A Slackers Guide to being beautiful.

Hello again slackfans!

The long summer break is over, christmas is around the corner and I have decided to give myself a makeover.

A few weeks ago I looked in the mirror and realised that I looked a bit rubbish! No longer was I an 18 year old babe who could stumble out the house in ripped jeans and a jumper and look ruddy gorgeous.

No, I was definitely a 33 year old mother of 4 in urgent need of an upgrade.

I analysed the situation carefully and concluded that I needed a 3 pronged approach.

Firstly, my hair.

I have the curliest hair in the world and it has been the bane of my life. If I wear it short it looks like a curly crash helmet, mid length it's wider than it is longer and when it's long it requires a lot of tender loving care.

At the moment it's in a long phase, but I've taken to wearing it back all the time and haven't invested a great deal of time in looking after it.

Secondly, my clothes.

I've got caught in a style rut. I tend to dress for comfort, pulling on old jeans and baggy tops. I think my problem is that I haven't fully grown out of my indie kid mentality and anything that isn't velvet, tye-dyed or a bit 'ethnic' I dismiss as being old fogey-ish.

And thirdly, make up.

Well, I have always been of the opinion that I was so naturally 'gawjus' that I didn't need make up! The times they have a changed! Whilst I do have 'good' skin...not too wrinkly and not spotty...I have started to look a little 'tired'. And in the morning my face seems to take a while to wake up!
I have a box in my bedroom where I keep my 'cosmetics', so I decided to look through it and see if there was anything of any use in there. I found some sandpaper, bank statements, a 4 year old party invitation for one of the kids, a tube of 'bazooka that verruca' and a dead wasp. Not exactly an awe inspiring collection of beauty equipment!

My plan of action!

It was clear that I needed a plan. A Saturday afternoon shopping trip wasn't going to be enough to sort me out. I needed information, I needed research, I needed experts. So, I watched an episode of 'What not to wear' to see if that would help me. It didn't. The two new presenters made their 'victims' look like a right pair of dogs dinners.

I then looked at mums in the school playground, there was a strict division between 'mumsy' chic and what I can only describe as 'hooker-wear'. Neither of which is my cup of tea.

So I turned to the interweb and started looking at clothes. I didn't like anything at all.

Until I found this website:

http://www.nomadsclothing.com

In particular some of the dresses.

This:

http://www.nomadsclothing.com/pages/pf27olvsml.htm

This:

http://www.nomadsclothing.com/pages/rp27telsml.htm

And this:

http://www.nomadsclothing.com/pages/tn25rstsml.htm

I thought that they were flattering, practical and age appropriate.

So then I moved on to my hair. My bloody nightmare hair. I had discovered that using coconut oil really helped with my mad curls. But the other week my local source of coconut oil dried up and I ended up buying some of the Frizz Ease range as a stop gap.

Big mistake, it left my hair sticky, dried out and really tangly.

So again I turned to the lovely, lovely interweb and did a search for coconut oil. It was a bit confusing, and some of the oils were pretty costly. However I found this website

http://www.anitagrant.com

I have ordered some of this:

https://anitagrant.com/index.php?page=shop.browse&category_id=2&option=com_phpshop&Itemid=41

And some of this:

https://anitagrant.com/index.php?page=shop.browse&category_id=19&option=com_phpshop&Itemid=41

They should be with me by the end of this week! (Please don't go on strike again Mr PostMan!)

I can't wait to try them out!

And the make up? Well, I have ordered a 'line minimising' cream and a moisturising foundation from The Bodyshop. I thought that getting my skin looking fabulous would be a great place to start.

I haven't got a clue about eye make up or blushers or bronzers. I think that I'll probably get a grey eyeliner to start off with and gradually get used to wearing 'proper' make-up.

So this time next week I'll look like a million dollars!

Probably!