A Family Heirloom repaired (sort of)

This is my Grandma's engagement ring, given to her by my late Grandad sometime in the 1940s.  The ring was given to my Mum when I was a little girl, but I can never remember it having a stone in the middle and for a long time it sat in a drawer in the kitchen looking sad and lonely.  It was passed to me, by my Mum, about 5 years ago and I took it to a jewelers in Hatton Garden in London to have it repaired.  The jeweler put a very pretty opal in it, which fell out on the same day.  I, like my Mum before me, gave up and stuck it in a drawer in my bedroom.

But recently I've been thinking about it again, mainly because I thought it would be lovely to give to my daughter when she's all grown up.  It has little value, although it is made of platinum and has small diamond chips in it, I can't imagine it has much of a resale value.  But the sentimental value is huge and we are not a family loaded down with family jewels.

I tried a jewelers at Lucky Plaza on Orchard Road who said they could not do anything with it - the ring is weak and beyond repair it seems.  But they suggested I try Jewel Harbour, a small workshop on the fourth floor, who might be able to help me.  The staff seemed rather annoyed with me for wanting to rescue this sad old ring, but they listened to my story and said they could glue a pearl in to at least give it a centre again.

So that's what I ended up with.  To be honest, I do not love it (the opal looked much prettier, albeit with the crucial flaw of falling straight out), but at least it is no longer an empty vessel.  I am now in two minds - to put it back in the drawer or try again and look for someone else who will give it the TLC I think it deserves...

Malin+Goetz Grapefruit Face Cleanser

This is another San Francisco purchase, this time from Barneys.  Amazingly I was the only person in the store on a Saturday morning, which meant I got a little too much assistant attention for my liking - I like a nice anonymous browse round a department store, like the true Brit I am.

I'd actually gone into Barneys to look at Valextra bags, but they were all locked behind glass and two sales assistants were hovering around me checking out my every move so I headed down to the basement to look at the beauty department.  I'd been meaning to get this cleanser in Singapore ever since a facialist at Spa Esprit recommended it to me.  I really like this, it cleanses well, doesn't sting my eyes and doesn't irritate my sensitive skin or leave my face feeling tight.  That's it though - I can't say there's anything hugely special about this, it's just effective.

btw when I took this to the cashier the first thing she said was, "Have you tried their deodorant?"!  Errr, no, why, do I need it?!!

Tory Burch Troy Stripe Sweater

And here I am looking rather fetching, don't you think?  Only joking, alas, I have a few years and a few kilos on this whippersnapper.  I bought this (and...ahem...a few other things) at the Tory Burch store in San Francisco and got the most fantastic customer service.  I basically walked in on a cold and rainy Saturday morning and told the assistant I lived in Singapore and needed new clothes.   She installed me in a changing room and bought huge amounts of things for me to try on, plenty of which I would never have picked out for myself.  I ended up with two pairs of pants, this sweater and another top and a couple of pairs of shoes.  Very nice indeed, now I just need Tory to open up a store in Singapore...

A Seriously Wonky Pedicure from Snails, Mandarin Gallery

When it comes to facials, massages and hairdressers I am seemingly incapable of seeing the same person more than twice.  But when it comes to pedicures, I have no desire to seek out new thrills - I either go to Snails at Mandarin Gallery or the Lac Bar at Millenia Walk, nowhere else.  I wasn't always such a stickler, but a bad experience where someone tried to use a blade on me (without asking) that I'd just seen used on the person sat next to me pretty much sealed it for me.  Hmmm I'll pass on the hepatitis thanks...

Lac Bar, I think, is the better pedicure.  They file and file until you have baby soft feet and the polish is always perfect.  But, they're not exactly fast - I swear sometimes you go in before lunch and head out again to find it's gone dark.  Today I needed fast and was on Orchard Road so popped into Mandarin Gallery.

Everything about this pedicure was perfect.  They have a fantastic selection of Essie and OPI colours (the picture above is Essie Limited Addiction, my shade of choice for today), excellent selection of magazines and I got a really good leg scrub and massage.  It was only when I got up to leave and looked down at my toes that I realised my therapist had filed both my big toe-nails at an angle, the nail was longer at the end of the foot and shorter at the side next to the next toe.  And she'd done this on both sides, so my toes looked like a rather quizical set of eyebrows, or two asymmetric fringes.

I hummed and awed about saying something.  "Does this look right to you?", I asked the lady on reception.  She looked and confirmed I was seeing (not) straight.  And really they couldn't have been nicer; they tried to level them out, they offered to take the polish off and start again (I didn't have time) and they said I could come back the next day if I was still unhappy.   I suspect to make them remotely straight they would have to cut my nails eye-wateringly short, so I am resigned to a few weeks of wonky toes...I'm even starting to get used to them now!

Badger Sleep Balm

Here's the thing.  If you type 'is it safe to drug a baby on a 19 hour flight' in Google, the response you get, strangely enough, is that it is really not a good idea at all.  Some people, apparently, use Medi-Sed, but that has the risk of causing hallucinations, and I really can't think of anything more terrifying than a hallucinating baby (what would they see?!).  But, I am indeed going on a 19 hour flight with my beloved little person, just me and her, and if everyone is to keep their sanity, then she and I need to sleep.

I'm pretty much sorted: since little person's arrival I can sleep anywhere. I have so much sleep negative equity that any chance I get I can slip into a deep slumber.  But for me to sleep, I need her to sleep, which is why I was contemplating the Medi-Sed hallucinating baby option.  So when I saw this Badger Sleep Balm I knew all my problems had been solved!  An all natural 'temple rub' that makes you dreamy and helps you slip into a deep slumber - it had to be the answer to my long haul problem.

So I purchased and decided to try it out on little person tonight.  Did it work and send her off into a deep sleep?  Err...no, not at all.   I should have looked at their website. It says Badger Balm does not make you sleepy, it just takes the edge off the day's stress.  So obviously little person has no stress, no frayed nerves, no tension.  And that makes me a very happy mummy badger indeed.

Dr Hauschka mega-haul

Well, it's a bit of a cheat to say I bought this lot today.  One of the first things you get used to in Singapore is being approached about 'the package' (er..not that kind), whenever you have a manicure, haircut, massage etc.  This is where you buy a package of, say, ten facials upfront and then receive a discount for doing so.  I suspect this is where the therapists make their cash because you're always put under tons of pressure to take one and when you politely decline you often get a death stare and a frosty chill descends upon the room.  As a rule, I'm too fickle to take a package - I get bored going to the same place over and over and need to change after a few visits.  But a few years ago, weakened by a complimentary hand massage while my face mask was on instead of the usual being left in the dark for an eternity, I signed up to a package of Dr Hauschka facials.

Then, the inevitable happened.  I went along a few more times, had a terrible facial where the therapist seemed to want to moisturise my eyeballs (and I'm British so I put up with it for a while then meekly pointed out that I was being tortured) and decided to take my chances somewhere else.

Unfortunately, you can't get a refund on a package, so after a while I decided to return to Guantanamo and try again.  But something had happened and in the meantime the spa stopped answering their phones.  When I eventually got through they told me they were booked up until forever and no, I couldn't have my cash back, but I could exchange the balance for product.

So that's what I did.  I should be thrilled, but to be honest I just feel a bit overwhelmed - I have enough clutter in my bathroom already waiting to be used up, without adding this lot to it.  Oh well, I'm sure I'll survive somehow.

PS Apologies for the shocking picture...