I need to start this, by saying I’m by no stretch of the imagination any kind of voice or expert on beauty, or beauty routines, or even just regular routines. My daily routine for my face involves splashing water on it. When I wash my hair, which is usually once or twice a week, I use St. Ives Apricot Scrub in the shower, but that’s all I use on my face. I don’t have a makeup routine – I get eyelash extensions. I do occasionally wear lipstick, but my loyalty lies with my beauty gurus at my lash salon, and I use their in house make-up brand for all my lip colours. I don’t have a facial moisturizer, but I have a few odd creams that I really enjoy, and rotate around for different needs. I’m what this quarantine describes as ‘low maintenance’, minus my eyelashes I guess, but they’re something I don’t feel like I need, I just love them on a superficial level, and I do my best to maintain them to support a friend and her business.
However, despite quarantine, I’ve decided to change that up a bit.
I had a Foreo Luna Fofo, literally fall into my lap, via my mother. She picked it up, not really knowing what it was but in her travels, she found it for $4, and figured if I didn’t want it, my sister could find a use for it, since I have issues with rosacea, and she has issues with eczema. Just in case you don’t believe me, here’s the proof;
When I looked it up, I couldn’t believe it’s price tag. $120? For a little silicon bristle vibrator that you auto-tune to your face for a daily skin care routine? I will admit, I was very curious, so I figured there was no harm in giving it a go. My fofo is the mint coloured one, and has started off with almost a minty scent to it as well, which was kind of nice. To start, you need to download an app for your fofo to connect and store data. Once you register your fofo, you then are guided through a few steps that analyzes the current quality of your skin, based on what the little sensors on the back discovered. It tells you the current ‘age’ of your face, as well as outlines a timed cleansing routine for different zones on your face. I was feeling pretty haughty, and figured mine would be pretty high considering the lack of damage I figured I had done over the years. Oh, boy was I surprised!
Not only is my skin apparently two years older than it should be, but my score was only a 64/100. I wasn’t surprised by the low moisture, it’s winter and as mentioned, I don’t really moisturize my face, but a 64? I will be honest, I was a little skeptical of the whole analysis part of this tool, so I did go digging. Turns out, most people, when using the fofo for the first time have a score in the sixities, and their skin is always at least two years older than they are. Either everyone starts this journey with basically the same skin quality issues, or there’s something a little fishy in their algorithm. I decided to just leave it be, and go forward, to test to see if this little thing will actually make a difference for me.
The biggest challenge for me with starting a daily facial cleansing routine, is that I have literally no supplies. I don’t have a cleanser, moisturizer, or even little face towels to make this easier. One of the strangest ones for me is discovering that maybe a cloth headband or two to tame my mane while I wash my face would be a good idea, now that I’m not just splashing water on it.
Deciding on a moisturizer and cleanser were agonizing. My rosacea isn’t really a problem, but it does react, and quickly, to products being applied to my face, which is why I’ve kept such a low maintenance routine over the years. Most cleansers, no matter how gentle, dry my face out, and when you have rosacea, it’s not just a few dry spots, or a little flakiness. It’s painful and cracks if not attended to properly, but on the flip side, most moisturizers flare up the acne side effect of rosacea, and then I’ve got to deal with mini cyst like buds in the ‘butterfly zone’. Before starting, I needed to do a bit of research, and some trial and error to find a combination of products that would work nicely if I was going to improve my skin to my Luna Fofo’s standards.
The two products that won out is Saje’s Parisian Garden soap bar, and the classic, St. Ives Avocado face moisturizer.
I originally started using Saje exclusively for their Peppermint Halo to help me deal with my headaches, but I’ve slowly introduced quite a few of their products into my world, from their bath salts to the creams. Their products have really helped tame my sister’s eczema, so I’ve really developed a trust in their quality. So far, I’ve had no issues with their soap.
Going with St. Ives was really a fallback, knowing that I’ve used a range of their products all my life with no issues. I’ve tried a variety of facial creams over the years, from Olay to Arbonne, to Clinique, to homemade all natural solutions, to literally everything you can purchase in between, and quite literally, nothing has worked. Either they just burn on my skin, or they cause breakouts, and I gave up a long time ago on trying to find a nice routine for my face. I took a chance when I purchased this, not really expecting it to go well, and after a few days of using it (before starting the fofo routine), I still had no burning and no breakouts. I’m quite pleased, and love that I finally have something, and it smells really nice to!
I have now started the daily routine that has been outlined to me, with my fofo. I have to wash my face twice a day with the little device, and it records my data to make sure I’m keeping up. I get a little alert to remind me, morning and night and in two weeks, I get to re-analyze my face to see if there’s any improvement. Hopefully in two weeks, my new towels and soap dish will have arrived as well, so I can add a little luxury to this process (as well as I don’t think the cardboard box the soap came in will hold up forever). I’m actually looking forward to seeing if there’s a change, though, I’m still pretty convinced the analysis of your face is bogus.
What are your daily beauty routines? Have they changed much with the lock downs in your world? Have you been able to start routines that you never had before or are you enjoying a bit of a break from the upkeep?
Until next!
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