Beauty Tips
Introduction on A.H.C’s Vital Medica line of Masks
Let’s talk about the masks from A.H.C’s Vital Medica line today. There are 3 types of masks: Hydra Soother Mask, Phyto Complex Mask, and Vital C Complex Mask. Each of the 3 masks has different focus:
- Hydra Soother Mask hydrates and repairs skin. – The mask contains 50% of hyaluronic acid for hydration. Genseng Root Extract, ginkgo biloba leaf extract, and collagen work to repair and nourish skin.
- Phyto Complex Mask lifts/shapes and nourishes skin. – This mask contains 50% of soluble collagen for lifting. In addition, soy collagen is extracted from soy beans through a fermentation process so it can be easily absorbed into skin to improve the elasticity of the skin. Adenosin and wheat amino acid are also used to strengthen and repair skin.
- Vital C Complex Mask brightens/whitens and protects skin. – The mask contains 50% of lemon extract to give a whiter/brighter complexion. The whitening ingredients (including also Niacinamide and other vitamin C derivatives) can also protect skin from harmful environmental factors.
The common features between the masks are:
- They all contain hyaluronic acid which is the best ingredient providing lasting hydration.
- They all contain ingredients (e.g. collagen) to repairs and revitalise skin.
- They all use a skin-friendly fiber sheet called Tencel. Tencel is natural fiber that’s made with wood pulps. It’s as soft as cotton but more flexible. Used as fiber sheet for masks, Tencel can easily adhere to skin, so it offers great comfort and allows the masks to deliver effective result.
How to hydrate my skin?
After having power outage for a few days in an extremely cold weather last week, we realize we've grown so dependent on electricity! This cold and dry winter also reminds us of the fact that keeping a good hydration level in our skin is particularly challenging for us who live up here in such a weather condition!
A few weeks ago, I got a product question from a friend who tried A.H.C’s star product, A.H.C hydration serum - Hydra B5 Soother. She told me after applying the serum, it can be rubbed off easily afterward. "The serum was apparently not absorbed into my skin at all", she said. Yes, she was right about that! While I was trying to figure out a way to help her, I told her the problem lie in the fact that her skin was too dry to use the serum alone like that.
Hydra B5 Soother contains high percentage of hyaluronic acid, which naturally exist in our skin. It has great power to attract and attain water (80 times of water than its own size), so it's considered the best ingredient used in skin care products to maintain good level of hydration for our skin. However, if your skin is too dry and you don't hydrate your skin by using toner before applying the serum, there is no water for the serum to attract nor keep, then the serum will not work in the way it should....
My friend said oil-based serum works well for her skin. But I have to warn her about using oil-based serum. To have a beautiful skin, we need to keep a good balance of hydration and sebum in our skin. The weather is dry, so we need to supply what's needed, which is hydration, not oil! We use too much oil-based products, and our skin will stop producing the amount of sebum it used to produce. And when we age, we will end up looking for product that's heavier (more oil-based)!
So, my recommendation for my friend and for those of you who have dry skin is to use A.H.C Hydra B5 Soother together with A.H.C Hyaluronic Toner. Use the toner as the first step to hydrate your skin and then use the serum to maximize the effect. The dry skin problem should be improved within a couple of weeks! 
Fighting against dull skin!
A friend once said to me "I love my skin tone, but what I am unhappy with is that somehow my skin looks a bit 'dirty' all the time." A common way to put it is that her skin looks dull. While this term "dull skin" is ambiquious, we can generally categorize skin to be dull looking if it lacks its healthy natural glow.
The cause for having dull skin might vary from person to person. However, in most cases, the main cause for having dull skin is dehydration! Maybe you have also noticed, during seasons change or during winter time, skin tend to look particularly dull. So at this time, instead of applying higher concentrated whitening products, hydrating your skin is a better solution.
Aging is another factor that contributes to this problem. As we age, our skin layers becomes thinner, skin gradually loses elasticity and skin would look dull or yellowish as a result. In this case, we should find ways to revitalize skin, repair, and strengthen skin cells.
Fight against dull skin by maintaining good level of hydration in your skin and by revitalizing skin. When you do both at the same time, you will be able to see improvement ... maybe even sooner than you expect! 
Top Quality Skin Care - A.H.C
Maybe you have noticed, The Beauty Mask Shop loves A.H.C! 
We love it so much that we start selling serum and face/eye cream because of it!! We are people with high standard. We can't help it ..... we just couldn't allow any lower quality skincare products to come near us. 
Therefore, we have been the loyal customers of some of the most prestigious international brands (like Sysley, Gurlain, etc.) ..... well ... til we met A.H.C! 
Here, we recommend just a few popular products from A.H.C:
- AHC Vital Medica line of serums (Hydra B5 Soother, Phyto Complex Gel, Vital Complex C-15)
- AHC Vital Medica line of masks (Hydra Soother Mask, Phyto Complex Mask, Vital C Complex Mask)
- AHC Intense Soothing Balm
- AHC Real Eye Cream For Face
Google them and you'll be able to find only positive reviews! Below is some brief introduction about the brand:
A.H.C is a prestigious cosmeceutical brand from Korea. It was launched under Carver Korea in 1999. A.H.C is Carver Korea's premium brand, as well as a functional brand. A.H.C's vision is that its customers get to enjoy luxurious treatment offered in professional spa with the ease of relaxing at home. A.H.C aims to bring back beautiful and confident smiles for women worldwide. In Korea, A.H.C is distributed to over 3,000 professional skincare establishments such as skincare clinics, dermatologists, and cosmetic surgery offices. Adopting advance technology, A.H.C offers high quality hydrating skincare products derived from plant extracts to create a vital skin health for every woman.
Our skin tells us that A.H.C's products are as good as the products from those big brands (if not better), and yet they are reasonably priced. You gotta try them out! Your skin will tell you the truth!! 
Encouragement for a quitter
Do you often think of yourself as a quitter? Do you tend to quit early and easily? If so, why is that? ..... Is it because you fear that the weight of disappointment might overwhelm you later? Or you want to escape from the pressure coming from opposing voices?
Life is all about choices. We make choices all the time whether we are aware of it or not. Life is about making choices. It's about setting our priorities and communicate that through our actions. A few days ago, I heard an inspiring statement from a Japanese soap opera. It says, "you would know whether something is doable or not ONLY IF you've done it." I can't agree more! If you are certain about where you want to go, you quit early then you will never get there. As to the discouraging attitudes or words from others, sometimes, I just think that we need to learn to train our hearts and ears so that we can filter them out. Noise belong to the background, doesn't it? We might have to stay in a noisy room for a little longer, but we don't have to pay attention to it the whole time and let it stop us from doing what we should be doing. After all, like Tony Robbins says "where focus goes, energy flows". Who would devote his/her energy to listening to noise?! It's such a waste of time!
"Don't let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do." (~ John Wooden) Do you rather have a life of 'what-if' than a life of 'oh-wells'? Be encouraged. Life is full of opportunities. Your life is. 
How to minimize my pores?
Large pores is a common skin concern, even to those with healthy skin. We tend to think we have this problem since we can see our pores and they look rather big! 
In fact, the sizes of skin pores vary between individuals, and it's one of our inherited features. However, there are external factors that make it worse. So, we can definitely do our best to improve it (or lessen the problem).
- Start by keeping your skin clean! Exfoliate at least once a week. -- If your pores are clogged with dirt and/or dead skin cells, they will become large over time.
- Keep your skin healthy and youthful! -- As skin ages, it gradually loses elasticity and becomes saggy. Gravity takes quite a toll on our skin and the pores look bigger as a result.
- To reduce the appearance of large pores, hydration is the key! -- When skin is dehydrated, it would not look smooth and would lose its natural glow. Pores would then look large.
- One of the home remedies to shrink large pores is using Lemon Juice, which contains natural enzymes that tighten, firm, purify and brighten the skin and shrink pores. Here's an easy home remedy :
Take 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, 1 cup of rose water and add 1/2 cup of cucumber juice. Mix the ingredients well and apply on your pores. This natural remedy for large pores reduces large pores and makes them appear visibly smaller.
How to tell if a mask is good?
Given its effectiveness, face masks have become a necessity in every girl's cosmetic pouch. There are so many face masks out there in the market (e.g. masks from different brands, masks that serve various purposes, etc.), and their prices vary greatly too. How can we tell if we are using good quality masks? The price of a mask suggests its value, but it surely shouldn't be the only criterion we consider when we compare between masks....
A few days ago, I got a question, "how long does the effect of your masks last?". "This is a hard question", I thought to myself. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized it might not be a very legitimate question. Because unless it's a simple hydration mask which you can measure the hydration level of your skin after using the mask, most other types of masks also offer other benefits which can only be observed over a period of persistent use. My mom rarely eats meat. So, egg is the only source of protein in her diet. When I do my grocery shopping, I usually buy an extra dozen of organic eggs for her. I encourage her to eat only Grade A eggs. Would anyone ask me why? (I suppose no one buys organic eggs because those eggs make him stay full longer! ) The answer is obvious. Our body needs good stuffs, and so does our skin!
So here, I've gather some small tips to help you decide if a face mask is of good quality:
- Fiber sheet - The quality of the fiber sheet a mask uses matters! It's better if it's made of natural materials, and it will feel soft and silky on your skin. Good quality fiber sheet should be flexible so it's easy for you to smooth it on your face, and yet it should also be thick/strong enough so the serum will stay in place when you use the mask. The quality of the fiber sheet is crucial in determining the effectiveness of its mask.
- Serum - The thickness of the serum in a mask tells us the percentage of the hyaluronic acid it contains. Hyaluronic acid is well known for its effectiveness on attracting and attaining hydration in the skin. However, it's a costly ingredient, so that explains why some lower priced masks feels watery/liquid.
- Other factors - The fragrance of a mask should be fresh and light if the ingredients are from natural plants. Stay away from the masks with strong or unreal scents. It's also generally recommended to use masks from reputable brand and companies.
Beauty Sleep Hours: from 11pm to 2am
Most people have the experience of staying up at night. We may be staying up for different reasons, but the consequence is the same: we feel extra tired on the next day (even if we only miss our sleep for a couple of hours)! Somehow, on the next day after we stay up, our hearts would feel weak and the rest of our bodies just don't feel right. As we age, those "symptoms" become even more severe. Simply put, it's because our biological clock doesn't work this way!
Human body has a biological clock. Our bodies function in its own rhythms and patterns. And nighttime is when our bodies go into a repair mode. If we "respect" the rhythms and patterns by not trying to interrupt it or change it, our bodies will function properly and will get rid of toxin and free radicals in our bodies by itself. Therefore, a good night sleep matters, and it slows down the aging process!
There are a few professions that need to work in shifts: doctor, nurse, flight attendant, police, etc. They are basically staying up every day! This type of work schedule speeds up the aging process, and for them it's particularly challenging to maintaining good health and beautiful skin....
Beauty sleep is real and it shows on our faces. Be sure you get your beauty sleep tonight~ 
My skin feels DRY!
After cleansing your face, does it feel dry and tight? During the time when seasons change, do you start having flaky skin? These are the times when we know our skin is dry. (At least we can feel it!) Dryness doesn't seem to be a big deal, but it can lead to serious skin issues.
When our outer skin layer is weak, the first symptom is dryness. Dryness typically takes place around eyes, on our cheeks, or limbs. The serious consequences of having dry skin can be dull skin, large pores, redness, fine lines, pimples, just to name a few! In the worst case, dry skin will become weak and sensitive skin. Therefore, keep your skin hydrated should be the first step in all your skin care routines.
Different people have different skin types. And even on one person's face, there are different skin needs. However, what's the same is that everyone needs to do a good job of maintaining good hydration level for the skin!
Eye contour area is the area that tends to feel dry most easily. The skin around our eye area is thin and produce less sebum. What's worse is that it's often irritated because of the eye make-up we put on daily. If we forget to take special care to keep it well hydrated, fine lines will not be the only problem that follows!
Talking about hydration, however, the usage of hydration mist should be warned. Some people complain that their skin feel even more dry after using mist over the face. Using hydration mist may be providing hydration in the first place, but as the mist get evaporated, it will end up taking more water off the skin, leaving the skin more dry. In addition to supplying hydration, "locking" it in is just as important! There goes the reason why face cream/lotion is often used at the end of our usual skin-care routine. 
Skin - the largest organ in human body
When asked to name human organs, what come to mind are often "stomach", "liver", "kidney", etc. We tend to miss the most "visible" organ of all: our skin! In fact, our skin, is our biggest organ.
Skin is also the organ that works at the fastest self-repairing speed. However, because skin covers various areas of our bodies, from head, face, neck, body, to limbs, we should understand the characteristics of the skin in different areas, so we can properly take care and attend to the different needs of various skin areas.
Take facial area for example, we often consider it to be one of the most important part of our appearance, but it's also easily exposed to external irritants. Facial skin has therefore developed a strong self-protecting mechanism; comparing to the rest of the body, facial skin tends to produce more sebum and it also more easily renews and repairs its own damaged cells. But even within such small area, different parts on our faces have different skin needs:
- For examples, the skin in the conture area around eyes and lips, as well as our ears are rather thin, and the sebum is produced less there. If you use highly concentrated skin care product, your eye conture skin might be easily burned. Or if you use skin care products that contains insufficient oil level, crow's feet or fine lines may start to develop due to dehydration.
- Also, the skin of our ears is often easily neglected. How many of us include that skin area when we put on sun block lotion for our faces?! Do you know it's a common skin area where sun burn occurs after a day of fun at beach!
- Furthermore, many of us are troubled with dry lips, especially during winter. Some of us have the habit of wetting our lips with our saliva, attempting to ease the problems. To the contrary, that makes it worse! Lip balms contain high level of nutritious oils, which is what our lips needs!
Know your skin. Take care of different areas of your skin individually. Beautiful skin need not be just someone else's inherited blessing; it can also be your reward as a result of your correct and diligent skin care "ritual"! 