March is a weird month for the Northeast. It could snow one day or be 50 degrees another. I woke up this past Sunday morning smelling and hearing Spring from the open window. Somewhat the same way you can smell winter coming around the middle of September. Its just one of those things you can smell in the air and sense in your bones. I guess Mother Nature is a pretty smart lady.
Two great things happen in March this year. We turn the clocks forward one hour which I love so I can come home from work at 7pm and still have a good hour or more of healthy, productive time in the daylight rather than getting home and immediately putting on PJs. As much as I love the cold weather and the winter, I don’t like getting home from work and feeling like its time to go to bed. #2 is St. Patrick’s Day! My favorite holiday.
Side note: Excessive alcohol consumption interferes with body’s ability to absorb calcium resulting in brittle bones. Alcohol causes the small blood vessels in the skin to become dilated causing flushed skin and possible broken capillaries. Women take longer to process alcohol and after age 40 we store more fat and take even longer to process and eliminate alcohol. Alcohol reduces the level of Vitamin A within the body resulting in slower cell turnover, decreased ability to fight free radicals, and collagen and elastin breakdown which shows up in the form of sagging skin and wrinkles.
How does this relate to skin care? March is the time you should be thinking about making some changes in your skin care products. Since the weather can be iffy depending on where you are, it’s probably a good idea to have both cold and warm weather products on hand if your skin reacts to climate changes. A blustery, windy day calls for protective cream instead of moisturizer and a mild, Spring-like March day calls for moisturizer with sunscreen. The heat in your house may not be on as often or as high and your skin may not seem as dry or dehydrated. Make necessary changes after observing your skin and what it’s doing at this time of year.
Spring cleaning anyone? Don’t forget to include your medicine cabinet and make-up bag. Time to get rid of those crusty tubes and bottles sitting around. Who the heck knows how old those things are? Replenish your sunscreen products which lose efficacy after 3 years. My question to you is why do you have a bottle of sunscreen that is 3 years old? The answer is: because you aren’t using it as often as you should or you aren’t using enough. May I state again for the record, the sun is the number one factor that ages the skin. Period. Use your sunscreen. A shot glass full (approximately 1.5oz) is enough to cover the body. Are you itching to get into the sun and get a tan? NO! Run to the nearest store or click here and order a self tanning lotion! Are you resistant to the idea of using sunscreen moisturizer every day? Then change your make up to something that has a built in sunscreen like mineral make up or tinted moisturizer. Really, I can’t stress this enough. I’m really going to lose it one day if another person asks me for anti-aging, wrinkle repair products or something to reduce discoloration then in the next breath tells me they don’t want sunscreen in their moisturizer.
Wash your make-up brushes. Something we know we should do but never actually do. Throw away the 15 bottles and jars of random hair products you thought you needed but thardly used. (See Blog: Are You A Beauty Junkie:?)Pick up all the q-tips and hair elastics that are stuck to the bottom of your bathroom cabinets. Replace your make-up sponges.
It’s March. That means you have almost 2 full months until Memorial Day and the unofficial start of Summer. You may actually have to take off that giant sweater and start revealing a little more skin. Do you need a good scrub down? Are you dull and flaky and scaly? I’m sure your feet are a mess from skipping pedicures all winter. Assess the situation of your winter skin finally coming out of hibernation. It ain’t pretty, right? Do something about it. I know we all can’t be so lucky to work for a skin care company and salon.
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