Etsy a Great Place to Shop for Natural Beauty Products

I have a new favorite shopping outlet online!  Of course, I still love my good old Amazon for buying a lot of my beauty staples and things like hair dryers and other tools you can’t buy on a handmade site, but I’ve found Etsy to be a great shopping experience for natural beauty products.

What I really like about Etsy is the fact that they have so many vendors on there that actually make cosmetics and beauty and personal care items like lotions, soaps and even natural deodorants with all natural ingredients.  Also, I like that I’m supporting a small business, as I feel small businesses have really gotten the shaft lately here in the US with all the big corporations taking over everything.

I used to think that was only the kind of thing that “old people” talked about when I was younger. Well, I guess I never claimed to be wise at a young age lol.  Seriously though, look at the trouble our economy is in, and a lot of it is because we ship our jobs overseas and also because small business has been so pressured by the bigger guys.

This is your chance to support a good small business, and to get some great, healthy beauty and body care products at a reasonable price as well.  The user interface is really friendly as well, and you can find just about anything. Not just handmade beauty products either, but also vintage clothes and other really cool stuff that you wouldn’t find at your typical local store.

There’s lots of paraben free, aluminum free and chemical free skincare on there. There are fun shaped soaps and little stocking stuffers of healthy, NATURAL bath and body care on there too that make great gifts for the health conscious people on your Christmas list.

You can really find one of a kind stuff on there instead of the mass produced stuff that usually contains loads of preservatives and costs a lot to boot.  Here’s a link where you can find some of the natural body care stuff that I’m talking about.  It’s a pet project of mine to bring healthy, natural body care to the masses affordably.

Jersey Shore Cast Going Hollywood?

It looks like the cast of Jersey Shore, like most other people, is not immune to the pressures to look perfect in Hollywood. Well, let’s not even pretend like this crew wasn’t already the type to fall victim to societal ideals – they are all pretty into their appearance – what with the whole GTL regimen.

At any rate, it does make me a little sad to see the two main women who gained fame on the show, albeit maybe not for the best behavior at times, Snooki and JWOW or Jenni Farley and Nicole Polizzi clearly caving in to the ridiculous pressures.

The pressure to be thin is probably the one that most alarms me. These two girls started off the show as good looking, typical American girls. They looked great.  They may have felt they had an extra few pounds on them, but they looked “normal” and they clearly did not have really restrictive diets judging by the meals that used to be cooked in the house.

Fast forward a few years, and it looks like JWOW has succumbed to some of the pressures after dropping quite a few pounds and also appearing to have gotten lip plumping injections in her lips to make them bigger.

Now there is also the news that Snooki has not only dropped a ton of weight on her tiny frame, but she is also planning on getting gargantuan breast implants like her friend JWOW already has.  Snooki already has a pretty large chest, so this one I’m really perplexed about?

What is particularly disturbing, if you have watched the show, you know that Snooki admitted to struggling with an eating disorder for years in high school.  She got down to a dangerously low weight and was obsessed with her weight.

So when you see someone who had a problem in the past start to really drop dramatic weight, coming from someone who has struggled with their own eating habits in the past, let me tell you – there is cause for alarm.

It’s just sad that women cannot just look average in certain ways – they always have to be subjected to this ridiculous, unattainable norm if they are in any kind of show business. This is the reason there are so many eating disorders, and the reason that so many people want to flock to the plastic surgeon’s office to get a better nose, lips, eyes, face, boobs, butt, you name it.

Of course, I have no room to talk. I’m into beuaty – clearly by this blog. However there is a time and place for it, and when it becomes an obsession it becomes unhealthy.

Welcome to 2012!

Happy New Year to all of our wonderful readers!  What an interesting year 2011 was. We saw plastic surgery go down in popularity as Americans try to be more frugal with their money in a fragile economy and weak job market.

We also some some innovations in beauty, plastic surgery and non invasive skin care treatments. However, they sort of fell by the wayside in light of struggling families, and understandably so.

We heard some horror stories as well, to be sure. We heard stories about unauthorized practitioners, botched surgeries and more.  But what we continue to do is try to offer you the best advice, reviews and tips to keep your beauty the natural, inexpensive way.

That’s what we intend to do throughout this new year of 2012 as well. We hope you come along for the ride and continue to lend your forever intresting stories via comments!

WELCOME TO 2012. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

MERRRRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

Hello all MBS readers. I hope you, like me, are having a wonderful holiday and a very Merry Christmas Eve tonight and a Merry Christmas tommorrow.

Like many of you, I will be enjoying the comfort and company of family tommorrow and reflecting on the year gone by.  As with so many other holidays past, this one sure has flown by, but it’s been great.

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas!!!

Holiday Beauty Favorites

Who doesn’t want their stocking stuff with a few things that will make them look pretty for the new year?  Heck, if I could get mine stuffed with something that would take off the inevitable 5-10 pounds I put on before the New Year, I’d love that! But since that isn’t going to happen, let me share with you some of the best gifts to give the lady in your life who may be cosmetic and beauty savvy.

1.)  What woman couldn’t do with a little plump to her pout?  Even those of us with fuller lips enjoy having the look of poutier, sexier lips from time to time. Thankfully, lip plumpers have come a long way, and they can really make your lips look fuller in an instant.  Lip plumpers are a great “fashion accessory” that every women would love to have in her purse from time to time.

2.)  Self tanners. Everyone loves the look of a healthy summer glow. But in the winter, especially in the colder, sunless northeast climes out here, it’s nearly impossible to get any sunkissed color the natural way. So a great self tanner, like Fake Bake, or Sheer Tan or Xen-Tan is a great stocking stuffer for women who like to apply these self tanners from time to time to give themselves that etherial glow.

3.)  How about some nice natural soaps or hand lotions – the kind without all the nasty chemicals in them?  Women are becoming increasingly aware that the lotions, cleansers, soaps and creams that they apply to their skin eventually can lead to problems within the body. Parabens, phthalates, petroleum and other potentially hormone disrupting and cancer causing chemicals have no place in body care!

4.)  A new eyeshadow pallette.  Every woman loves to experiment a little with color if they like eyeshadow.  A huge pallette is not only easy to do this time of year since so many gifts sets are usually out, but you can also get a ton of limited edition awesome colors this time of year that you won’t find anywhere after the holiday season is over. For example, Sephora has specific holiday pallettes with really cool sparkly, vibrant colors this time of year.

5.)  Hair care packages. There are lots of top notch salon quality hair products that come in reasonably priced multi packs or sample packs this time of year. I’ve gotten these for family members before, and believe me,  they smile a mile wide when they realize they won’t have to pay for their hair products for a while!

Quaternium-15 and Why It’s Bad

You’ve probably seen the scandal that has been occurring lately regarding a long-held trusted brand of baby shampoo and the raging outcry coming from the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics to take certain cancer causing and irritating chemicals out of their baby shampoo here in the states.

The crazy part is that they already sell a safer option overseas, so no expensive reformulation would be necessary.  The company has responded by saying that it will phase the chemicals in question, one being quaternium-15, the subject of this post within the next two years.  And that was only under intense scrutiny and scolding from consumer rights groups.

Not only that – but two years? Why the long wait when apparently they have already been selling a safer product oversease?  Well, the answers aren’t really there for that part of it. I think the company feels they’ve done JUST ENOUGH to appease consumer rights advocates, and they will stop there if not pushed further most likely.

So, what’s the big deal about this chemical called quaternium-15?  Well, the big deal is that it is a chemical that releases formaldehyde, a very serious chemical that has been linked to cancer of all kinds, into the shampoo over a period of time.

These products you see on store shelves need a loooooong shelf life, and often times in order to sustain this long shelf life, there are tons of chemicals dumped in that are supposed to kill bacteria and potential spoiling agents over potential years on the shelf.

Quaternium-15 is a preservative, and it is also a skin irritant. These are both reasons for the call to remove the chemical from Johnson and Johnson baby shampoo, but it is the formaldehyde component that is even more pressing and disturbing.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING BEAUTY READERS!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO EVERYONE!!!!

Have a happy and safe day today and try not to over do it. If you do, take a nice long brisk walk and you’ll feel alive again.

Baby Boomers Spent a Ton on Health and Beauty?

I just read some very interesting statistics on the baby boomer generation. The baby boomer generation is one where the oldest of the generation are now turning about 65 years old.

This generation was responsible for things ranging from a booming economy thanks to tons of baby suddenly in the US after the war, to a boom in vehicle sales as the first baby boomers were just getting old enough to leave the nest and get jobs.

They have, in short, been responsible for keeping America afloat and keeping the economy going for several years now, on and off. Well, one of the things that baby boomers have reportedly been spending a lot of their disposable income on has been health and beauty products.

Everything from natural beauty products, to wrinkle creams, to plastic surgery to look younger, to other products that can enhance their health such as supplements and other things designed to help enhance beauty and health.  They propped up the health and beauty industry to a large degree over the several years where they were hitting ages where they wanted to start improving these things in their life.

A lot of younger people, particularly twenty, thirty and forty something women, also are increasingly turning to health and beauty improvement products, so this industry has enjoyed quite the boom for a long time now with the combination of young and old investing in it.

Botox, one of the most popular cosmetic improvement services requested, has surged in popularity to an almost ridiculous amount as of late for example. It seems everyone and their sister is getting this done.  There are also a surge of new anti aging and wrinkle products, and do it yourself types of things coming on the market that are servicing the skin-aware market segment.

Case in point – you can now do your own microdermabrasion at home. You can do a chemical peel at home too. You just have to use caution and common sense when doing these things on your own skin.

Shoot, I just bought a little roller device that is supposed to put tiny microscoping punctures in my skin so as to deliver my serums, lotions and creams more effectively down deeper into the skin!  These are exactly the types of products that are fueling a huge industry for baby boomers now too.  And many baby boomers are becoming more savvy on the web, where much of this stuff resides, which helps sales as well.

This has opened up a whole market for the industry of aging and health and beauty to comfortable market to people who were previously thought to be uncomfortable purchasing from the internet.

Botox and Actresses : Where are the Expressions?

When it comes to Hollywood, it is increasingly a rarity to find an actress (or nowadays an actor) who hasn’t had some sort of procedure, process or plastic surgery to alter their looks or freeze time and prevent the signs of aging.

In fact, actresses are going under the Botox needle earlier and earlier since actresses are perceived to have such a  short “shelf life” in Hollywood. A sad fact, but these are the ridiculous pressures and double standards that these young women have to live up to. I’m sure it’s gotta be extremely depressing to live in such a an oppressive mini-society.

Botox, as you well know by now, is a botulism toxin that is inserted just below the skin, no deeper than the surface muscles, to help freeze muscle control and expressions to a degree so that you do not emote and show – God forbid – wrinkles. These wrinkles include crows feet (my favorite), laugh lines, forehead creases and more.

These wrinkles though, are signs that you have lived, loved and laughed, and they are also visual cues to show others how you are feeling. As Julia Roberts has said in her effort not to get Botox as she ages – she wants her kids to know when she’s happy or pissed!

What I have been noticing, both in television and movies, is that it seems an increasing amount of actresses are showing signs of frozen face. They cannot properly emote on screen due to Botox, and therefore, their acting takes a hit – it looks disingenuous and actually can really impact how their acting skills are perceived.

Actresses who want to be taken seriously should really lay off the Botox. Look at what happened to Nicole Kidman’s career after she started getting too much surgery and Botox – she’s no longer respected as the raw actress she used to be.

Of course there are others as well, but sometimes you can’t put your finger on it, they just don’t look like they are expressing themselves properly.  Remember, Botox comes with a price – you may not be able to express your personality as much!  But then again, you’ll be staving off those bothersome wrinkles.  I guess if you’re not an actress, it’s less of an issue ?

Young Women Getting Surgery/Botox Prematurely?

There was a great article that I recently read about how the age for “youth enhancing” types of procedures, surgery and things like Botox and peels is being pushed lower and lower. The incredible pressure that we feel as women to maintain a youthful, fresh appearance often weighs so heavily. 

I’ve found myself looking at my ever increasing wrinkles in the mirror, which I’ve largely been able to help reverse or at least keep at a standstill for a couple years by using the best anti aging and wrinkle products.  I often think about what they would look like if I had some radical procedure (NEVER would I get a facelift – EVER).

But of course my mind has gone the way of Botox. I’m still really leery of Botox though. I know that thousands of women and men get Botox every year without incident, and no side effects, it’s just that the long term safety of it is what scares me. I do think it’s a great way to freeze wrinkles where they are, but I have serious questions about the safety of injecting a toxin underneath the skin.

A toxin is a toxin.  Period.  And what kinds of other things are in the shot? No doubt preservatives and other delivery type of chemicals.  I just don’t know what all is being injected. Plus there have been studies that Botulism may migrate to the brain and stay there. What are the long term effects of getting this done a couple times a year, built up over the years?

We really don’t know yet. And Botox isn’t something that you just get done once and then you’re done. You don’t maintain your results if you don’t keep getting the injections 2-4 times per year.

The age for women who are getting Botox often now is starting in the twenties!  This is when your skin still looks its best naturally!  Yet some doctors are recommending it this young so that you can have a sort of “preventive” measure against wrinkles. 

In Hollywood, take the pressure that us normal women feel to look young and beautiful and multiply it by a hundred. Women in the entertainment industry are incredibly pressured to look young forever.  It’s unfair, but the media really crucifies women when they start to look old.

Fox News does a segment that’s particularly cruel where they compare two stars of the same age.  Obviously, one looks older and one looks younger. It’s this type of constant comparing that women need to get away from, and yet we’re faced with it, both self imposed and outside-imposed every day!