curiouslycarmen, Author at Curiously Carmen

Palmer’s Cocoa Butter Line

December 1, 2015

These new Palmer’s products could not have arrived at a better time to relieve my skin. These three super products help combat dry skin caused by the dry and cold air, and leave you smelling like chocolate.

Keep reading to find out how to enter the giveaway – full sized bottles of Palmer’s Cocoa Butter line! (Update: Giveaway ended)

Did you know that hot water actually dries out your skin? After a cold day, I want to do nothing but take a nice, hot shower to warm up.. but my skin has been insanely itchy and dry afterwards. I never knew this since I don’t ever suffer from dry skin but now I’m forced to take colder showers so I don’t become ridiculously itchy and dry after.

With the harsh winter air coming, my skin has not been drier. I constantly find myself having to moisturize many times a day, which is unusual for me! In particular, my face has been super, super, super dry compared to my usual oily skin… I’m finding myself looking for masks that help dry skin- something I never thought I would do.

I could not wait to try these products out as my itchy skin was becoming so frustratingly uncomfortable. Trying to relieve an itch that won’t go away does not look good in public… and I might have scratched too hard because certain parts of my skin are raw and red now… UGH.

To fully moisturize your skin, I recommend using all three products during and after your shower routine. While you’re in the shower or bath, use the moisturizing body oil on your skin after your soap. Be careful though! As this is an oil, your bathtub may become slippery so take extra caution.
After the shower, follow up with the skin therapy oil. I find that the spray bottle is better because there is less mess, and you have better control to the amount of oil that spray. The soothing oil, compared to the body oil, was not as thick but still did an amazing job in moisturizing my skin.

Sometimes, I’ll just use the soothing oil on its own on extra dry areas.
Once your skin has soaked up all the soothing oil goodness, finish with the classic Cocoa Butter Formula Lotion with Vitamin E. As you can see from the photo, the lotion has an off-white colour to it.

I love how all three products smell like chocolate! I just recently finished my Halloween chocolate stash but I’m able to still be surrounded by the wonderful chocolate scent with these products. The scent is not too overwhelming either.

Giveaway Guidelines, Rules, and Conditions

I am giving away two sets of the Palmer’s Cocoa Butter line and hope that you and a friend will enjoy them as much as I did!

To enter:

Visit my Instagram & follow me
On the photo, like & tag a friend who would love a set as well and use #Palmers
By entering, participant is agreeing to the rules & conditions

Rules:

Contest open to Canadians of legal age only
Must provide CuriouslyCarmen & Palmer’s with a Canadian shipping address
If winner does not respond in 7 days, CuriouslyCarmen will select a new winner

Conditions:

The two sets will be shipped to the winner.
CuriouslyCarmen & Palmer’s are not responsible for any injury or harm that may occur. This which would be super unlikely, but the oils may be slippery so take caution of your surroundings when using them!
CuriouslyCarmen & Palmer’s are not responsible for any allergic or health reactions that may occur. It is up to the individual to consult product ingredients and acknowledge ingredients are right for them.
Winner will be drawn on December 8, 2015

Good luck and thanks for reading!

Carmen

Neverland Tea Salon

November 27, 2015

I can’t believe that I forgot to talk about Neverland Tea Salon. I was in the middle of switching phones in the summer, and the photos were taken on my old phone and I completely forgot about them after I got my new phone. Nonetheless, a late review is better than no review – especially if it is a place as magical as Neverland Tea Salon.

I first stumbled upon this place after a meager dinner experience at Ramen Sanpachi, over a year ago. We were walking around the street after dinner, and although the lights were off and the place was closed, I knew I had to come back to Neverland Tea Salon one day. I kept this place at the back of my head until Bubble suggested to go to high tea!

We also had Entertainment Book coupons for high tea so decided to go before things got busy in the Fall (Hah, it’s practically Winter now).

Neverland is very cutesy and girly. You step into a fairy tale setting and everything about this place is just so princess-y, classy, and cute. Luckily, we got the best seats in the restaurant that day, which was a big pink sofa spot at the front.

There were four of us, and we ordered two separate sets of high tea. We ordered the high tea ($30 each) and the demi high tea ($18 each), but it was slightly cheaper from the coupon. With the high tea, you get bottomless tea (!!!!) but with the demi high tea, you are only able to select two teas per person.

I’m not going to go to detail over all the teas that we ordered, but trust me when I say their tea was pretty good! All of the teas that we ordered were full of flavour, and can be sweetened with honey or sugar cubes on your table.
Demi tea ($18/person): This is the smaller and cheaper selection of high tea. The pastries and sandwiches offered with the demi tea are the same as high tea, but it does not include some items. Since Rainbow, and Stitch had already been here many times and weren’t that hungry, they split the demi tea.

Fun fact: The owner of the tea salon actually made all the high tea trays herself! She bought all these vintage plates, and glued them together into beautiful stands.

High tea ($30/person): Bubble and I split the high tea, which ended up being cheaper since we had a buy one get one from the Entertainment Book! As you can see, there are more items offered from the high tea.

Although I’m not a big fan of scones, I was told that I had to try the scones here because they were really good. And yes, they were delicious. They were soft, warm, and buttery. So good!

If you’ve been following my blog for awhile now, you know that I prefer savoury food over sweet food. In fact, I don’t have much of a sweet tooth at all so naturally I gravitated towards the bottom plate with the savoury selections.

Since their sandwich and pastry selection changes often and this visit was over three months ago, I don’t think it’s much use to describe each of the food items in detail. Although the sandwiches look very simple, they were actually really delicious and the quality was definitely there.

Here is a picture of both the demi and high tea! Since you are drinking A LOT of tea, you definitely get full really fast. We ended up packing most of the pastries home because we were so full from the sandwiches and amount of tea we were drinking.

I would recommend trying out Neverland Tea Salon if you like girly and cute themed places. The service is very friendly and knowledgeable, although a bit slow. Maki came here last month too and mentioned that it took so long for her to ask for the bill, that she ended up with a parking ticket when she left because the meter expired. She asked for the bill 15 minutes before the meter expired so that really sucks. 🙁

Thanks for reading!

-Carmen

Vancouver Tea Festival 2015

November 25, 2015

Over the weekend, I attended the Vancouver Tea Festival, presented by the Vancouver Tea Society with a friend! Tea lovers congregated into the Croatian Cultural Center to discover and taste tea from over thirty different tea vendors. I spent the afternoon discovering many new tea companies and tasting tea, and left with a better appreciation of tea.

Since I don’t have caffeine due to caffeine sensitivity (bad things happen when I have caffeine), I was only able to sample the herbal or caffeine free teas but there were so many herbal teas being offered that it wasn’t a problem or frustration! I was a bit worried that my tea sampling would be limited but there was a good balance of caffeinated and herbal tea.

Also, my friend has a pretty extensive knowledge of tea and is an even bigger tea lover than I am, so I trust her opinion on the taste and quality of tea!

Top left, going clockwise

Tea Sparrow: The first stand we went to was Tea Sparrow, which I first saw at the EAT! Vancouver festival. Tea Sparrow offers monthly subscription boxes for tea. Unfortunately, the table was really busy so we didn’t end up trying a sample here.

The Tea Spot: I sampled the red hot chai tea from them. It was pretty rich and full of flavour, but I’m not a fan of cinnamon so this wasn’t a favourite of mine.

David’s Tea: We (my friend) sampled the citron oolong. There was a very strong lemon/citrusy scent to the tea, which showed in the taste as well.

Wize Monkey: The packaging was so cute! They also had fake mustaches plastered on some of their products as well. I sampled the peppermint tea, which had a strong minty and refreshing flavour to it.

Top left, going clockwise

Capilano Tea House: I sampled the lavender chamomile tea here. It was just absolutely amazing and probably my favourite tea at the festival. The strong lavender taste made the tea very well rounded and fragrant. Chamomile is usually a lighter tasting tea, but I how well the lavender went with the tea.

Cultivate Tea: This was an oolong kombucha tea. Did you know that kombucha tea is made from fermented bacteria in sweet tea? I didn’t know that! My friend drank a lot one time, and her face ended up getting red from the alcoholic content although she didn’t feel drunk.

Crimson Lotus Tea: There was a big crowd around this vendor table as well, so we didn’t get a chance to try their tea. However, it was the only table that had a carved wooden table set up for tea demonstrations, which I thought was pretty cool!

The Chinese Tea Shop: I tried the red rose herbal tea, but it was nothing new to me since my dad has a big jar of this at home. The flavour was pretty light although fragrant. We usually add dried rosebuds like this to other teas, I think this would go well with chamomile tea!
Top left, going clockwise

Justea: We were really drawn in by the packaging of their products! Luckily, they had two samples of herbal tea so I tried the peppermint and chamomile tea. The peppermint tea had a very strong and minty flavour, great for those days when you have a sore throat or congested nose. As for the chamomile, the flavour was pretty light.

Aromatica Fine Teas: Their rooibos tea was also one of my favourites. It was a nice, rich rooibos tea with hints of apple and nutty flavours.

Lumbini Tea: One of their green teas hold a patent for the way that it is hand rolled in Sri Lanka. I wish that I took a photo of it, but I had never seen green tea rolled in that way before!

Trudy Ann’s: Normally I stay away from chai because it is usually served as a chai black tea, which contains caffeine. However, I was happy to discover Trudy Ann’s as they have many chai flavoured herbal teas! I sampled a few of their teas, but my favourite was the peach cobbler chai. It was very rich and sweet, and would make a delicious dessert tea.

Pure Leaf: I’ve seen this brand many times and tried their tea before, so I didn’t try it again at the festival. Their tea is pretty light and slightly sweetened, with different flavours that you’re able to choose from.

Karla’s Specialteas: Karla had a big selection of tea to sample and buy, all packaged in small and durable tea tins. I tried the fireside tea, which is a rooibos and fruit blend tea. I was blown away by the amount of flavour in it since the colouring of the tea wasn’t that dark! The tea had a strong and delicious berry flavour, perfect for those fruit tea lovers.

Ichiyo: I could smell the matcha as we were approaching their table! I really wanted some, but was able to resist! My friend said it was amazing, and even talked about it afterwards. I could definitely see the quality in the matcha!

6 Mountains Tea: My friend sampled the pu-erh tea here.

Shaktea: I have been to the Shaktea store on Main Street before, but haven’t tried this tea before. I read the tag wrong and was expecting a peach tea (it said peace, oops), but what I tasted instead was a strong hit of peppermint. The peppermint tea had a round, sweet aftertaste due to the licorice.

My Steeped Tea: This table was featured on Dragon’s Den, and even had their episode playing in the background. I’m a big fan of Dragon’s Den so naturally, I was drawn to this table. Seems like the company is doing well after signing a deal with one of the dragons! Their egg nogging tea is a blend of black and green tea, which my friend enjoyed.

My Matcha Life: The only table that was giving out food- matcha cookies, that is!
Young Mountain Tea: The team here was very kind and sweet! They drove here from Oregon to attend the festival. My friend sampled the Nilgiri FOP tea, with the FOP standing for three ingredients in the tea that I can’t recall anymore. It had a slight honey taste to it.

Oollo Tea: My friend sampled the oolong tea here, while we were trying to figure out how to pronounce the company’s name! Their logo is actually an infinity symbol, I just typed in oollo tea hoping that something would show up.

The Tea Guys: The last table of the day! Phew! Before we knew it, 1.5 hours had gone by. This was a great tea to end the festival with. Similar to Karla’s Specialteas, this herbal berry tea was full of delicious fruity flavour!

Amoda Tea: Amoda Tea was one of the few tables that were selling full sized drinks to go. My friend sampled the matcha vanilla lavendar latte, which she really loved. I was able to talk to one of the co-owners of this company, and learned about a new app called Ant Square which connects consumers with local shops.

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Even if you aren’t a tea lover or know much about tea, I would recommend attending this event as you get to taste so many different types of tea in one place. You’re bound to find a tea you love here. Thanks for a great event, Vancouver Tea Festival!

-Carmen

Media passes provided. Opinions are own.

NOTD: Yellow & Floral Nails

November 22, 2015

After having my first gel nail manicure a month ago, I decided to paint my nails again once I had let my nails breathe a bit. While watching How To Get Away With Murder (is anyone else obsessed with that show? I watched the entire first season in 3 days), I decided to finally give my nails a splash of colour.

Amy, an independent Jamberry consultant, had sent me a nail sheet to try out last month, but since I had gel nails on, I didn’t get the chance until now. I received the some of the designs from the Fall 2015 catalog (keep reading to see how big the entire collection is!).

Anyways, I decided to go with the floral print (middle one) because I was feeling girly. Since the weather in Vancouver has been pretty gloomy and cold (although for the past two days it’s been miraculously sunny albeit freezing cold), I decided I wanted a bright colour that would perk me up and remind me of the sun that I so dearly need.
Other than the Jamberry nail sticker, I’m using the Anna Sui nail colour in N800- lemon yellow to brighten my nails up!

For best results, it is recommended that you warm up the nail sticker with a blow dryer/some sort of heat before peeling it onto your finger. Since I was watching How to Get Away With Murder and it was too intense to leave my living room to blow dry the stickers, I gave it a chance and just stuck it on without the heat. It’s been two days and the sticker is still on great, and hasn’t scratched one bit!

Upon looking at their catalog, Jamberry offers a very impressive array of nail stickers that would fit even the pickiest person. I love nail stickers because I can get cute designs on my nails with minimal effort! I found that the Jamberry nailstrip was very big for my nail, so I ended up cutting quite a bit off to fit my nail.

Seriously, their nail sticker collection is HUGE. This isn’t even all of it, just part of the Fall 2015 collection! Which one is your favourite? You can see their entire collection here.

A fun thing to add is that I noticed that one of my favourite tops to wear to work match my nails -what a lovely coincidence! My nails chip extremelyyyy fast (it’s a miracle if a polish lasts 24 hours without minor chipping for me), which is partly my fault because I use my hands a lot. This is two days after applying the nail sticker, and I applied another coat of polish to cover up the chip at the top of my nail.

Thanks for reading and stay warm everyone!

Carmen

Press samples provided. Opinions are own.

THEFACESHOP Ghassoul Pore Mask

November 19, 2015

After grabbing some food with old coworkers a couple months ago, two of us decided to go to Lush afterwards because I was raving about the Lush masks and my coworker wanted to check it out herself. Since we had time afterwards, we decided to stroll around the mall and ended up at THEFACESHOP.

First off, isn’t this packaging so adorable?! The packaging was what caught my eye in the first place, and after reading about what it does and talking to the sales rep, I found out that this mask is suitable for someone with oily skin and prone to breakouts.

Since my skin was feeling more oily than that week. I decided to purchase this to see if it would make a difference!
After purchasing the ghassoul pore mask, I went online to look up reviews and read up on ghassoul, but there as much information as I hoped on. Luckily, the sales rep was really informative and I was able to pull pieces together from her comments and the various sites I researched before writing this post.

Ghassoul has similar properties to charcoal, where it draws out dirt, oil, etc (aka. all the bad stuff). From my online research, ghassoul isn’t popularly used in the beauty industry, compared to other minerals. One thing I found very interesting about ghassoul is that it is only mined in the mountains of Moroco, Africa! Moroccan women have been using ghassoul for skin and hair since the 8th century.

Another name for ghassoul is rhassoul. The mineral also contains iron, silica, magnesium, and potassium. In its natural form, ghassoul looks like small sheet rocks, which are then dissolved in water for usage.
Upon opening the jar, the mask was protected by a thick waterproof paper-like material and was 3/4 full of product. There was a light, somewhat floral scent to it as well.

The mask is pretty thick, as you can tell from the swatch. I applied this to my entire face, focusing more on oily areas. I found this pretty easy to apply, and the scent was a nice touch too. After awhile, the scent kind of goes away and I found myself forgetting that I had put this mask on until I passed by a mirror! Oops.

You wash the mask off after 10-15 minutes and follow up with a moisturizer. My skin felt more nourished, smooth, and less oily afterwards. I have been using this mask a couple of times each week, or whenever I feel that my face is more oily than usual after I’m off work.
Overall, I’m glad that I tried using this mask. I purchased this for around $8 CAD, which I think is a pretty reasonable price as you do get many uses out of the jar! It also doubles up as a cute jar for small items once it has been emptied and washed out 🙂

Thanks for reading!

Carmen