Face time

Let’s talk makeup.

Firstly, what’s the deal?  Initially, to me, makeup was just something that you put on your face.  And that it had to look like you had put something on your face so that you can be deemed an adult.

Until… one day, I was surfing the internet and I came across this beauty guru.  And I fell in love.  I fell in love with how I was looking at her face and not her makeup.  I fell in love with how she made Asian features look beautiful.  In how she took her beautiful youthful Asian face and turned it into a beautiful refined Asian face.  And that was part of my revelation – while I appreciated my Asian genes allowing me a youthful appearance, I wanted to be more refined and mature at the same time.  I saw how makeup could help me reflect how I feel about myself. 

Ok, maybe not so much the refined bit and more the mature bit.  Ok, ok – maybe not so much the mature bit and more not-so-young.  Whatever.  There was just something about her look that appealed to me, and something about her tutorials that made me believe that it was attainable.

Am I vain?  Am I shallow?  Maybe.  Am I really depending on something on the surface to boost my confidence?  Uh yeah.  If making up my face helps me project the person that I know I am inside, then I’m all for it! 

Onto my philosophy… I think makeup is just one part of the presentation package.  In delving into makeup, I was also committed into delving into diet and skincare. 

Here’s my deal – I think makeup looks best on good skin.  It can be minimal and natural and applied just so to emphasis your best features.  Good skin comes from proper skincare to prepare the skin from the outside and a good diet to prepare the skin from the inside.  The better the skin the less makeup, the more simplified to achieve that level of beauty.  And you know I’m all about simplification.

And, from my experience with my skin, I know that my skin gets oily, but usually when it hasn’t been moisturized enough.  I know that my skin can look dull and lifeless and lines are more pronounced when I haven’t properly exfoliated.  And that it looks worse when I know I have not been drinking enough water and eating too much sugar.  So skincare and diet.

Now onto makeup.  If you’re interested in what I use, then read on.

Before

After

I wear foundation.  I have tried and tried, but I cannot get rid of the redness around my nose or the darkness around my mouth.  If my skin was beautifully even-toned (like my gorgeous sister or my beautiful mom), then I wouldn’t bother with foundation.

I use a primer to help the foundation wear nicely – as in fades away during the day in a nice way and stays on as long as possible without too much touch up.  And I use a setting powder to try and keep the foundation on my face for as long as possible.

I use blush because it makes me feel pretty and girly.  I would just pinch my cheeks for that rosy-au-naturel look, but I think prolonged use of that technique would not be nice to my skin.

I fill in my eyebrows.  I’ve plucked them over the years.  They didn’t grow back nicely.  And I need good looking eyebrows to frame my eyes and my glasses.

I line my eyes with eyeliner, mainly to add depth to my scarce eyelashes which also frames my eyes.

This is my basic makeup requirement.  If pressed for time, I would try to do all of this and leave it at that.

But you know I don’t do things in half measures, so the makeup continues on.

I like to wear eyeshadow.  Having an Asian monolid and in studying a lot of the Asian beauty gurus on youtube, I think the key to emphasizing the beauty of Asian eyes is to breakup the space between the eyebrow and the eye.  By breaking up the space with eyeshadow, I think I am taking the emphasis away from the lid itself and bringing the focus to the actual eye.  I’m not aiming to change the shape of my eyes.

I love love love to wear mascara.  Every since I discovered that mascara does not have to end up on my glasses lens, or that there are ways to prevent it from becoming a smudge on my cheeks, I am addicted to it.

And of course, the very basic of basic makeup, lipstick.  With a lip liner thrown in.

So that’s it.  I have invested in makeup that, if used properly, will last a majority of the day and will fade nicely as the days ends.  I have also invested in brushes that allow me to apply my makeup efficiently.  And by investing, I don’t only mean in terms of money – there are some really good makeup and brushes out there that do not cost an arm and a leg.  By investing, I mean taking the time, the effort, and sometimes the money, to get exactly what I need to achieve the look that I want in the space of time that I have.  By investing, I also mean practicing and practicing so that I can expend the effort once a day to get the look that I want and then, save for a touch up of lipstick, I don’t have to worry about it for the rest of the day.

Beginning of the day

End of the day - no touch ups; running after 3 little ones