Smells like love: Back by popular demand, today we have a wonderful deep-discount deal from Essence of the Vali. This offer is our favorite kind: a site-wide reduction for our readers that lets you buy whatever your little heart desires. But with all the beating hearts just around the corner for Valentines Day you may want to check out the Passion gift set: a spicy-sweet combination of some of our favorites oils (notably Ylang Ylang, citrus, ginger… yum!). Gift it, ask for it, or treat yourself!
Onto the deal! Get any of your favorite scents, mists, and oils from Essence of the Vali for a whole 20% off when you use the promo code NMDL. Wham bam. Going through until next Thursday at midnight.
And if you ordered from E of V last time, be sure to drop a comment telling us and fellow readers what you liked (or didn’t). As most of you know, we are not the only reviewers with opinions on this site!
We hope you had a wonderful week. We did. Alexandra made a speed trip to New York for work, so us girls got to have a night of fun with some of our favorite friends. Let’s put it this way… we didn’t exactly wake up the next day looking like this, but it was well worth it. Here’s to a restful weekend.
Some of you may recall this popular GOOD post from my darling cowriter Siobhan. But because we have so many new readers (welcome!), and some of you are indeed men (yay! welcome!), and also because a few of you specifically requested a repost, voila: the original post for the boys (and the women who love them). Have you (or your boyfriends, besties, husbands) tried these recommends? Coming soon: A real-live guy will review his favorite boysturizers.
Gentlemen, listen up. Whether you think you do or not, most of you use an average of six personal care products a day, which sounds like a lot until you get out your fingers and count: Deodorant, shampoo, cologne, and shaving cream all count—and so does the moisturizer you steal from your girlfriend. With each of these products containing anywhere from 10 to 40 unique ingredients, it’s worth your while to think about what it is you’re actually using every day, and whether those products are even doing your looks any favors—especially when some of it is so toxic it’s getting fines for air pollution in the state of California.
When, in February 2010, Axe Body Spray’s parent company was fined $1.3 million for air pollution, it sounded like an Onionesque joke. Except that it wasn’t, because in California, progressive environmental laws limit the amount of certain chemicals used in consumer products. According to the California Air Resources Board, the fragrance was in violation of the volatile organic compound limits for aerosol deodorant.
So here’s a primer on the stuff in your everyday products, plus what brands and products to buy instead. If you don’t want to do it for the planet, or yourself, do it for your sperm.
Cologne: Most conventional colognes (and “body sprays”) contain a host of synthetic chemicals that can affect your little swimmers. Phthalate metabolites in male urine was shown in several studies to be linked to sperm DNA damage, a lower sperm count, and less mobile sperm. Unfortunately for all of us, synthetic fragrance is used in just about every conventional product on the shelves of pharmacies and Sephoras, so weeding it out can be a bit of a bear. That said, naturals have gotten really sophisticated, and there are countless lines that are either synthetics-free or at least phthalate- and petrochemical free. Diptyque, a high-end candle and fragrance line, makes gorgeous scents for men (and women) that are paraben-, petrochemical-, and phthalate-free. Intelligent Nutrients, Tsi-La, and Honoré des Près also make amazing woodsy fragrances for guys.
Deodorant and Antiperspirant: Most antiperspirants and deodorant contain some if not all of the following: triclosan, aluminum salts, BHT, penetration enhancers, and artificial fragrance. Many of these are problematic from an environmental perspective, and none of them are good for your health. And yet deodorant is a must for modern living, so try a natural one from Soapwalla, a small Brooklyn company that sells on Etsy, which makes a unisex deodorant cream that works like a charm. For store-bought, look for Tom’s of Maine long-lasting deodorant, which is relatively clean and can be found at most drugstore chains.
Shaving Cream: Besides the propellants and butane in many shaving creams, there is also diazolidinyl urea, which is a formaldehyde releaser, triethanolamine, which is often contaminated with carcinogenic nitrosamines, parabens, which are weak estrogen mimickers, and synthetic fragrance. (See the slide on cologne for a reminder on why that’s not desirable for your health.) Instead, we recommend using organic oils, such as olive or coconut, if you can get past the whole oil-on-face thing. For a store-bought option, try Dr. Bronner’s Organic Shave Gel, which is 100 percent free of synthetics. If you break out, get the one with tea tree oil. Weleda also has a nice one.
Aftershave: Most aftershave contains alcohol, the toxicity of which is less a concern than the fact that it can dry out your face when it needs moisture. Cold water is sufficient to close your pores, and a nice organic cologne is a better bet if you are using aftershave as your cologne. Fill up the sink with cold water and put in a few drops of a woodsy scent like cedar, or something minty if that’s more your speed, and splash your face with that instead. That said, if you like the antiseptic sting of alcohol (who doesn’t, really?) go for a natural alternative with other ingredients to soothe your skin. Jurlique’s Calendula Lotion is soothing on freshly shaved skin, and so is pure aloe. For a splurge, Living Nature, which is an amazing line out of New Zealand, has a great one with antibacterial manuka honey, soothing calendula, and witch hazel, and Dr. Hauschka’s spray-on toner is another favorite.
Shampoo and Conditioner: Our scalps are one of the most porous parts of our bodies, and are easily penetrated by the products we lather onto them—which is counterintuitive, because we tend to think of hair as something separate from our skin, and we think shampoo must wash down the drain too quickly to do any harm. Not so. Shampoos and conditioners are both loaded with skin-, earth- and hair-unfriendly ingredients that dry out our locks, necessitating more products, like leave-ins. Instead, try a sodium laurel/laureth sulfate-free shampoo that won’t lather like a traditional one, but gets the job done without stripping your hair. Alaffia, Giovanni, and Aubrey’s all make nice affordable clean shampoos and conditioners. On the higher end, you can’t beat John Masters Organics. If you have dandruff, find a natural shampoo with tea tree or neem oil, or get JMO’s Zinc and Sage Shampoo With Conditioner.
Moisturizer: Whether it’s your body or your mug you’re slathering in cream, this is an important one to make sure is clean—mainly because you probably use it daily (which ups exposure to whatever is in there) and over a large surface area. Instead of a 30-ingredient lotion filled with silicones, penetration enhancers, fake fragrance, and petroleum derivatives, go for something simpler like a pure body oil (coconut from the health food store works well), or pure aloe vera. For a store-bought lotion for your body (and your face, if you aren’t picky or prone to breakouts) Everyday Shea lotion from Whole Foods is just over $10 for 32 ounces. Dr. Bronner’s, which is also shea-based, is another affordable all-over lotion. For your face, there’s the high-end Dr. Alkaitis, which is a unisex celebrity favorite, and Organic Apoteke, which is light and doesn’t smell like girls.
Read other posts from our GOOD series here.
I am such a sucker for a good eye cream. I’ve already professed my love for Kahina Giving Beauty’s, which smells like Oil of Olay (in a very good way) but better, and is packed with good-for-you argan oil. I’ve reviewed La Bella Figura’s serum, which seems to erase undereye circles and puffiness like nothing I’ve used before, perhaps thanks to barbary fig seed oil. I also told you about Skincando’s Eye Balm, which is just incredibly hydrating.
Now I’m going to tell you about my new favorite toy: Sevani’s Eye Repair Creme.
I’ve been using it pretty steadily for about 5 weeks now, and while the smile lines around my eyes are here to stay (and thank god, honestly—we both love smile lines), I have noticed that my undereyes look and feel more hydrated. We’re not talking about some overnight oh-my-god miracle, but a subtle and meaningful difference nonetheless. The edges of my eyes seem a little plumped thanks to the hyaluronic acid, and I’m holding out hope that the peptides and the Q10—a promising antiager we wrote about in the book—may be doing some long-term good as well. Actives aside, there are some really lovely oils and extracts that are packed with antioxidants and have some nice data on them for their skin-friendliness and antiaging properties.
I have yet to get my hands on Sevani’s other eye treatment—a serum with a lovely ingredient list—but it’ll be on my list of things to try. Well, maybe. I have a serious crush on this one for now. We’ll see when (and if) I’m ready to move on…
Have you tried another you like? And do you, like me, share a love of eye cream?
Ingredients: *Aloe vera juice, avocado fruit oil, sunflower seed oil, cetearyl olivate (and) sorbitan olivate (olive derived), evening primrose oil, vegetable glycerin, gotu kola extract, green tea extract, olive squalane, leuconostoc/radish root ferment filtrate (all-natural preservative), caffeine, hyaluronic acid (mushroom derived), acetyl hexapeptide-8, retinyl palmitate, licorice root extract, ubiquinone (co-enzyme Q10), rosehip seed oil, xanthan gum, *pomegranate extract, *rose damascene extract, *sacred lotus blossom extract, *neroli blossom extract, *red tea extract & *neem leaf extract. (*certified organic)
Last night over a glass of wine, my friend announced he was on day 1 (and take 2) of a new diet. Well, not a diet, exactly, and I’m paraphrasing here, but he said something to the effect of: “When I cut out dairy, processed sugar and wheat, I wake up every day feeling better than I’ve ever felt in my life.”
Gah. I want to feel like that! Who doesn’t want to feel like that, frankly. But I don’t, and I notice it most when I first wake up in the morning.
Do most people wake up feeling awesome? Seriously?
The thing is, I would wager that most of us know exactly what we need to do to feel our best.
- We know how much sleep we need *
- We can list the foods we digest most easily **
- We can identify the habits that make us feel like garbage and, in theory anyway, we could not do those things ***
- We know what kind of exercise our body craves ****
- We understand who make us feel all happy and glowy *****
I certainly do, I just don’t always do it—and how boring would life be if I did. (That’s what I tell myself, anyway—which might be part of the problem?) The truth is, I am a sucker for a good time, I’m pretty spontaneous, but I’m also someone who feels best when I stick to a routine. Because as anyone over the age of 30 knows, good times often come at a cost. And that feeling of waking up totally rested and relaxed? You can’t beat it. So I’m going to embark on a mission to have more mornings like that, and fewer when I wake up with a four-letter word in my head just because the alarm went off.
Now tell us, and be brutally honest, please: Do you wake up every day feeling refreshed? If so, I am jealous, but I want to know your secrets. Share, share.
* 8 hours
** Vegetables, cooked or raw, gluten-free grains, some fish, yummy good fats
*** I’m not telling
**** Vigorous yoga, hiking, boot camp drills in the park
***** You know who you are, and I thank you!
image via
A couple of months ago Siobhan reviewed her favorite new lipstick from Ilia, then I told you about it again when I was playing Mad Men dress up. But I’m getting the feeling that we haven’t quite expressed just how obsessed we are with this brand.
First there are the colors. I’m personally wild for Bang Bang, but there’s something for everyone, from pretty blushing pinks to a deep and gorgeous burgundy. Then there’s the texture, which is ridiculously hydrating, and yet the color still lasts.
Last but not least, there is Sasha Plavsic: the beautiful, cool Canadian founder of Ilia who we feel like we’ve known forever from some distant Degrassi past. She has created a natural brand that competes with the Macy’s counter, and Well+Good is talking to her about it. But first, have you tried Ilia? Which color works best for you (include your skin tone!)?
From Well+Good:
“I wanted to make a natural lipstick that could sit next to NARS at the beauty counter and inspire women to reach for it whether they were natural-leaning or not,” says Sasha Plavsic.
And Plavsic, a package-design maven turned beauty formulator, did just that when she launched Ilia Pure Lip Care last summer.
Skipping ingredients like petrochemicals and the ever-elusive fragrance, Ilia lipsticks are 85 percent organic but have the look and feel of a traditional luxe brand (but are significantly less drying).
The line quickly became a cult favorite, even outside natural circles. That’s great news considering the toxic lineage of lip products.
Talk about inspiring. Many of you participated in our Fruit and Veggie Challenge, and your stories read like a resounding WOW.
You guys felt amazing! Many of you were more energized, less bloated, experienced fewer food comas, had better digestion, and even saw a perceptible difference in the quality of your skin tone (that famous veggie glow!).
Some of you were already on the fruit-and-veggie tip but still seemed to appreciate the extra kick. Excitingly though, not all of you started out as big plant-based food fans, so it was especially cool to hear about the changes you noticed and how much you enjoyed the challenge.
As promised, there is a prize for one lucky winner. We reached out to Sarah Britton over at My New Roots, one of our favorite food blogs, to see if she had any plant-based cookbooks to recommend.
She told us that one of her favorites is Enlightened Eating by Caroline Dupont, so our intern Sylvie got ahold of Caroline who was kind enough to donate the book along with her DVD to our lucky winner.
And the winner is…
Sydney Skillen, of Middlebury, Indiana.
We didn’t pick out of a hat this time, but actually chose Sydney because she told us this was a tough challenge for her, but she noticed positive changes and wants to keep it up. So as a new convert to a heavily plant-based diet, we thought this would be good encouragement. Sydney, we will email you with more details!
As for the rest of you, thank you so much for participating. We currently have a big challenge in the works and we’re hoping that this one will actually have a prize for everyone… Because we’re all going to Australia!! Just kidding. But it’s going to be really awesome.
Happy Meatless Monday!
OK I guess that makes it more of a happy Friday for us, but still. We have buttons! To share and to tweet and to like—they now automatically show up at the bottom of our posts, because the nice guy Josh who helps us with this kind of stuff installed them there.
It’s a bit nuts that it took us this long to up our tech game, but there you have it. Please share, tweet and like stuff at your leisure (some of you already have, woot!), and feel free to go back through old posts and blow them out to everyone you know. Just kidding. :)
There’s no deal today, but if I’m not mistaken, we have an encore from Essence of the Vali next week, which is really exciting. It’s been a fun, hairy, and interactive week here in the land of no dirty, so scroll down if you’re just showing up today.
When my insomnia hit the other night, I did everything wrong.
I’d managed to work myself up about something before bed, but because I have the stamina of a toddler when I’m upset, I tired myself out quickly and crashed hard around 11:30pm. Then, at 4:30am, my brain went on like a light. There I was, in that strange time when “tonight” becomes “tomorrow” and the last thing in the world you should be doing is witnessing it. (Unless of course you’re doing something really fun—which I wasn’t. I was lying there with looping thoughts, the lights on, a search window open on my laptop, and Twitter fired up on my phone…)
We have written plenty about sleep hygiene here. We polled you once to find out how much you sleep (a lot!); we asked you guys to share your bedtime rituals with us (they were great!); we’ve explored how sleep can help your looks (duh); and we’ve covered ayurvedic principles about sleep before, as well.
But isn’t it funny (dumb) that no matter how much you know about the Right Thing To Do for your wellbeing, it’s often exactly when you need that advice the most that it escapes you?
With that in mind, here’s a primer, filled with things you already know, on the best and worst things to do when you can’t sleep. Obviously this advice is highly subjective. Where appropriate, we’ve mentioned some actual science to back us up. And, as always, we want your tips in the comments.
The Bad
1. Tweeting, emailing, checking your stocks, approving comments on your blog etc. Research shows that light-emitting devices can suppress the production of the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin—which means when you wake up to check your cell, or simply have it on blinking at you from the bedside table, you’re sending signals to your brain that it isn’t time to chill out. Turn them off, use airplane mode, or put them on the other side of the room. When you wake up, try your best not to check them.
2. Watching scary TV shows. I can’t watch scary things at night anymore without getting nightmares and waking up a lot. Granted I’m on the sensitive side (cough), but there is good research that shows how disruptive this can be. It can spike stress hormones in the body and put you in an excited state (not the good kind) that doesn’t bode well for rest. Some people can watch anything before bed and fall asleep, but if you wake up in the middle of the night and decide to flip on the tube, maybe don’t try to catch up on a season’s worth of Boardwalk Empire?
3. Turning on the light. This actually can be a good thing (see below), but in general, if you wake up and have to pee or you stand a chance of falling back asleep fairly quickly, don’t turn on the lights or lift up your black-out blinds. (You all have black-out blinds, right? If not, you should! They’re super cheap at Ikea and make a world of difference.) For the same reasons you want to avoid electronics, you also want to avoid turning on the lights: It tells your brain that it’s time to be awake by suppressing sleep hormones. Pas bon.
4. Drinking booze. We’ve all seen the research about nightcaps actually disrupting sleep, and here’s why: It robs you of REM and the other, deeper stages of sleep—which are the ones that make you feel most rested. A glass or two of wine can make you feel nice and relaxed, and that can be sleep-promoting, but drinking too close to bedtime (not to mention in the middle of the night) should probably be avoided.
5. Just lying there freaking out. If you’re past the point of no return—meaning you can just tell you won’t be falling back asleep any time soon—do something else. You can go ahead and break rule number 3 here. Get up and do something, anything, until you feel sleepy again.
The Good
1. A cup of herbal tea or some aromatherapy. Many herbs—chamomile, lavender, valerian root—have been shown in research (and by wise grandmothers) to make you sleepy. Similarly, jasmine has a sedative effect when inhaled, as do Hope Gillerman’s Sleep Remedy and Essence of Vali’s. Just be sure to do your research and/or check with your doctor before you start dosing yourself. Nature makes some very powerful plants
2. Reading something you’ve read before. This works wonders for me. A yogi and a nerdy scholar at heart, I have been rereading The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali for years now. Here’s why it works: When you read things you are already familiar with, it doesn’t stimulate your mind with new information the way an exciting novel or a piece of nonfiction would. In fact, it has the opposite effect of comforting you with information you already possess, and, well, kind of boring you.
3. Meditate. A tough sell at 4am, I know, but it helps quiet the mind and ready you for more sleep. Our tips are here—and the compassion meditation is an especially nice one to do because it puts your focus on people you love. You could also try listening to recordings of meditations by Pema Chodron (or someone else, but man is she good). You can break rule number 1, above, for this one, obviously.
4. Do some yoga. Nothing too vigorous, but some poses have been shown to promote sleepiness. There’s a nice list over here.
5. Wake up your buddy and chat and/or have sex. This requires a forgiving and generous significant other, but if you have one, and you know they won’t mind hearing what’s on your mind and helping you simmer down, this can be very helpful. As for sex, just bear in mind that for some people, sex is sleep inducing (for example, every single man who ever walked the earth*) and for others it’s sleep inhibiting.
6. Pretend it’s already tomorrow. If you’re really stuck, try pretending it’s not 4am but 8am and it’s time to get ready for work or school. Take a shower, brush your teeth, drink some water—but be sure to skip the coffee. It sounds nuts but this has worked for me! At some point, when you’re going through the motions, something in your mind will click and you’ll think: “This is totally insane. I should be asleep right now.” And then maybe, just maybe, you will be.
Your turn! What are your tips: What’s the best—and worst—things one can do when one can’t sleep?
Image via
* I kid! Sort of.
Thank you all for being so patient with our first Quarterly mailing. We are thrilled to see that you have started receiving your packages and if Twitter is any indication (and let’s be honest, it usually is) you all seem happy so far!
Maybe, then, you would like to tweet about it with the hashtag #NDL01? I mean, if you feel like it. Bonus points if you also include a link to our site.
Kisses and hugs
S & A
Image used without permission (oh hey!) but with thanks, via
You know how it goes. One day you’re driving in your car, or the sun comes through the bathroom window. You catch your reflection and there it is: an honest-to-goodness mustache. Not just a little lady stache anymore, but in the right light something closer to the dirty lip you wish teenage boys would shave much sooner than they ever do.
The truth is I’ve been ignoring this Frida Kahlo situation—though truly, has any woman ever looked so beautiful with a mustache?—because I just don’t know what to do. So let’s review the options, shall we? And by golly, tell me what you or your fuzzy friends do too.
Plucking/Threading. My greatest concern is that I’m always accidentally plucking my little blonde hairs, and someone once told me that would make them dark. True or false?
Waxing. I’ve never really understood waxing. It kills, it gives people red bumps (or worse, as a commenter told us yesterday—actually, thanks for the idea for this post Moksha!—break out), the hair grows back funny, and you have to wait until it fully comes in to do it again. Oh, and it’s expensive! Am I missing something here? I know people say over time you have less hair, but that’s taken years for the folks I know, and even my sister—who was a die-hard leg waxer since the age of 13—eventually got fed up and started shaving.
Bleaching. Remember Jolen? Cause I do. I loved that stuff. And thanks to that scene from Reality Bites (remember, she’s going on her first date with Ben Stiller and almost forgets to wipe it off? lol), I actually thought mustache bleaching was kind of cool. Alas, it’s not clean. But should I make an exception in this case? Or will my blonde lip look even sillier? Probably can’t know without trying, but I’m totally afraid of what will happen to my newly sensitive clean-girl skin if I do. Could be rash-o-rama.
Laser. I’ve done it on my legs in the past and the hair stopped growing back for several years. Of course, then I didn’t realize how dangerous numbing cream is (actually deadly in two reported cases, though surely used in some insane excess). But here’s the thing: I know someone who got seriously burned from laser while doing her upper lip and it took ages to heal. And lots of light treatments and ointments and stuff. This friend has extremely pale and sensitive skin, but there’s always a risk. And it’s a big risk when it’s on your face.
Am I missing some other elusive option? What do you do with your lady lip hair?
