ZZZzzzzzZZZzzz….. ZZZZZzzzzz….

What a perfect Saturday… Just watched my favourite ‘Saturday Kitchen’ with James Martin and lovely Nigella’s Kitchen. I was waiting for this morning all week when I can just sit back in front of the telly and relax… later I had my morning or should I say afternoon shower and I can tell you that there is only one way to deal with the cold: if the coming winter is biting you, you have to bite it back! And that’s what I did! I treated my skin with a warm and 100% natural honey&sugar scrub!

Having my beauty regime in place is great but unfortunately last night I didn’t sleep well!

I am usually blessed with good night sleep and I can sleep wherever and whenever… When I travel back home to Lithuania and if I travel on my own I always sleep in the plane… how lucky am I! A few times I fell asleep just before taking off and woke up when I landed in my country!

My lovely Australian friend Neil suggested that I write about quality sleep and its impact on our health. Also my sleepless night gave me a few ideas… I didn’t sleep because my head was packed with thoughts of Christmas presents… so I got my laptop and simply looked through a few websites, bought some lovely Christmas presents for my family and my friends… only then I calmed down… even thought I was just too excited to have a good night sleep…

Importance of quality sleep

I believe that the simplest secret of health, youth and glowing skin is quality sleep! I recently read loads of articles related to beauty sleep and in summary I can say that sleep is as important as food and water!

It is important not only how long you stay in bed but the quality of sleep. Make sure that you have as few disruptions as possible when you sleep! My boyfriend has attended the ‘sleep well, perform well’ seminar the other day and he said that ‘the biggest interruption is our mobile phones, because usually we have them  somewhere near us and mobile phone radiation wrecks our sleep!’

Impact on our health

Reading some insomnia articles makes me glad I do not have this problem. Some people deliberately sleep less hours and have the excuse of having loads of things to do. This leads people in to dangerous health problems such as irritability and stress. Lack of sleep weakens our immune system and it can also affect our memory and mathematical ability!

Sleep is extremely important for the health of our skin! The lack of good night sleep results in dark circles underneath our eyes and the skin looks dull and lifeless. It also results in early ageing which none of us wants to experience!

Quality sleep benefits every aspect of our life quality, the way we feel, the level of energy and our happiness!

Every person should have their sleep pattern and make it a regular event! We should sleep from 8 to 9 hours a day. Personally for me 6-7 hours is enough. But I do let myself lie in longer on weekends and get some extra beauty sleep!

What can help you sleep?

Switch off all the devices in your room and don’t leave your TV, lap top or speakers on stand by as they produce electrical waves which can disturb your sleep.

When your head is full of thoughts about work or things you have to do, just write them down on a piece of paper. It will help you to relax because you don’t need to worry that you might forget them, literally taking the thoughts out of your brain.

Try some breathing exercises. Concentrate only on your breathing from the diaphragm, breath in through your nose and breathe out through your mouth.

Go to a happy place! If you feel stressed and unhappy just imagine good things which happened to you or things you want to happen!

Do not go to sleep extremely hungry and also do not drink too much liquid before bed!

What helps me to sleep?

My mum visiting London

Occasionally I can’t fall asleep when I am cold, stressed or hungry, also if I slept too long that morning…

Nice, crisp clean and cute bed sheets and a tidy room help me to have my beauty sleep.

Just letting in some fresh air to my room before bed time helps me to have my quality sleep.

Warm milk is a good old cure for sleepless nights, also herbal teas like camomile tea and especially cinnamon tea. See the recipe in my ‘Lovely cinnamon’ blog.

From all the reading I’ve done on good night sleep I loved the sentence that ‘the bed should be used only for sleep and sexual relationship and not for reading or watching TV. Excessive time in bed seems to fragment sleep.’