It is a sad day for PeaceBang and her crow’s feet. Kiehl’s has discontinued their wonderful Ultra Moisturizing Eye Gel with SPF 15. After doing an on-line search I have found and ordered my last tube at MakeMeHeal.com (a strange little site devoted to providing services and products to folks who’ve had cosmetic surgery) and will be on the look-out for something as good to replace this beloved gel. Eye gel is something you just can’t stockpile, since the active ingredients won’t last beyond a year or so.

It is VERY hard to find an eye gel that firms, moisturizes and protects from the sun. I loved this product because it left a bit of shine behind that brightened my face and gave me a bit of a youthful glow.

And there was wailing and gnashing of teeth heard throughout all of Norwell.

Why, it’s none other than BURT’S BEES LIP BALM!! One of our favorite, minty lip softening products!!

Remember, though, that Burt’s Bees does not provide SPF. We discussed this here. Read the comments, too, because we have since recommended more products that will protect your kisser from the harsh rays of El Sol.

But seriously, it’s rather depressing, no? Is it too much to ask that when companies say there are no toxins in their products, they might be telling the truth?

Thanks to BoyInTheBands for sending me this news item. Let’s see how this develops.

ANYHOO, as the sun waxes stronger in these here parts, a girl starts to think about SPF products for the lips (and fellas should, too, since your lips are tender little darlings and shouldn’t be left out there all alone to bake unprotected). Turns out that most SPF products are just dull, though; waxy Chapsticky things that don’t slide easily over lipstick or Covergirl Outlast All Day Lipcolor (PeaceBang’s daily product), which is what *I* certainly want them to do. I would think that even men seek a lip product with ease of application and a decent taste (not overly minty or medicinal or herbal or fruity).

(Incidentally, there’s a lip balm called, no kidding, Chicken Poop out there. I wanted to recommend it but it has no sun protection factor. Darn.)

I did find a tropical-flavored lip balm during my January trip to Florida that has good SPF coverage, but it makes my lips taste like a shirt Don Johnson would have worn in “Miami Vice,” so it’s a choice of last resort. I want something sophisticated with little or no flavoring, thank you very much. A cruise around my local CVS yielded nothing interesting (and did you know that Burt’s Bees lip products don’t even have SPF in them??? I just assumed that they did!). A girl can’t smear Carmex all over her mouth, for heaven’s sake: have you tasted that stuff?

So I did a little googling around online and discovered that the good people at Revlon have a Super Lustrous Lip Gloss that looks to have not only nice, glossy color coverage but SPF 15. Has anyone tried this stuff? It’s expensive, so I’d rather not purchase it without having some advance word on it. It may be that getting SPF coverage into a gloss form is a costly process, which is why so few companies are doing it.

If you’re looking for a subtle hint of color, or a clear lip balm with SPF coverage, Kiehl’s makes a very fine product that lasts and lasts, and that comes in a tube, which I love. This would be a great gift for the guy in your life. I mean, isn’t that packaging positively MANLY? Kiehl’s has its own web site and is also available at upscale department stores. This lip balm costs about $9 but again, it last for a long time even if you use it every day.

Oh, and this advance word to you, my doves: do not ever rely on make-up to provide full sun coverage for your face. If you really want to protect yourself from all the ravages of the sun (and you should), it is wisest to apply your sunblock of choice before any make-up. After much searching and many flare-ups of red blotching on my face (curses on you, Neutrogena tinted sun block! Because I love your other products so much!), I am sticking this year with Alba Botanica Facial Sunscreen for Sensitive Skin.

I was using a Juice Beauty Organics product but it smells kind of yucky and I had a devil of a time getting the product out through the pump dispenser. I like that it’s entirely non-chemical and mineral based, but they’d do better to put it in a tube so a girl or guy can actually get the stuff out of the ever-lovin’ container.

When applying sunscreen, don’t forget to get your chest, your neck, the back of your neck, the edges of your face at the hairline (wherever that hairline may be), and your ears. Let’s not be worrying our dermatologists and requiring snippings of suspicious moles and bumps this year. Be safe out there and for heaven’s sake wear a hat when we’ll be in the sun for any prolonged period of time. And just this once, I’ll give you a pass: it doesn’t even have to be particularly fashionable or attractive, it just needs to keep your skin and scalp protected. Extra bonus for those who color our hair: wearing hats is a big deterrent to fading. So go get you one! They’re always on sale at TJ Maxx or Marshall’s and places like that.

Just a note to say that three days of proper facial care (including toner and moisturizer and eye cream, in addition to the witch hazel treatment) have already made a world of difference, and I haven’t even tried the makeup (though I will admit I bought some…we’ll see if I need it on Sunday). My congregation’s president said I “looked well-rested” when we met today–the first time she has ever said something like that.

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Thanks for letting us know, hon. And amen.

Someone wrote to PeaceBang today asking about how to cover up dark circles under the ole eyes, so before she skips off to write her newsletter column and watch Part IV of “John Adams” on HBO, PeaceBang will try to offer some helpful advice.

First, she’ll share what she thinks is pretty unhelpful advice on the subject, which she found by a blogger named “NY Make-Up Artist.” Not to malign New York Make-Up Artist’s skills or sage wisdom, but PeaceBang thinks that the following regimen

# Powder the area under your eyes with very fine translucent powder to set the corrective concealer, and then go over the area one more time with your regular, everyday concealer (the one that matches the rest of your happy, non-discolored skin).

P.S. If you have no idea why you constantly have dark circles under your eyes – if you have no reason to believe that your recurring dark circles are hereditary or caused by allergies, for example – you might want to see a dermatologist, who can determine whether your dark circles are caused by poor circulation.

Here’s PeaceBang again, who agrees with the author above in one detail: to cover dark circles, it really is worth the time and effort to find the right formulation for your skin and the particular hue of your circles. When PeaceBang gets the Walter Mondale bags on important occasions, she follows this routine:

1. For puffiness, ice and lots of water. Witch hazel on pads over the eyes for five to ten minutes (if there’s time). Application of a firming eye cream kept in the fridge.

2. When eyes are dry and hydrated with a day cream of some sort (that’s had time to fully absorb into the skin, and nothing too oily), GENTLY apply a foundation with a very light touch (tap with edge of finger) to undereye area AND EYELID (don’t forget to blend into corner of eye/bridge of nose) as you apply to the rest of your face (or just to blotchy areas, as PB prefers to do, which means sides of nose, chin and forehead).

3. If skin still looks noticeably dark, use make-up brush to apply a very light coat of light-reflecting cover-up to circles under eyes. Choose a shade just one shade lighter than your skin color; nothing too obvious. Tinted products can work very well, as the article above details. Again, blend well into bridge of nose and surrounding area. You do NOT want to look as though you have clowny circles around your eyes.

4. With a small, fluffy brush, set the area with a translucent powder. Better yet, set the area with a light-reflecting powder. There are many on the market right now but PeaceBang has been using Revlon Skinlights for a thousand years (the same container, in fact, which is ridiculously huge: did they think I was going to douse my entire body in the stuff? I decant it into a smaller container and it’s still fine after all these years).

5. On dark circle days, avoid lots of eye make-up. Curl your lashes, load on the mascara, smudge some eyeliner on the top lid only, and use a bright lip color and sweep a pop of blush on to wake up your face.

6. Gentlemen, there is no reason on God’s green earth that those of you who have hereditary or fatigue-related dark circles can’t use a subtle product to make them less noticeable. You will look ten years younger and rested, and if that doesn’t matter to you, your eyes will be more expressive and less shadowed in the pulpit.

7. I travel with this wonderful product by Mac, which doubles as a foundation AND cover-up! It’s supremely blendable and comes in so many shades, you’re bound to find one that works for you.

8. If the dark circles are a new thing for you, consider dietary and hormonal changes. Dark circles under the eyes can be related to other health issues, so don’t hesitate to ask your doc about it. For some reason I remember hearing that dark circles can be caused by nasal congestion (NETI POT!) and also by vitamin deficiencies. Someone once told me to eat lots of leafy green veggies if I got dark circles, but I can’t swear by that.

Finally, can you believe someone has a blog that’s exclusively about this subject??? I couldn’t believe it, either, but here it is!

That’s an interesting idea, and God knows that MotherBang has beautiful skin at the age of 69 without having washed her face with anything but soap over the years or having used night cream (she now uses various retinol-based creams, however). I’m sure it can be done.

However, PeaceBang’s skin looks and feels MUCH better when she follows a nightly regimen of washing with a gentle cream-based cleanser (currently using one by REN), smoothing on an anti-oxidant serum with retinol in it (this excellent product by Paula’s Choice) and finishing off (after giving the serum time to soak in) with a healing, redness-reducing moisturizer (currently by REN). She dots ROC eye cream with retinol under and around her eyes (the evidence is undeniable; I had worse crow’s feet two years ago than I do now), puts in her night bite guard and goes to sleep at a decent hour.

During the day, I wash with a gentle cleanser in the shower, smooth on an anti-oxidant pomegranate serum by Desert Essence, top it with a Neutrogena SPF 30 sunblock (or I skip it and use a Neutrogena tinted moisturizer with SPF 30 — not really enough but I’m not much in the sun until the warmer months). I must thank Miss Conduct, Robin Abrahams, for turning me on to this wonderful Neutrogena product.

I exfoliate twice a week or so with either a fruit enzyme masque or Aveda’s Tourmaline Charged Radiance Masque. I cannot use anything even vaguely granular on my skin; not even so-called “gentle” scrubs.

If you are adding up the cost of all these products, believe me, I am too. The masques and serums last for many months. The eye cream lasts even longer than that. I use the expensive cleanser only at night (when I try to massage it in for a full, relaxing minute or so) and a $8-10 one for daytime use, when I’m in a hurry. I portion out my REN moisturizer carefully and even the small pump bottle lasts pretty long, though not as long as I would like, because I LOVE REN products and think they’ve done wonders for my skin. They are worth every penny, and when I don’t have enough pennies to keep myself in REN, I switch to the closest drugstore equivalent I can find.

This recent photo was taken in winter sunlight: I’m wearing eye make-up and lip color, but nothing on my face but the Neutrogena Healthy Skin Enhancer Tinted Moisturizer and some creme blush. I’m 42 years old, very fair and have extremely sensitive, blotchy-and redness-prone skin. I’m happy with the results of all my potions. Drinking enough water, eating well and exercising also make a big difference in my skin’s appearance, of course, and so does being happy. Do what works for you, pigeons!

I’ve used all kinds of moisturizers and my daily choice is a simple, unscented product from Trader Joe’s that works well in a no-nonsense kind of way.

But this, Sephora Body Butter works even better and smells like coconuty, almondy heaven. It sinks right into your skin, and to make it really effective, exfoliate first:

Harken unto PeaceBang. Please.

If you have not yet considered how washed out and exhausted and drab you look without any make-up because you have been too busy to look in the mirror lately, or because of your feminist commitments, or because you don’t want to spend the money, please understand that PeaceBang has the most sincere respect for all of those reasons. But she still wants to say that too many of us are going around looking seriously drab and wan when we don’t need to, and that It’s a Problem for some of us.

I know that we live in a sexist culture. We also live in a visual world, and always have. We can still fight sexism and look like vibrant leaders and not washed out, blotchy and eyebrowless women whose visage screams, “Who, ME? A public figure? Oh, no, no, no, not MOI. I am a simple woman, a humble woman, a woman unaware of the fact that lipstick might actually brighten my face and make me seem as though I made even the slightest effort to prepare myself to be present in a visual universe.”

I’m seeing a whole lot of Seriously Drab out there, sister ministers (and brothers, too — you can use skin care, too! It won’t effect your masculinity in any way, I promise). And from a distance (as in from the pew’s perspective), that’s a serious detriment to your message. When your mouth proclaims resurrection and your visage proclaims that you didn’t take time to properly wash your face this morning, there’s a major disconnect.

PeaceBang has a little swollen eye just now, probably from a head cold that is GONE after 24 hours because of the magic of Neti Pot, Neti Pot, Neti Pot… I am a tireless evangelist for the wonders of the Neti Pot! Here, for your viewing pleasure is that scary, bug-eyed woman Neti-potting her nose, in case you haven’t seen it. The trick is to breathe through your mouth and to keep a box of tissues nearby. Neti Pot is The Answer!!
Twenty minutes pouring warm salt water through my very stuffy schnoz on Sunday morning until both nostrils were clear, and then again Sunday night when I felt as sick and exhausted as a cat left out in a storm, and then again on Monday morning, has left me healthy and fine, while SweetieBang’s cold is settling in his chest for a walrusy cough and more sinus honking — That is my TESTIMONIAL! Amen! But I digress.

Because I have this tiny swelling in my left eyelid I have made sure to
(a) avoid all eye make-up for a few days and
(b) throw out my possibly infected mascara and
(c) clean all my eye make-up brushes, including my eyelash curlers.

Origins makes a fine spray cleaner, but a mild shampoo will do as well. Wash your brushes and applicators in warm, soapy (shampoo-y) water and rinse. Blot on a clean towel, re-shape and lay flat to dry.

If you have a sty (and I’m not sure this is a sty — it’s a very minor swelling that may be a result of rubbing my itchy eyes a lot on Sunday), do NOT share towels and washcloths. Launder pillowcases in hot water and apply a warm compress to the eye when you can.

Neti Pot! Neti Pot! Clean brushes! Health and happiness! Many exclamation points!