Body

Gigi here! I am not prejudiced.  I like Rimmel products.  Other Jane items have enticed me.  Milani’s runway shadows have caught my attention, along with makeup from NYC and several others.  But I’m in a dilemma.  With unresolved eye issues and pain, I am only permitted to drive about a mile from our home. 

Driving for me isn’t a habit—it’s pure bliss.  I am given to opening the windows, taking the speaker volume to max, and playing and singing anything from Samuel Barber’s “Agnus Dei” from “Adagio for Strings” to Steve Winwood’s “Roll With It,” the Stones’ “Gimme Shelter,” The Doors’ “Riders on the Storm” to “Highway Star” by Deep Purple.  A more mellow mood will have me chanting “Amazing Grace” or “It Was a Very Good Year.”  My taste is obviously eclectic.  My husband warned that I would blow the speakers and thus I did.  But did that influence me?  No—what rides I have!
 
Now my territory is limited along with my access to brands.  Our large, sprawling community has one full-service drugstore; the reasoning eludes me.  I feel as if I’m in the movie “Gaslight.”  Am I going crazy or am I imagining it?  When I see a stack of “Jesse’s Girl” boxes lined up on the floor, I return the next day for the contents.  The packaging has disappeared and only one container of eye shadow has been put up.  It’s in a vibrant shade of pink-infused orange (eyeshadow by any company in this hue is highly effective for work—use before approaching your boss and saying, “I think I’m getting sick.”  You’ll be home in no time, and people will give you their seat on public transit to avoid contracting the plague.)  Last week new Rimmel inventory arrived.  Finally, after a year, I would give some mention to the brand.  The boxes sat unopened.  I can’t see the surveillance camera and I don’t want “Local Teacher Found Shoplifting” splattered across our hometown newspaper.  I waited and returned.  Two products were on hangers:  A black mascara, partially opened, and a red lipstick with teeth marks in the wrapping (evidently someone has worse makeup addiction issues than I do)!
 
And thus I remain with Olay again this week for a timely topic—Olay’s “Daily Body Lotion Plus A Touch of Sunless Tanner.”   Jergens ranks high in this area, but I somehow was not born with the gene allowing me to use sunless tanner properly.  (Disclaimer:  Please note that, when you signed up for this site, you were implanted with a unique cyber device.  If you fry your delicate skin in the sun or in a tanning bed, a signal will be beamed back to one of the MP’s—Meghead Police—and we will be forced to find you and slap you silly.  We remain anonymous at all times.)
 
I was reading a beauty magazine article about Olay’s version.  It touted it as totally goof-proof.  Obviously they haven’t met me!  I run a small business from our game room, where I do creative sunless tanning, promising to give you a look which is totally unique, with swaths and streaks unlike anyone else’s, auburn palms, and lines of demarcation.  A treatment includes a tie-dye T-shirt (mistakes from using Rit for clothing) and a free “peace” pendant.
 
I decided to see just how goof-proof Olay is.  I purposely didn’t do what I knew I should do—exfoliate first.  For your face, neck, and décolletage, use your finest products.  For arms, hands, fingers (yes, fingers), legs, and all else (including toes), any will do.  Uneven layers of skin will add to a creative look.  I applied as is.  This is first and foremost a moisturizer, and it glides on with no heavy, slick feel at all; skin remains hydrated for several hours, and the ingredients will not cause blemishes.  The lightweight lotion is available for both face and body, but using just the body formula will cause no harm (around $7.00-8.50, depending on the store, online drugstore, and/or coupons available).

Sweetassgal here popping the cork on some Veuve Clicquot to celebrate ONE YEAR as Megs Green Chi Tuesdays reviewer!  It was just last June that I threw my hat in the ring for Drugstore Deals and ended up Green Chi instead.  Thank you, thank you, thank you Meg...it has been a WONDERFUL year and I can't even begin to express to you how much you and the wonderful people of this site have enriched my life.  I am grateful for your friendship and humbled by your incomparable ability to support and love each other.  My soulmate's in makeup and all things beauty...I thank you all for the light you've brought to my life.  XOXOXOXO
 
Now on to one the the BIGGEST lights in my life...my mother!  I have been blessed with the BEST mother on earth.  In all seriousness I think she was just born to Mommie!  And not just to me and my sister (welcome to Meg's ashleereece) but to anyone she comes into contact with.  Walk in my mom's front door and you are immediately treated to her down home Southern hospitality.  She'll make sure you have a cool drink in hand, a plate of damn good food to eat and advice on how to deer proof your garden by the time you leave!  She's just all around amazing and I don't think there's one person who has ever met her that wouldn't say the same.  So why was it when I was 25 that I so flippantly ignored some very good advice of hers?  Post traumatic stress from my gut wrenching breakup of a 7 year relationship I guess.  But still, when Mom kindly mentioned that the ash grey color of my dry elbows and rough feet might not be the sexiest thing for a new guy in my life to rub up to I simply tuned it out.  When she showed up to my apartment with a tube of Fancy Feet foot scrub I knew she meant business.  Since then I've been almost overly concerned about my elbows and tootsies.  I probably make my hubby nuts because just about every night I sit straight up in bed, rub lotion on both and watch reruns of Frazier on Lifetime. It's my thing.
 
Meg sent me a little tub of Grounded in Nature's Whipped Body Cream in White Clover in my last shipment and I was super excited to work it into my nightly ritual.  My daughter Samantha.Provost (welcome ALSO to Meg's girlie...you're as addicted as I am!) immediately opened it and took a whif.  AAAAAAHHHHHH was her first reaction and I concur.  This stuff smells SO good and the light scent really lingers.  I put it on at night and wake up to the lovely scent first thing in the morning.  I'm not really good at identifying scents but I know what I like and this is the kind of smell everyone would enjoy.  It's light and lovely and not too girlie to be used by a guy.  I'm also thrilled to mention its paraben free and made with natural shea butter, glycerin and Vitamin E while also being cruelty free (why is that even necessary these days!).  On the moisture scale I'd give it an 8 because it does make my skin really soft but it doesn't seal like an intense or medicated moisturizer would which is also why it doesn't feel greasy.  Therefore its a perfect every day lotion...not too heavy...not too light...just right!

Hello! it’s Jeanasina here a.k.a. Sunhat Stella (summer time alias) your ace reporter on location in Minneapolis!  These days, especially during the summer months I completely make every attempt to keep the sun off of my face and body.  For YEARS I would spend every weekend and my two week vacations taking my lawn chair to the beach along with a good mystery and I’d sit my bikini covered buttocks down on my lawn chair which was always strategically placed IN the water, just on the edge of the lake. I always had the perfect people watching spot and would sit there for at least 8 hours a day!  I would bake in the sun until I was a beautifully glazed brown!  I am a good tanning candidate and it takes a lot for me to get a burn. What a gift huh?  My mom, in the early days of my life was a tanner too!  She had the darkest tan of anybody I ever met!  When she was around, she would put on some short terry cloth shorts and a matching terry cloth halter top (much like the look of the 1940's) and lay out in our front yard slathered in OLIVE OIL!  Truth – I kid you not!  It probably was the secret to her fabulous tan but man oh man, olive oil on baked-in-the-sun-skin is SO not a good smell! Gagging as I write this…Obviously I inherited the tanning gene.  A few years ago I finally realized that what I was doing to my skin was STUPID and dangerous.  I did use SOME sunscreen during these marathons at the beach and it usually was Coppertone #4 because I loved the smell and figured it did do a little something to protect me from the sun’s rays!  It was my token acknowledgment to sunburn prevention.  More times than not, after I had been in the water, I wouldn't reapply sunscreen unless I felt something was starting to blister! I was always able to acquire a very dark tan and because of this I pretty much worked my skin into a brown frenzy which in later years resulted in sun damage and age spots.  These gems are a daily reminder that I was SO STUPID to bake my body like I always did.  Let me say if I could have a ‘do over’ I’d SO have never ever spent all that time frying my poor skin!  Sunscreen really was about ‘amplifying’ the sun so you’d get even tanner rather than any real type of skin cancer prevention back then!  People actually put iodine in their baby oil or suntan lotion to make their skin appear even darker back in my youth!  Yes, even I tried the iodine thing at least once!  I remember going to the drugstores and smelling each lotion and sometimes THAT was my criteria for which suntan product I'd take to the beach - if it smelled yummy I'd buy it! What's wrong with this picture?

There is no magic cream I can put on my body that will overnight bring me back the lovely youthful porcelain skin I began with.  I have to deal with what I have now because I helped create it and those spots are all over my body except for my buttocks because THAT was the only part that was constantly covered!  Who hopes I am including a photo of my buttocks with this review?  Every time I see a young girl with unmarred lovely white skin I want to run up and tell her how fabulous her skin is and to never start tanning!  I try to put on sunscreen every time I go outdoors these days but it’s not second nature so I have to really think about slathering it on before I go out.  There are SO many brands out there to chose from.  Lucky for ME that Meg has sent me several lovely sun screen brands to test out!  Today I’m going to give a little shout out to Epione of Beverly Hills SPF 30 Full Spectrum Sun Protection!

The SPF 30 Epione sunscreen comes in a 2.0 oz tube (not very large so a person might use it up quite quickly, unfortunately).  It has a lovely creamy texture and it’s somewhat thick, so when you rub it in, you feel like you are truly getting some high quality product on your skin!  If you touch the area where you put the sunscreen about five minutes later, it’s still there!  You really feel like it’s making a protective barrier wherever you put it.  I filled my bathtub up and got in with the sunscreen on and my floaties and pretended I was playing at the beach for an extended period of time to test it out. (This could be true - you don't know...)  I noticed that the water kind of bounced off of my skin which, again, showed me that the product was undoubtedly providing an invisible barrier from unwanted sunbeams.  I also noticed that my skin feels incredibly soft wherever I put on the lotion and not tacky in any way.  I was hoping for a more tropical fragrance however. But the fragrance seems to leave the area within a short span of time so my thoughts are – what is the purpose of this product – TO KEEP BAD SUNRAYS OFF OF ME!  It’s not a perfume, so there you go.  The next time I can even bear to be outside in the sun – it’s 95 humid degrees here today (I'm melting) – I will be conducting an actual sun rainin’ down on me experiment to see if it truly blocks the sun and I’ll report back immediately with my results on that aspect!

Meg here! I used to get so bummed out when I was a kid reading about all the cool and hip new places that opened! They were all in the magazines and they were all places in New York City or Los Angeles. I was sure as an adult I would live in both places!

It really didn't give any information on new salons or stores or services in Boston. I was only a kid and didn't have any money to actually spend there but it still would have been nice if my area had been noticed!

So Memphis and Tulsa-rejoice! Yolanda, the creator of Classified Cosmetics, founder of airbrush makeup is coming to your hood!

Have her show you how to get a celebrity spray-on foundation! See why she is Hollywood's best kept (but the secrets getting out there so move quick.)

She's really cool and super talented and can show you how to look amazing!

All that and you don't even have to take a subway!

Her Schedule Below!

THURSDAY 6/18/09
Memphis, TN
Ike’s # 3
ADDRESS: 2145 Union Ave, Memphis, TN 38104
TIME: 2:00PM – 5:00PM
PHONE: (901)274-3107

Meg here! We are rewarding some cellulite wrinkles! No, our featured writers are not eligible and they are not greedy. They are getting this and loads other of product. They are not your competition but showing you the informative and Funny writing that we love to reward!

So here are our winners of the Vichy Cellulite Treatment!

Jelici You WON Please send me your address and the band member (and band you are trying impress!)
Misstrishdelish We'll save some room with your "Face Saver Pillow" Because you won this as well!
Faith24 Expect a giftie on the way!!

Seriously, these ladies won because they wrote more then "Sounds Nice"
You know what I learn from a "Sounds nice?" comment? I learn to never ask your opinion again because that comment means nothing.

You have a brain in your head ( I hope-If not-don't bring us down.) You better enlighten, make us laugh or leave a meaningful comment. "This is nice" is not for us! WE ARE NOT NICE! We are hysterical-wet your pants funny! We are off color! We are brilliant! You one-line "nice" people? Catch the next nice bus out of town!! We want personality! We want flair! We want to laugh or learn from your thoughts! We reward them!