Just ASK

These four cute books are jam packed with so much information you will just love them.  They look so cute on my bookshelf and sometimes that’s all I’m after – is anyone else like that?    Trying to recreate an aspirational ‘ideal’ from a magazine? Anyway, I do digress and these little books are filled to the brim with 1000 of the most asked questions about Beauty, Love, Gardening and DIY.

Ask Beauty by Bella Blissett – This little beauty (haha) will help answer the countless questions in our everyday lives on our constant pursuit of youth and beauty.  The beauty industry provides a never-ending stream of miracle products, but how do we know which ones really work?  Not only does it cover lotions and potions, it also covers nutrition advice and fashion tricks to flatter your body plus ancient beauty rituals to the latest in anti-aging technology.  Full of home remedies, quick-fixes, sneaky tips and strange myths (do pores really open and close?).  Find out if toothpaste really does help banish spots or or how many hairs on our head we have (and blondes have more, go figure!) and find out Vicky B’s ‘keeping it thin’ secret … seriously is there anyone who wants to be that thin?  But this book is perfect for when you’re experiencing a Sassi Moment of having Nothing to Wear or experiencing a Bad Hair Day!

Ask Love by Jenny Hare – Argh, the art of love, love, love, love, love! The concept of love is so simple but boy it can turn out to be extremely complicated and I myself need all the help I can get in this department!  I love lots of things, but for all matters of the heart I’m in need of some help, boo   Even the author commented when she was asked to write 1000 questions about love in relationships, surely there can’t be that many!  Well she admits she was very wrong.  She advocates that Love is the most important dimension in our lives generally and in any happy relationship.  I was discussing the subject of Love with a friend not so long ago and I think the premise of love is much more challenging these days, we can get caught up in the romance of love, what we think it should be like from the movies, and it’s much easier to walk away than to work through ’stuff’.  Being in a relationship is a ’skill’ and it needs both sides to be committed to it.  This little book really is bursting with loving tips and sometimes that’s all we need as a gentle reminder from being too caught up in the day-to-day busyness of life.

Ask Gardening by Daphne Ledward – Hands up who has a green thumb? Yep me neither, I need all the help I can get in this department too.  I do love my little garden on my balcony that I have created, I have wisely (I like to think so) planted succulents so that when I forget to water them they don’t suffer too much.  I also have two Frangipani trees, a yellow & white one and a pink & white one (of course) and the pink & white one has NEVER flowered much to my constant disappointment.  So this cute little book is broken down into the seasons and although the questions will often remain the same from the era of our grandparents, the answers for the 21st gardener demand to be simple, inexpensive, ergonomic, understandable and ‘green’ and the author hopes this little book will achieve that!  Seeing as we are in Autumn, I decided to jump to that section to see what I should be doing to care for my well behaved succulents.  I learnt that many plants die in wet soil during autumn and winter because the water replaces the air in the soil and so effectively the roots suffocate – makes sense!  I’ve always wanted to buy some tulip bulbs and now is the perfect time to plant them!  So that’s it for me, I’m off to Flower Power to be some bulbs for Spring!

Ask Home by Julian Cassell & Peter Parham – I am so not a DIY person, that’s what my Dad is for (he loves to feel wanted you know and the book’s intro does state that those with clever hands get asked lots of DIY questions and they  do really feel wanted, so there we’re clear).  The book is broken down into easy sections; Maintenance, Renovating, Decorating & tiling, Finishing touches and Outside.  None of those are for me, noooo!  But let’s have a look and see if there’s anything in there that I could do.  Here we go, even I knew the answer to this; My smoke alarm keeps beeping, is it broken? Noooo, it needs a new battery silly!  Okay next one; this is hilarious!  My ceiling light won’t work, why?  Try replacing the bulb, seriously!  They do go onto explain how to figure it out if it’s not the bulb.  Oh wow, they now have digital tape measure, now that is really cool!  Seriously, this book looks like it has great DIY advice, just not for me but I’ll definitely show my Dad

Available now from Hachette Australia; RRP $14.99

Love,

Sassi

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