I'm okay with being a minimalist
Posted
Friday, June 20, 2008 1:16 AM
Summer is not the time to be sweating over how good you look. There's suntanning outside to be done and summer activities to find your way to. Really, what is the point of getting dressed up when all you want to do is lay in your backyard with a bikini on and listen to some tunes while your baby naps? Or if they're awake, take them to a sandy playground to get dirty?
I've never ever been a high-maintenance girl. For prom it took me maybe an hour to get ready. That included showering, getting dressed, curling and pinning up my hair, and putting make up on. It didn't take me too much longer on my wedding day to get ready either. Andy takes huge pride in the fact that if I say I'll only be 15 more minutes, it'll be 15 minutes later. Maybe 16. But I'm never that girl who takes 3 hours to get ready.
Ever since high school I've had bad skin. But I was in sports and you can't always wear make up because it just comes right off. But when you're 15, you want to look good and so you slather it on anyway even if it 's going to come right off in the pool. Right up until I was a senior in college I had spurts of bad months where I just wanted to smash all the mirrors and then times where I couldn't stop staring at myself. But all the while I couldn't live without putting tons of make up on. Luckily for my wedding and up until I got pregnant, I felt as if I had things under control and didn't worry too much about it. Then pregnancy hormones kicked in and for at least a month, maybe two, I felt as if I was 15 all over again. But luckily there came a reward with just glowing beautiful skin 'til I stopped breastfeeding. Since then I've discovered that my skin is a tricky tricky beast. I'm sensitive to change in routine. I'm sensitive to things that claim to be 'organic'. Organic usually means I'll break out everywhere and it'll take 3 months to bring it under control again. At the moment I'm on a strict (well, not really) regiment of Neutrogena products. And I'm proud to say I love my skin.
So this ties into my whole minimalist attitude. When I went to work I went all out with the makeup. Lots of eyeliner, eye shadow, mineral foundation, bronzer, lipgloss, the whole 9 yards. Now I might put on the sheer Neutrogena shimmer with some light powder on top and mascara. Usually though I'll throw on some of that mineral based powder and call it a day. And only if I'm going to be running errands. Since we have swimming in the evenings, I shower at night and then throw my hair up in a ponytail. No point in doing it, I'm just going to throw it up again the next day when it gets hot.
So I'm thrilled with being au natural 99% of the time. Although sometimes I miss having my hair all curly and crazy and pinned together in a funky design. But then I remember how my hair would smell when I washed that damaged hair spray smell out. *gag*
The other thing I like about being a minimalist is no matter what you're comfy in what you're in. Instead of dressing to impress, I'm dressing to either a) get the most optimal tan ever or b) to be comfy in. Which is sad because my dress clothes hardly ever see the light of day anymore, but I'm okay with that. I'm just waiting for some killer sundresses to go on sale so I can stock up. Honestly, if I could, that's all I would wear in the summer. Unfortunately my closet only has 3.