How to Conceal Wrinkles …

… Less is more!

Never has that been so true when it comes to makeup and our faces as we age.

Here’s some tips on the right and the wrong ways to apply foundation and powders:

• Go light on the use of foundation. Most women use too much foundation in the attempt to cover up wrinkles and fine lines. This actually has the opposite effect of highlighting imperfections instead of covering them up.
• Use a tinted moisterizer instead and only on the parts of your face that you feel need it. Go a shade or two darker as well no matter how light your skin. Darker shades can also help to hide those wrinkles as lighter shades have the tendency to make them stand out.
• Powder Power: When you were younger, you probably had the problem of too much oil on your skin and thus used powder all over your face. Stop this habit Now! Powder absorbs moisture and oil as it is intended to do. Mature skin lacks moisture and doesn’t need it. Use it only on either your nose or chin areas. Professional makeup artists NEVER use powder on women over 50. Powder has the nasty habit of sitting on top of wrinkles and makes them stand out.

… Sagging Skin and What To Do About It

Plastic surgery? Facelifts? Botox?

Wait! Don’t run off and find a plastic surgeon just yet!

Makeup can do wonders here too.

Jowl lines are sometimes called funny lines as they extend from your nose are down to your jaw line. They appear most prominently when you laugh and that’s why they are referred to as “funny lines”. These tend to deepen as we age. You can minimize these by drawing attention away from them:

• Wear longer more prominent earrings as it will pull eyes away from your jaw lines
  but don’t wear chokers or large necklaces as they will draw attention to your jawline.
• Use the proper haircut – a trick to hide those sagging necklines. Haircuts that drop just below the chin will draw attention away from your chin. Longer cuts are better as they will draw the eyes even further down and distract from your neck.

Crow’s Feet…

… No Not Another Exotic Chinese Dish!

Crow’s feet are those wrinkles and fine lines that appear on the outside edges of our eyes.

They also appear often when you laugh as we crinkle our eyes when we do so.

When you were younger, your skin was elastic enough to bounce back from this act of crinkling.

Not so when you get older. Your skin loses its elasticity and these lines become permanent so:

• Don’t use heavy amounts of concealer or you’ll risk having “raccoon eyes”.
• Just apply a few dabs of concealer and lightly pat it on with a good high quality brush.
• Do not use powder around the eyes as it will settle into those lines.

Saggy Eyelids…

… Don’t use mascara on the bottom eyelashes. Instead:

• Curl your upper lashes and use the darkest color mascara you have on them to make your eyes pop.
• Use eyeliner only on the upper lid as well.
• Use liquid liner instead of a pencil as it stays better.
• Apply a natural looking curve line on the outer corners to give a faux lift to them. Make the lines light and not thick.
• Don’t line the inside of your eyes.
• Don’t use shimmer or light eyeshadow.
• Use darker shades to create a shadow effect to minimize the look of crow’s feet.

Thinning Hair …

… No. We’re not talking about a new hair re-growth product!

We can go to the moon but we can’t re-grow hair…yet!

Facial hair thins as well. For us women, particularly our eyebrows.

Thinning eyebrows need particular attention. Why? When thinning eyebrows, stray out of place uneven length hairs will stand out more than normal. Get them professionally done.
Don’t try to draw your own brows. They NEVER turn out looking good. If you must draw in to fill in, also have them professionally done.

Your lips will also thin as you grow older…

.. Yes, hair isn’t the only thing that thins!

Lips thin because we will lose fat in them as we age. That’s why women have fat injections to plump up their lips. But you don’t need to go to this extreme. Makeup can help here too:

• Pick the right lip color.
• Skip the bright colors.
• Use a color that is a shade or 2 darker than than your natural color.
• Create a lip line by using a lip liner – to compenaste for your lip line fading as you get
  older so .
• Then apply lipstick. Consider replacing your lipstick and using lip gloss instead.
• Gloss can create the illusion of plump lips.
• Don’t use lip plumpers. They do work but the effects are very temporary and when your lips deflate, it will cause your lip lines and lipstick to become displaced.

The Webster’s Dictionary defines a wrinkle as “a small ridge or furrow in a normally smooth surface”. But you should see how the whole world is up in arms against this small furrow. This is evident by the millions of dollars spent on wrinkle treatment. And, everywhere you will find animated discussions over wrinkles and wrinkle treatment.

Wrinkles are the result of depletion of collagen and elastin. This can be due to ageing or prolonged exposure to the sun. Wrinkles are common in dry skin or particular skin types like fair skin with blue eyes. Smoking and genes also play a hand in wrinkles. Wrinkle treatment aims at restoring the skin elasticity.

Wrinkles can be either fine lines or deep creases. Fine lines respond readily to treatment while the remedy for the latter type is along harsher lines like plastic surgery. Wrinkle treatment spans the entire gamut from cosmetic cures to medical treatment, and surgical procedures.

A superficial wrinkle treatment involves minor lifestyle changes like cutting down on nicotine, junk and fatty foods and having more water to keep dehydration at bay. You should also guard your sensitive skin from the sun’s harmful rays with sun blocks and covered garments.

Medical wrinkle remedy is a milder form of treatment. In this range you have antioxidants like formulas containing Vitamins A, C and E, beta-carotene, fruits like blue and black berries, fish, red wine, moisturizers and cosmetics that include AHA (alpha-hydroxy acid) or fruit acids.

However, one of the best treatments against wrinkles in the medical arena is Vitamin A acid. Vitamin A treatment is also effective against other skin problems like dryness and pigmentation.

Amongst the plethora of cosmetic procedures, the skin peel reigns supreme as an effective anti-wrinkle remedy. Glycolic acid peels work only on the surface of the skin and as such are not much effective against wrinkles. It takes penetrative peels like salicylic and trichloroacetic acids (TCA) to produce visible results. In fact, TCA peels are the best wrinkle remedy that is presently around.

Dermabrasion and laser resurfacing are other peel types used as wrinkle remedy. Both involve a scraping of the skin surface. However, laser resurfacing is more penetrative and like the copper-peptide cream boosts the body’s collagen production to pump out the drooping muscles and the wrinkles. It also entails a longer recuperation time.

Nevertheless, laser resurfacing peel-type wrinkle remedy involves side effects like scarring and pigmentation. They should be undergone only under mild sedation or general anesthesia, as prescribed.

Recent years have seen much fanfare around the Botox injection. This treatment involves paralyzing the muscles with botulinum toxin shots to smooth out the wrinkles, laugh and frown lines. The effects last for several months.

For those willing to submit themselves under the surgeon’s scalpel, plastic surgery is an option for wrinkle remedy. A facelift or a brow lift can also act as an effective wrinkle reducer.

Now, you can keep away skin resembling an old parchment. With the proper wrinkle treatment, look 25 at 45.