It’s Easter in just a few days! Who’s excited?
I love Easter, it’s such a great time of the year – Spring blossoms (here’s hoping spring actually arrives), my little star being off school (Yay, I have a little helper for 2 weeks) and more time for friends and family, which inevitably means lots of chocolate. Dark, milk, white chocolate, you name it in all sorts of Easter shapes and sizes. There are even Percy Pig pink chocolate Easter “pigs”, can you believe it? And if you’re like me and have acne prone skin – Easter can turn into a holiday from hell if we don’t take care of our skin properly.
So what do we do? Chocolate during Easter is like Santa at Christmas – it’s unavoidable. We will be having chocolate and we will be indulging on Easter lunches and dinners – it is a holiday after all. But there are things you and your family can do to “secretly” help each other survive this tempting period, perhaps you could take charge of that and not even tell them? Trust me, they won’t even notice you’re tricking them!
Here’s what you can do when cooking or baking during Easter holidays (and always), only my family notices when I trick them:
– Swap flower with ground almonds, oats or a mix of all when baking.
– Sugar for honey in most dishes.
– Butter and vegetable cooking oil for coconut oil – it doesn’t get saturated when heated and is amazing as a skin moisturiser too.
– Milk for non-dairy alternatives such as almond or coconut milk as dairy usually triggers acne.
Once you get used to swapping the above ingredients with the healthy ones, it becomes a habit. Kids grow up knowing that it’s the only option and therefore live a healthier life with more natural energy. That’s my aim anyway…
So, chocolate…
There will be a lot of it and I say – melt it!
Kids and friends love a fun gooey chocolatey afternoon where you can have a few bowls of dark, white or milk chocolate with various berries, fruit, dried fruit and even nuts for dipping into melted chocolate. Just think how many vitamins you will “secretly” all consume? Or if you’re going out to visit someone instead, why not make a few trays or plates with dipped strawberries, sprinkle them with some tasty sparkly decorations (we tried) and use popcake sticks for holding them up! Again – so easy and so much healthier than your usual Eater Eggs, just decorate them with some chicks and bunnies, ha… We love white chocolate dipped strawberries. They’re natural sources of Vitamin C, Folic Acid, anti-oxidants and fiber, which all act as anti-ageing properties, but also help minimise oil and acne in our skin. Win Win!
Do you want to know what else I love during holidays, any holidays? Going over to my parents’ for a sleepover – they have a SAUNA! Not only does the sauna release stress and cleanse skin, but it also helps you flush out toxins, relax muscles and clear pores. I realise that sauna may be hard to get to, so the second best things instead of sauna is giving your skin a good salt scrub to increase circulation and get rid of all that dead skin on your body. I adore The Sanctuary Spa ultimate salt scrub before sauna and once a week at home, it’s so gentle on the skin and oh does it smells divine or does it smell divine?
Do you have days when you just feel that your daily facial cleanser is just not enough? Clogged pores and tired skin needs something more than a cleanser to draw out those bad oils and bacteria… For days like these, I love using thermal detox face mask also by The Sanctuary. It’s s self-heated clay and charcoal mask that leaves my skin feeling so soft, clean and nourished just after 5 minutes and it re-balances my oil levels without taking all of them out! I love it and it’s only £10.50!
I hope you enjoyed this post and are not too worried about over-indulging at Easter now that you know how to eat your Easter Eggs more healthily… But have a read here for all over detox beauty tips – great for getting your skin ready for the Summer!
Big Love and Happy Easter!
Tatyana x
Thanks to The Sanctuary Spa for sponsoring this post and for helping me detox my skin!