Glowing Up
I don’t think I need to acknowledge that it’s been a weird year for everyone…
but just in case you missed it, let me tell you, this has been a really weird year. It’s easy to get wrapped up in the bad weird things that have happened, but for just this moment, I want to focus on a good weird thing that happened: I finally got a skincare routine!
The author doing one of her favorite things: eating her way through a city.
Yes, I’m thirty. I recognize I probably should have already had some resemblance of a routine to take care of my skin, especially because I’ve been working with Leslie and Elle Landon for almost three years now. The truth is, before quarantine, I was lucky if I remembered to wash my face in the morning, let alone put on my face oil (sorry, Leslie…). I don’t know if it was being stuck at home and seeing my rosacea face in the mirror more often, the extra stress causing some extra breakouts or maybe it was just the need for some structure in all this craziness, but I finally took the time to research some products and invest in ones that made sense for me. It’s nothing that fancy or intricate, but let me tell you where I landed.
For starters, I knew I needed to upgrade from my bar soap face wash. I went looking for something that was good for all skin types—one consequence of never trying any product was having no idea if my skin would be sensitive to certain products. I tried out a few different brands before I landed on Cerave’s Acne Foaming Cream Cleanser. It is fragrance-free, it makes my skin instantly feel velvety, and super bonus—it’s very affordable and available at most major drug stores! This was the first product I implemented, and my breakouts were gone in less than a week. This cleanser has even stood up against the dreaded “mask-ne,” which, in case you haven’t had the pleasure of experiencing this little COVID phenomenon—it’s a tenacious mask-shaped breakout. Cereve has helped with all of it, so I think I’ll stick with it for the foreseeable future.
Next up, I wanted to ditch the Oil of Olay moisturizer because I’d had it since I was teenager. I did weeks of research on this one because, you guys—there are an overwhelming number of options when it comes to moisturizer. First of all, I wondered if I could just use Elle Landon face oil (answer, you can, and I did for a few weeks while I decided). Then I thought, maybe because of my oily skin I should ditch anything with oil (and then I remembered that I knew this was a myth—see previous article). I finally kept seeing the same name pop-up in all of the threads and from several likeable beauty bloggers: Drunk Elephant Protini Polypeptide Moisturizer. People with sensitive skin said it didn’t irritate them. People with oily skin said it lacked any greasy feeling. People with dry skin said it plumped their skin right up. The only problem I kept facing: it felt so expensive to a recently laid-off pastry chef. Upon further review, I heard reports that the cost was worth it because if you’re washing your face twice a day, you’ll likely only have to buy a jar once every five months.
Photo taken from drunkelephant.com
I felt like I was going to drive myself crazy if I looked any longer, so I finally went for it. And consider me on the hype train. My skin feels like an actual baby’s bottom. It’s given me what I now understand to be the “glow up” that people have been hashtagging about—what it really means is just achieving your skin’s best version of itself. And I just ordered my second jar and it was almost exactly five months from when I bought the first one.
The cherry on top has been finally making a habit of utilizing Elle Landon’s face oil. When I was using it solo, my skin was just craving a little extra throughout the day (which wasn’t a huge deal honestly, I just reapplied two or three times). Since I’ve gotten the Protini moisturizer, I use my face oil as the last step and not only does it have a gentle and delightful smell, but it secures the work of the previous two products. Until the end of the day—I was going to say until the end of the work day, but you would have called my bluff there—my skin feels like I just washed it and like I’m ready for portrait-mode.
Photo of the author’s dresser, featuring her favorite face oil.
I’ve been doing this three-step routine since April, and I feel super about it. I recognize that my routine might not be the most thrilling to some real connoisseurs, but maybe you’ve been thinking about Protini and now give it a shot, or maybe you weren’t quite sure where Elle Landon fit into your routine, and now you feel less intimidated to incorporate into your skincare regimen. Or maybe my little story will inspire you to do something you’ve been meaning to do for ten years and have just been putting off.