Makeup shelf life

Whether you like Dior or Covergirl or any other brand of cosmetic products you need to know the following guidelines about their shelf life to avoid any problems with skin, infections, etc.:

1. Mascara’s shelf life is 4-6 month and you should be especially careful with anything that goes close to your eye. An eye infection is a nasty thing you want to avoid by all means.

2. Eyeliner: if it’s a pencil its shelf life is 1 year and since you always sharpen it you always renew the tip and delete any bacteria on it. But if an oily substance is leaking out of it – throw it away immediately. Liquid eyeliners “live” much less, about 6 months, because microbes can easily breed inside the bottle.

3. Lipstick: on average its shelf life is 8 months but good brands live much longer. If your lipstick started to stick to your lips – don’t use it anymore

4. Powder eye shades and blushes are usually good for up to 2 years, liquid – up to a year.

5. Concealers and compacts are good for 1 year too but pay attention to their smell and consistency. If something changes for the worth – throw them away

6. Brushes: if made of natural hair, they can live forever if you take care of them properly: wash them once a week with warm water and regular soap and let them dry well.

If you want your favorite cosmetic products live longer there is one rule of thumb: decrease sun, heat and humidity exposure!

Aveen Active Naturals Creamy Moisturizing Oil

Now that summer is here I am very picky about moisturizers I use. I really hate that sticky feeling of a greasy product on my skin combined with sweat - don’t you? That’s why I LOVE Aveeno Active Naturals Creamy Moisturizing Oil

First of all, it doesn’t have an oily texture, though it is called “oil”. It feels more like a very lightweight lotion that perfectly moisturizes my skin (and I have a very dry skin, BTW) making it so smooth and silky.

Second of all, Aveeno Active Naturals Creamy Moisturizing Oil contains natural colloidal oatmeal and pure oat oil (known to sooth dry skin) as well as sesame seed oil and sweet almond oil and thus has a very pleasant (not overpowering) sweet almond smell.

On top of all, for a bit more than $7 (12 oz bottle) it’s indeed a beauty steal!

I read many customer reviews about of this product and everybody agrees that it is great but it is difficult to find it stocked in stores (maybe it is so good that it sells out quickly?) If you have a problem finding it – Amazon has it: you can buy one bottle or a pack of threeand save on shipping!

The Cream that Saved my Face

I wanted to tell you about a product that literally saved my face a couple of weeks ago. Since early spring I developed a light red rash on my forehead which, according to a cosmetologist, could have been due to an irritation. On her advice I stopped using the products I was using at the time – nothing helped, I tried using different products – didn’t help either, I tried to use NOTHING but with no apparent result.

I was not too much worried because the redness was not too bright and not too visible so I thought it would go away with time. Then at the end of May I went on a cruise. The change of environment, food and water made the rash much worse. I was desperate: none of the beautiful dresses I brought for the formal evenings on the ship would distract attention from the terrible bright red spots on my face…

Not knowing what else to do I decided to go to the spa on board the ship hoping they would have a magical cream that would erase all the redness right away… and they DID!!! The cosmetologist who talked to me could not exactly determine the cause of the rash (it was probably a combination of many factors) but she offered me a cream that would sooth the redness regardless of its origins - La Therapie Creme Fortifiante- Fortifying Skin Cream for softening high color. Apparently, this cream, rich in Amino Acids and vitamins from Horse Chestnut and Red Vine extracts, is formulated for skins prone to high colouring. It is good for any skin type and should be applied twice a day to a clean face on problem areas before you use a moisturizer.

“How good is this cream, really?” – you would probably ask. Well, I had my spa appointment at around 2 pm and at 5.30 pm I went to dinner with practically no redness on my face! I continued to use La Thérapie Crème Fortifiante during all my vacation and the redness did not re-appear. You might not be able to save money on this product but it is 100% worth it since it is guaranteed to save your face! Plus the tube is quite big, it will last you at least a year.

P.S. I would like to thank the girls from the spa on Ms. Zuiderdam ship, Holland America cruise line. They were very professional and attentive to customer needs!

Inositol Vegetal Eye Cream

Today I would like to tell you about a wonderful product for eyes. Another look at Cosmopolitan.com “Celebs favorite beauty products” and we find a classic example of advice on how to waste money. Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat Radiant Touch Concealer is being recommended to fight dark circles around eyes. This product does work well but it’s not an eye cream and you definitely need to apply a regular eye cream to moisturize, correct fine lines, etc. So if you follow this advice you will need 2 products and spend twice as much time and money to make your eyes shine.

Here is an easier and more beautiful solution: Inositol Végétal Line Smoothing Eye Cream by Yves Rocher . It moisturizes, reduce 1st signs of lines (according to YR gradation this cream is for age 25+) and the appearance of puffiness. On top of that it does the best job ever of hiding dark circles in your eye contour area. It is not a concealer, but when you squeeze out this cream out of the tube you immediately see the difference compared to other products: it has a light beige color (as a tinted moisturizer) and has a light pink shimmer. So when your skin absorbs it the beige color works almost like cover up AND those simmering particles reflect light in such a way that you simply don’t see the dark circles anymore!!! Plus you eyes look brighter! It is almost like a magic trick! This is one of the most amazing eye cream I have ever tried.

So to sum up: with Inositol Végétal Line Smoothing Eye Cream you eliminate 1 step in you beauty routine and save some money too: you buy 1 product instead of 2 and this product costs just 24 USD compared to 40 USD price tag of Yves Saint Laurent concealer!
How to save even more money: website offers the following discounts at the moment:

10% OFF all orders - DISCOUNT10 – expires 7/31/2009
Free shipping with orders over $25 - FREESHIPTODAY - expires 7/31/2009
$5 OFF orders over $25 - 5OFF25 – expires 7/31/2009
Yves Rocher also usually offers a surprise gift at checkout. I strongly suggest choosing a beauty item. Their jewelry, scarves and other non-cosmetics stuff is not as good as their cosmetics products.

Bulgarian Beauty Secret

Today I am taking you on a trip to Bulgaria. It is a wonderful little country in South East Europe nestled between Balkan Mountains and the Black Sea. June is the best month to discover and enjoy the Bulgarian beauty secret because it is ROSE. Bulgaria is famous for its Rose Valley which produces tons of precious flowers each year which are used by most cosmetics companies in the world in the form of rose oil added to everything from creams to perfumes.

But my personal favorite is Rose WATER. It is a 100% pure and natural product produced by steam-distillation of fresh rose blossoms. Pure rose water contains no additives, preservatives or synthetic ingredients. Very often a manufacturer says on a label that a product contains “rose essence”, this is not what I am talking about, it’s a fake, it doesn’t have the same beauty and therapeutic properties. Real, pure rose water contains nothing but rose water itself and it is produced locally, in Bulgaria, from the flowers that have just been picked.

Rose water is an excellent product for skin: it hydrates, tones, calms, stimulates regeneration process, maintains PH-balance and has anti-inflammatory properties. It also has an absolutely divine smell of fresh roses and can be used in aromatherapy. I use it as my daily face toner and I have never found a better product. I have been using it for years since it was a very popular product in the former USSR due its close ties with Bulgaria.

I buy my rose water from a family-owned Bulgarian company, Alteya, and I chose them because they are vertically integrated: they own rose fields in the Rose Valley, their manufacturing and packaging facility is right there, on the spot and thus, they guarantee the purest and freshest ingredients. Moreover, their rose water is USDA certified Organic.

The World wouldn’t have known about wonderful Alteya products but for the Internet (you cannot find them in stores yet) and now you can indulge yourself and enjoy the best and oldest Bulgarian beauty secret:

Professional advice on choosing sunscreen

The summer has finally arrived (in the Northern hemisphere) and the sun is bright and warm and… dangerous... We all know about the risks of excessive sun exposure and the necessity to wear sunscreen but I know many people have troubles choosing the right sunscreen so I was searching the Internet for some good guidelines on this. I was lucky to find a great article written by Darrell Gonzales, M.D., a dermatologist with Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, California: http://www.scripps.org/news_items/3420-sunscreen-101-what-you-need-to-know-to-protect-your-skin

It’s an excellent article because it is not written by a cosmetic company trying to promote its products but by a dermatologist, it is very well written and easy to follow.

From my personal experience I would like to share with you information on a product that I’ve tried and really like. I am allergic to sun and I get red itchy spots all over my body if I don’t use a good sunscreen so my preferred product is La Roche Posay Anthelios SPF 60 Melt in Sunscreen Lotion:
Things I like about it are:
- It is or all skin types, especially normal to dry and good for sensitive like mine
- It is fast absorbing, non-greasy
- It gives high UVA protection (PFA 26) and SPF 60 for outdoor use
- It is water-resistant, fragrance-free and PABA-free

I also use La Roche Posay brand baby sunscreen on my baby (they have a special product for babies, the one described above is for adults) and neither of us ever had any allergic or any other adverse reactions, never been sun burnt either!

Where to buy and save:
has this product in stock and it also has several fantastic promotions going on right now:
1. Save 10% EVERY DAY: code SSM18447 (NO expiration)
2. FREE shipment on orders $49+ (NO expiration)
3. They send you FREE product samples with every shipment
4. You can join Skinstore rewards program for FREE and earn 1 point for each 1 USD spent (excluding tax and shipment). Each 300 points earn you a 30 USD Rewards Certificate!

Israel Beauty Secret - Part II

To continue on my previous story about Dead Sea beauty secrets ( http://beautymanual.blogspot.com/2009/05/israel-beauty-secret.html) I want to share with you another great find that I have recently discovered: Cleopatra's Choice website offers a variety of authentic Dead Sea products. The best part is that if you don’t know what product you need or have any sorts of doubts you can try 10 products for FREE!!! They kindly ask you to pay $4.99 for shipping but I think it’s fair enough.

Click on the link in the upper left hand corner of their main page and it will take you to the description of items they offer for FREE:
1. Mineral Lift Serum
2. Moisturizing Day Cream
3. Intensive Anti Wrinkle Cream
4. Night Renewal Cream
5. Purifying Mud Mask
6. Mineral Eye Gel
7. Mineral Hand Cream
8. Mineral Body Lotion
9. Shea Body Butter
10. Deep Pore Mineral Cleanser

I was pleasantly surprised that all these didn’t come in tiny trial-size pouches that you can hardly open, and when you do it’s only enough for 1 use. These come in nice little jars and I used their eye gel, for instance, for nearly a week, day and night; hand and face creams last for about 3 -4 days, and the only one product that is for 1 time use is the body lotion (the body is big and the jar is small – you do the math)

My absolute favorites were Mineral Eye Gel and Mineral Hand Cream. The eye gel was soothing and refreshing and the hand cream made my hands wonderfully soft!

So when you choose the product YOU like you can order it risk-free.

Also their bath salts (authentic 100% natural Dead Sea salts) are FANTASTIC and CUSTOM-MADE: first you choose from 70 different scents (or choose un-scented), then you choose any of 13 colors available and, finally, you choose any size from 5 to 2400 LB! I’ve never seen such a huge selection of salts which come with all the beauty and therapeutic benefits that Dead Sea has to offer. These also come in samples: 2 OZ = 0.99 USD. You can try any combination of scents and colors.

How to save even more:
1. FREE shipping on orders $49+
2. Use discount coupon “beauty10” to get 10% OFF
3. They send 3 FREE samples with every purchase!

Learn to read your beauty products labels

I was reading my “Parents” magazine the other day and found a very interesting and useful insert: Burt’s Bees cosmetic company created a handy card that lists synthetic ingredients that cosmetic companies use in their products. It teaches you to read labels carefully and not to be tricked by a company which claims to have “natural” products but in fact uses synthetic ingredients. These are:

CLEANSERS:
Sodium Lauryl Sulfate
Sodium Laureth Sulfate
Sodium Myreth Sulfate
PETROCHEMICALS:
Petrolatum
Mineral Oil
Paraffin
PRESERVATIVES:
Parabens
DMDM Hydantoin
CHEMICAL SUNSCREENS
Oxibenzone
Avobenzone
Octinoxate
MOISTURIZERS:
Propylene Glycol
Butylene Glycol
Polyisobutene

Background info on Burt’s Bees: Burt’s Bees produces affordable natural skin, hair and lips care products. They call themselves an "Earth Friendly, Natural Personal Care Company" and claim not to use synthetic ingredients in their products unless absolutely necessary (i.e. there is no natural substitute available). Their main ingredients are: beeswax, botanical and essential oils, herbs, flowers and minerals.

What I like about this company is that they are very open about the contents of their products: they give real percentages of natural ingredients in each products: for instance, they state that their Replenishing Lip Balm with Pomergranate Oil is 99.6% natural. Any other company would probably market itself as “100% Natural” without scruples and you wouldn’t even notice the difference (0.4% is nothing, really) but as a customer I appreciate the honesty. That’s why I like Burt’s Bees, in addition to the fact that most of their products are under $10!

How to save even more:
If you buy from
you get the following:
1. Free shipping on orders $50+
2. 20% OFF with coupon code 27164
3. You can CHOOSE 3 FREE samples with your order