Category: mental health

Anti-aging tips and secrets…and announcing my new store!

~ Emmie Reve ~ Leave a comment

Hello readers and followers of my online journal.  Over the years, I have really enjoyed writing articles for this site and talking about fashion, make-up, alternative trends, and having a healthy mind, soul, and body.  One of the top concerns us women have is how to stay youthful; not only the way to do it, but finding a healthy, natural way. Yes, it is possible and I will tell you what works for me.

My kid is 14 years old now, and I had him my third year in Art College.  If you do the math, you can imagine how old I actually am.  I will not give a number, but most people cannot believe I am his mom!  I’ve been asked if he is my cousin, my brother, my nephew.  So many guesses, but mom is not really one of them.  I raised him on my own since he was four, living in a small apartment in the west end of Toronto, and I had my shares of ups and downs, good times, and bad times, great boyfriends, and bad ones.  And I’ll admit one of the first secrets of staying young is attitude.  Always be positive, try not to stress out, and accept yourself, and others for who they are.  Be at peace, find religion and God.  And remember, you get what you give.

Me and my kid. Can you imagine, I raised him since he was a baby? Now at 14, he towers over me!
Me and my kid. Can you imagine, I raised him since he was a baby? Now at 14, he towers over me!

And after the inner work, comes the outer work.  Cosmetics and skin care can only enhance and reflect what you already do have.  So treating your body and skin with the respect it deserves is key.  If your skin is dry, moisturize, if it is oily, tone it.  Listen to what it wants, and always understand that there is no turning point when skin is damaged. So prevention is most important. Stay out of the sun or use sunblock all times.

My 5 step night routine is where all the voodoo happens:

  1. Cleanse your skin.  My skin is very dry, so I use a mild liquid castile soap to do the job.  Castile soap goes back in time to the days when soap was simple.  Just oils and lye mixed together to make soap.  If you wear lots of make-up and have oily skin, you may need something stronger, like a specialty face soap, but for me, I have been loving my castile soap, as it cleanses my skin thoroughly without over drying.
  2.  Coconut oil.  Virgin, cold pressed and smelling like roasted coconuts is the way to go.  After cleaning, I slather a light amount all over my face to soften and prepare it for vitamin E absorption.  Because vitamin E and other antioxidant oils are usually thick, the coconut oil increases the spread-ability of the vitamin E.
  3. Vitamin E oil: the promised land!!! Anti oxidants are naturally ANTI WRINKLE!  I spread a layer of this stuff on problem areas first; such as the corners of your mouth/ smile lines, the corners of your eyes and high cheeks, the forehead and even under the chin.  After years of smiling, crying and just being human, our emotions try to carve out “character” in our faces by leaving lines.  Let emotions do that?  I say, no.
  4.  Use an anti-wrinkle balm/cream: I make an awesome anti aging balm called “Face Tight”, that not only aims to prevent wrinkles, but also aims to prevent the skin sagging that is often the giver away of age.  If your face stays tight, you stay young!  I apply “Face Tight” after the vitamin E application.  (Between each step, I give time for my skin to absorb each oil before slathering on another.  For me about 30 mins is usually good, but feel for yourself how long it takes for your skin to be ready for the next treatment.)
  5. Finish with a night cream–light or heavy, whatever you need.  Just before I go to bed, I like to put a thin layer of night cream to top off all of my treatments for extra protection.  During the night, your skin loses so much moisture, so I find the night cream seals all the goodness in and lets me wake up with benefits only.

    So these are the 5 products I use nightly! it's a lot, but don't knock what works: (left to right) liquid castile soap, virgin coconut oil, vitamin E, anti-age balm, night cream.
    So these are the 5 products I use nightly! it’s a lot, but don’t knock what works: (left to right) liquid castile soap, virgin coconut oil, vitamin E, anti-age balm, night cream.

So that is my nightly skincare routine!  I’ve been doing my face this way for years now, and I find it the way for me to prevent and heal fine lines that want to creep up.  I also find this is how to keep collagen and face elasticity up, during the years when your face becomes tired and wants to sag a bit.  So gear up and fight this!

My anti-aging balm is now available for sale through my newly opened E-store online at dreamecosmetics.com Check it out, and maybe place an order on “Face Tight” or on any of my other natural based cosmetics aimed to give you results you want, and nothing else!  Thanks for all the years of loyal reading! ❤

Make-up for sad, puffy eyes!

~ Emmie Reve ~ 1 Comment

My spring/summer of minor health problems continues, only this time end of June hit me with eye allergies.  After trying out a new skin oil on my face, I developed an allergic reaction.  My eyes went from normal to bright red over night, and had me running to the doctor hoping it was not an infection.  Finding out it was just an allergic reaction, I treated it with eye drops and allergy medication.  Soon the red started to disappear…but to my frustration, the symptom of puffiness lagged on.  I would wake up with swollen eyes daily. I was using everything from ice, chilled tea bags, to cucumber slices to reduce the swelling….but nothing seemed to fully get rid of the puffiness on the top lid and puff bags underneath.

Not that puffy, swollen eyes are the most horrendous looking thing for a girl to have, it was still better than the acne I suffered from earlier this spring.  But I did have comments from people saying I looked “sad” or “stressed”; questions about if I was going to cry!?  I am an emotional gal, and am sensitive about it, so it was definitely not pleasant to have my facial mood judged and commented on.  All those perceptions from others were made based on my face appearance when in reality, I was just recovering from eye allergies! So this was a problem. I was also meeting people around this time, and knew for a better first impression, I needed a stronger fix than cold tea bags and ice on my eyes.

In comes the smokey eye make-up!  I have never been a fan of the smokey eye. Too dramatic for everyday, and bordering on a goth art student aesthetics…it was just not practical, semi-dated.  I usually opt for a more minimal approach to my make-up; sticking with youthful light coloured shimmer shadows. But there is nothing that covers puffiness better than matte black, greys, and neutral shadows.  Something about black matte shadows suggest a receding in effect, perfect to combat my eye’s puffing out effect.  So I set out to rediscover the “smokey eye”.  I figured out a way to do a subtle smokey eye that could be worn daily by me to hide puffiness as my eyes continued to heal…or for days where they puffed up again. yikes.

How I took out excessive “glam” in the smokey eye make-up:

(Apply foundation/bb and setting powder first and prep face)

  1. Start with a nude eye shadow as base over the whole lid from lashline to brow.  This helps with blending a smooth gradation between different shades of shadow that will be applied on top of eyelid.
  2. Use a really dark, matte black shadow as a liner, and line a thick line above your lashline accentuating your eyes shape.  Thicker in the outer corners, and flicking up slightly as if doing a cat eye shape.  Thinly line the bottom lid corners with black shadow too.
  3. Fill in and soften the black shadow line with a grey matte shadow.  This gradation should be subtle, and also following the angled shape of the black shadow.  Stop about mid eye lid so that it is not overly dramatic.
  4. Use a tiny bit of liquid liner to clean up the outer edge of the cat eye made by the black eye shadow.  Do this by out lining the shape lightly, and filling in more intensely in the outer eyes corners, and thinning away at mid point of the eye.
  5. Very important: Use a clean, fluffy shadow blending brush all over the top and bottom lid to smudge and make extra “smokey”.  Without this step, you will not get a nice blurred gradation, and that is what makes a dark smokey eye not harsh.
This is a really cool shadow palette I got from NYX. The reason I like them is that their shadows are really pigmented...this helps to cover up puff...
This is a really cool shadow palette I got from NYX. The reason I like them is that their shadows are really pigmented…this helps to cover up puff…

 

not sad, or puff, just shadowy cover when you need it.
not sad, or puff, just shadowy cover when you need it.

I find this look is not overly dramatic, and can be worn daily, even on simple errands.  And as a make-up for a first meeting or date, it knocks it out of the ball park, because I says you’re “fashion”, but not “high-maintenance”.  And it helped me hide those “sad” puffy eyes of mine, and kept random, public judgements at bay.  😛

The Holidays are depressing, but don’t go on an eat/drink binge…

~ Emmie Reve ~ Leave a comment

It’s the holidays at the moment.  And consumerist North America would want you to believe this is the best time of the year.  A time for sharing and giving, hanging out with loved ones, and just being thankful, for all the stuff we can get!  But truthfully, it is a really stressful time of year in most people’s realities.  Family get-togethers, the obligation to give gifts and find outfits for parties…and just eat, drink and be merry.  But mostly we eat and drink and gain weight.  I actually quite despise the holidays.  Being forced to deal family relations that are mostly difficult, flawed and painful are on my list this year, and there is no awesome shade of lip gloss, smoking hot colour of eye shadow, or cute mini skirt that can lift my spirits.  Christmas music playing everywhere just compounds this feeling of suffocating repetition that is the end of the year.  Mostly, I just think about all that I wanted to get done and all that I didn’t.  Yes, this time of year always depresses me for all the above said reasons.

The depressing qualities on life in general. Degas paints it in a disconnected way with the clutter of zig-zaging bar tables. The sadness of drink.
The depressing qualities of life in general. Degas paints it in a disconnected way with the clutter of zig-zaging bar tables. The sadness of drinking a glass of absinthe.

But that brings me onto this topic of eating and drinking during the holidays.  I like food.  I like me the drinks.  But I recently found out how the two actually do not go together…drinking (alcohol) actually slows down your body’s ability to break down fat and sugars, raising the risk of it being stored as fat.  That means every drink you have actually makes what you eat during that time twice as fattening…simply because it is being ignored, and your body is busy metabolizing the alcohol.  So what does this mean in terms of our holiday eating habits?  It means we have to be careful when pairing the two.

Wine and beer tend to have more calories because there are still sugars and starches left over from the fermentation process.  Which makes straight up spirits the more slimming choice.  I like to treat myself to gin and diet tonics just because I know at least I am not adding sugars to my drinking.  But also think about how drinking puts a pause button on your metabolism, and makes what you eat before, during and after crucial in terms of picking what and how much to eat.  Therefore keep meals and snacks light.  And after drinking avoid the urge to gorge on super greasy fattening foods.  Just keep drinking tons of water to wash yourself out.

You often see people washing down burgers and fries, wings and nachos with alcoholic drinks, wine and beer and as normal as this would seem, it is probably the easiest way to gain weight.  Our culture is about living, and enjoying life.  But what is enjoyable about looking in the mirror a few days later and having a double chin, or having your pants feel overly tight?  It is not always worth it, if you think about it.

You often see ads about drinking responsibly during the holidays…and this is true.  Equally as true is the sentiment that it pays to be responsible to your waist line too.  The saying everything in moderation is always one of my favourites to live by (except when it comes to great love, in that case I say live like there is no tomorrow!).