Great Grooming Tips For The Guys!
Being the savvy sweethearts that you are, you won’t mind if Beauty Marked! has a wee shift of focus for today to highlight a few great grooming tips for the ever-so-handsome guys out there? So good-looking, these are just for you:
- Shave If you are sporting a hair-free face, do shave at least once a day…twice if necessary, to keep up your groomed appearance.
- Trim If you are going with a bit of facial hair, keep it trimmed and shaped.
- Cleanse & Moisturize Even the blokiest blokes have skin (albeit rhino-like at times) and need to ensure that it stays clean, well hydrated, and sun blocked.
- Exfoliate Your face and body will love you when you attend to at least weekly scrubs and will work to keep you looking your vital best.
- Nails Clean, short, and filed are the three operatives here when it comes to finger and toe nails (yes, we do notice your dashing digits).
- Duo-browed. And yes, it is an absolute requirement that you have two eyebrows at all times.
Shedding A Bit Of Light Under The Matter.
Beauty Marked! very often gets emails inquiring about the dusky shadows seen on a great many underarms of our gorgeous readers. Most emails are asking about what causes this darkening and how can one get rid of it? Since BM! can’t ever pass up an opportunity to assist where we can, we thought we’d just shed a bit of light under the old arm if we could.
A lot of the darkening seen in the underarm area is due to friction. This friction is more than likely being caused by excess rubbing due to skin-on-skin contact and or shaving. It’s worth mentioning too, that good old-fashioned genetics can also play a part in darkening the skin there as well. The good news is that you may be able to lighten the area by regular under arm exfoliation. Both mechanical (scrubs and loofahs) and chemical exfoliation (AHAs and LAs) should not only lighten the area overtime, but will assist with any ingrowns should you traditionally fall prey to them. Waxing is generally the hair removal method of choice if you are bothered by dusky underarms. I suspect it has more to do with the hair lying just under the skin left by razoring, as shaving only removes the surface parts of the hair, while leaving the deeper, more pigmented follicles behind. Think of the darkening as a 5 o’clock shadow of the underarm area. Waxing, when done well, removes the follicles and any hair hanging out just below the surface eliminating the appearance of shading and fast re-growth…for a much longer period of time that is.
So, for those of you who are bothered by the darkening often seen in the underarm area, have a go at regular exfoliating and perhaps waxing, as your hair removal of choice, to brighten up your underarms. You should see a vast improvement within a few weeks with bit of luck and a calculated plan of approach. Not bad, ay?
Thanks for your wonderful enquiries, ladies, and do know that it is always our Beauty Marked! pleasure to assist.
-BM! xx
Nice Day For Ducks…
I don’t know about the weather in your neck of the woods, but in Beauty Marked!’s, it’s been pretty abysmal. Light showers one minute, scorchingly hot and humid the next followed by hail, threats of hypothermia and hideous torrential downpours. The weather has just been unreal and more labile in the shortest space of time than most makeup maven’s FOTDs can, quite possibly, stand. This crazy, ultra changeable weather reminds me of a fun, spirited article I once came across on the web titled, ‘makeup for a monsoon’. Gotta love the web. Oddly enough, I recall it offering some pretty good tips to keep in mind and the stellar pearls were pretty much in accord with anything I could come up with. Lets see…from memory, the monsoonal makeup essentials were:
Waterproof mascara
creamy lipstick in a trans lip/cheek type colour
Long last gel eyeliner
Powder eyeshadow or loose pigment
Cream blush
Powder blush
Makes sense to me. The only things I recall not on the list, but would be an ever-so-useful BM! addition to the Makeup Mavens Monsoonal Makeup Essentials would be:
Lip and Cheek stain
Mineral Makeup
Colour-free Lip balm
With these three added items, you’d be pretty sorted. The lip and cheek stain would be a fab base for when everything else either melted or blew off in all wonky weather. Mineral makeup is generally pretty water resistant, easy wearing, lightweight, and protective while offering you a medium coverage for the most part and doesn’t tend to go manky with heat, sweat or rain. Lip balm…well this ought to be everyone’s staple beauty item as it can be swung in a great many directions with masterful effect for the most part. What other beauty product can you think of that can double or even treble as a hair styling product, cream eyeshadow and blush when mixed with pigment, and function as a spot makeup remover in a pinch? Lip balm can freshen up most makeup when tending to running repairs, all the while acting as a sneaky bit of moisturizer for those rogue ashy patches that can become manifest in the mayhem of the weather of the moment. *idea*
I don’t know about you, but I think you’d be better than sorted if you battened down the hatches with these beaut meteorologically inspired bits of makeup magic in your arsenal. In fact, you’d be one darling ducky indeed.
What’s A Bad Hair Day?
A few months ago I had my hair titivated with several Original Diva Exclusive Hair Inserts and gosh was that ever fun. When the near OCD-like shaking of the head and the shameless reflection gazing subsided somewhat, it dawned on me that with these nifty, clip-on, Silk Remy human hair inserts, there is really no longer a need for there to be such a thing as a “bad hair day” ever again. I’m liking that notion, absolutely! Original Diva offers you a “great hair day” with their three, Original Diva 100% Human Hair Extensions options:
Single Clip-on Highlights Offers you a burst of colour or a subtle high or low light to complement any hair tone.
Original Diva In a Box This is your full head of hair in multiple clip-on tracks of inserts that can be used as often as desired and inserted and removed in minutes.
Permanent Micro Ring System Original Diva’s Permanent Ring Micro System offers the wearer a keratin tipped end sitting close to the scalp attached with soft teflon coated beads for reduced scalp irritation. As your hair grows, a professional stylist can easily reposition the beads to the roots of the hair for ongoing wear.
Original Diva products are sold throughout Australia’s leading salons, but do be sure to visit the Original Diva Online store for so much more! *still flicking*
C{4U and For Me.
As many of you will know I am a flat iron hound and am always on the lookout for a marvelous shampoo and conditioner to nourish my naturally curly hair that is very often being cajoled (read: shamelessly coerced) straight. Well I have found the most unsuspecting ally in what has seemed a never-ending pursuit to keep my tresses in trim. The proudly Australian PPS Hairwear company has created the C{4u line of shampoos and conditioners of which Beauty Marked! has been absolutely digging the magical C{4u Curl Cure Shampoo and Conditioner. Who would have thunk it? A shampoo and conditioner designed especially for curly hair that works a treat to support the hair of the likes of this serial straightener. C{4u Curl Cure’s moisture intensive curl complex of apricot and olive oils and vitamin E, not only leave my hair protected, but smooth, hydrated, strengthened and criminally supple to boot. *whispers* Not a bad preparative foundation for a flat iron now is it?
C{4u Shampoo and Conditioner sets are also available in Colour Addict, Expand, Frequent Shampoo & Frequent Conditioner, Revamp, and Thermal varieties. With PPS’ C{4u, you are assured of finding a fabulous bit of hair care just for you!
Is There Such A Thing?
I know that there are laws about smoking in public places and that the designated smoking areas are getting fewer and fewer. But this post is not so much a commentary on the lack of places to smoke, as I am a non-smoker, but more to do with the fact that even with the quasi-rigid anti-smoking laws, I still seem to get the uninvited and ultra tenacious smoke smell in my hair when I go out in public. How’s that work? What we really need is a shampoo, conditioner, or styling product that will transcend cigarette smoke. No point in going for the gorgeous hair spritzes that wonderfully scent your tresses as even they don’t seem to be able to keep the upper hand on those wayward wafts, because Lord knows I’ve tried them. What do you reckon Lovelies? Is there such a thing as a super duper cloaking device that will protect our precious hair from passive pong? Do be sure to let me know if you learn of one. In the meantime, off to the shower I go…Again.
Eep!…Hair Product Buildup?
Here’s a nifty little number to rinse through your hair, around once a fortnight, to get rid of any styling product buildup that refuses to take leave in the face of regular washing:
Rinse your hair with half a cup of Bicarbonate of Soda (baking soda) mixed into a cup of warm water.
Ta da! Now you can relax because it’s as easy as that.
