20 pounds down

In reality, I lost five pounds this month. I worked out for two months and dropped 25 pounds then gained back ten pounds, unfortunately. But I started back again on March 04, 2013 and as of March 23, 2013 I lost 50% of that weight I gained back. WOOOHOOO! That's the update on my weight loss so far. I am also back to eating clean again but still have a few cheat meals. Yes, there are times when I will binge but since eating clean again, my body will shut down if I eat crap.

I struggle from time to time then I have days when I feel like I just murdered a giant (meaning my elliptical machine at home). But most days are good :)

Review: Hempz Original Lotion

It has been over two weeks since I received this baby and I am more than happy with it! My opinion is not influenced and results/experience will differ.

My skin type: Normal
Skin color: Slight tanned

Texture: Not too watery but not thick.
Scent: Not strong but has a very light flower fragrance.
Price: Fair ($60 Free shipping from Ebay)
Review: This is a gallon bottle that includes a pump for it. It is best used, like other lotions, to apply after shower. 1 full pump or an ounce will cover your body from head to toe. It is just the right texture where it does not feel like it is just sitting on top of your skin. It's not sticky so when you sweat, you do not see streak or feel "oily or greasy". It moisturizes very well and will last full 24 hours. It works much like Olay body lotion without the shimmers, thick texture, and greasy feeling. Great for men and women (I mean come on, my boyfriend loves this thing.) The only con about this is that it comes in a plastic container but it beats having to buy 5-10 tiny plastic bottles every year. You can always clean up the bottle, remove the sticker, and reuse the bottle for pumped soap, etc.

Hygiene

My household (meaning my boyfriend, the house, the dogs, and myself) are trying to go natural from cooking, containers, cleaning, and hygienes (my favorite so far). Please excuse the plastic Target spray bottle, I could not find a glass version and the one I found online were cheap BUT shipping to Hawaii was crazy for a tiny $2 bottle. 

1. Spectrum organic coconut oil 
2. Mixture of castile soap (unscented baby mild)
3. Sugar scrub
4. ACV hair rinse

I have been using the coconut oil for about a week now and yes, it is almost half way. I bought it for the purpose of using a long lasting face moisturizer at night but after coming home, I researched about it and read that it can be used as a mouthwash (I do oil pulling every night now), day and night moisturizer, great for dog's hair (I add a tablespoon daily for two of my hair pomeranians), and hair moisturizer (I need to give it a week before I can say I 'like' it).

I made my first batch of anything castile yesterday and it was my first time trying out my own recipe as well. The amount for each ingredients might differ for each individual that will suit your hair type. I have a cross between thin and thick hair, black but oddly growing reddish brown hair for the past year, and it is straight. If you want to give it a try, here is the recipe I used. Modify the amount depending how many fluid ounce your container has. My bottle was 16 fl. oz.

Ingredients: 

1. 1-2 T. Fresh rosemary (It says fresh is for gray hair and dried is for black hair. I wanted it to be REALLY natural and organic so I went with the fresh one.)
2. 1/2 T. grapeseed oil
3. 1/2 T. vitamin E oil or 1 capsule (poke with a pin and squeeze out)
4. 3/4 cup unscented castile soap baby mild

Direction:

• Add rosemary sprig and water (I added 3 cups), bring to a boil. Bring heat to low, cover, and let simmer for 30 minutes. 
• Remove sprig and strain out the rest of the rosemary. Let it cool.  
• Depending on your bottle capacity, pour rosemary water in your bottle. I put 1 cup rosemary water into my container. 
• Pour castile in a bowl, add the rest of your ingredients, pour in bottle container. 

You are done! Easy enough right? You can also substitute the rosemary with simple water but I wanted to bring extra darkness to my hair and to promote hair growth. This is a 2 or 3 in one bottle for me. I used it as my shampoo, body wash, and face wash last night and I love it! So did my boyfriend so it is a winner at the moment. I will give it a one-week full trial before I can say anything else on it. 

Third item is my ACV hair since, I purchase the Bragger organic Apple Cider VInegar. I used the 1:1 ratio ACV and water. This is also a 2 in 1 bottle for me as a hair rinse and face toner but I will make a different batch for my face toner of 1:2 ACV to water because it is a little strong. 

The last recipe is our favorite body scrub. Although it can be used for the entire body, we like to concentrate on our soles every night. It is plain ol' white sugar with a few this and that. 

Recipes: (Feel free to modify depending on your container)

1. 12 T. white sugar
2. 1 T. cinnamon ground (optional)
3. 1 T. grapeseed oil
4. 1 tsp. vanilla extract (optional or use other scent)
5. 1/4 cup Lemongrass liquid soap (I am trying to finish my last bottle, I am sure you may use castile soap).

Direction:

• Mix everything in a bowl until it gets a little runny but still thick enough to spread. 
• Pour into glass jar and viola!

Bonus on my new hygiene items, I hand knitted a small hemp loofah our of my leftover beading rustic hemp twine (I will buy a hemp yarn once I use it all up) as a face scrubber. I also made another two for me and my boyfriend to use in the shower. Ditch those synthetic body loofah!

Debating

I am contemplating if I should really devote this blog into my new journey into going almost no plastic household? I am having a blast switching to natural and organic goods, and so is my boyfriend. hmmmm???

Bliss

I came home to the cutest thing today, more than than the vintage cooper. 

Yucky

Our bathroom suffers but not as much as our eyes. But to renovate this entire bathroom will mean that our wallet will suffer big time. We do not own the house since we are only living at the other half of my in-laws 9 bedroom home. We are allowed to do renovations but I mean, we are not living here forever so why waste money? We can however afford to do a little to make the place clean looking and fresh atmosphere. Here, we decided to literally yank out the medicine cabinet three fold mirrors (by the way, all the endless mismatching tiles and colors in this house was the previous owners "wrong doing"), repainted the sink bottom drawer, attached knobs, added $5 window blinds, and replaced a $10 project DIY mirror. I will make a separate post on the mirror as well as the shower area. I found a brand new Behr white paint in the mother-in-law's storage outback and thought it was the same eggshell Behr in our master bedroom and I wanted to repaint the dirty spots and holes on them. Turns out, it was 2 shades lighter and decided to paint the entire room (it was unplanned). We decided to use some of the leftover paint and started attacking the bathroom sink and anything else that would look good white (everything became white but I had enough self-control to not paint my dogs lol). 

We are almost done with the bathroom but I feel like it is never ending trying to get it done-done! It always seems a mess to me but then again I guess I am just a little OCD and my definition of clean is different from those who don't see it MY way ;]

Hawaii 2013 Auto Show

Is it not the cutest thing you have ever seen? I don't really care for car show, let alone interest in cars I mean unless we were talking about a brand new car for me then yes we will talk. But if it is just to sit in the shade for people to awe over it, no thanks. But I wanted to go out to check out my brother in law's car that he entered into the show plus a free pass to check out the brand new autos so why not. It is a shame that this little guy was tucked away in the corner. Yes, it had some oil leak on the bottom, some wires were sticking out the front light but really? It is freaking awesome I mean I would drive this car around! Just a few work, more wax, and more cleaning I would be caught in a Chanel purchase, JC Litas, and a messy hair bun in this bad boy ;)

Slow & Steady switching

I have been making the "switch" this entire month.... errr slowly anyway. The first thing that I decided to bring into our home is organic spectrum coconut oil from Wal-Mart. I ran out of my Olay night cream that usually last me about six months. It cost about $25 so that is a total of $50 a year on night cream alone. After learning that my holy grail of a brand is a participant of testing on animals, I had to say no bueno to purchasing another one. I read about organic coconut oil being used as moisturizer, mouth wash, etc. so I figured why not?! I purchased a 14 fl. oz Spectrum coconut oil from Wal-Mart for $7.50 in the oil aisle and it has been about a week since I purchased it and..... I LOVE IT!

I recently researched about the other uses of coconut oil and the result was abundant. Someone mentioned that you cannot state certain information for coconut oil (which I find a complete weird thing) but I will state just what I use it for.

• Oil pulling (will post a separate post on this later)
• Tablespoon serving for my dogs meal once a day for shiny coat (specially since they are pomeranians)
• Face moisturizer (day and night)
• Hair tip moisturizer (alternating with my leftover Chi silk infusion)

These are my current uses for my organic coconut oil but I cannot wait until I make my own deodorant and eye cream. 

Other switches made:

1. Ditched my favorite Olay body lotion for a gallon of Hempz original lotion (I will right a review soon). Switching our lotion means less tiny bottles, economical, organic, eco-friendly, and cheaper. 
2. Replaced synthetic body loofah for 100% hemp washcloth scrubber that I knitted myself. I used my leftover beading hemp twine (rustic) from a year ago and it does the job better than the $2 plastic loofahs at the store. It is rough enough to get the job done but gentle enough to not hurt. It is still in the testing zone so I will not write a full review just yet. 
3. Dryer balls instead of store bought dryer sheets. 
4. No more store bought foot scrubber. I make batches weekly for our daily use in the shower. 

So far, these are the small adjustments we have made in our household but are progressing with other things. I will share other switches we have made. I am happy to announce my boyfriend is being so kind to let me use him as my little lab rat to try out DIY castile soap recipes. 

Homestyle Yakiniku

It was an ultimate money saving cheat day today. Peppers, jalapenos, and okra all grown locally at the family farm. They were fresh from the farm this evening and handpicked :D. 

I worked extremely hard with my workout and clean eating that a cheat day was well deserved. Remember that previous post I wrote on the jalapenos? Yes, these are the meat minus the cow tongue since I was not up for cleaning, freezing, and thinly slicing them LOL. Indoor grilling with my griddle/grill for the first time AND it was my first time ever grilling anything on my own. The boyfriend high five me on that. 

Organic jalapenos

My father-in-law has a huge farm that caters to our family only (I know, selfish in a good way) but his jalapeno plant bear a ton this month. They are very crispy, clean, very spicy, and organic. We had so much jalapenos that I had to add jalapenos in almost all of my cooking this week. What do you eat with yours? I love mines with grilled meat especially cow tongue, briskets, and pork belly :D.