Because Every Woman Needs A “5 Minute Face”

There was a time in my life when I thought that make up was only for those women who cared too much about what they looked like.

You know what I mean right?  The poppies who were out to impress at every turn – the kind of women who wore expensive clothes, drove cars worth more than my house and just oozed money and superiority out of every one of their fine pores.

That was not me.  That was never going to be me.

When my boyfriend asked me why I never wore make up, I was offended that he thought I needed it, but I married him anyway.  But it did make me reconsider my stance on it and so I occasionally fluffed my eyelashes up with a bit of mascara.

Still my view of make up was that it was definitely not for real, regular women to wear.  And most definitely not to wear every day.

That was until one day, after having three babies, I woke up looking like this:

Yeah.

Sorry, I probably should have warned you not to eat before reading this post.  I appologise if you’ve just lost your breakfast or your appetite for the rest of the day.

I guess the good news of this, is that I don’t look like that anymore, thanks to a second round of Roaccutane that I am still on (only like, 3 more months to go or something).

But for 6 long years having a face that looked like this, meant that either I could walk around and expose this to everyone or I could cover it up.  It’s probably obvious, but I went with the second option.  I covered the crap out of my face.  When I exposed this picture after hiding it for so long, most people couldn’t believe that I really looked like this.  Which probably means I could have a rather successful career in special effects make up.

Having to wear make up every day has meant that I’ve re-evaluated how I look at make up and the impression that it creates.  Make up helped to make me feel confident when all I wanted to do was hide in a basement for the rest of my life.  And I’m thankful for it.

Now that my skin is at a point where I could (and have – can you believe it) leave the house without any make up on, I’ve realised that I don’t put make up on to hide anymore – I put it on because I like it.

Here’s the thing.

I’ve heard so many women, especially Moms, complain that they don’t have enough time for themselves and they can’t even find 10 minutes to spend putting on make up.  What if I told you that you didn’t need 10 minutes?  You only need 5.  Probably less once you get the hang of it.  AND all you need is 4 products and 2 brushes?

Here’s my 5 minute face.

So maybe you have flawless skin (yes, you bet I’m jealous) so you won’t even need the foundation.

I still find that even though my skin is clearing, I like the look of having an even skin tone as opposed to a few red blotches here and there.  Not to mention my Rudolf the Red Nosed reindeer nose that I seem to have.  Any way this is what you need:

That’s mascara, eyebrow pencil, bronzer, foundation, blush brush and foundation brush.  Easy peasy.

And in case you’re wondering why make up is still an important part of my life, this is what I wake up looking like…

So ja,  Make up it is.

First I start by taking my foundation brush and evenly spreading foundation all over my face.

The result is that you have “flawless skin” but it also looks like you’re just seen your dead grandparent feed your kids pasta.  Time to get some colour in your life by using your blush brush and bronzer.  If you don’t have naturally red cheeks like I do, you can switch the bronzer for a blush.

I’m no expert in the art of make up, but I put the bulk of the bronzer on the apples of my cheeks then lightly brush over the other areas of my face that would naturally get sun, like my forehead and nose.

Then I fix my thin eyebrows with the eyebrow pencil and extend my lashes with mascara.  As you can see from the left to the right, it really does make a difference.  Not huge, but enough to make you look awake, which after a night up with sick kids, is really useful.

And then you’re done!

Viola!

If you want to spice it up a bit for a date night or important meeting, then plop a bit of colour onto your lips.

To be honest, lipstick scared me too in the beginning.  It felt like I was a clown.  Also, drawing WAY to much attention to my face – much more than I was comfortable with at the time.  But you can start with a tinted gloss and then move on up to a solid colour.

 

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