My Essentials: Skincare (continued)

As I said two blogs ago we all need sunblock and vitamin C, as well as cleasing and moisturiser:

I've liked Weleda sun lotion, Paul & Joe sun filter/primer (now discontinued) - that worked really well with a lick of bronzing powder (again Paul & Joe's has been my favourite to date)and Aveda tinted moisturiser. I'm currently using Bobbie Brown's tinted balm but it's not a patch on the Aveda. I'd like to make a special mention for Philosophy's Supernatural as sun protection and foundation.

For cheap and cheerful vitamin C, Sainsbury's Defend! isn't too harsh or sickly - I get the effervescent tablets and get one of my eight glasses of water a day - but Solgar supplements, or Neal's Yard, are among my favourites for a really good quality, buffered product and with these I indulge in my weakness for bottled, sparkling water even though I have a filter on my kitchen tap!

But just now I'm off to watch the final episode of Skins...

Childhood Smells: Coughs and Sneezes, part 2

One constant for the treatment of childhood coughs was a thick, sticky medicine with a pungent smell and a strong taste. Always in dark brown glass bottles, these balsams give us the medicinal vocabulary for pungent and fabulous resins in describing scent. Even now the original formulas can be bought like Covonia's still in a brown bottle but many others have been repackaged; Weleda's are delightfully old-fashioned and the Lavender & Myrrh mouthwash from Neal's Yard is wonderfully efficacious.