Personal Beauty Care

The long awaited manicure and hand care post. With a bonus.

The jar on the left is a jam jar. A jam jar that matches my 1950's bathroom. The object on the right is a crystal and silver powder shaker.

This is the crystal and silver plate jam jar that sits in the kitchen. I got them all from eBay for under 10 dollars apiece. The current "manicure in a minute" type stuff I got from Sephora was made by Loccitane and was close to 20 bucks for a small jar. And it was the only one I could find. Then I heard about making your own. So I bought the jam jars, some fine salt, fine sugar and Vitamin E oil from Trader Joe's and made my own. You can use either salt or sugar, and any oil. I might try grape seed oil next. You can add drops of fragrance oils, I did not. So here is how you do it. Pour about half the container full of either the salt or the sugar. Add oil and stir-you are looking for a consistency of thick but all wet. When you get there continue adding oil until you get loose oatmeal. Now you are good to go.

This is not to clean your hands, so start with relatively clean dry hands. Put a scoop from the spoon in your palm and rub in just like you are washing your hands. Pay attention to the cuticles. Rub at least one minute. Rinse well in warm water and now you will feel all slithery and oily and will be cursing me for this stupid idea. Dry your hands well with a fluffy terry cloth towel-paying special attention to between the fingers. When you are done you will have the softest and nicest hands you have felt since your last paraffin treatment. And it is so cheap you can do it a couple times a day if you need to. I wash my hands with industrial soap all day and it is really drying, and I cannot use hand cream at work.

The bonus, the powder shaker is full of baking soda. This is what I use to exfoliate my face a few times a week. It is cheap, now looks luxe and does the job.

Okay done with the girly stuff, but I will tell you Big Daddy uses the hand stuff and loves it. But he also used the olive oil in the bathrooms in Italy. He is that guy.

Went to Car City today and I think it will be okay if I can find more bathrooms. Engineers are the same as ever, disorganized and kinda strange. This launch has a bunch of parts and some are not so good.

So tonight it is once again cold and a predicted 3 to 6 inches. Hurray.

Me and Ebay go way back

I love Ebay. I can spend money without really spending a lot and still get some interesting things. Here is my strategy, I find something I like, figure out how much I am willing to pay for it and then I make my bid. That is it, if I don't get it-fine. If I think people are waiting around to get something on the cheap I will publish the entire bid and make them put in a real bid. This is for mostly trinket jewelry shopping although years ago I bought a lovely pair of 18 karat gold rose cut diamond earrings. They were not huge and the price was right. I also bought quite a bit of vintage fur before it became popular. Yes, I have the heads and the tails.

Lately I am obsessed with "One minute manicure" type product as my hands take a beating during the day. I cannot always wear gloves in the cold, I wash my hands frequently with cheap or industrial soap and constant hand cream at work is not an option. My hands feel so wonderful after this treatment I searched and searched for the product. The only place I could find it was Sephora and it was mighty pricey in my book. So I investigated Internet recipes and found that it is nothing more than an oil and either sugar or salt. You can add other stuff if you want but that is just your choice, not a necessary item.

Well, I said to myself, just where would I store this stuff so that it looked nice, was easily available and easy to use. Goodness gracious---what about jam jars. You know, the kind with the spoon. Well, I received my first one today. I paid $5.99 plus shipping. It is green and peach to match my 1950's bathroom.  I plan on using grape seed oil and sea salt or maybe just Kosher salt. I will take pictures and let you know.

Just in case you are intrigued, you put a glop on dry (as in not just washed) (but not dirty) hands and massage into your hands rubbing well and paying attention to the cuticles. When you are finished just rinse off and dry your hands and they are the softest, non-greasy, nicest hands ever. I promise. And if we can do it on the cheap, well-why the hell not.  I also got a cut glass powder shaker for under ten bucks to hold the baking soda that I use for my face exfoliation. Another cheap but useful item.

Tomorrow making Buckeyes for the plant Christmas lunch.

I am not a doctor

Nor do I play one on television. But I am quite opinionated and well read.

Well, for those of you who remember the partial Rubik's Cube that manifested in my sight line, that is called an Ocular Migraine. I am blessed I have no pain or headache when I get them. If that changes or the frequency increases I need to go to my Internist and then a Neurologist. And hydration is a factor here which makes perfect sense. With the cold weather I have to cart my coat around and do not carry the water bottle in my hand which I used to do. Less water is a bad thing for me.

Other news from the eye doctor, I am not a glaucoma candidate but one to be watched. I might be perfectly normal. However this does rule out the Latisse or the common stuff for the eye drops for the eye pressure---as this can cause false readings for the testing. So I will still have normal crappy eyelashes. She suggested those trendy eyelashes everyone is wearing but I am not that kinda gal.

Onto the facial expert, every woman over 35 needs to exfoliate her face. When I explained my technique--which needs to be put back into use--she fell out. Baking soda. Yes, it is the best for the face and the cheapest. Oh, and my eye doctor swears by Prep H for bags under the eyes.

Well, I could call this funny of the day but Big Daddy would kill me. He was ill recently. It started Thursday evening with odd complaints but by Friday morning he was in misery. You all know how a man in misery is, the moaning, sighing, gasping, and just plain noisiness of a man in discomfort is enough to send you running down the street naked--screaming and pulling out your crappy eyelashes. You see, Big Daddy had not had a recent bowel movement and was in some discomfort from constipation. As a good wife I gave him some green tea and an apple. I tried really hard to block his moaning and groaning out of my mind. I went to work, he went to the drugstore. This situation dragged on another day. It was now Saturday and the miseries were still with us. I looked at the container of "medicine" BD had purchased and it guaranteed success in 1-3 days. I asked BD if he read the directions and claims on the bottle before he purchased it. He asked why. I asked him if he was content with not "having success" until Monday. Yes, I laughed my ass off.