Showing posts with label Make-up. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Make-up. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 28, 2017

Make-Up 101 for the Woman of a Certain Age

From time to time I have talked about how not to look old, how not to act old, personal style for women of a certain age, how to look chic even though you are retired, and not just how to look chic, but how to look fabulous from A-Z, even though you are old, er, a woman of a certain age.  In fact, in that last post, for the letter "M" I listed "Make-up" and here is what I said about that:

"Now I am not one of those women who won't let her husband see her without makeup so she jumps out of bed first thing and paints her face.  We all know I never jump out of bed.  When I am at home, I look like hell, but if I am going out, you won't catch me without mascara and lipstick at the very least.  Well, maybe at the gym or running to the grocery store, I let it slip a bit, but my point is, just because we are old, doesn't mean we have to accept the wrinkles and the flab and the little hairs on our chinny chin chins.  We should do what we can to still look good."

But as I look back on those earlier posts, I am surprised that I didn't talk more about make-up, because if there is one thing that seems to go by the wayside when a woman retires and/or gets old, it is using make-up. And yet a little brightening of the face will take years off of it. But I know, at our age, we might think, why bother?  It might be one of those things that now that you don't have to go to work anymore, who cares how you look?  Or you've been married for 50 years and Hubby doesn't pay that much attention any more so who cares how you look?

YOU DO!!!

No matter how old you are, most women look better with a little mascara (those eyelashes start getting thinner when you get older) and some lippy.  Anything else you want to do in addition to that is up to you but DO SOMETHING.  We want the world to be a more beautiful place, right?  Well, we can add some beauty to it.

But I get it.  It is a pain in the butt to have to spend those few minutes touching up the old face when you really want to get to the Lifetime Channel or off for some wine with the girls. And I know we will never be 18 again. 




I am not going for that.

What I am going for is not giving up just because we have a few wrinkles and have become practically invisible to the opposite sex. I am here to say, you can take ten years off your face with just about ten minutes of you and the mirror having a little face time and make yourself more visible.

WE WILL NOT GO QUIETLY INTO INVISIBILITY!!!

Say it with me!!!

WE WILL NOT GO QUIETLY INTO INVISIBILITY!!!

So with that said, if you have given up on make-up, I am going to try to inspire you by sharing with you my go-to make-up products that get me party-ready in just minutes (and every day is a party, right)?  I have tried many, many beauty products.  I have been on the lookout for the best easy-to-use products for years.  Let's just say they know me by name at Sephora!


Oops!  You weren't supposed to see that!

Anyway, if I promise to keep it simple will you promise to try to not give up on your looks and not give in to aging? 

(And by the way, this is all so simple, you will have few products to take on the plane when you travel.  I have a grab and go baggie with everything I need). 

Now I know the exact product you will want to use will vary by your coloring, your skin type and other factors, but I am going to share what I think are the basic TYPES of things you should have on hand and the ones I feel are the easiest, cheapest and work best.

So here are what I think should be in your basic collection of beauty products: 

(These are all mostly available at the drugstore, are inexpensive and easy to use.  But you don't have to use these. Whether you use these products or something else, all I can say is, don't give up on yourself)!



Eyebrow shaper and color


You have heard of the Wonder Bra, right?  Well, this is the Wonder Bra for your brows! It's Wunderbrow.  It's practically a miracleAs we get older, our brows start to get more sparse. With this product, you paint the color onto your brows with the little wand and it has little particles that adhere to your brows -  voila!  You have brows again.  Andt he color lasts for days.  I don't even wax my brows as much as I used to because you can shape your brows with this.


Eye shadow


I know there are all kinds of rules about eye shadow for women of a certain age, but screw them!  Go nuts if you want to!  It's your face and your life!



Eye liner


I really like this eyeliner because it is very easy to use.  I find that some eyeliner just won't do what I want it to do, but this is practically foolproof and it is an inexpensive drugstore item.  Unfortunately, I have had trouble finding it recently so not sure if it's been discontinued but find one that has a sort of crayon tip rather than a wand.  Those types are much easier to manage.

Now eyeliner is one of those things that isn't mandatory, but since I think that my eyes are one of my better features, I like to highlight them and have a more dramatic eye, but if you have dark eyelashes already and dark eyes, then perhaps you can forego the eyeliner.  It's up to you.


Mascara

But unless you already have really full, dark eyelashes, mascara is a must.

I don't really have a favorite.  I think Diorshow is one of the most popular but it is expensive.  There are other mascaras that are just as good and cheaper so choose the brand and style of applicator that works best for you. 

I like Lash Accelerator by Rimmel because it has a thin applicator,


but why not have a little fun with it too?


This one by Urban Decay has a very lush wand.  I use both depending on my mood.

But I don't feel strongly about which product you use. Choose whatever product works best for you. The point is to use something.

What I DO feel strongly about is using black mascara.

When I think about that, I have to laugh about a memory from my 30's.  I was at the cosmetic counter of a very upscale department store asking for black mascara and the woman at the counter WOULD NOT SELL ME BLACK MASCARA!  She gave me a little lecture about how fair my coloring and eyes were, and I should never wear black mascara, only brown.  Well, this was the 80's and I wanted to highlight my eyes, so I just went somewhere else and bought black mascara.  My point here is that mascara doesn't necessarily have to match your skin tone or anything else for that matter.  It highlights your eyes and black does the best job. Women in countries all over the world use kohl around their eyes for a reason.  It highlights them.

And if you feel like it, don't be afraid to experiment with color.  Why not try navy blue or green?


Concealer



Age spots, you know?  Just when you have grown out of pimples, later in life something worse comes along.  And I have always had freckles which were a huge annoyance as a child and they still torment me. So it's nice to have an easy to use concealer that you can dab over those annoying little dark spots.  I like a concealer that is like a crayon so you can pretend your face is a little coloring book instead of an old lady's face.  That's what I tell myself anyway!

This is Dream Brightening Creamy Concealer by Maybelline.




Light foundation



I don't always use a foundation, but if I am really dolling myself up, I will dab some on. This isn't actually foundation makeup, either.  It's more of a sponge on make-up to even out your skin tone.  This is NOT the old days where you would see women with foundation on their face but they had neglected to do their necks so you could see the delineating line between the foundation on their faces and the real skin on their necks. That's a no no.  So I don't like liquid foundation.  You just need a little something to smooth out the concealer and give your face a little color so this kind of sponge-on finish works great.

TIP:  We women of the certain age should NOT use powder, ever, ever, ever.  It gets caught in those damn wrinkles on our faces.  No, always always use sponge-on cream and NO POWDER!  Powder will make you look like Bette Davis in "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?"  And you don't want that, do you?


But I rather like the beauty mark!


Blush



The same goes for blush.  No powder, always the stick.  And the absolute best is Nars the Multiple, and the color that fits everyone's skin tone is - now if you are squeamish about sex, cover your eyes now before I give you the name of this blush - ready?

Orgasm.




Lipstick


The color and style of lipstick is totally up to you as long you wear SOMETHING.

However, I have just discovered this Cover Girl Outlast lipstick that you apply with a little stick applicator.  I am experimenting with red but it comes in several colors and it really does last better than most lipsticks I have tried.


So there you have it.


Eight basics that you can slap on in less than 10 minutes.

I haven't included moisturizer here, because I am not a big moisturizer person.  I use it from time to time but I have quite sensitive skin and actually I read once that Katharine Hepburn scrubbed her face with a rough washcloth every day and that's all she ever did and look how good she looked all of her 90+ years.  Moisturizer is basically trying to hold in water so why not just put water on your face? 

I may believe in make-up, but I don't believe in putting all kinds of extra stuff on my face so when I get up in the morning, basically all I do is wash my face with a warm, wet washcloth, (no soap) and that's it.  If it was good enough for Katharine Hepburn, it's good enough for me. Remember, water is the best moisturizer and that is what those commercial products are trying to replicate so why not just use water?  So that's what I do and at the few facials I have had in my life, I was told I had good skin, so that works for me.  But I am not going to get into moisturizer vs. no moisturizer.  That's up to you.

I also remove any mascara that has dripped off my eye lashes in the night using what I think is the absolute best eye makeup remover (in the morning, I usually have black bags under my eyes that make me look like a zombie). I have to admit that I am terrible about removing make-up before bed.  My bad. 


(The eye makeup remover has little pads that make it very easy to wipe off your eye makeup and these travel really well too).



As I said, I have good skin but just good skin does not a glam girl make.

Sometimes we ladies of a certain age need a little help and that's where a little make-up comes in.


Why look like this?


(And most of those are freckles, NOT age spots, just so you know)!!!



When I can look like this?




And a crown doesn't hurt! 

Anyway, I hope I have done what I set out to do for you women of a certain age: renewed your interest in looking your best and made it easy and inexpensive to do so.


Now I can rest easy.  I have done my bit to make the world a better place.

How about you?


Thanks for reading!
See you next Friday 

 
for my review of



"Personal Shopper"

and


The Week in Reviews
(What to See or Read and What to Avoid)


 and the latest on



"My 1001 Movies I Must See Before 

 I Die Project." 


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