Facial Care Treats

What better way to treat yourself than with a yummy new natural facial care product! I just picked myself up an Organic Jojoba & Mint Facial by Kiss My Face and it sure brightened my day!
The name sounds like it’s a treatment you’d get at an expensive spa, but it’s actually a very gentle facial scrub with a nice minty smell that leaves your face tingling all over! Love it!!

If money were no object, I’d have a bathroom cupboard FULL of all the fabulous, natural facial care products out there. But since money does not grow on trees (at least where I live), I find myself searching for the best affordable, high quality, good-for-you-and-the-planet products around. Truth is, if it’s over $20, I probably won’t be buying it – and if I do, it’s a big splurge.

Thankfully, there is no shortage of reasonably priced, naturally based facial care lines and because they are so popular, you don’t always have to go to Whole Foods or your local coop to find them anymore.

Here are a few of my faves:

• Alba Botanica Sea Moss Moisturizer with SPF 15.
Been using it for years – the light, outdoorsy scent is OK by my husband so he uses it too! The price went up recently to about $13 for a 2-oz tube but that’s still a good deal in my book. I recently tried their Sea Lettuce Cleansing Milk and love that too. Not sure what sea lettuce does for my face though.

• Grassroots is a good line that I discovered awhile back at Kohl’s stores of all places. No animal testing, decent ingredients and great essential oil based fragrances. The Happily Ever After Moisture Cream with SPF 15 is rich, but not greasy (perfect for my dry skin) and has a nice, light citrusy scent that is not at all overpowering. Cost is $16 for 1.7 oz but you’d be a fool to pay full price since there is almost always some type of sale going on. The Feast Your Eyes eye balm is a nice product too.

• Burt’s Bees is a classic, naturally based line with very concentrated products so you don’t need to use much at a time. They have a new Radiance line of facial care cremes made with Royal Jelly (from bees of course!) that I haven’t tried yet.

• Queen Helene Mint Julep Facial Scrub is a really cheap ($4) but nice scrub that is a staple in my shower and works great on elbows too!

If I had buckets of disposable income, here’s what I’d be buying:

• Dr. Hauschka - Incredible pure, rich and concentrated products made from sustainably sourced, organic ingredients. About $40 an ounce but a little goes a long way.

• Zia Cosmetics - Their Fresh Papaya Enzyme Peel is very unique and leaves your skin feeling SO smooth.

• Pangea Organics - Exotic sounding ingredients like Egyptian Fennel, Malagasy Ylang Ylang and Blood Orange. Haven’t tried it yet myself but would love to.

• Nature’s Gate Organics - A relatively new line with lots of anti-aging products that I should probably be thinking about as my 40 something birthday approaches…

So pick yourself up a facial care treat sometime soon - go on, you deserve it!

Comments

[suzannes]

I love all of the brands that Micaela mentioned especially ZIA, they have a great sunscreen just for the face that I wear everyday. I also officially hate all of these brands with the exception of Burt's Bees because of their packaging! It's all plastic and very little of it is recyclable or made from post consumer recycled content. Burt's Bees uses lots of glass and aluminum packaging and when they do use plastic, it is recycled plastic with a minimum of at least 30% post consumer recycled plastic. I think how products are packaged are at least as important as what's in them. I encourage everyone when reading labels to also look for info. about the packaging. Choose products that are minimally packaged and are easily recycled (glass is the easiest) or use recycled post consumer plastic, cardboard or glass etc. I use mostly Burt's Bees products or other products that come in glass containers with the exception of my much loved ZIA sunscreen. I also look for body products and face products that come in larger re-fill containers (like my Desert Essence Thoroughly Clean Face Wash) or can be purchased in bulk with a reused container (like my Nature's Gate Herbal Original Moisturizing Lotion). I think if we as consumers vote with our dollars for better packaging, we will get better packaging and we can reduce what goes into the waste stream to the landfill.

[Micaela]

Great comment Suzanne. I too am bummed about the packaging issue. When I first started using Alba Botanica face lotion, years and years ago, it was sold in a plain plastic bottle (not sure about recycled content), with no other packaging. Then they got all fancy and added a cardboard box. They also went for a smaller bottle and of course, the price per ounce went up! I was working in the body care industry at the time and it was clear that they wanted to compete with the upscale look of all the other brands that were jumping on the 'natural' bandwagon. I complained, but without luck. Oh well! Good point about voting with your dollar though - I need to be better about finding products that I can refill at the coop.

[Katie Hallison]

Women often use natural treatments! They just love the effect of such products on their skin. However, there are others who prefer to undergo unnatural procedures like skin rejuvenation and botox. Those are probably the fastest ways to achieve younger looking skin. Science deals with nature too, but everything just keeps on getting better and better!