

5. March is the next month

I'm just happy in general that it is March soon, because there are a lot of positive things happening in that month :)

Box of my favorite chocolate in the States....yummyyy<3

Sooo goooood!!!

Some more...

My Valentine's day nail color :) (this nail shop didn't do a good job :( )

This past week, I also decided to my own nails after the V-Day color got chipped after 2 days (argh! never going there again!) and washing my own hair (which is a process, because flat ironing is so annoying). I also did a mud mask and some soothing sea salt + hot water treatments on the skin.

Hungarian Mud 

Sea Salt

My sulfate-free shampoos that I have to use because I did the Brazilian Blowout some months ago.

I'm so excited because before the Brazilian Blowout my hair was super frizzy and curly... Now this is what it looks like after I wash it and dry just a little BEFORE flat ironing... I wish I had a before picture to show how curly it was!

My nail color for this week.. I did it myself this time. With Lumene Party On underneath and O.P.I. Gold Shatter on top.

This is what it is supposed to look like with the Gold Shatter on top so I don't know what happened with the other nails

-Jennine

Self-care Sunday

This past week has been a hard one for me. I've been working the night shift from 10pm to 6am which hasn't been easy for me. I feel like I've been walking around like a zombie and my body is working and doing stuff, but my brain in nowhere to be found. The week has just flown past me and I can hardly remember anything I've said or done (great excuse, huh?). I don't understand how some people can do this for a long time. Not only that, I'm on a totally different schedule from the rest of the world and so when others are doing stuff, I'm sleeping and the other way around. Well, at least I know this is only temporary so it's not that bad.

I was able to drag myself out of bed "early" (1pm) on Thursday to go meet up with my sister's best friend, Patisse. She's going to a wedding in a couple of weeks and asked me if I could make her a dress. We tried to look for inspiration and come up with something simple, yet stunning. We found perfect fabrics after a long (long!) time in the fabric store and came up with a lovely design, so that's next on my to-do list!

Fabrics we chose for the dress.

This week's self-pamper day (aka Sunday) was just what I needed. For the longest time now I've had a habit of spending Sunday as a self-care day. It's perfect because I get all the things I don't have time for during the week out of the way and it's just so stress-free and gets me ready for the upcoming week both physically and mentally.

I started the day with a nice breakfast, followed by a Yogalates class.

My morning doesn't start without one of these.

My breakfast: rye bread, egg, kiwi, banana bread and some yoghurt with blueberries, granola & honey.

A new class at my gym called Yogalates, combining Yoga and Pilates. It was really nice.

In the evening my godmother invited me over to paint since she's an artist. It was really relaxing and fun. Later on I stopped at my friend Nina's house. My lazy Sunday ended perfectly when I got home and warmed up our sauna.

At my godmothers house.

She had made us pancakes. So good!

Shower gel and cream I use. I love The Body Shop. The coconut is my favorite.

My favorite shampoo and deep conditioning. I've noticed a huge difference since I started using these.

A basic whole body scrub.

Chocolate & strawberry face mask!

I have a routine of putting coconut oil in my hair & scalp the night before I wash my hair. It conditions my hair and I swear it helps it grow faster, since my ends aren't breaking off.

I can't help but to buy a new one every time I see a color I like...

That all for today. Now I'm off to watch Modern Family and drink some tea, since I don't have to wake up early tomorrow. Nighty night! :)

pic sats.fi

Skin care

The older you grow, the more you need to focus on skin care... Personally, I've noticed that since moving to L.A. where the air is way more congested than in Finland, I've need to use different products than I used to..and definitely get more facials! You also need to take into consideration the type of skin you have and use products accordingly. I have oily to combination skin, which means it's oily but the surface is dry and one of my estheticians recommended a great skin care line 'Ayur-medic', which I've since then included in my skin care product-family.

The skin care products I use the most currently

I use the Ayur-medic cleanser and facial cream daily and it leaves the skin feeling nice and "dry" but not too dry. A lot of facial creams leave the skin really "creamy" and this product doesn't, I really like that.

The cream that I use, especially at night

Another product line that I love is Clinique!!! I've used a lot of their products (cleansers, creams, toners and make-up) and their all pretty great. Currently, I use the 'Moisture Surge' series, which really moisturizes the skin well and leaves it feeling smooth. My mom introduced the facial cream to me years ago and I've been using it ever since. One of my best friends gave me the 'Moisture Surge Face Spray' and it's great! I use it when I'm on long flights and the skin gets super dry. I spray in straight on the face and spread it with a cotton ball. It's my saviour for long flights!

                                                                                     The Clinique 'Moisture Surge' skin care line


Another great product is one that one of my friends showed and recommended to me..the OroGold 24k Deep Peeling, which actually has gold in it!!! I use this peel once or twice a week (trying not to use it too much right now coz I have a tan :) ) and it really peels off the dead skin. Feels really nice! I also have the OroGold Deep Day moisturizer cream, which is recommended to use after the peel.

                                                                                            OroGold 24k Deep Peeling

The newest add is the 'Triple Oxygen' products from Bliss. An esthetician there recommended it to me and right before I left to India I saw the travel pack at Sephora. It was the perfect size for traveling so I took it there and it was perfect for the climate there! It was really humid and hot in India so it was suitable coz it was so moisturizing.

                                                                                     Bliss Triple Oxygen products


In addition to these, a body scrub that I found to be good is Seacret Body Salt and Scrub. I use it once a week and it leaves the body sooo smooth! Love it.

Source: www.seacretdirect.com    
My own just finished

The nail color for the week is: OPI Shootout at the O.K. Coral...sooo cute!

Bubble Baths!

Especially now that it's winter, it's good to relax sometimes and what better way than to take a nice, relaxing bubble bath. It's good for your nerves and also muscles! I had a crazy workout on Saturday and that's why I needed a nice bubble bath this weekend! It's so good for sore muscles to soak in hot water. I usually use a really bubbly bath soap, but I found a bath salt I got from Bellagio in Vegas when I stayed there earlier this year, so I decided to try that out. I also lit some candles, had a couple pieces of chocolate, a glass of sparkling wine and some Alicia Keys playing..perfect!

Bubble baths<3

Toblerone chocolate and Martini Asti (I looove sweet sparkling wine)

I love candles in the Winter..and Fall..and when it's dark

Other than that, my weekend was really chill...just sleeping, relaxing, working out, seeing friends and getting back to the L.A. time zone. I also saw my Finnish girls..it had been a couple weeks so it was great to catch up and have sushi with them.

Going out for sushi with the girls... Shirt: some store on Melrose, Pants: Zara, Bag: Gucci, Shoes: Christian Louboutin

-Jen