Bee Venom... Yay, or definitely Neigh?

I was on my way home tonight when I received an email from Boxed Beauty about some products by Manuka Doctor for acne prone skin.

As someone who has been troubled by acne since I was 11 years old, I always have my eyes and ears open for something new to try. I know from working with horses that Manuka honey has great healing properties, and was excited to hear about a skin care range that incorporated it.

That was, until I kept reading, and found it also contains bee venom. What?!! My thoughts exactly - I've never heard of this being in skin products!
Turns out, I'm slow... it is this year's new trend. Of course, the first question that goes through my head is "How on earth do they collect that, and what benefit can it possibly have?". So I've taken to the land of the interwebz to find out, and it did not take me long to find out more.

MANUKA DR BEE VENOM COLLECTION

This video is taken from the Manuka Doctor website (I couldn't get this exact one to embed), which shows you how they collect it. I guess your feelings on exactly how cruelty free are dependent on if you think that electrocuting the little guys to make them angry to sting is mean or not. Myself, I'm not down with the idea.

Basically what they're doing is sending an electric pulse through the thin membrane which is laying over a sheet of glass. The bees are let loose, so as the pulse goes through, it electrocutes our little buzzers so they 'sting' the membrane - the venom is collected on the sheet of glass underneath and they wait for it to dry.

Now, the 'cruelty free' part is that they fly away after. That is, if they don't get their little stingers caught in the membrane so it falls off and they die. Or they don't go crazy and start attacking each other in their rage, and kill each other. My next thought is, if this really DOES get popular, will this 'harmless' way of collection get shoved aside for the cheaper option of killing them and removing the venom sacks completely for larger production?? Only time will tell on that one I guess.

The benefit part is that the venom is said to replicate the feeling of being stung when applied to the skin, so the rush of blood to the area increases collagen production to help with scarring and wrinkle appearance. As much as I hate my acne scars, I'm not convinced.

So, really I guess my hopes are dashed. To be totally honest, I haven't done much in terms of research on Manuka honey facial products, so I am unsure if there are any others out there that don't want Mr Bumble Bee's weapon of choice inside. I don't think we'll be finding Manuka Doctor on BUAV's leaping bunny lists anytime soon.

What do you think?

Brighton Badger March

My photo

Today was the Brighton peaceful protest against the badger cull. I went down on my own and was quite nervous having never been on a protest before, and not having any moral support made me feel like I might look like a bit of a wally.

I got there just as the speeches were beginning, (no thanks to First Capital Connect trains making me late, as usual) and just caught the tail end of the Green Party speech. It was tricky to hear parts of the speech from the Badger Trust representative, but Dominic Dyer's speech was very heartfelt, got right to the nitty gritty and encouraged a very meaningful round of cheers at the end. It was exciting to see one person be able to generate so much enthusiasm, an he explained the history, the present situation and where we need to get to in such a simple way that even an alien that's just landed on this planet could understand. It made me wish that I had other people who don't understand the importance of this (my Dad, for example) because it was really a very well explained speech. Plenty of gusto ensued for the chants for the march on the back, and I was eager to get going.

I found myself up the front without meaning to, and after getting into the spirit, was shouting, clapping and cheering along. We started off outside the Theatre Royal, and would up Church Street, down Queens Road and past the clock tower and down West Street. It started to get very windy as we approached the sea front so some of the larger banners had to come down to stop being blown away, but then we went along the seafront. I got chatting to a few people as we made our way along the seafront, and then we headed back towards Grand Parade and up the bottom of North Street. By the end was just me walking beside Dominic right at the very front as we made our way to the finish point back in New Road, where lots of congratulatory hugs and cheers rang out between those who knew each other. Such a sense of community was amazing to see.

I can't stress enough how important it is to get behind this cause. Not only did I feel welcome from being on my own, but I was inspired by the amount of people getting together, sharing the same views and the overwhelming support for our wildlife. We, as Britons, need to make sure that this murderous killing spree ends, NOW. I feel quite lonely in my day to day life in my feelings towards the badger cull, as no one in my family really understands what it means, or pays attention to what's going on. To quote, "The culling of badgers can make no meaningful contribution to the reduction of bTB in cattle", is entirely accurate. To be part of this today made me feel quite emotional that there are so many like minded people out there, and I hope to be able to continue to make my voice heard, with this phenomenal support.

Photo credit: Emily Laurence. I am in the brown t-shirt and black hat.

This One Shampoo & Conditioner review

OK, so in October 2011 I thought it would be a great idea to dye my naturally blonde hair, red. I had done this once before when my hair was short but I thought that being long, and having a better shade, I would like it more.

By March 2012, I was bored of it and wanted it to be blonde again. The only way, being 3 layers of bleach.
As I'm sure anyone who has made this mistake can imagine, my hair turned into chewing gum texture, with the ends snapping off and flying around every time I dried it and brushed it. That is, when I could get a brush through it.

I've tried various 'treatments' and hair products for dry and damaged hair, but the first ones that I found useful are the ones I found in May this year, by a company called This One. I found the products on an intro offer in Superdrug and immediately was interested as they are BUAV approved and suitable for vegetarians and vegans - these things being something which was limiting my search of suitable products to use.
I should add at this point that I also picked up a bottle of Superdrug's own Argan Oil but I'll review that separately.

The bottles look like this:

These are the ones for dry hair. The Nourishing Shampoo, and the Intensive Conditioner. I also got a tub of this:

Replenishing Treatment

The first thing to mention of the shampoo is the smell. I find it to be pleasant, and quite natural. It seems almost fruity. The shampoo contains Morninga seed extract, Rice bran oil and vitamin E. 

The Morninga seed helps to strengthen the hair, while the Rice bran oil protects from dryness and damage.

The conditioner doesn't have much of a scent, but is very creamy and is easy to comb through my tangled tresses with a shower comb, and is nicely absorbed into the hair. I leave it on for a few minutes while I wash myself in the shower, so it has time to treat the hair.

It contains the same 2 ingredients as the shampoo, but with the added ingredient of Brazilian Pequi oil, which is known for it's nourishing qualities. 

It is worth noting that the shampoo does contain SLS (sodium laureth sulphate) so if this is something that you might react to then this won't be the shampoo for you.

In regards to the treatment, I've only actually used it twice so I don't think I could make a fair judgement on it yet. As I said before, I have been using Argan oil every time I was my hair so the need for the treatment hasn't been essential. What I will say, is it does make the hair very soft and it contains Cocoa butter so it is very nourishing.

I have used this shampoo and conditioner every other day since about mid-May, with the occasional use of my Lush Fair Trade Honey shampoo, and I think it has helped repair my hair significantly. The snapping off is reduced, but also helped by haircuts to get the dead ends taken off - it has to be said that there is no better cure for split and damaged hair than a haircut. No amount of hair products will repair very damaged hair, they will only help to control the damage,

Body Shop Heartmakers

As mentioned in my previous post, I have been shortlisted as a Heartmaker for The Body Shop, for their value Against Animal Testing. This is something which I have been living my life by for the past 14 months, so although I haven't been on this journey for very long, I take it seriously and can only go up from here.

Please vote for me to become the Heartmaker. I need to have the most votes by the time voting closes on Thursday night.




This is my postcard, which was my entry alongside my reasons why I believe I should be be picked. Their reasons for picking me were;

Carla described in her application how she likes to be well-informed about any causes she supports, and seemed to us to be very up to date with her take on the current animal testing for cosmetics situation. She is clearly on a journey that is inspiring others around her. 

You can vote for my entry HERE

The Shape of Things to Come

Boy, have I forgotten I had a blog! I've just re-designed and deleted some old blog posts which were not worth having.

I had to unfortunately delete my Rockalily lipstick review, as the image was apparently infected with Malware. Who knew?! So, that's lost. But I'll start again and maybe review it again at a later date.

I decided over the weekend that I would like to start blogging properly again like I used to years ago, I enjoy writing. I was trying to do this last night but my home internet connection kept dropping out every 5 minutes (no exaggeration) and I gave up in the end.

As it happens, I had a voicemail this morning from The Body Shop to tell me I have been shortlisted as one of their Heartmakers, for the value of Animal Testing. This is something I am super passionate about, so I'm really excited. I will need to call them back at lunch time to discuss what happens next. Please vote for me!

More to come on that, and how.

For now, I must get back to work.I just wanted to get this up and going.

Carla x

Kissing the corner of your clavicle

Alkaline Trio have been my favourite band since I was about 14 or 15, whenever it was that they released Good Mourning.
I was already a fan from seeing Stupid Kid on P-Rock (damn I miss that channel) and was in love at first sight, adding Every Time I Die to my favourite band bow when I was 15 and in year 10 at school.


So, seeing as I've held this band so close to my heart for roughly 10 years, I thought it seemed about time I had a tattoo done, that isn't corny, to remind myself of growing up with them. I got my ETID one done in Aberdeen last year, which is just a pink old english I which is used in the band name text on every album cover, t-shirt, poster etc. But with Alkaline Trio, I've always found it hard to decide what I would have to represent them. I nearly had the logo  of the skull-in-heart done on my arm where my ETID one is, but decided against it as there's too much black. I didn't want a line from a song, as I can't pick a favourite that would look good as a tattoo, and I couldn't conjure up any visual representations of them.


Then recently, I came across this artwork interpretation. I have yet to find out who it was created by, but I would love it to be tattooed on  me (just the picture, not the band name underneath), or a similar commission in the same idea. It's what fits perfectly, it's creative and includes the band logo but not in such a bold way.
Placing is the importance though, which I will have to consider, but it's definitely in the pipe line and not a pipe dream.