Thursday, October 23, 2008

A product I love (I have many, so more to come!)


Now that winter is fast approaching, soon we will not only be continuously subjected to Christmas music wherever we go, but our lips and cuticles may become cracked and dry. I don't know which is worse. Just kidding, it's the Christmas music for of course, because the lips and cuticles we can actually do something about.


One of my favourite cheap beauty products is 100% lanolin, readily found in pharmacies as 'nipple ointment' for breastfeeding moms. It's all-natural, has no scent or taste, and is super, super thick and soothing. A little goes a very long way, and one tube lasts me almost a year. Try it as a night treatment and you will notice a difference in the morning, even after only one use. As a makeup artist, it's been pretty much my duty to try every lip balm and cuticle cream out there and though I'd love to be able to recommend something more fancy-shmancy, this is really the best, and it will only set you back about ten bucks.



Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Madonna's Anti-aging plan?

Read on!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1078650/The-mad-world-Madonna-Grains-meal-rice-milk-TV-sleeping-plastic-suit-covered-500-cream.html

Who knows how much of it is actually true, but in my opinion, it doesn't seem to be working so well for her. Sure she's still great, and she's in absolutely fantastic shape, but there's nothing luscious and juicy about her anymore. There is definitely something to be said for having some body fat as one gets older.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

My morning banana...

Japan is going crazy for a new diet:

http://morningbanana.com/

Speaking of fruit for breakfast, this summer I found a copy of 'Fit For Life' at a garage sale (yay garage sales!) for ten cents and started reading it last week. This book was written in 1987 by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond and is still in print today. One of the principles in the book is that we should eat only fresh fruit in the morning, nothing else. Oh, you can eat as much fruit as you want, though it's not exactly a breakfast of champions for those of us who wake up at 5:30 am to a screaming baby. I have been trying it for two days now, and by 10am I am shaky, ready to eat the furniture, and even a little angry. Maybe it's just an adjustment period for my body? I sure hope so. There are eight whole pages of glowing reviews in the front of the book, here are some of my favourite snippets:

"Deserves a Nobel Prize."

"I have lost 20 pounds in 30 days..."

"How could something so simple avoid my reasoning for so long?"

"People comment on how much smaller my gut is and that's in 2 weeks time!"

"I feel like I have been buried under concrete in a cave all my life, and finally I was rescued..."

Pretty compelling stuff. I will be sure to post an update when I feel I've given Fit For Life a fair chance to work it's magic...

Monday, October 20, 2008

40 Is The New 25?

When I was a small child, my mom worked as an Avon lady. Every month she'd receive her order, huge boxes filled with glamorously-packaged potions and concoctions of every kind, all promising to make their user gorgeous, radiant, youthful and everything else you can think of . There were always lots of samples for me to play with, teeny tiny lipsticks and little envelopes filled with magic creams and exotically-perfumed towelettes. I couldn't wait for those boxes to arrive. For me, this was heaven, so much so that it led to a career as a makeup artist and a lifelong passion for everything related to the beauty industry. I am always on the hunt for new (and often outlandish) products or techniques that I can test on myself and gossip to my girlfriends about. I also have very strong interests in alternative therapies, and the importance of nutrition and exercising. Of course exercise is one of the fountains of youth, but I still have a lot of 'hope in a jar', whether it be a some crazy-exclusive expensive eye cream imported from some obscure, unheard of place or just a cheap blush from the drugstore. I want to try it all.

'Forty is the new twenty-five' is a phrase I have been hearing a lot these days, and it makes me giggle every time I think about it because it makes me only twenty years old. It makes me feel a kind of silly optimism, and everyone I tell it to seems to have the same reaction. Would I want to be twenty years old again? Well...just the thought sends my brain flashing back to waitressing hell, crappy boyfriends, and eating Ramen noodles in my cramped apartment that I furnished with discarded items I found on the street, so..no. Would I like to look and feel twenty-five by the time I'm forty? You betcha.