Cassie DeNisco

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My Skin Secrets

As I get older, I get more passionate about skin care. In high school I struggled with simple, hormonal breakouts but of course to me it was the end of the world. There wasn’t a day that I didn’t wear makeup, even to workout or teach a dance class because I was so insecure about my skin. Today, I rarely wear makeup, even on special occasions. People always ask me how I cleared my skin and got it to where it is now, so today I am sharing my top skin secrets with you!

Don’t Over Exfoliate

I feel like for most of us when our skin is breaking out, all we want to do is take it and scrub away all the bacteria. Now, a little exfoliation has been proven to help break away dead skin cells, too much exfoliation can strip your skin of the important oils it needs and lead to more breakouts! I noticed that once I switched from a face scrub to a more gel like cleanser, my skin immediately felt more hydrated and looked better. Exfoliation is definitely important but I recommend only about once or twice a week because you only need to strip the skin of dead skin cells and not oils that are going to help rejuvenate you. Here’s the scrub I use once a week!

Cetaphil Gentle Exfoliating Cleaner $7.99

Face Brushes are a Must Have

I was so late to hop on this train. I ended up ordering the cheapest one I could find on Amazon and immediately noticed my pores and blackheads disappearing. I like to use the most fluffy brush head that it came with and put some of my face wash on it every other morning just to really deep clean my skin. Not only do skin brushes provide deep cleansing but they also help to stimulate circulation.

Facial Cleansing Brush $18.99

Don’t Sleep In Makeup!

This tip might be common sense but its probably the hardest one to follow. Believe me, I know how hard it is to come home and take off your makeup and do your entire skin care routine but it is so important. There are so many products on the market now that basically melt your makeup right off. I love this Clinique one. While you sleep, your skin is resetting itself after a long day. You should not let your skin go to bed dirty because you’re just going to clog your pores. Even if you don’t do your full routine, keep some micellar water right next to your bed to at least take off your makeup.

Micellar Cleansing Water $5.99

What You Put in, Is What you Get Out

I think this is so crucial and honestly underrated. You can’t expect your skin to change overnight if your not nourishing your body with the nutrients it needs. Great skin comes from within and the types of foods that you’re eating. Now, this is not to say that you can’t eat that pizza or those french fries but you need to make sure that you’re eating more things that have known skin benefits than the unhealthier foods. This book called Eat Pretty is my holy grail with eating for beauty.

Eat Pretty $3.40

Water is Everything

Drink your water! If there is only one thing you do from this blog post, it has to be to drink more water. Water is so essential to your entire body’s health but for me, water is the key to my clear and beautiful skin. I like to drink at least 100 oz of water a day and I promise you, drinking water and upping your water in take will do wonders for your skin. Water really helps you to stay hydrated but also to flush out toxins. I swear that when I don’t drink enough water the day before, the next day I can immediately tell in the look of my skin.

Know Your Products

Once I decided to dive right in to skin care and actually caring for my skin, my face transformed. For a lot of us, walking into Sephora or Ulta’s skin care section is so massive that you never know where to start and then you look at the prices and are so turned off. Buying products that are natural, clean, and a little pricier are definitely worth it in my book in reassuring that I am using the best for my skin. I also think that using products within the same brand is so important as well. A lot of times, skin products are designed to be used together so its important to follow the directions. I know that Drunk Elephant is definitely a bran that works best when put together and I also think that Clinque is too!

Drunk Elephant

I hope these tricks help you in your journey to flawless skin. I know that without them, I would still be struggling with my skin. Let me know in the comments down below if you do any of these already or if you have any secrets of your own you want to share!

C

My Favorite Workout Brands

Being a dance teacher means that I am constantly in athleisure. I am always on the lookout for really great leggings and workout bras and tops that are good quality but also worth the price tag. Workout clothes these days can be so expensive but you never really know if its worth the price unless you try it. Lucky for you guys, I have tried lots of brands and here are my top 3!

Lululemon

Lululemon is definitely on the pricier side of the workout clothes market. I know that their prices sometimes even will turn people off entirely from the brand. For me, I tried their apparel and fell instantly in love. The quality of their clothing is amazing and it lasts really long, as long as you properly take care of them. I think that that is the only downside to Lululemon. You have to make sure that you wash their clothes in the way that they suggest or else you’ll have major piling on your hands. I’ve found that as long as I wash the clothes in cold water, separate from everything else, and hang them to try they will maintain their shape and their quality. My pro tip is if you live near a Lululemon outlet, go to it! The prices are way more reasonable and it’s a good way to introduce yourself to their apparel.

Gymshark

Gymshark has really great prices for the quality of close they produce. I also love love love all of the colors and patterns that they use. They also have so many matching sets to choose from that vary from bras, shirts, shorts, and leggings. I actually found out about Gymshark from Youtuber and fitness model Whitney Simmons who is an ambassador for the brand. Everything that she wears is so cute and its always Gymshark. The only issue I have with this brand is their sizing. I find that my usual size of small fits me but is a little snug with their apparel. I size up to medium because there’s nothing worse than wearing uncomfortable gym clothes.

Outdoor Voices

This brand is somewhat newer to me but I love it just as much as the other two. Outdoor Voices has matching sets for such great prices. Their quality is also spot on which is another thing I love. When I ordered online from there, my package arrived in like two days and came with a cute little care instructions card. The care is similar to the Lululemon apparel so I actually just wash all of my workout gear together. I am really looking forward to heading out to an Outdoor Voices store soon so that I can get more from this awesome brand!

A workout brand review wouldn’t be complete without shoes. For me, I was a Nike girl through and through until I found my Adidas X_PLR sneakers in pink. They are insanely comfortable and are the cutest color. I actually just ordered a new pair of them in black and white to replace my Nikes. I feel like all of the Adidas shoes that I own have the “cloud foam” that they’re known for which I am not complaining about. I hope this helped you learn about new brands and maybe even try some that you were hesitant to try before.

C

What I Eat in a Day

intermittent fasting + food combining

I fell in love with food combining when I realized how great it is in reducing bloating throughout the day. Food combining isn’t necessarily a “diet” but it is a lifestyle change. It basically revolves around how you eat certain foods and what you eat with them. I also like to follow a pretty loose interpretation of intermittent fasting, where I’m only eating for around 8 hours a day, starting around 11:30am and ending around 7:30pm. I say loose because sometimes I love a good midnight snack or some mornings I wake up hungry at 7 am.

One major rule of food combining is to eat your fruit first thing in the morning on an empty stomach. I like to have my fruit at around 11:30 and then drink lots of water for the next 30 minutes before I eat anything else. This is so important to do because fruit digests so quickly so if you eat it any later in the day, it will just sit in your stomach on top of everything else that takes longer to digest and cause bloating. My all time favorite fruit is watermelon and it’s the perfect summer ” pre-breakfast”. I am not usually a breakfast eater other than my fruit but if I’m headed to teach or to a work out class, I’ll reach towards some greek yogurt and granola or an english muffin with peanut butter (not food combining but still super yummy). Both are high in protein so they help to hold me over until lunch.

Another important rule of food combining is to either eat a protein with a veggie or a starch with a veggie but don’t mix a starch and a protein. Because both starches and proteins take long to digest, mixing them together leads to that really sluggish and tired feeling. Mixing them with a vegetable separately helps to speed up digestion and help you feel lighter and less bloated. For lunch I love to do a huge salad with lots of greens and veggies. Because its almost summer, so many great veggies like zucchini and tomatoes are in season so I love piling them on my salad. This day I decided to put grilled chicken on my salad but sometimes I’ll also put some baked salmon. My all time favorite dinner is lemon salmon with steamed broccoli. It really fills me up but doesn’t leave me bloated heading to bed.

I can’t stress enough just how important water is as well. I like to drink at least 100 oz of water a day. I find that by drinking water not only does it help my moods but I also have the clearest skin because of it. Water doesn’t seem appealing to a lot of people but adding lemon or cucumbers can actually help make it taste better. I also love treating myself to a cute water bottle because it makes drinking so much water in a day fun. I find that because I drink so much water, I never really have to reach for a snack during the day. I am usually full enough from meal to meal that I rarely will reach for something else.

I always like to treat myself to a dessert if I ate pretty healthy for the first half of the day. I’m a sucker for Golden Oreos or B5aby Goldfish. I don’t often treat myself but I love to indulge when I know that I’ve been eating so well. I like to finish my day off with some sort of tea. My two favorite kinds are green tea and mint tea. Both are great for digestion and help me really detox my body after a full day of eating!

When I initially looked in to food combining, I was like oh that will never work. I was so happy when it actually did. Making simple choices in eating can really help bloating and that overly full feeling. For so long I had been just not feeling good about myself after I ate because I was just always so bloated. Once I actually took the time to try this new way of eating, I realized that I can have such a better relationship with food and eating healthy. I feel like dieting and living a “healthy” lifestyle is all about what makes you feel good. The way I eat in a day might not be exactly for you or what you should do but food combining is definitely something to research if you had some of the similar problems I had.