I did it and it didn’t feel good though I know it’s good for me. I finally got rid of my expired lippies and I am not ashamed to say that I sighed and teared up a bit. Some of these colours held strong memories associated with them. A few of them symbolized risks I took in life or lessons I learned. And I also didn’t want to compromise the health of my lips any longer.
A lot of them meant I learned a lot about my own Black culture and what support of Black owned and woman owned companies can look like. And though I wore a lot of them in heavy rotation, the time came for me to make room for others.
Sometimes life is like this. There are things, opportunities, and relationships that are for seasons. We like holding onto things especially if they remind us of a great feeling, or maybe we know they’re bad, but they’re familiar. But a regular purge is not just necessary, it’s healthy.
It’s time to make room for what’s good and what’s new or more of what was right and healthy for you. The Lord has good plans for us, even if they’re hard, but the new season, this new year can be a fresh start.
So my love, what do you need to keep, donate, or throw away? It’s time to purge and then make room for the good things that will be a benefit to you in the season to come. It might be weight, a couple sweaters, or that lippy in the back of your make up drawer. Take stock and walk into your new year lighter with less stress and ready for what is for you!
Christmas is coming, are you ready? Are you busy, stressed out, tired, excited, already counting the calories?
I’ve been thinking quite a bit about self care and what it really is. I quite enjoy a good spa day and have been privileged to have a few this year alone with and without friends. I love getting my nails done and having my toes done regularly. I’ve tried to be mindful of rest days where I made no apologies for the lounge wear or the pj’s of choice to do the day’s living in. I’ve been doing some Pilates and breathing deeper just because I can, but also because I need to.
When’s the last time you took a good deep breath instead of the shallow ones we exist on as we go about our various routines? My voice teacher called me out on it a while back and then my therapist told me to stop and take a breath before I even said a word. I took one and then another and then burst into tears. It was more than just a breath, it was a full moment without judgment or stress and my whole body relaxed, for free.
The entrance to Thermea Spa in Whitby, ON.
You know when you wear a wonderful red lipstick, but it doesn’t have the staying power of a true matte lipstick so you eat with the fork barely touching your lips or you give more air kisses than usual and your mindful of your garments when putting on your outerwear? That isn’t real living or a good way to enjoy your lipstick. Being tired all of the time, even if you look good doing it isn’t real living. And spa days and the occasional matte lippy are just management tools to help us take occasional breaths. But what if we did self care the right way? What would that look like for you. Hey, there’s no judgment here, I’m still trying to answer this for myself. So let me be vulnerable and share what’s on my list so far:
First, I start with a healthy spiritual rhythm of prayer and devotion to God who sustains all things and good mental practices of recognizing thought patterns and addressing them when they happen. I like to include musical worship and reading too.
Next is one we all know and don’t always love, but it’s doing the hard things regularly so they become habits that aren’t so hard anymore, like doing scales at the piano, exercising regularly, and eating all of my greens 🙄. It’s discipline that creates the care, like using your toothbrush on your lips after you brush to exfoliate. Soft lips need care too.
One of my big realizations over the last few years is recognizing how much I need both alone time and people time. A lot of people think I’m an extrovert, but I’m actually an ambivert, needing both solace and interaction. The interaction with my loved ones and chosen family is a blessing to me and gives me so much energy to keep going. I have communities where people can come and speak into my life or allow me to do that for them. I actually go into withdrawal when I haven’t seen or spoken to certain people for a while. I value their input into my life and returning some of that love is something I want to treasure.
Lastly, I need vitamin D. It’s not just for. strong bones or whatever the medical books say, it’s for my happy thoughts and for my lack of sunshine here in Toronto in the Winter months. As some of my previous posts have shown, I love a sunny vacation where I can completely unwind on a beach. Like a sunflower, I turn my face and body toward the sun’s rays and soak them in. Unfortunately, this temporary method of self care is too expensive to have every day, so I try my best to thoroughly enjoy the Summer months and I take my Vitamin D in excessive dosages.
What’s on your self care list and do you know the difference between management and care? I would much rather maintain a practice of care than just manage from day to day. As the holidays approach, or maybe as I get older, or maybe both-I feel the need to be mindful of me in ways that aren’t selfish but will help me say a better yes to something or someone else if I am well cared for. I will have more to give, more peace to live from, and more joy to share. Baby, we were made to live, so let’s live well wearing a lippy that compliments the sentiment exactly, in any shade of course.
Merry almost Christmas and whatever shade you choose to wear, wear it like you mean it and for the sake of you, mean it when you do.
It’s been a while since I’ve posted a current picture of myself. I used to do so with regularity featuring lippies that accentuate my full pout. I’d stage a little photoshoot in the back yard and get out my favourite features. I used to know what my body looked like without the need of a mirror. I knew what pants would fit my hips, hold in my butt, and accentuate my waist. And my waist used to be its own entity not a joint one with my tummy. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been a full figured hour glass (with an extra 15 minutes in it) shape most of my adult life and love being a full figured woman, but it’s crazy what a little bit of stress and extra weight can do when you’re not emotionally and mentally healthy they way you’re used to being.
Just before my birthday last year, I lost 12-14 pounds in a short amount of time and felt great. It must have been noticeable because a few people said something. I enjoyed my birthday festivities and Christmas holidays with friends, families, smiles, and fun outfits. By the end of March I had gained double what I lost and the numbers on the scale were climbing. I had a lot of stress and anxiety hit me like a ton of bricks in the new year and lost my appetite for the intermittent fasting regime I’d known before the holidays and replaced it with quick filling meals and yummy pastries when I could. I went on vacation shortly after Easter and didn’t really care about my size, because it’s hot and we we’re at the beach, but when others were at the gym or watching what they ate, I made small mental notes that I was the “big one”.
I would try to take a selfie every so often, but noticed my jawline disappearing and my face growing rounder. And not once did I ever look in the mirror and think, “this is not cute” because baby I can be cute in any size, I just didn’t and sometimes don’t feel like me. So the picture would stay in my phone or worse get deleted and the joy of my appearance from the morning while getting ready would dissipate when the phone didn’t quite capture what I thought I saw. But I recently heard in an interview where someone was quoting a friend who said, “A sunset is always beautiful but the pictures we take of it never do it justice”…that made me feel a tiny bit better. No one would ever look at a sunset and think “No honey, you’re just not shining the way you did last week”.
I’ve decided to get back on the intermittent-for-a-size-healthier-me train not for anyone else but myself. I decided to take a picture of my lip choice today because it was bold and fun the way I like to be and I decided to just try. The world of fashion and other public places like the stage and film are back to highlighting the thin eyebrows and waistlines of skinny minis again since the 90s and early 2000 trends are back🙄, but if you are any kind of millennial, you’ll know some of those were big mistakes and we should all keep our eyebrows because they just don’t grow back the same, we should love the skin we’ve been given, and we should be the healthy we need to be for our lifestyles. Nude lips, red glosses, matte mauves, and satin purples all have a place at the table and fuller figures of women and men can be and are just as worthy of shine time and love and access to healthy options as the others…and yet it’s a work in progress within myself first.
Most people will still compliment me on an outfit or a lip choice, and no I’m not bragging, but what they see is someone being confident (if only outwardly) in the moment more than the outfit. I’ve lost count the amount of times I’ve heard, “oh I could never get away with that colour” or “your skin makes a great canvas for that outfit”. Honey, my confidence is why I wear the colour and the outfit. Lately, it’s my confidence that has taken the hit even if others don’t notice it and is why I’m taking a moment to say Hi again. I don’t want to blend in because I’ve gotten a little thicker and I don’t just want clear lipgloss unless that thing is going to pop, I want to be the confident orange-lippie-wearing chick walking in the God-given confidence I found when I realized God makes no mistakes.
I don’t know what your current hang up is or if you’ve slipped back into your chapstick only wearing days, but Babe, let’s try again, for us, for fun, just because we can, while doing all of the necessary things we might need to do ( like therapy, exercise, a good cry, journaling) and wear the lippy with a smile because it won’t always be this way. #wearitlikeyoumeanit 💋
Hi There, How are you? Has anyone asked you that lately genuinely awaiting your honest reply? Did you get on with the interviewer and found out you had something, anything other than good manners in common?
I’ve been told I’m a good friend, loyal, honest, prayerful, and available for all kinds of things. I’ve also been the recipient of kindness and I often boast about my beautiful friends. I once thought that I wouldn’t make many new friends after university seeing that my besties and I are still besties even with the changing schedules life has thrown us. BUT I am happy to report that I’ve learned that it is ok even as we age to keep making friends. The Lord in his kindness has given us friends for days, for seasons of life, for life, and for love. Sometimes those friends change places and sometimes a person who has been in your life for 20 years and one who has been there for 2 both hold the dearest of spaces in your heart and this is perfectly fine.
I have recently encountered new friendships that have been so life-giving and so encouraging. I am in what is an interesting part of life that I’m sure others are also living in. I am a mid-thirties, beautiful Black woman who happens to be currently single and childless. My friends circle is just about evenly split between the Single and Paired Up. Those who are married and with children naturally have less time to dispose of even if they wish to. And to be fair most of us Single ones are not at home twiddling thumbs and staring at walls either.
This season of life has taught me to go and get what I need. If it’s a hug, I can ask for it; a special beach day with or without friends, go do it; Community, build it. Imagine my surprise when I realized a couple of these new friends also had and loved lippies too. I’ll use initials here because I can and this is about them being kind when they didn’t need to be and me appreciating that more than the gifts they gave me.
N.B., is a wonderful young Black mom and wife with the most beautiful skin and a desire to just hang out and connect. She works in the beauty industry and when I went to hang out with her she brought out a bag of brand new beauty products for me to try and keep. I was surprised and grateful. See a few of the things she gave me. Full sized products and lippies.
Products include Hermes trio of tinted lip balms in nude, ELF lipstick named Untamed, and 1 of 2 lip oils by Rare Beauty called Delight
B.B., is another wonderful Black woman with acting experience in Europe and just wanted to hang out with me. Her hair is a wonderful mane and she loves either coral and reds for lip choices or chocolate nudes that wonderfully contrast her butterscotch skin tones. She told me that she usually gets to keep whatever is used on her in the make up chair when she’s in the middle of shooting and so she had a few things to offer me too. How kind! B.B. is back in Europe but we are keeping in touch and the relationship wisdom she offers me is very welcomed gift. After a quick wipe with some rubbing alcohol, I try them on and smile.
My dear reader let me be the first to encourage you to be kind to everyone you know because you never know which of those faces will be the one your new friend wears. And yes I know not every person you are kind to will be kind to you, but kindness is free, doing it and receiving it do not take as much effort as being nasty and mean. The good thing about giving is that you actually receive the blessings of other’s joy too. Try it! Ask someone how they’re doing, hold the door for someone, pay for someone’s meal, buy someone a lippy and enjoy the smile someone will send your way.
If you’re anything like me, you plan and look forward to a vacation a couple times of the year to a sunny beach with or without your loved ones. I think about what I’ll wear and what size suitcase will fit all of my clothing options with room for souvenirs. And as I grab my toiletries, I consider make up that will be easy but will also withstand the heat.
This time I was prepared to be a little more natural with a couple pops of colour. I was looking forward to the sun kisses making my skin the right shade of bronze so that besides a little highlighter, mascara, and a beautiful lippie I would be good to go. I decided to try the new Maybelline Vinyl Ink collection as well as some tried and true glosses from The Lip Bar and I’m so glad I did.
On day one of this Caribbean vacay I used my Neutrogena SPF 60 spray, did my brows, and then added a popping pink called Capricious from the VinylInk collection. I had lilac hair and needed something that look purposeful but also stayed on. What I like about this collection is that is reads like a glossy satin finish even when it is dry and feels balmy when I press my lips together but only comes off with oil. This combination makes it a perfect pick for the hot sunny days by the beach and it even lasted through the Chicken I had for lunch. It was at this moment that I gave thanks to the Lord above for the wisdom to buy several shades 😌.
For the evening festivities I chose glosses as they would come off with food more graciously than a lippie with staying power. Reapplication with these two would also be easy without a compact mirror. TheLipBar’s gloss in First Lady has been a favourite of mine since I got it in December for my birthday. It’s a gentle pink nude that has full coverage in one swipe and we know how full my lips are! I’m so pleased every time I put it on. It made for a great choice for my dinner outfit. (Here I am wearing it with brown liner on 3 other occasions.)
Even though Summer is winding down, the time to get away for some R&R is always now (or whenever your bank account and rest schedule align🫠). So I’m wondering where are you going and what lippies are you taking with you? Wherever you end up and whatever you choose just make sure you #wearitlikeyoumeanit 💋. Safe travels, friend!
The Lipstick Blogger 