What is your least favorite part of your beauty routine?
Applying blush… I like it, but there are days where I just feel nothing is going on as evenly and as diffused as I envisioned!
Applying blush… I like it, but there are days where I just feel nothing is going on as evenly and as diffused as I envisioned!
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My eyebrows. It takes the longest time to het them even and perfect.
Eyebrows, which I always do first. They’re very patchy and the tails are virtually non-existent (aging being what it is). I just tell myself, “They’re sisters, not twins,” as I’m working on them. Once my brows are done, the rest of my makeup is fun.
I’d have to say doing my brows. I love having my brows done, but when everything else is going well I’m always worried that my brows will come out uneven and throw off my look. Applying foundation/concealer would be my runner up for least favourite step just because that takes the most time – I like to really blend everything together and bake it which usually comes out awesome in the end, but it’s just a long process and one I don’t always feel like doing.
Applying highlight and finishing spray. Always. 🙂
Actually, the above part is my favorite. My least favorite is eyebrows, lol.
Brows – it takes me about 20 seconds and it’s so simple I often forget. It’s the least fun or creative part of my makeup routine. It really does make a difference in the overall look, though.
I wish my brows took only 20 seconds!!!!
Plucking errant hairs from my chin! Yuck.
Found out about this in my 40’s. Now over 50 and there are more!. Fortunately, some have turned white from continual plucking, but then I can feel them, but can’t see them…grrrrrr I despise my 15x mirror, but I needs it.
I keep a tweezer in my car, since the natural light seems to illuminate them, even the white ones.
Ooohhh good tip! Thanks Bonnie ?
Probably my brows. I never feel quite satisfied with the result. Uneven brows annoy me and I have one that droops lower than the other. It’s common, I know, but still bugs me!
At least I didn’t like the application why my eyeshadow, so maybe it wouldn’t be so bad as it seems; let’s leave it as that.
Now I was getting ready for work, and I had plenty of time left over because I had an early start. I think it’s a big deal for me to be almost done because I can eat breakfast. Eating breakfast feels like Christmas to me. I knew it was going to be alright.
I
Was
Fooled
Now, I wanted to be a little extra because I deserved it. Let’s just put a wing on it. Put that wing on so I can fly away from my problems. I ended up flying towards my problem. I crashed.
The eyeliner… that is a brush pen one… pressing the tip against the corner of my eye, I felt like time itself had stopped. From colors I see to black waters filling my duct, I had to give myself a moment to cry.
Everyone had seen Mulan, and I hope you did, looking at myself in the mirror after an inky explosion, I felt like the Matchmaker from the black tears running down my face.
DISHONOR ON ME, DISHONOR ON MY MAKEUP GAME… DISHONOR ON MY FAMILY, MY COW
I had 45 minutes until I had to go to work.
“I’ll go to work like I had a rough breakup.”
Eyeliner and mascara, btw.
Lol
+1 excellent slam poetry
Perfection…hope you write.
concealer. some days i just feel like nothing helps cover the horrid circles and blemishes i have ?
These days, it’s applying lip products. My lips have been changing shape/color and, it’s very cold and dry in Michigan winter. I find now that I can’t apply lip products without using a lip liner first. I also hate applying eyeliner, because I have depth perception issues and one eye is always significantly more difficult than the other.
Having to take it off and put everything away!!
This!
Washing off eye makeup, especially mascara! I feel like i’m just irritating the skin and causing my lashes to fall out. I haven’t been wearing mascara lately because I don’t want to scrub it off.
Ginny, same problem here with mascara. I’m losing length and numbers, and I am starting to avoid mascara. I started using a Clinique mascara that’s supposed to come off with warm water. I can get it off with warm water, but it takes forever?
Yep I have moved to the tubing mascaras now… they come off the lashes easily but then getting the flakes off the “delicate” undereye skin I feel is unnecessary rubbing as well….
Just watch out for Eyeko Yoga. Presumably it’s tubing, but you need oil based remover. Def not the warm water approach. I need both micellar and oil gel to get it off, think it’s gone, and still have a moon sliver of raccoon in the AM. Plus, the brush has a bulb opposite the end…no directions…and it gets in the way, when you use the skinny end. I only figured out the ‘guitar pick’ was prob a mascara guard after i’d thrown it away. Really dislike when a product makes me feel stupid!
Don’t scrub your skin! Even if you’re not wearing mascara, you need to come up with another cleansing method if your current one requires you to rub or scrub.
I’ve never successfully taken off mascara — any kind — with anything other than oil. And not just any oil, as I’ve tried many, and some work for me some don’t. With the right oil, I don’t have to rub at all, I just apply oil to the eye area, then move to “washing” the rest of my face with oil; by the time I get done and come back to my eyes, everything there is melted and swipes off easily (and if it doesn’t, I didn’t give it enough time).
I have rosacea, so I can’t do the “hot water and washcloth” oil removal method that seems so popular. I soak a cotton square with coconut water, use both sides gently to wipe over my whole face, do the same with a triple size cotton ball, and all my makeup (including mascara) is gone. Yes, this leaves just enough oil to leave my skin feeling soft, but I’m not one of those people who thinks every drop of oil needs to be removed from their skin (in fact, I think that’s a very bad thing).
I’ve had lifelong acne and oily/combination skin, but I’ve just reached the beginnings of menopause and my skin is clearer, softer, and less irritated than it’s ever been, and I know for a fact it’s because I stopped using cleansers, scrubs, and washcloths (also stopped rinsing my face with tap water, but that’s a solution that might not apply to everyone).
Sorry about the sermon — you didn’t ask for it. I’ve come to strongly believe that we way over-cleanse and over-scrub and I apparently have a problem keeping that to myself; I guess I’m on a mission.
Oh we’re on the same page. I use an oil cleanser and I don’t use soaps, exfoliating scrubs, I don’t double cleanse or anything like that. I think over-cleansing is totally unnecessary. I swipe the mascara off but then I usually have to soak a Q tip in remover and run it through the base of my lashes. I’m not rough about it but I’d rather not do it at all. Maybe soaking a cotton square and pressing it on would be better. Are you using a cosmetic coconut water? I’ve never heard of that as a makeup remover (only coconut oil).
I don’t use the coconut water as a makeup remover, I use it as a toner and as a replacement for water when “rinsing” my face (though I don’t splash it, I use a cotton square or ball).
I’ve discovered that water out of the tap here irritates my skin, and my skin was overreacting to everything because of it. I haven’t put water on my face for cleansing purposes for about a year. I even put a thin layer of oil on my face before I shower so any water that runs over my face while I’m washing my hair touches oil instead of skin. Sounds over-the-top, I know, but it has made a big difference for me.
The coconut water I use is “Harmless Harvest.” I got started down this path because so many facial mists and setting sprays were putting coconut water in that I got curious about just using straight coconut water rather than paying $30 for a couple ounces of spritzing stuff. It took a long time to find a water that didn’t have sugar or some other sweetener in it. It’s a beverage; granted, it’s an expensive beverage (about $4 for a 16 oz. bottle), but it’s a cheap toner. And my skin has improved a lot.
Wow I’m so intrigued. I feel similar about tap water, I think it dries me out, but I’m not sure I’m really willing to commit to alternate plan. I admire your resolve, impressive.
Eyeliner and under eye mascara. I’m terribly near-sighted and I need to be two inches from a mirror to be able to see myself clearly enough for clean eyeliner/mascara application. And of course, no eyeliner/mascara is small enough for that.
I have this problem with makeup brushes sometimes. I have to turn my head sideways to keep from bumping the end of the handle against the mirror.
Oh my goodness! My fellow nearsighted makeup application struggle twins! The brush hitting my (magnifying) mirror and having my head 2 inches from the mirror for liner and mascara, yep, I feel ya.
Lol, I have mono vision, I can get my left eye on good but the right is a struggle with my nose pressed against the mirror. So eyeliner is my least favorite.
I have a 10x magnifiying mirror suction cupped onto the bathroom mirror. I bought a lighted vanity mirror that has 2x, 3x, normal and a suction cupped 10x mirror, I go to the 10 x every single time. I’m farsighted so my close up vision is 10x worse than my 55+ peers. The price for being 20/20 until age 40…
I always use a small compact mirror to do my eye makeup because of this. I find it much more convenient than using an actual mirror, and can always look in the actual mirror to get a more cohesive idea of how a look is turning out.
I’m right with you – I hoard any decent travel size brushes that are short handled. Mini mascaras & eyeliners are helpful – and easy to come by.
These comments are making me glad I don’t do brows! (I’m NC20 but definitely inherited my brows from my dad, who was quite a bit darker. They already stand out and I used to get teased for them when I was a kid. Now they’re fashionable, lol!)
Least favorite, maybe lipstick? I like wearing it, but getting it right is sometimes a pain. I often end up wearing sheer colors just because it’s fast and easy. More opaque lipsticks just feel so high maintenance to me.
Mascara; I don’t mind applying it, I just hate the way it feels… Unfortunately, it is a necessity if I’m wearing makeup. In my own, personal opinion, no matter how long/full/dark ones lashes are, it just looks odd & incomplete to have spent time on shadow/liner, but omit mascara, almost like it was forgotten.
Taking all my makeup off to reveal the horror of under eye bags & dark shadows!!
Eyeliner. I don’t apply it evenly and non-gel formulas can disappear into my oily eyelids. Some days, I’ll just wear mascara and focus on the rest of the face instead.
Eyebrows. I have thin brows with gaps where the hair did not grow back after my chemotherapy. I have tried a lot of different brow products and have never really gotten into the whole brow routine. Now I pretty much do the minimum to get by.
Exact same problem here, Deborah S., though I prefer to blame it on aging. For the past decade, I have been using Clinique Brow Shaper together with Clinique Super Fine Brow Liner to deal with my brows, which only partially grew back after I lost them. I don’t know if these products would work for you, but they have worked great for me. (In my previous life, the only brow product I had ever needed was tweezers.)
Applying mascara. I hate it. Frankly, if my natural lashes were darker I’d probably go without. Alas, a necessary evil.
I have my lashes dyed every two months when I go for a lash lift, they look amazing afterwards. I don’t know if this is a possibility for you but I love it. I don’t need to wear mascara for a week afterwards. Then it seems that they just kind of fade, I am kind of obsessive with long dark lashes though, so I always use mascara after that.
Definitely brows! I love that so many people share the struggle with me!
Foundation and concealer. I haven’t quite found the right products for my skin colour/type yet, so I currently feel like applying these products requires a lot of problem solving followed by a long sigh and me giving up for the day.
I pick up new tips and tricks all the time, but I’m not quite there yet.
Foundation-it never really looks that great on me. I feel like I’m better off without it.
Foundation. I like having smooth, even skin, but I just hate the process of applying it.
It’s a toss-up between mascara and foundation! For the same exact reason; I’m nearsighted as heck, so this means that I need to get way up close to the mirror to make sure these are applying evenly and correctly. That’s when the foundation brush handle gets in my way and becomes a pain in the rump! Mascara application is also a bit too up close and personal to the mirror, which is just exhausting and definitely not fun!
Brows-just a pain in general. I have a bald area due to a scar, they are really quite arched and high, and the tails are thinning terribly. I do them first, get it over with, then go on with the rest, which I enjoy.
Skincare. It’s so freaking boring. As far as makeup, it would have to be my brows. They’re never perfect.
I have largely removed a lot of my least favorite parts of my routine (foundation, powder blush/bronzer, and liquid eyeliner). So, if I had to pick something, I’d say undereye concealer. I’m never content with how it looks. I feel like I can never satisfactorily cover my shadows, and my undereyes are so dry that they can easily look cakey and old.
Definitely eyebrows. I’ve been told that my natural shape is strong (so it doesn’t take me forever to fill them in or anything like that), I just hate doing it. I only started doing it relatively recently and I feel like a kid coloring outside the lines… I hope my skills in this area improve soon because I can see the difference it makes when I get it right.
Doing my brows and applying mascara. It’s really hard to get the brows right with your glasses off. And I hate it when the mascara takes too long to dry and ends up streaking or smudging.
That would be under eye concealer and setting it. If I don’t set it it migrates to the fine and not so fine lines, if I set it the skin looks dry and is filled with a million small lines.
I don’t use concealer every day anymore as I’m less bothered by some darkness than lines and small wrinkles.
Ditto. I’ve had the same issues, but I’ve recently been using an eye cream (which I thought were just hype). Although I’m still not 100% confident in my under eye concealing, I can definitely see a difference in the way my under eye makeup looks since I’ve been using eye cream.
I’ve used eye creams for a long time. Maybe I need to change to one for mature skin.
I’m glad it’s helping you, Monica.
Foundation and concealer – this has become an issue recently with changes in my skin (aging, type, texture and color).
Ditto on the blush (my cheeks are red and I have to cover them, so I rarely need much blush), and also lip stick (I have a time finding the right colors at times for my lips).
I say a prayer every day before I do my brows! I’m not asking for Instagram brows, just let them be even and look decent…
The blush, the eyebrows (because my outer brows are gone and the rest are turning thick and gray). I have the same issues with blush that Christina mentioned, blending, either over doing it and looking like a circus clown or under doing it, which isn’t really so bad. Sometimes I end up using highlight type blush and end up glowing like the 4th of July on a work day! lol! I’m kind of thinking of sucking up and getting the drawn on semi permanent brows. I want to call it dermaplaning but I have a dermaplaning tool and it’s basically a single blade shaver (a very good tool at that).
Maybe you mean microblading?
Applying mascara to my bottom lashes is the most nerve racking thing. One errant move and it can destroy my concealing!
Hmmm? I actually enjoy the entire process and excitement from moisturizing with Cera Vé under my light foundation. Chapstick always under lipsticks, filling in eyebrows, love applying blush and lipsticks, choosing eyeshadow color, highliter, and using the slightest hand with bronzer it gives me life along with blush & mascara for these aging hooded eyes. I would say applying eyeliner I’m never good at it and end up blending so much I almost erased it entirely. ??♀️ But outside face beauty what I used to hate when I was running marathons was shaving! I shaved often since I wanted to get some sun on this pair of milk bottled legs which the sun completely ignored. Lol! Sometimes they would get that flaky white powdery from shaving so often that’s one thing I certainly don’t miss and armpits as well. Many nick cuts when on a rush early, early morning before heading to that gorgeous Santa Monica beach to meet my Roadrunners training group. But I enjoy doing my face all of it! Is fun and like to rotate things often. Is my little unique and fun lab. Lol!
1. Setting under-eye with powder…
It’s a daily argument. Will it look crepe-y today, did I do all the prep to make sure it won’t? Did I miss a step, did I apply too many layers, did I warm it with my fingers, did I sponge it enough?
2. Eyeliner.
I never use it on the bottom and I’ve all but given it the heave-ho on the top. Eyelids just are not smooth like they used to be, and it just tends to look choppy–especially in my lit-5x-zoom-simple-human-frenemy.
Mascara…so much room for screw-ups. Even worse, lashes, but I only use them occasionally.
BROWS. Maybe I just haven’t found the right product, but it such a pain to fill them in.
Foundation, mostly because I wish had the kind of skin that didn’t need it.
As an aside, I am getting either laser or light treatments THIS YEAR, so next year I might be able to say that mascara is my least favorite part.