What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we’ve got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #9: A fast and free mini-massage for instant relaxation.
You can schlep to a masseuse for $100 an hour, or relieve stress in minutes for free, using acupressure—the Chinese art of applying pressure to specific points on the body, says Dr. Mehmet Oz. Start by gently tugging your earlobes, pressing lightly with your thumb and index finger. Rub your lobes and move up the outer rim of the ear. This can stimulate endorphin production and reduce stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline.
Keep Reading
30 days of makeovers
The hidden health benefits of massage
4 easy ways to incorporate touch into your day
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| Photo: Thinkstock |
Keep Reading
30 days of makeovers
The hidden health benefits of massage
4 easy ways to incorporate touch into your day
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we’ve got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #8: Three sites that make tracking your finances a breeze.
Create budgets, set savings goals, and monitor where the dough goes, with this money manager that syncs automatically with your bank, credit card, investment, and loan accounts.
Manilla.com
A virtual and secure file cabinet with unlimited storage, Manilla allows you to go paperless while streamlining banking, magazine subscriptions, loyalty reward programs, and utilities.
Pageonce.com
If you want to manage your Netflix queue and pay
your credit card bills on the same screen,
head to this popular mobile app.
Keep Reading
30 days of makeovers
Convert money into happiness
Suze Orman answers your top money questions
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| Photo: Thinkstock |
Account for nearly everything with these
digital dashboards
Mint.comdigital dashboards
Create budgets, set savings goals, and monitor where the dough goes, with this money manager that syncs automatically with your bank, credit card, investment, and loan accounts.
Manilla.com
A virtual and secure file cabinet with unlimited storage, Manilla allows you to go paperless while streamlining banking, magazine subscriptions, loyalty reward programs, and utilities.
Pageonce.com
If you want to manage your Netflix queue and pay
your credit card bills on the same screen,
head to this popular mobile app.
Keep Reading
30 days of makeovers
Convert money into happiness
Suze Orman answers your top money questions
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we’ve got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #7: Cheeky stationery provides a fun new way to communicate.
Say it with...elephant dung. Seriously: Green-minded stationer Haathi Chaap collects the stuff from elephant stables, then dries it and boils it with salt water to eliminate odor and bacteria. The remaining fibrous material—digested sugarcane and leafy tree stalks—is beaten into pulp, diluted with water, and pressed into hygienic sheets. The paper's light brown color varies depending on the elephant's diet.
Available at elephantpoopaper.com
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| Photo: Gregor Halenda |
Available at elephantpoopaper.com
Keep Reading
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we’ve got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #7: Cheeky stationery provides a fun new way to communicate.
Say it with...elephant dung. Seriously: Green-minded stationer Haathi Chaap collects the stuff from elephant stables, then dries it and boils it with salt water to eliminate odor and bacteria. The remaining fibrous material—digested sugarcane and leafy tree stalks—is beaten into pulp, diluted with water, and pressed into hygienic sheets. The paper's light brown color varies depending on the elephant's diet.
Available at elephantpoopaper.com
Keep Reading:
30 days of makeovers
What "green" means
17 ways to save money—and the planet
|
| Photo: Gregor Halenda |
Say it with...elephant dung. Seriously: Green-minded stationer Haathi Chaap collects the stuff from elephant stables, then dries it and boils it with salt water to eliminate odor and bacteria. The remaining fibrous material—digested sugarcane and leafy tree stalks—is beaten into pulp, diluted with water, and pressed into hygienic sheets. The paper's light brown color varies depending on the elephant's diet.
Available at elephantpoopaper.com
Keep Reading:
30 days of makeovers
What "green" means
17 ways to save money—and the planet
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we’ve got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #6: Customizing your candy.
Mmm, dark chocolate with yogurt-covered pretzels, rainbow sprinkles, and salty potato chips. Or—oh, God—milk chocolate with pumpkin seeds, dried raspberries, and flaxseeds. No—wait—white chocolate with toffee bits and Fruity Pebbles. Hungry? Sites like chocri.com, chocomize.com, and chocbite.com let you customize your own bar from scratch, with scores of sweet, savory, and spicy add-ons. Chocolate with Pop Rocks, anyone?
Keep Reading:
30 days of makeovers
20 favorite childhood desserts (with adult twists)
Perfect wine and chocolate pairings
7 decadent chocolate treats
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| Photo: Gregor Halenda |
Keep Reading:
30 days of makeovers
20 favorite childhood desserts (with adult twists)
Perfect wine and chocolate pairings
7 decadent chocolate treats
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we've got mini makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #5: The changeup that will make hosting a snap.
Who knew the humble paper plate could bring both class and consciousness to the table? A Japanese brand called Wasara, that's who. Designer and restaurateur Shinichiro Ogata sculpted the curvaceous plates (and bowls, and cups and saucers) for easy balancing while you're deep in conversation, then molded their creamy surfaces from rapidly renewing materials like bamboo, reed pulp and sugarcane fibers. When the party's over, the dishes go straight into the compost bin. (BranchHome.com)
Keep Reading
30 days of makeovers
A stress-free dinner party
How to break bread (and poor eating habits)
| Photo: Gregor Halenda |
Who knew the humble paper plate could bring both class and consciousness to the table? A Japanese brand called Wasara, that's who. Designer and restaurateur Shinichiro Ogata sculpted the curvaceous plates (and bowls, and cups and saucers) for easy balancing while you're deep in conversation, then molded their creamy surfaces from rapidly renewing materials like bamboo, reed pulp and sugarcane fibers. When the party's over, the dishes go straight into the compost bin. (BranchHome.com)
Keep Reading
30 days of makeovers
A stress-free dinner party
How to break bread (and poor eating habits)
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we've got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #4: Rehabbing your virtual reputation.
Deleting old Flickr photos and closing Myspace accounts do only so much. If you want to seriously revamp what pops up when someone searches for you, consider turning to an online reputation management agency. Such sites, like reputation.com and metalrabbitmedia.com, reverse engineer search-engine algorithms in order to drive favorable content towards the top and bury unflattering posts. One DIY to hiding embarrassing content: Create Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter pages; Google and Bing generally put content from social networking sites toward the top of search results.
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| Photo: Thinkstock |
Keep Reading:
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we've got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #3: Getting photos onto your wall (your real one) in a snap.
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| Photo: Thinkstock |
Click, Click, Print
We take 28 billion digital photos each year, most of which languish on our hard drives. To get those third-grade plays and surprise birthday parties off your computer and onto the fridge, consider the digital-photo collage. Photovisi.com offers customized tools that can be downloaded free of charge, smilebox.com provides more than 1,000 collage templates for home printing, and shutterfly.com and snapfish.com will deliver printed collages to your home or office.
We take 28 billion digital photos each year, most of which languish on our hard drives. To get those third-grade plays and surprise birthday parties off your computer and onto the fridge, consider the digital-photo collage. Photovisi.com offers customized tools that can be downloaded free of charge, smilebox.com provides more than 1,000 collage templates for home printing, and shutterfly.com and snapfish.com will deliver printed collages to your home or office.
Keep Reading:
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we've got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #2: Martha Beck has a simple trick to help resolve conflict.
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| Illustration: Marcos Chin |
You're mulling the night's TV options when your significant other grabs the remote and starts clicking away like a sugar-fueled 5-year-old. When you mention this, he asks how your OCD is going. Your counterstrike that his mother raised her sons to be boorish louts—eliciting his usual rant about your mom still serving him meatloaf when he's been a vegetarian for years.
What would it take to change your life for the better? It may be less than you think—we've got mini-makeovers to help you upgrade everything from your workout to your weekend. #1: New fruits to try.
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| Photo: Thinkstock |
Apple, banana, pear, yawn. These exotic alternatives are packed with vitamins and fabulous new flavor.
Rambutan
Peel off the spiky red covering of this iron-rich Southeast Asian treat to reveal a translucent white orb with a taste that marries grape and watermelon.
Rambutan
Peel off the spiky red covering of this iron-rich Southeast Asian treat to reveal a translucent white orb with a taste that marries grape and watermelon.
Keep Reading: 3 more exotic fruits to try
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