The Cosmetic Cheat Sheet

So even though it’s called cosmetics, It should be called cos-mess-tics. Why? Because it is a mess half the time.

Over the years there has been an evolution in esteem with cosmetic enhancements. Some looks and styles continue to be sculpted onto the self canvas, But sometimes it’s hard to find how to make these enhancements onto our self canvas.

For years I have been continually learning how to do better with my cosmetic skills from makeup to hair. I still get frustrated that I can’t blend my eyeshadow into a gradient glam or contour like other women.

I’d like to share what I have found out to improve my beauty regime, you might find you are going through some of the problems I went through. It's information that isn't entirely known. It was information that wasn't available until a couple of years ago. You can still look up all of this information on YouTube.

If you're looking to make your cosmetic list, but aren't sure where to look or what specific product to buy and how it works, then this article should answer all your questions.

The eyesha-don’t

Primer is a big benefactor for holding the eyeshadow on all day but here’s something that you might have never known.

So with a primer the instructions are simple you put it on your eyes and that is supposed to keep your eyeshadow intact to hold the eyeshadow on your eyes a little bit longer. But in recent years as it turns out primer has been used wrong and it isn’t instructed on how to make your eyeshadow last longer and to use the primer to its full extent.

So think about when you put on your makeup, you’re using your primer and you have it perfectly packed onto your eyelid and then you use your eyeshadow and you have all of your colors perfectly placed on your eyelid for that picturesque finish. And then within the hour or hours, you look in the mirror and your eyeshadow has now collected into your crease and you wonder why in the world the primer did not keep it packed onto your lid like it’s supposed to.

If you are like me and you have such greasy skin that could outdo all of the cast on The Walking Dead. Then you know how frustrating it is when you put on your eyeshadow within an hour you can see the shadow making a crisp line onto your crease when it’s supposed to be on top of your lid! It would continually piss me off that my outer crease in the color on my lid was up on my creases if it was like a windshield wiper put it up there.

So as it turns out when you use primer you’re supposed to put powder on top of it otherwise that is why the eyeshadow will crease so easily because the base wasn’t set with powder. It would be nice information to know! Of all the makeup tutorials I’ve ever seen it’s strange how it was either putting primer on your eyes and you’re good to go, or just putting foundation on your eyes as the base. Recently since the videos in 2017, there have been some beauty gurus that have been teaching makeup techniques with this first step. But it’s still weird how it’s not entirely known and should be taught to some women that are frustrated like me, that do their make-up and put on shadow for it to smear and smudge within the hour(s). It’s selective information, so, understandably, some beauty gurus might not share that kind of information if they just want to go ahead and get to the basics depending on how far a certain person wants to go with their beauty regime. When I learned this recently I tested it out myself and it did work!

My oily skin still does scheme its way through my eyeshadow, but it's lasted longer than it has, and the shadows appear brighter and not as patchy and smudged when I put the eyeshadow on my primer by itself.

Grease is the way to go

Oily hair is uncomfortable, to feel the stringy, mounded texture just doesn't look or feel good. It just felt better to have clean hair and it's sought after to have the cleanest hair with products that claim to do the job. Yet the real key to healthy hair is not having clean hair, and greasy hair is the key to a prominent and posh styling.

It has been advertised to women to have clean long luxurious hair, and to see this styled wavy curly hair on beautiful shiny hair is something that a lot of women wanted. That's what I thought I had to do, wash my hair, dry it, and then curl it so I could look like that. It’s all freshly washed, and I would see the sheen and silky style. I’m sure that’s the way that you were taught as well that the hair constantly has to be clean to be styled and it has to be clean to be attractive.

When I got into a routine of curling my hair it would continually frustrate me that I could not make my follicles hold into the folded curl. I would spend so much hairspray only for my hair to deflate within the hour.

It wasn’t until I did my research that a curl can hold better when you’ve waited a day after the initial hair wash day to curl it. Now if you happen to have a day where you have got to curl your hair for a date or event, and you can’t wait a day to let your hair build up the grease again. Dry Shampoo can be your time machine to speed up the process, just use a lot of dry shampoos it will hold the curl better because when your hair has a chalky feel to it, It can hold better against the barrel of the curling iron as opposed to clean hair where it would slip a lot faster because of the freshly washed hair.

I tried it out for myself; I waited a day, I curled my hair, and it lasted longer! I didn't think that the curls would look good with greasy hair, but with the proper products, it looked like my hair was freshly washed.

Stretching out the hair wash days will help the hair growth too, that hair has to breathe from the heat and hair care product. The natural oils in the hair can help replenish. You don't have to gamble your money on products that say that it’s supposed to help grow your hair out. If you want your hair to grow out, the best regime is to just leave it with minor styling or products. Dry Shampoo is going to be the loophole product to use during the process of training your hair to go days without a wash. After a couple of weeks, there will be a difference in the natural shine of your hair.

I wash my hair two days out of the week, and it has had a healthy shine to it from the natural oils, as well as not looking as greasy as it usually was.

So realistically even though it is marketed to many women to have clean hair, it really should be reversed that it should be marketed that dirty hair does better!

The real cleansing

Throughout this article I have revealed my troubles with oily skin and oily hair, so oftentimes I had to just read the labels to see what was suited for oily hair, which I thought was the way it had to be.

As it turns out I was wrong. Maybe as you’re reading this you’re also thinking about the certain products that you buy specifically for a certain problem you have isn’t exactly correcting the problem. I did my math that if you have oily hair you have to buy shampoo that was made for oily hair or if you have dry hair you have to buy shampoo that’s made for dry hair. But then there was the whole idea about what you do to your hair for styling, that does alter your hair. Then there is also the schedule that you shower too. So those factors don’t go into what you have to buy.

The back of the bottles doesn’t specifically say “do you use a lot of hairsprays, do you use a lot of product, or do you use a lot of heat?” Most of the time most bottles of shampoo try to tell you that it’s been better for the environment or doesn’t have as much of a certain chemical which is great to know but it doesn’t exactly help out when you buy the product and doesn’t do anything for your hair it’s mostly just the marketing.

A couple of months ago my hair was starting to look like the scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz. I used everything, and nothing worked to help me with my follicle frustrations. I took a trip to Ulta to go ask an associate in the salon about what I can do to fix my mane. When I explained everything to the associate, she took in all the information I said about how I tried everything. She appreciated the fact that I read the back of the bottles to try and understand what was going on. She mentioned to me that my problem might be a residue build-up which is the one thing that not a lot of women think about I know I wouldn’t think about that!

So I decided to try a product remover shampoo, and now it's permanently a part of my routine. At first, it was hard to see if it worked, there were no suds and I wondered if it was getting into all the areas. I took a quarter-sized amount and patted it on my wet hair in all areas. I rubbed and tousled it into my hair, after rinsing, there was a softness to my hair. When I got out of the shower and let my hair dry naturally, I didn't see any stringy hair.

If you have been struggling with stringy hair, find a shampoo that says "Product Removal". Anything from Neutrogena to Paul Mitchell will work.

Hair spraying your hair before you style

The way that we thought the regime for go-to hair is that you’re supposed to hairspray your hair after you’re done styling it turns out it’s an integral part of the pre-styling process. I do not know this until I learned from my hairdresser that the key to keeping curls to last all day or several days is to hair spray your hair with a dry spray before you curl your hair.

From what I’ve heard from other women is the usual fact; that if you have the curling device at a higher level of heat then it will maintain the curl to last. But all that would do is just create heat damage to the hair, and even with a heat protectant it really wouldn’t do anything to hold the curl intact. No matter what heat the barrel is on. So it’s important to hair spray your hair with a dry spray before you style. I’ve been doing it for a year and it’s made my waves last for days.

Just spray it in your hair after your heat protectant dries, then brush your hair to spread the spray in your piece of selected hair to curl.

TRESemme' makes a great spray called Micro Mist, add it to your list for your style shopping.

Makeup shouldn't be a mess and hair shouldn't be a hassle, it should be fun to glam up. Having this minor problem solved can make the prepping process easier and more satisfying for styling.