Gosh, I told a bit of a fib when I said I would update more frequently! The last few weeks have been enormously stressful, so it's been quite hard to find the time to blog.
As you know, I resigned from my job last month. The few weeks leading up to my last day were pretty tiring as I had to find a replacement for my position, and train them to hopefully get an idea if what I do. Luckily, it wasn't so bad, it at least took my mind of the 'new job nerves' which got to me later on.
Whilst all this was going on, I was frantically packing up as much as I could of my things in suitcases, ready to move to Melbourne. I got most of it done, but the night of my last day at my previous job - I was still packing. I had to be ready by the next morning as I had to pick K up from the station, and we were going to drive my car back to Melbourne. Everything went smoothly, my car held up pretty good with the amount of things I'd stuffed into it, and off we went - not without a heap of tears on the way. I have a really good relationship with my parents, which is why I've been able to stay as long as I had. Plus they have been there through the hardest parts of my life, and since then, it's been very hard to break away or even entertain the thought of leaving home. In saying that, it's taken me quite a while to settle into K's house. It just doesn't feel like 'home' yet. I'm hoping as time goes by, that feeling will go away. Although, I really think that once we actually buy our own home - it'll feel more homey, but that most likely won't be until next year.
So, after moving into K's house that weekend, getting my things all sorted, and going grocery shopping for our work lunches - I started work that Monday. Let me tell you, my nerves absolutely killed me. For two whole weeks, my stomach felt like it was about to curl up and die. I could barely eat, I slept terribly, I missed home, and I cried every night after work. Things are better now, but gee, they were a rough few weeks. 
To compensate for my rough time, K said that I could find a cat of my own. And that's where Sir Purrton comes in! We adopted him a week ago from my home town at an animal shelter, and drove him home to Melbourne. I tell you, you want to rip your hair out when a cat just meows the entire time for 2 HOURS! Argh. But, he is the cutest little thing and I just love his ginger fur. My first cat was ginger when I was a child, and I've never had one since. So it feels so odd to actually have ginger cat again. But he's the biggest snuggler, and enjoys company and lots of pats (and food!). He has the best personality and I laugh at all the funny things he does. He's only 6 months old, so still a kitten, but he is as big as our 1.5yr old cat! I wonder how big he will get when he's older? 

Purrton playing with my slipper drawstrings

Looking at me when I was holding the bag of catnip. Oh yes. He does funny things for catnip!

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Omigosh, I finally get to share with you my little beauty haul I did whilst we were in Hong Kong. Let me tell you, it took a lot of will power not to go completely overboard at the beauty counters, however I was able to resist temptation and buy only what I had on my list to begin with. Pretty good eh?!
The newest items that I've not really worn much of in the past but in the last year or so I can't get enough of, and that's lipsticks. I was more of a lip balm girl as my lips usually got quite dry - especially being indoors all the time during the day for work, there just wasn't any point in wearing lipstick as it would look hideous on dry lips. 
However, over the course of the year my lips haven't been getting as dry because I'm constantly piling on the lip balm & moisturiser  at night - which has helped immensely during the day for wearing lipstick. Winning! 
So here's to welcoming fabulous new products!

First up, lipsticks. I can't remember how many You Tube videos I watched, and reviews I read trying to figure out which colours would suit me, how they looked on other people, and their staying power.
From left to right: 
- Rouge Coco, Paradis 39 
I first saw this used on a Lisa Eldridge You Tube tutorial for Chanel, and her finished look was perfection using this lipstick. It's a beautiful medium coral shade perfect for the spring/summer seasons. It's semi-opaque, but still gives a good amount of colour, and has a noticeable sheen and shimmer. This just brightens up the face immediately and it's definitely one of my absolute favourites.
- Rouge Coco, Chambon 31
Chambon is a wonderfully rich, vibrant, glowing red, with a glossy sheen. I wanted to find a red lipstick that wasn't too red, as being pale, I thought it may look a bit stark on me, so I was after something with more pink tones. I think I found it!
- Rouge Coco Shine, Aventure 57
A beautiful light pink shade, I would say this is a little bit more of a gloss than a lipstick, as the staying power isn't as good as I would expect it to be, however it's really good for a natural day to day look - especially those with a light complexion. 
- Christian Dior, Rouge Dior, Darling 567
I adore this shade. It's almost verging on a hot pink, but not quite there. It's a great tone to wear if you're not wearing red, and it adds an almost instant pop of colour once you apply it to your lips. It's very moisturising and very comfortable to wear, and it lasts for a good 2 hours without applying more and leaves a nice stain afterwards.

On my shopping list, I had already decided I needed a new blush. I was going to go with one a Chanel creme blush, however I couldn't find the colour I really wanted. It was out of stock everywhere! So that was a pain. 
So an alternative I spied was the Christian Dior Rosy Glow in Petal 001. It's a really light Barbie pink, and gives a nice rosy cheek. Although I've become accustomed to creme blushes in the past, using powder I find is a little difficult with judging the correct amount, so not to look too overdone. In all, I really like this blush, it suits my complexion and creates a more 'awake' and fresh look.

I have to say, this product, is my holy grail of products. The Chanel Hydro Base Lumiere is just waaaaaay too good. It's a primer and a moisturiser, so you can use it under makeup or just on its own. Since I got it in 2012, I've used nothing else but this primer and my skin is thanking me for it. It's quite light in texture when you're applying it with your hands, but as you rub it into your skin it sticks a little. You can see when you apply it, it gives this white sheer sheen to your face and evens out blemishes, and just makes you look more fresh. 
I love this product, and I'm really sorry to say it's only available in Asian countries. The Chanel's De La Blanc is the alternative available here, but I just don't feel it comes close to this product! Well worth the money. 

As we all know flying can be a complete bore, and sometimes we get looking at the InSky magazine with all these wonderful duty free items. I was browsing on our way over to HK, and I was debating on whether or not to get this YSL travel makeup kit. I spent the next two and a half weeks thinking about it, and I ended up buying it at the airport beauty kiosk before we departed for Australia. It comes with this really stylish black fold up case YSL logo on the front, containing three makeup brushes, eyeliner and a mascara. Once you open the makeup box, there's a choice of five eyeshadows, one blush, and four lipsticks. Each are very pretty, pigmented spring/summer shades. Perfect to look fresh when traveling.
I hope you enjoyed some of my beauty buys, I'd love to know what is your 'must have' in your makeup bag because I'm really loving all these wonderful products and I just can't decide! 

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Wowsers! I haven't done an update for sometime, and I apologise profusely! However, the last few weeks have been an absolute whirlwind which I'll go over below. Things have quietened back down (for now) but I expect this will reoccur again once we head off to HK in a few weeks. 
So I'll start from the start shall I?
Let me just say first off, the weather here has been absolutely HORRENDOUS. Hideous. Disgusting. Any other negative words you can think of, feel free to add them in! More than a week of consecutive days over over 38 degrees. Not to mention it's bushfire season, so there has been a lot of warnings going out lately, and some have been quite close to home. I hope mother nature can spare us some cooler weather very very soon. (Even the pooches have been so tired of it, see my furry puppy Trevor napping above!)
Starting from tomorrow, we have exactly ONE MONTH before we get married. A month. And gee, I can tell it's just going to fly by. We have still so much to do, and have a lot of little bits and pieces to purchase for my parents so they'll have a comfortable flight/holiday. Not to mention what I'm going to pack!
In amongst all the organising, the lists we've written down, the itineraries we've planned down to the last day - we've also been very busy with our September wedding. So far we've bought all our stationary, and wedding decoration supplies - and so far the small mountain hasn't moved from the corner of my room due to not having the spare time at the moment, so that will be waiting for me once we get back from overseas, when I can really get stuck into creating our DIY decorations.  I'm a little bit surprised my brain just hasn't gone completely bonkers from all the wedding prep, (which I admit it has gone a bit mushy lately) but I think it's all about time, and giving yourself some breathing space so that you're not completely and utterly overwhelmed - like I was beginning to be.
I am still a little nervous about next month and how it will go, but I'm gradually coming to terms with it and I know it will turn out to be absolutely amazing. Of course, I can't wait to see Hong Kong again, and I hope to come back with a lot more photos to share with you all.
In other BIG news. I bought another wedding dress. Well, okay, not me, but my mum for me - (she totally talked me into it!)
We decided my previous dress I bought last year - although very pretty and simple, it just wasn't....me. It did need a small amount of alteration which could have possibly either ruined the dress, OR the dress would end up to be to short. So in the end we said 'Hey, we only do this once in our lives, so the dress should be one of those memorable experiences!' But I'll write about more of that day on my Wedding Sunday post, so stay tuned :)
Another reason I haven't updated lately is more for personal reasons. I'd been waiting since last November for a letter from my hospital with a surgery date for my laproscopy. I can't tell you how many times I wrote all over my admission form and phoned them up to let them know this had to happen before March as I was getting married overseas. I guess they listened to my pleas and I had my surgery this past Monday. So very happy about that - not so happy about the recovery process!
(Please skip if TMI) I've been a long sufferer of painful, heavy periods since I was in my teens, and since there was a long family history of Endometriosis on my mums side, it made sense that I could have it. Previously to meeting K, although still bad - it wasn't high on my priorities list. I felt I had a high pain threshold, and could deal with my reproductive organs exploding in my body every month. 
However, it has progressively gotten worse with age, and since we're planning on having babies next year, now was the time to get it sorted and find out exactly what I was dealing with. It turns out I DO have endometriosis, and I'm just under the severe category. I had 3 cysts removed from my uterus and had a laser ablation. I am now the new owner of three incisions, one on my left and right side, and one in my bellybutton - which is the WORST place to have stitches, so much pulling when you move! But each day I am getting better and am able to move around a bit more. Today is the first day out of 4 that I can sit for some length of time at my computer without feeling like crap. So that's a bonus! 
I do hope I'll be a lot better on the weekend as we have our appointment with the cake maker on Saturday. We know pretty much what we're after and I'm hoping it'll look super super cute :D I'll let you all know how it goes, and try to update as regularly as I can!

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K and I have needed to get away for quite some time as the last few weeks have been pretty rough on us. It was so good to be able to completely relax and chill out at my parents beach house, and not have to worry about rushing to be somewhere, or do something that required extra thinking! Our brains had earned a well deserved break, and we had an amazing quiet weekend just being together.

My parents beach house is situated in Blairgowrie, in the Mornington Peninsula which is about an hours drive from Melbourne CBD. We've had this house for over 10 years in our family, and I've seen it transform from being pretty horrid inside to something that is very homey. It still has a long way to go, but it has good character and a lot of potential! A diamond in the rough if you may. We got to the house at about 10pm on Friday night, we would have got there earlier, however we made a stop at Chadstone where I purchased my first full frame camera - the Canon 6D! I cannot tell you how much I am loving this camera, the added Wi-fi feature is a real help with uploading to instagram, so I'll be carrying it with me a lot!!
We got up late on Saturday morning - we needed a good sleep in after Burdie, (aka BurdieWood) our baby cat, kept us awake by exploring her new surrounds! Naughty kitty! We headed off to Sorrento, (which is a beach side town about a 5 minutes drive away) just before lunch and chose a cute cafe by the name of 'Buckley's Chance' to dine at. They had these adorable menus, which were made out of 'Little Golden Books', a series of story books that were around when I was very young. I remember I had a huge collection of those books, but now the originals are hard to come by. 

After flicking through the menu, K decided on the slow cooked beef foccacia, and I went for the full Buckley's Breakfast! Both were pretty good, and even though Sorrento is well know to be a little pricey - it wasn't that expensive at all. Around $14-$16 each for what we ate. 

After our bellies were full, we walked the many arty stores that lined the town, and were amazed at some of the art that people had designed. This one particular shop was heavily into wood art - and there was a huge elephant, a pig, and a bull with huge horns made entirely of pieces of wood that were found on the beach. It was just inspiring, but I'm not entirely sure where you would put a massive wooden bull though at your house! I did however, as it was pretty hot, bought some cute handmade burgundy shorts with white lace trim to wear around the house for $12. Not bad!

We made our way down to the beach, stopping at the botanical gardens and taking a few snaps, before heading to the pier and watched the sailboats with their fishermen, the speedboats and even caught a seat plane taking off! It was such a nice day - I really should have listened to my dear husband when he said 'put sunscreen on', which now I'm regretting not doing because my feet and neck are quite burnt! Silly me :( But I'll live (I think). At least my feet and legs got a really good exfoliation walking along the beach though!

I actually enjoyed this weekend a lot, it felt great to just take our time and do what we wanted - and take as many photos as we could with the new camera of course! I am very much looking forward to the Christmas holidays which are just over two weeks away so we can spend more time together, and enjoy the festivities the city has to offer - and not forgetting the Boxing Day sales! Hopefully the next few working weeks go really really fast!

What are you doing for the Christmas holidays?

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The whole purpose of our Hong Kong trip this year, was for us to not only wind down and relax a little from our jobs, but to attend K's cousin - Matthew, and his bride to be Blanche's wedding. I'd never seen a traditional Chinese wedding before, apart from what I'd seen on You Tube. The day was an early start, and a late night, so we were definitely ready for bed by the time we arrived home! We were able to take lots of photos of the days events which I'll explain below. I've broken this up into two parts, the traditional tea ceremony, and the church ceremony & reception :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our day started at 7.30am, we woke up and got ready, as we had to leave at 9.45am to go to Matthews parents house in Ma On Shan for the traditional tea ceremony. It was a high rise apartment and the view was amazing. A massive window of sea views and a great view of the water park that was close by! All the girls, including the Groom's mothers sisters wore flower armbands, which we wore all night. Must say it did go well with the dress I wore later on for the reception! I had photos with my mother in laws sisters which was nice, now I have something to put in my photo album :)

LTR: With my flower wristband / My gorgeous man! / Cute pic of us!

Me & my mother in laws sisters. My MIL is on the far right :)

The Bride & Groom arrived just after 11am, and they both wore traditional costumes, which were so beautiful! After greeting everyone, the ceremony began. I would imagine with conducting the tea ceremony with most of their relatives, kneeling for the long period of time would have hurt, or either, you'd have very good leg muscles! Fortunately for me, I will only have to kneel for a short time at our wedding in March, as my knees probably wouldn't hold up that long!

The Bride and Groom arriving for the tea ceremony

Giving of gifts (red envelopes) Should also mention this is my father in law!

The Bride and Groom with the Grooms parents

I'm very lucky to have been able to witness such a great event, and it makes me a bit less worried and more happier that I know roughly how the day will go for myself and K. (Which by the way in other news, my two custom made dresses are finally finished, and OMG, I cannot believe how BEAUTIFUL they are. Our tailor did a superior job and I'm absolutely elated!)
Stay tuned for Part II of Matthew & Blanche's wedding!

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So does it? The answer is yes...and no. And I'll tell you why.
Last year I was looking for a new skin care regime, one that would be easy to remember, keep my skin clear from breakouts and be cost effective. After seeing countless commercials on TV and reading in magazines how wonderful Proactiv was, I finally caved and bought the 3 Step System online. I think at the time, I paid $29.95, with a 60 day money back guarantee. You can buy this system here.   (Note: only half of the system is in the above photo but I'll get to that in a minute).
I thought it was pretty good value, and with that price it didn't really matter if it worked or not. I received the package a few days after I ordered and I excitedly opened it up to find the tiniest bottles I'd seen in my life. And it was that moment, I thought 'how is this going to last 2 months!?' Don't be fooled, they actually last longer than you'd think they would! So it's definitely a bonus in that regard. 
Now when you purchase this, or any other system on the Proactiv website, you will be paying by credit card, and you will automatically be sent 3 new bottles every 3 months. Now this was the only annoying part of the process, as the next order you recieve, the bottles are 240ml in size and this COSTS MORE. So if you're like me, opening the next box up, seeing these huge bottles compared to the last and wonder why $120 has gone from your bank account, this is why. I hadn't even finished my first bottles, so what I did was cancel my membership, and returned the 240ml bottles to Proactiv, and got my money back. They had no problem in me returning the items, as I told them I was going to buy them directly from their kiosk in one of the shopping malls here in Melbourne.
The 3 Step System comes with a ) step 1) cleanser, (step 2) toner and (step 3) repair (not shown). Each are labeled so you know which one to apply first. The kit also comes with some bonus extras, for me, it came with a green tea moisturizer & a clear purifying mask. 

Left To Right: Deep Cleansing Wash, Cleanse & Toner

I started using the system religiously for about 2 weeks, and every time I used it -  my skin felt clean & fresh. However after a few weeks my skin was drying out something chronic, especially my nose and T zone which got really flaky and incredibly itchy. I read online that the green tea moisturizer could help with the dryness which I applied liberally, but wasn't enough in the end.
In all fairness, this system DOES work, you just have to tailor it to your skin type, which means if you can, go into one of their kiosks at a mall and explain your situation to the sales person. I did this, and the lady tailored a system and advised me on products that would better suit my skin - as the 3 step system is just a generic system and not aimed at a particular skin type. 
I now only use the (step 1) cleanser 3 times a week, and every other day I use Proactiv's 'Deep Cleansing Wash' in the 240ml bottle, which is not as harsh on my skin. I then use (step 2) toner, and I follow up with my Natio Ageless Firming Night Cream - which I talked about previously here.
I find this combination of using certain Proactiv products and my own choice of moisturizer works better for me, and has kept my skin hydrated, and clear with only one or two breakouts during that 'hormonal time' of the month. I would think if you had very oily skin, perhaps the 3 Step System would work for you, but with combination skin, maybe looking into the more sensitive range. 

Also, I will advise you on the little gift they give you - the 'clear purifying mask' is horrid! I used this at K's house once after my shower, and after I put it on my face, all I could smell was sulpher (which if you don't know, smells like poo!)- and I stank his house house out well and truly. So I have never used it since then. But if you like the smell, feel free to smell like poo! :)
I actually really like Proactiv, it doesn't cost an organ to buy and it's a well known reputable brand, not too mention really helpful when you need a little guidance with products. I'm not entirely sure if the commercials are 100% truthful when you see teenagers with really really bad acne and it's gone in a month, but like I said - it may work that way for them - just like my own personal system works for me. 
Am I going to continue using Proactiv? For sure! Let me know in the comments below on what your experiences have been using this or any other system on the website!

Purchased: Last year Overall Quality: 5* Price: $20-$120 (depending on different systems and individual products) Value For Money: 4* Would I Recommend It? Yes I would, and I have to many people, even my fiance who now uses it everyday!

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NEUTRALS, NEUTRALS, NEUTRALS! For a girl with my complexion, there is no such thing as owning too many neutral palettes, especially when this one could be the best dupes for Urban Decay's 'Naked' eyeshadow palette which unfortunately for us Aussies - isn't available here. (Unless you want to pay $70+ on eBay for something that is probably fake! But I won't take my chances thanks!)
I saw this in Myer in my hometown a few weekends ago and I didn't fully catch on that it was very similar to Naked, though after doing some research when I got home - I got excited. It was lucky for me the weekend just passed, I was able to pick this little baby up for HALF price. Yup, $17. So I was pretty happy!
The colors are similar to the Naked palette, but not all are spot on. I've already done the research and the pigmentation of these are a little less than I see when people use the Naked palette, but they are still pretty. I'm not one for hugely pigmented eyeshadows, I find them messy, and I think for me being so pale, I'd rather stick with light, natural eyeshadows. 
It's a lovely little palette and I can't wait to try it all out, especially in 26 days when K & I go to Hong Kong again! 
So guys, what do you think of Chi Chi's nude palette? Do you find it to be one of the best dupes for Urban Decay's Naked Palette? Let me know in the comments below!

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