does sugar waxing works?

let me first start off with a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO EVERYONE!!! one more tiny fact about chinese new year is that we celebrate everyone's birthday on the 7th day which is today! with the reason behind as God used 7 days to create the world and men were created on the 7th day. so happy birthday again my friends! 

except for the tiny fact, today I wanna talk about perfect hairless legs. to be honest, I am never a wax person. I love to shave my legs because it's fast and I am usually very lazy in terms of grooming myself. UNTIL. I went to the spa for a proper wax treatment few months ago. my legs felt silky smooth afterwards, no more nasty black dots and bumps, plus all my in grown hair resulted from too much shaving got all pulled out so I can start fresh again. waxing- especially in natural organic salons are not cheap here. I don't wanna go all luxury and spend hundreds of dollars to go waxing every few months. So I researched for some natural methods online and here I found this one about making your own natural hair wax at home that I thought I could give it a try. 

So what's with the question mark at the end of the sentence? I never like sentences ended up with a question mark because it means something is not going right. yeah. something is really not going right in the process. even though I am sure most of you who are into natural home remedies will know about this method, let me quickly go through it again. Basically all you need are sugar, lemon and water (or honey). you mix them all together, boil the mixture until it gets sticky (like how normal hair wax are like) then you are good to go. applied the mixture onto hairy areas, get a cloth, pressed on top and PULL! there you go, hair gone!  yes. my hair did get pulled out, but only limiting to those long ones. looking at my legs right now, I can still see tons of random baby hairs everywhere. even thou I am not bushily hairy, I still want all my hair gone! and this method is not going to do the job. 

another problem with this method is that things get pretty messy. I got the sugar wax everywhere, the mixture gets hard when it cools down so you have to finish everything quick. it's just a disaster. ONE CONCLUSION. it's fun to try it out once to see if it really works, but no I am not going to do it again. people are professional for a reason, I will probably just leave the job to them. 

if you have tried the method and find it a great success. please share with me your experience because I would really want to save the money and have things natural at the same time:( xoxo

a haul post it is- what I got from ASOS

Here comes an official chinese new year greeting to my readers! Happy lunar new year and gung hey fart choi (which means wish you have a prosperous year)! Chinese new year is keeping me really busy so it's almost impossible to do a proper post. Remembered I mentioned about making a video showing you guys how we celebrate cny? I did manage to capture some footage these days and I will continue to do it and hopefully will be able to edit sth nice to show you guys after. This is going to take a while until I can have the video uploaded because cny last for a month here. And my family do have tradition to do sth different each day. So... stay tune! (props for those who can do daily vlog. vlogging is like the most difficult thing to do EVER! So wayy to go if you do vlogs! )

One other small fact about cny- we do have tradition to get new things for the festival. People tend to re-purchase their wardrobe, have their hair groomed right before cny. Normally people would purchase new shoes because we are not allow to buy shoes during the new year. I didn't get to buy any new shoes:( but I do manage to get myself some nice clothes and accessories for the new year. 

I got everything from ASOS. If you live in Hong Kong and you've never purchase anything from ASOS! GO CHECK THEM OUT! They pretty much have sales all year long, and they are in pretty good bargain when things are on sale. PLUS! they deliver fast!!! I ordered mine on monday and they arrived at my door on thursday. crazy speed for the fact that they are shipping from UK. 

off to my haul - everything are linked. so if you do happens to like them, click on the link and add them into your cart! 

1. Bralet with PU trim - i absolutely adore this one. it's really sexy and it gives you a bit of vintage feeling when you paired it accordingly. 

2. Cropped V neck sweatshirt  - great quality. it's really thick and comfy so it will definitely keep you warm during cooler season.

// these are all the garment I've got from ASOS. these two both happens to be short and cropped because im currently really obsess with cropped items. I will definitely pair them with high waisted bottoms for some "vintage" looks. 

3. Metallic belt 

4. Chain bracelet pack

5. Cross pearl torque bangle 

6. Skull bangle

7. Pack of three necklaces

8. Flapper headband

everything under $1300. not what I will called cheap, but they are definitely in good qualities. We do have to treat ourselves with good qualities stuff once in a while right? esp during the new year! 

what do you think about my purchase from ASOS? Spotted anything for yourself? Let me know! xoxo

happy chinese new year! celebrating for a second chance

things are finally getting better and I am back to my old happy self again. so chinese new year is coming up and I am planning to share with you guys about my feeling of having the chance to celebrate CNY in my life. 

what's good about being chinese is to have a festival like chinese new year. I love it because it feels like I am having a second chance to start things all over again. you know sometimes you rush through xmas, and in a blink of the eyes it's new years eve which means it's the time to make new year resolution and have a brand new start. Often times people get discourage for not being able to keep up. But for me, I will just wait for my second new year!

Chinese new year is how we chinese people celebrate the new year! just like how you celebrate yours on the 31st of dec. We will be spending one whole day to clean up the entire house, to get rid of your junks which resemble a brand new clean start for the new year. (oh btw, today is the clean up day! and I am planning to go clean up myself and my room once I am done with this post). We will be decorating the house, bringing in fresh flowers and putting up lucky red banners. We have to prepare red pocket money (which is another yay for unmarried "kids" like me). And just so much more. For those who had experience with CNY, you will know that this is a really fun and loud festival. Anyways, I am getting too excited I got carried away. 

We Chinese might have the excuse to have a second chance to start the new year all over again just in case the first month is not going quite well. But you do too! Every morning is a brand new start anyways. So if things are not going smooth yesterday? Start over again! Celebrate new days just like how you celebrate new year! 

Would you like me to make a video showing you how we celebrate chinese new year? Let me know! 

xoxo

placing summer right in front of our eyes - ZARA SS13 TRF

supporting green living and natural beauty products doesn't make me give up the glam.
ZARA TRF Spring 2013 campaign with Cara Delevingne.
Romantic, flowy, breezy, summer fun, floral and sexy.

my personal favourite? everything. lol

Have you spotted anything to put in your shopping bag?

stay chic and green.

xoxo

xo baking cupcake mix review

Being really short in ingredients, I have to admit that I didn't used the best things here. But hey, there's always another time right?

As a "baker", even thou I really love to spend time on baking, sometimes I just wish to make things a little bit easier with the help of baking kits out from the box. For your information, I am on a gluten free, dairy free and sometimes egg free (depending on the eggs) diet, having the opportunity to enjoy desserts in where I live is pretty much impossible unless I make them myself. I love to experiment with different kinds of gluten free flours, but I just can't get them all, so this is another good thing about gluten free baking mix. You can try out different flour combination without purchasing them all. 

Onto the product- this time I have chosen a gluten free chocolate cupcake kit from xobakingco. What caught my eyes is definitely the packaging. It's fun and colorful, plus those cupcakes on the box look like they are from heaven. Anyways, I got home, grabbed a punch of ingredients from the cabinet and start baking. 

Ingredients of the cupcake mix for your reference 

Cake mix (Pure Cane Sugar, Premium Cassava Flour, Cocoa Powder, Unmodified Potato Starch, Organic Coconut Flour, Baking Powder, Baking Soda, Sea Salt, Xanthan Gum, Organic Vanilla Flavor); 

Frosting Mix (Powdered Sugar (Pure Cane Sugar, Cornstarch), Cocoa Powder, Sea Salt, Organic Vanilla Flavor)

And these are the ingredients I've used

the cupcake mix of course

mazola oil

chocolate rice milk

natural vegetarian free range egg

olive oil spread

water

and that's all I need. I am actually pretty surprise and happy that you don't need to prepare that much ingredients for these cupcakes. (to be honest, these are all the stuff that my friends own at her place that are suitable for baking. If they require more stuff, I will be so sad that I have to cancel my baking afternoon). I've chosen chocolate flavoured rice milk because I want to enrich the chocolate flavour in the cakes. 

The process is really simple, you have all the instruction written very clearly on the box. So if you are not used to baking, I am sure you will be able to follow and make yourself some yummy treats as well. 

I baked mine for exactly 20 mins and let them just sit and cool down in the oven until I want to go and grab one for tasting. 20 mins is just right because they came out super soft and moist. So be sure to check on it to avoid over baking. OH THE TASTE! They're unbelievably delicious! They are soft, rich in taste and sweet. Trust me, if I serve them to you, you will not believe that these are gluten free. They are THAT good! 

Time for some review. Two downside of these cupcakes are first my choice to use olive spread for the frosting. I am off limit to any dairy products so I can't use butter. But stuff like olive spread or any other vegetable spread that came in a plastic container are just margarine. We've heard a lot of bad things about margarine, they are man-made, chemically processed and they can be even worst than butter. So next time if time allows, I will make my own butter or go get some other alternatives. (any recommendations?) 

The second downside of these cupcakes are the amount of sugar they have in the mix. I am not a fan of really sweet desserts, so these cupcakes are a little bit too sweet for me, especially the frosting. Plus if you believe that sugar is bad for you,  then this is not your type of dessert mix. They've used I believe lots of cane sugar, and because they are all mixed up with the flours and everything, you do not have the option to cut down the amount of sugar or replace them with something else. But apart from that, these are the yummiest gluten free cupcakes I've ever tasted so far in Hong Kong. 

Have you been making your own healthy yet super yummy treats? Or have you tried out anything from xobakingco? Share with me and comment below! xoxo