Bemissity

2017 is now over and for others like me, 2018 is a year for more travels. Travelling has always been a big part of my life until I got married and got pregnant and have my baby. But I was not disappointed, in fact I am very excited because I know that I will be able to travel soon together with my family. Even though I can’t travel much now, there are some packing tips that I would like to share with you savvy travelers.

As much as I love travelling, packing isn’t always fun. Some of us end up over-packing like crazy! Bringing 5 pairs of shoes? 10 tops? 5 dresses?

When it comes to packing, all you need to do is to relax, avoid over-packing. Plus, you can still be on style when travelling even though you only bring few things, just be creative!



Want to be a savvy traveller? Check out my 6 expert packing tips below!

PLAN AHEAD

No idea about your itinerary? Problem solved! Having a good idea of the activities you’re going to is a big plus. If you’re planning to hit the beach or go on a hike, make sure to pack your sneakers shoes and a back pack.  If you’re going to hit the beach, where it’s pretty much always hot, don’t pack your sweaters, or your jeans, instead grab your favorite beach wear, your beach hat and of course your sunblock!

Planning ahead also saves you from over packing. When you don’t have a plan you end up bringing too much. It would make it easier to know the place and where to get to if you plan ahead.

BRING A CARRY ON WHEN YOU CAN

For me, packing only a carry-on is extremely important. The advantage of this is that you don’t need to worry that your bag might lose and checking your bag. This would also save you time. If you’re going for a few weeks this may not be possible, but if you’re traveling for a week or less, try to fit your things into a carry-on!


BRING ONLY COMFY SHOES

This goes especially to fashion travelers out there that comfort comes first. J Make sure your shoes are comfortable to wear especially if you want to really walk while exploring the place. For me, I prefer to bring a white sneakers, I think this goes well with any outfits.  Traveling usually comes with lots and lots of walking around, so keep that in mind.

PACK AN EXTRA SET OF CLOTHES/SHOES IN YOUR CARRY ON

Don’t forget to pack an extra set of clothes in your carry-on if you have a luggage. Whenever you feel uncomfortable wearing your shoes or clothes, you can immediately grab one on your carry on. Losing your luggage sucks, no matter what, but it’s much better when you at least have a change of clothes suitable for your destination!

ROLL UP YOUR CLOTHES

By rolling your clothes, you’re able to fit so much more into your suitcase or travel bag. A space saver, and you would be able to add more in your bag. This is especially great when you’re just packing a carry-on with limited space!

DON’T FORGET SUNSCREEN

No matter where you’re traveling to don’t forget sunscreen! Wear a sunscreen even if it’s cloudy outside. Everywhere you go apply on a sunscreen to protect your skin from harmful UV rays. The sun doesn’t go away just because it’s cold outside and we tend to forget that. If you’re traveling to a new place, chances are you aren’t going to be inside your hotel room all day. So make sure your skin is protected!

Have you ever felt like you wanted to quit everything? Yes, I've been through this for a couple of months where I faced time when I wanted to quit blogging. I've been out of blogging for two months because I gave birth to handsome little man. This shouldn't be a hindrance for me to continue blogging but at that time I can't find time to juggle my life as a mom and as a blogger.

Then one day I realized that I really love to write and I miss blogging so much. And then here I am again, writing and sharing what I love with you guys. I looked at my little boy and told myself that, "You know what I will start to write again. " My little boy is the one who inspired me the most. 

Here are some things that keeps me motivated to blog again.

Why did I want blogging from the start? 

That question popped on my head for so long. Why did I ever start blogging in the first place? Am I passionate about it? The advice that I can give you guys is that, go back to the very beginning of when you first started thinking about whatever it is you're doing right now. When you feel like quitting, just remember why you started.

READ MORE

4 Ways to Regain Blogging Motivation
How to Manage Working from Home

Are you being too swift to make a decision? 

I think it is just normal to feel uncertain about new things. In my case, I made a big change in my life and that is to have my own family. It is really hard to make great decisions in life because you have to consider a lot of things. My tip to you guys is to give it time and see how your feelings change and maybe it will still work out in the end.

Think in advance 

Have you ever imagined your life when you complete your goals? This Blog Planner is a big help to make me more organized when planning. Envision your future and what it would be like if you quit. If it leads to a better future and greater happiness in life then don't give up. 

Who are your inspiration? 

Who are you doing it for? Are you doing it for others? Or are you doing it for yourself? The main person you should be doing it for is You. If you're not, then you need to reevaluate yourself and your true intentions to it.

Motivate yourself 

Surround yourself with positivity and motivation to give you that drive to succeed. Even if it is just reading a favorite book or doing things you don't usually do.

Believe in yourself 

Always believe in yourself and what you can do. You have the strength to keep working hard in achieving your goals and you will reach that end result.

Yes, it is normal to feel like quitting when things get tough. Believe in yourself and keep going and continue what you started. Once you reach your goal, you'll thank yourself for having the courage to go for it.

Clay masks are a great way to control oil production, which is great for people with oily acne prone skin such as myself. It helps get rid of dirt and has a wide variety of benefits.

The Innisfree Jeju Volcanic Pore Clay Mask is a clay mask often recommended for those trying to reduce the size of their pores/ blackheads.




Product Claims: 

Oily or combination skin, rejoice! Clay has long been known for its cleansing properties and as an effective sebum controller. The Jeju Volcanic Pore Clay Mask functions in 3 ways: removes sebum, brightens your skin tone, and cares for troubled spots. Rich in Jeju volcanic scoria, the masks goes deep into pores and get rid of impurities while absorbing excess sebum to revive your skin’s natural moisture balance. The result is skin that is visibly improved, and one that feels softer and smoother, for easier makeup application.

Size: 100ml
Type: Combination skin

How To Use: After your cleansing and toning regime, apply an adequate amount of mask all over your face, avoiding eye and lip areas. Leave on for 15 minutes, and rinse off with lukewarm water. For best results, use once or twice a week.




Packaging: It comes in a tin like container with a aluminium lid. It's very sturdy and does not break easily even when dropped. It can be scooped up very easily. I heard the product will eventually dry out if you don't finish it in 3 months time. 

My Experience: 

I bought it from Althea Korea for P550.00 pesos. The product itself comes in a 100ml tub, which looks very rustic and very cute.  The clay mask is very calming to the skin. I have a oily skin yet this clay mask does not irritate my skin. When applied to your face, the mask is the ashy-blue color that one can expect from a clay mask and as it hardens, it turns more grey. There is no spatula included. After using this clay mask, my face becomes supple, fresher and lighter. 




I bought the Innisfree Jeju Volcanic Pore Clay Mask to lessen my skin's oiliness, keep acne at bay, remove whiteheads and blackheads, and lighten acne scars due to hyperpigmentation. I used this product twice a week. I had high hopes given the blog reviews, and have been using this product for 2 months already.  

After cleansing and applying a toner, I am applying the clay mask,  I see that it prevents the development of acne on my cheeks and forehead.  It also removes my whiteheads on the nose and chin area, taking 1 to 2 days before new ones reappear. Morever, it does take off my blackheads along the nose area.  It has such a smooth texture and it feels so nice when applied to the skin. It dries pretty quickly and is easy to wash off, leaving skin clean and fresh. I use it at night. It has that instant brightening effect after you use it. It goes on very smoothly, it's easily spreadable. I noticed that my skin was SEBUM FREE and very SMOOTH. It doesn't feel very moist nor dry, but just right. I used it twice a week and noticed that the size of my pores looked smaller.
The one thing that consistently surprises me with this Jeju pore clay mask is the genuine cooling effect you get upon washing it off. It claims to have a cooling effect of -5 degrees (celsius) which doesn't surprise me because it is so refreshing when you rinse it off.


The immediate results I see from this masks are that cooling effect I mentioned earlier (very breathable) and that my skin is noticeably cleaner and soft to touch.  I usually use this face mask after cleansing and applying toner on my face. 

Pros: 

- Does get rid of sebum 
- Doesn't get rid of black heads or white heads 
- Easy to apply, glides on easily.
- Didn't seem to have any allergy or reaction on the first usage
- Really soft and clean skin
- Does a fab job of cleaning and 'reducing' the size of pores
- Has a cooling effect
- Recommended for combination/oily skin

Cons: 

- Unhygienic and you will need a spatula.
- Product can dry up easily if you don't finish it fast.
- Slight positive results with clearing on my blackheads

Will I Buy It Again? Definitely YES! But I will also try the Innisfree Super Volcanic Pore Clay Mask :)

Disclaimer: I am not an expert in Pinterest, but these are some tips that works for me which may also work for you. Some may contain affiliate links. 

If you’re new to blogging, you should know that you can make money blogging. I've been blogging for months now and that time I still have no idea on how I can make money with my blog aside from being passionate about it. I also read a lot of stories on how can you make money with blogging and grow your blog traffic. 

I mainly use Pinterest not only for personal use but also for pinning and sharing blog posts. I don't have a big following but I do get a lot of traffic from Pinterest and this is all down to doing some of these things I'm about to share with you rather than just re-pinning tons of pins to random boards. 
  
Not only is Pinterest extremely addictive it can really increase your blog traffic if you use it strategically. Lately, I just realized that Pinterest is in fact a search engine just like Google, so your content gets better over time especially when re-pined by new people who came across your content. This guide Pin Like You Mean It from DailyFemme is a big help! 



  
Here are my tips for using Pinterest which you can start implementing right now to increase your blog traffic, following and re-pins.
  
1. Pin your Niche 

You need to decide who your target audience is. Decide who are you pinning for, it maybe for bloggers, people who needs advice, food lovers, love for fashion and others. So it’s important that you are pinning quality pins to your boards. You only want to pin pins that you think are going to get a lot of engagement. 
  
Usually, I'm pinning for lifestyle bloggers, moms and everyday tips. I also have various other boards such as beauty, organizing, gardening, recipe boards and home interiors. 
  
2. Create Pin-able pins 

Pinterest is a visual platform, but it’s also a platform people mindlessly scroll through. You want to take up as much Pinterest pin-able pins as possible in order to catch attention! Make your pins vertical as these tend to be more visible in the feed. Also, don't forget to include great description with keywords to entice your readers to click on it. I use Viraltag to make my life easier especially for scheduling!
  
3. Make a Professional Profile

As you can see here I don't have much followers  as I am staring on stepping up my pinterest game. But I have like 14.6k monthly views which is already a big deal for me. 

   
For the Bio, make use of your bio to really sell what your blog is about. If you have a e-book or course that you are selling this is the perfect opportunity to include that in too along with a shortened link which will entice potential readers to copy and paste the link and click through.I have none as of the moment but I will work on it soon. Follow me on Pinterest! 
   
Profile Name: As you can see my profile name is just my real nickname which I love so I made it as my name for all my social media handle. Also don't forget to add descriptions to your boards. I see so many people who don't do this and are loosing out on so many potential clicks!

4. Delete Unused Boards 

You only want to have boards that you are active on and that help build your brand. If you won’t be using them, either delete them or make them private! You may also want to delete links with broken or bad links as this will also lower your internal user ranking with Pinterest if they're not leading your readers anywhere, after all Pinterest is looking for the highest quality pins to share.



5. Pin to Group Boards 

Group boards on Pinterest are amazing. They allow you to share audiences and get a ton of new eyes on your content.  Make sure to only join groups which are relevant to your niche and pin to them as often as you can following the group rules. You can find group boards by searching for a specific keyword on Pinterest and filter by clicking on "boards" and all of the groups are listed with the group board icon in the top right corner. Don't just join any group boards, you need to join around 3-5 group boards which are relevant to your blog. Aim to join groups which have a lot of followers which are frequently pinned to so people are seeing your content. Here are some of my pinterest group boards I joined: 

Bloggers on Pinterest
Bloggers Unite
Blogging

Also, random group boards like, Modern Interior Designing, Gardening DIY, Breakfast and others. 



6. Schedule Your Pins 

Before, I am very lazy to pin and re-pin on pinterest. I pin on average around 100 pins a day and cannot tell you have much this has changed my way of using Pinterest! I use BoardBooster to do this and set up my pins each week which will then be re-pined every single day. Since then, my views has doubled. With Boardbooster, you will have it for free for the first month or you can have plans for that. 

BoardBooster works by taking pins from your secret feeder board and pins them. There are other scheduling programs for Pinterest such as Tailwind, Buffer or Viraltag. Looping your re-pins is a great way of getting your old content seen. It takes your oldest first and re-pins them onto your boards so as your following grows your pins will get pinned more and means you don't have to find new content to post each day! 

7. Add a Pin it Button

Make it easy for your readers to pin your posts! If you're not giving people the option to pin with a simple click, they're not going to bother going out of their way. Also, don't forget to add a follow button for Pinterest in your sidebar so your followers can follow you there too. You could also add a widget for your profile or a popular board. 


8. Follow Pinners 

Follow some new people who are in the same niche as you. You can type in on the search bar those who are within your niche. What I usually do is to follow people who follow me and then follow those within my niche. 

Once you get everything set up, everything will into rhythm. You will get a fantastic return for the time invested. I’d say I spend about 20 minutes on Pinterest a day, and get thousands of views already thanks to that small amount of time I put into it. And thank you to Pin Like You Mean It for the great tips!  You can do it too! 

Do yo have any tips to share with us? Share them below! 

1. Switch Off from Work

2. Listen to Good Music

3. Grab your Favorite Book

4. Take a Long Hot Bath

5. Light a Candle

6. Take a Walk With Nature

7. Have a Regular Exercise