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product, review

Nivea Q10 Night Creme and Eye Creme review!

christinahopgood


In my constant quest to find a product that lessens or eliminates my dark under eye circles, I came across the Nivea Q10 range.  I bought the night cream and the eye cream.  I know that Nivea spells it ‘Creme’ but we all know that they only do that because it’s fashionable, and it’s not actually how you spell cream.  This is what the Eye Cream blurb says:
With age, skin loses its ability to produce energy deep within the skin’s cells. As a result, wrinkles appear and deeper wrinkles are further accentuated.  
Now enriched with twice the amount of skin’s own CoEnzyme Q10 as part of a high performing Anti-Wrinkle System, NIVEA VISAGE Q10 PLUS Advanced Wrinkle Reducer Eye Creme activates skin’s energy metabolism from within thereby continuously fighting wrinkles in the deeper layers of the skin’s surface. The fragrance-free light, caring formula is easy to apply and quickly absorbed.
Result:
  • Appearance of dark under-eye circles is minimized.
  • Fine lines are visibly reduced within hours.
  • Mimic wrinkles are visibly minimized within3 weeks.
  • Deeper wrinkles are visibly reduced in only 4 weeks.
And the night cream adds:
During the night, when skin is most receptive for moisture intake, the intensively moisturizing formula replenishes & regenerates skin most effectively from daily stress for soft & supple skin in the morning.
So!  It says that appearance of dark under-eye circles is minimised.  I’d like that!  So I started applying both products every night.  Here’s what I thought of them:
Packaging: Win.  The night cream comes in a lovely little glass jar which made it easy to get out.  It’s also blue!  The eye cream comes in a squeeze tube.  Easy to get out but hard to get the dregs at the end.  A bit like a tube of toothpaste.
Amount:  Win.  They both lasted me about 4 months, with the eye cream lasting longer by a few weeks.    That’s a pretty long time, and I am fairly generous when I apply this kind of thing.  I want it to WORK dammit!
Dark under-eye circles:  No effect.  The only reason it would make your dark circles diminish is because the cream is white.  It doesn’t actually DO anything to your skin colour or anything.  People still told me I look tired.
Fine lines:  No effect.  I have fine lines around my eyes – have done my whole life* – and almost have some on my forehead.  While these creams didn’t promote wrinkles, I also didn’t find them diminishing, even after 4 weeks as advertised.


Moisturiser: This is such a good moisturiser!  If you want a great luxurious moisturiser, then this is the stuff.  It’s thick and absorbs well and really does leave your skin soft and velvety smooth.  The reason I stuck with this stuff for so long even after it had no effect on fine lines or dark circles was because it was such a great moisturiser.
Price: A bit pricey I guess.  I think it was around the $25 mark for the night cream and $12 for the eye stuff.  It would be more worth it if it actually worked.
Originally I tried Olay’s product range, but it always burnt my skin.  Nivea doesn’t irritate at all.  All in all, a really nice moisturiser!  I would buy again – but after I finish using my next trial run!  Now I’m using Beauty Minerals eye cream for a while!  Review to come!








*When I was in year 7 I went to a friend’s sleepover and we did each other’s makeup, and the girl who did my eyes said “you have really wrinkly eyes.”  I thought it was such an insensitive thing to say, and it’s really stuck with me.  People don’t realise that the things they say can make such a huge impact for a lifetime.
blog

30 Day Lolita Challenge

christinahopgood
I saw this post on Millions of Bows for those who want to blog about Lolita stuff but aren’t sure what to blog about.  This is the list of topics:
Day 1 – 10 things about your lolita bubble.
Day 2 – 10 things you love in lolita.
Day 3 – 10 things you hate in lolita.
Day 4 – 10 different kinds of food you like.
Day 5 – 10 items from your wishlist.
Day 6 – 10 things you can’t live without in lolita.
Day 7 – 10 people who inspire your lolita style.
Day 8 – 10 songs that inspire you for lolita.
Day 9 – 10 things you will never do in lolita.
Day 10 – What’s in your bag?
Day 11 – One day in your lolita life in pictures.
Day 12 – A picture of yourself before lolita came in to your life.
Day 13 – A picture of your favorite sweets.
Day 14 – A picture of your dream item.
Day 15 – A picture of your last lolita purchase.
Day 16 – Your outfit for the day.
Day 17 – What do you want more then anything right now?
Day 18 – A picture of your favorite lolita style.
Day 19 – What’s in your make-up bag?
Day 20 – A picture of a lolita friend.
Day 21 – Your favorite fictional lolita.
Day 22 – A picture of your room.
Day 23 – A picture of your handwriting.
Day 24 – A picture of you from a meet.
Day 25 – Your favorite lolita themed artwork.
Day 26 – Your Facebook profile picture.
Day 27 – One song that fits your favorite lolita style.
Day 28 – A picture of the perfect lolita location.
Day 29 – A picture of a lolita you would love to meet for real.
Day 30 – A photo of yourself taken today and 3 good things that’s happened over the last 30 days.

Now, I’m not too keen on doing a few of these because some of them seem a little boring, or are things I could literally only write one sentence about.  So I’m not going to post about a picture of my handwriting, or my favourite fictional lolita (everyone’s is going to be that chick from Kamikaze Girls anyhow – although now there’s Deka Wanko too).
Another thing is that I’m not one of those “lifestyle” lolitas.  I like reading the blags and I like wearing pretty dresses, but I’m not super heavily into the culture and I don’t do things like wear false eyelashes or do pincurls.  I like going to the occasional meetup but don’t like wearing knee-high socks or nail art.
Despite my shortcomings as a Lolita, this is a good list of things that I can blog about from time to time.  I’ve edited the list quite a bit, but here are some posts I’m going to try to complete over the next few weeks:
About my lolita bubble (whatever the heck a bubble is)
Things I love and hate in Lolita
Favourite foods
Another wishlist post
Inspirational people
Favourite songs
What’s in my bag?
A picture of my last lolita purchase
Your outfit for the day
A picture of my favorite lolita style
What’s in my make-up bag?
A picture of me from a meet.
 A picture of a person I would love to meet for real.
A lot of this depends on having a good camera or a good friend to take photos for me and – yay – Charles is coming back in 12 days!  Unfortunately, I’m going to be super busy for the few days surrounding his arrival, but that’s okay, because he’ll be there for me to come home to!  Anyhow he has a good camera and will probably take photos for me because he’s a sweetheart.

Yay blogs!  I’ve been reading other girls’ blogs following this list and seems nobody else knows what a “bubble” is either.  Huh.

blog, life, percussion

Music for 18 Musicians

christinahopgood

(Photo from the 2004 version)

For the past few months, our ANU Percussion Ensemble (DRUMatiX) and some other ANU instrumentalists have been rehearsing Music for 18 Musicians by Steve Reich.  We finally performed it today at the Fitters Workshop as the grand finale of the Canberra International Music Festival.

I personally have fond memories associated with Music for 18 Musicians.  It was performed by the DRUMatiX back in 2004 when Charles was in first year and I was still in year 11 (See above photo from GaryFrance.com).  It was in a concert with lots of pieces, and I went to see Charles perform mostly.  He wasn’t in 18 Musicians so we could sit and watch it together.  It blew my mind!  That was my first Reich exposure.

It’s a piece with lots of instruments: 3 marimbas, 2 xylophones, vibraphone, 4 pianos, 4 singers, 2 bass clarinets, a violin and a cello.  It’s a minimalist piece with not much in the way of melody, so I would call it a sound work rather than a regular instrumental piece.  It’s exploring the different sounds that the combinations of instruments and harmonies can create, in a very repetitive and mesmerising way.

I was the Xylophone 1 player – that meant I had the easy part of playing on the beat while my friend the Xylo 2 player had to play off the beats.  Difficult for her!

Today it was kind of cold in the venue so I wore my cardigan – but that turned out to be a huge mistake!  I got extremely hot playing and almost died.  I managed to take off my cardigan in a resting part and felt better.  The piece itself went very well indeed!  All the wonky bits went very smoothly.  We got a standing ovation and each got a flower.

The performance was in the Fitters Workshop in Kingston.  There has been a lot of fuss recently in Canberra about that venue, because it is going to be scrapped as a music venue and turned into a gallery or something.  Musicians from all around are throwing hissy fits because they claim that it’s a wonderful venue for music, acoustically and visually.  There have been petitions and letters to the paper and blogs and speeches.  I agree that it’s okay acoustically (if you’re a singer or a solo guitarist or something) but the problems associated with performing there outweigh the benefits.  Charles wrote a great blog about it recently, and I have some thoughts to add to his.

(Fitters Workshop, Kingston.  Basically a barn.)

I’ve been rehearsing and performing there on and off for over two weeks now.  And I have to say it’s one of the more unpleasant places to play in Canberra.  During the day, the sun shines in the giant windows and blinds everyone – players, audience – and also is really hot on whoever it hits.  At night, it becomes super cold and the drums all tighten up. 
All the venue is, is a hall.  Everything else has to be provided – toilets, seating, heating, lighting, ushers, even the stage needs to be brought.  There’s no backstage area and no foyer. No toilets, you guys!!

Why do people like it so much?  It’s trendy because it’s in Kingston, the venue has an arty sort of history, it’s next to the Glassworks and the Markets (two very fashionable places to be seen), it’s nice to look at, it has free parking, and it’s cheap to hire.  Oh, and apparently it has a nice acoustic.  When rehearsing 18 Musicians in the venue, we’ve been having enormous trouble hearing each other from just metres away.  The sound is good out in the audience, but it’s extremely difficult to stay in time.

So in short: today they had a petition to save the Fitter’s Workshop and I didn’t sign it.


Me before I took my cardigan off!  I had a hot flush!  But I played very well nevertheless!
blog, fashion, life

Christina Style Evolution! Photo diary.

christinahopgood
I used to be an absolute dag.  I didn’t care about clothes or appearance at all.  My clothes were all bought for me, and although my mum is extremely stylish, I was fairly stubborn.  I refused to wear skirts or the colour pink.  I just didn’t care.  When boys started coming on the scene though (well, the one and only boy) I started to pay more attention to how I looked.  Problem was, I still didn’t have much taste!  My favourite item of clothing was a pair green wide-leg trousers with patches on the knees and embroidery on the pocket.  You would never catch me in high heels!

I continued being a total dag for many years.  I had (and still have!) a boyfriend who loved me anyway, and I could scrub up all right if I made an effort.  I had grown some taste in fashion but still didn’t put much effort in on a daily basis.  Cardigans and jeans daily.  Gross hair.  Weird t-shirts.

When I went to Japan at the end of 2008, it was a real eye-opener.  There are seriously NO dags in Japan.  When I look at my trip photos, my evolution over those 3 weeks is astounding.  I discovered Lolita, having never really considered it before, and bought my first blouse and skirt from Bodyline (the blouse was so ita I reconstructed it last year, but the skirt is still a winner).  I also bought a buttload of magazines (hair, lolita, regular fashion) and clothes and a really nice winter coat, makeup, plus a couple of pairs of shoes.  I even got a cute haircut with a fringe!  I think that going out every day and seeing how beautifully people were dressed made me want to fit in, that really did it for me.  At home in Canberra it’s okay to be a dag!  In Japan it’s not done.
So on my return I started trying harder to look good.  I started wearing skirts with tights instead of only jeans, and I kept my hair looking much nicer.  My second trip to Japan really cemented my idea of how to dress well.  I’m not saying that I dress perfectly now, or that my style won’t change at all.  It’s constantly changing!  All I’m saying is that now I’m way more aware of how I dress and look.  

Here’s my style evolution over the last few years in 9 photos!
This is probably from about 2007.  Walking my beautiful dog in a TERRIBLE coord.
Getting off the plane in Japan – our first trip!  End of 2008.
In Akihabara – nice new coat, scarf and haircut.
Home again and trying to make a cute skirt!  Early 2009.  That’s my Bodyline shirt pre-modifications.
Japan trip no. 2 at the end of 2009!  At a cafe post-haircut.   I just like the haircuts I get in Japan!
Looks like I bought a beret!  First photo of me in tights and a skirt.
First shopping service purchase – my favourite dress, the Adele Bustier dress.  Early last year my man friend.
Late last year, going to see Bill Bailey.
Early this year in Sweden, wearing my new Milk dress!  Quite a change from the first photo, but more casual than most of my other recent photos.
Well!  This blog is kind of embarrassing!