My emailbox is out to get me.

Is everyone else going insane from all the sales notices in their emailboxes? Or is it just me?

Between the sales notices and the cookies on my laptop (that appear to keep all of my selections permanently in every shopping cart I ever use on line), I've stumbled across some nice markdowns this weekend. I'm putting these up here in case anyone has something on their list that they'd like to order tonight.  Which, OK, is the next ten minutes. Anyway, this is where I was shopping.

J. Crew 

 

J. Crew's Bling Button cardigan, marked down from $72 to $59 to $41

I thought I'd missed out on a great J. Crew deal, because they were offering 25 percent off for Black Friday. At that point, I loaded up my shopping cart with some cute cardigans for my daughter, and then forgot to pull the trigger. Well, I went back to the site to discover that this weekend's sale--using the WINTER coupon code--was even better, with 30 percent off.

At the moment, it's back down to 25 percent off and free shipping.

Honestly, trying to keep up with on line deals is like telling time by looking at the second hand of a clock.

All I know is I got myself some button downs and my daughter the Bling Button cardigan for $41, marked down from $72.

Carson Pirie Scott

Carson's is offering 25 percent off everything in the store, and 10 percent off Beauty and Fragrance, with code FRIFAMNOV12. If you're interested in the Estee Lauder seasonal blockbuster or the Michael Kors/Estee Lauder collaboration, this is a good way to get it. 

This set features a cosmetics bag from Michael Kors, a compact blush with 3 shades of Pure Color Blush, a Pure Color Lipstick, a Pure Color Lipgloss, a Sumptuous Mascara, Intense Kajal Eyeliner and Pure Color Nail Color.

The Michael Kors set is available in three different colors, but each color is offered only by certain stores. Check out this post by GWP Addict for details.

Also, costume jewelry is on sale, which meant that I could pick out a cute Betsey Johnson necklace for my daughter.

Bloomingdale's 

OK, this is when it really got crazy. There was a combination of

• Free shipping on all on-line sales
• Loyalists receive double points
• Buy more/save more (10 to 30 percent off Women's, Men's, Home, Fashion Jewelry)
• Some kind of code they emailed me (X40936A7VCRK) for $25 off a purchase of $100 or more.

So I bought a bunch of clothes for my son--and a little wine cellar for Mr. Buxom--but you don't want to hear about them. I also picked up the Estee Lauder Blockbuster, because Santa likes to add these little goodies to the stockings she stuffs.

Estee Lauder's holiday blockbuster--better pictures and description available on Chic Profile.

Honestly, all I know is that it seems impossible to keep track of all these deals. It's worse than airline frequent flyer programs. All I know is that if I ever pay full retail for anything ever again, you can give me a good hard, internet spanking.

Merry Christmas shopping to all, and to all a good night!
 

Shopping and eating and *not* working out, or, several deadly sins

Internet! Thanks for all the compliments and good wishes. I wish I could return the favor by continuing to be inspiring, but today was about self-indulgence. One might even say today was about full-on sinning.

First, there was my appalling sloth. Please note the time in this loving exchange I had this morning with Mr. Buxom. (I'm the one in blue.)

Following breakfast, I indulged in some avarice.

I recently decided that the Gap Essential Scoop Neck tee is my favorite style.

The cotton is substantial, it shows enough clavicle to keep me from looking like Mae West in an inflatable life jacket, and it's a lot cheaper than the Nordstrom and Talbot's tee-shirts that are cluttering up my drawers.

So I decided to buy some--in black, gray, and white. It occurred to me that I had a pile of Gap Card Rewards to use up. Then it turned out that the Gap was having its friend and Families sale and everything in the store was 30 percent off.  What with my gift cards and the discount and the free shipping for purchases over $50, I ended up scoring seven $14.95 tee-shirts for $24.70. And I chortled like some crazy combination of Becky Bloomwood and Ebenezer Scrooge as I realized I had paid a bit more than 3.00 a shirt.

Then I took my daughter shopping because she needs a long dress for a formal dance she'll be going to later this month. We did very well at Bloomingdale's, where a sale was in progress. She tried on six dresses and looked stunning in every single one. Honestly, if I tried on six evening dresses and looks that good in all of them, I'd drag Mr. Buxom to every black tie event in Chicago. At any rate, she picked out one that I can't find anywhere, but it's lovely and age-appropriate and I was filled with maternal pride.

Say hello to Blue Blood

After helping my daughter in and out of so many dresses, I celebrated by stopping by the Estee Lauder counter, because some of the new nail polish shades filled me with an ungovernable lust. 

and Viper

Of course, I don't need to go into detail about the dinner I ate when I got home, right? Red wine, crackers with blue cheese, Korean spicy Sashimi, and the Hot Night Roll? Not to mention the Starbucks Peppermint Mocha and the birthday cake pop?

Trust me; it was a symphony in greed.

Luckily for me, tomorrow is another day!

p.s. A word to the wise: did you know that a Starbucks Cake Pop has 170 calories? It's so tiny and so caloric, you might as well be eating fudge.

What does "tinted moisturizer" mean to you?

I realize that all I seem to do these days is whine, but bear with me.

I've been on the road a lot lately, having driven with Mr. Buxom to a very remote part of New York to watch our kids perform in a production of Les Miserables.

(Idiotic aside: I'm sure the reaction to seeing your 14-year-old dressed as a whore for the Lovely Ladies number isn't supposed to be "OMG she's adorable!")

Eventually we'll be home, and the painters will leave, and I'll be through with Phase 1 of the South Beach Diet, and I'll cheer up.

Meanwhile, everything makes me cranky.

Like Estee Lauder. There was a time when I wrote Estee Lauder off as a cosmetics company for Old Ladies. But then they came out with Idealist. And Resilience Lift moisturizer. And DayWear tinted moisturizer. And I unbent and bought them. And they were good.

But. These excellent skincare products are no longer available in their original state. Idealist has been new-and-improved until it's unrecognizable. The same thing goes for Resilience Lift, once my absolutely favorite daytime moisturizer.

And now Estee Lauder has reformulated my beloved DayWear tinted moisturizer. Which is maddening, because in the last three years, I've probably gone through three tubes of the stuff.

The original came in different shades, was light, moisturizing, and so sheer that color matching wasn't an issue.

The replacement is this stuff with encapsulated bronzing beads in it. It's a very pale cream, but when you rub it on your face, the bronzing beads burst and add a tint. Which makes me look like an Oompah Loompah.

I've been searching for a replacement. So far I've popped for the famous Laura Mercier product, which isn't moisturizing enough for my middle-aged skin. The shade I was "color-matched" for is kind of off.

I also tried the Chanel Hydramax version. It smells pleasant and seems OK, but again, the color is slightly off.

Why is this so difficult? I always thought that tinted moisturizers were moisturizers with just a hint of tint. Like, say, what would happen if you took your SPF moisturizer and mixed in a little foundation. Which would keep the titanium dioxide from making you look super pale, and provide a little coverage to even your complexion. How do I know this? Believe it or not, back in the olden days, I used to do this myself.  I know, I know--it's the makeup equivalent of baking my own bread. But it worked because the foundation I started with was already a good match for my skin.

To my way of thinking, the tint in a tinted moisturizer isn't supposed to be a bronzer. And when you use a tinted moisturizer, you shouldn't have to worry about a demarcation line at the jaw. The tint should be so small a proportion of the product that you shouldn't be able to see where it leaves off and your neck begins.

The stuff I keep buying seems suspiciously like foundation. OK, it's not  What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? full-coverage spackle. But it's not really tinted moisturizer.

Am I completely off base?

And does anyone have any product recommendations?

30 Days to 10 years younger--10 minute tips. Tip 17: Be a brownie

You might be wondering why on earth Pamela Anderson is doing in a blog post aimed at beauty and style for women of a certain age. Well, duh, I'm using her as an example of what not to do. And I'm not going after her super-thin eyebrows and super-obvious implants. I'm going after her eyelashes.

Mascara has become like a Model T Ford--you can have any color you want, as long as it's black. Which is OK, as long as you think everyone looks best in black mascara. Unfortunately, I don't.

Black mascara is lovely at night, but for broad daylight, I find it a bit stark and artificial looking. If you're blonde, redhead, or like me, an aging brunette, you'll probably look better in a softer shade of brown/black or brown. In fact, if you're a redhead, you'll probably look best in auburn--if you can find it anywhere.

Unfortunately, most drugstore mascaras only come in black, super-plus-blackest-black, and black/brown. I checked L'Oreal, CoverGirl, Maybelline, and Revlon, and the story was almost always the same.

There are drugstore brands that offer brown mascara, but you have to dig pretty deep. Almay has at least one mascara available in brown.

For years, Max Factor was the only line with a mascara for redheads; unfortunately they're leaving the States. The mascara is still available at Drugstore.com, though. And Revlon's DoubleTwist line includes a shade called Blackened Ruby that looks auburn.

Fortunately, the latest fad in drugstore mascaras appears to be ones that emphasize the color of your eyes. Physician's Formula sells a brown mascara, and in addition, their intensive i-color mascara and intense i-color mascara with light interplay both claim to intensify eye-color. They're available in four shades. CoverGirl sells a similar line.

Department store lines offer a wider variety of mascara shades: Estee Lauder has several formulas that come in brown and and even navy blue; MAC has some browns, and so does Lancôme. (Lancôme also sells specialty mascaras, like gold and silver. But that's not the point of this post.)

Boutique brands like Jane Iredale, BeneFit, and Sephora offer mascaras in a variety of interesting shades. In fact, if you go to the Sephora website and do a search for "brown mascara," you'll discover that there are plenty of options.

The trick is to not go crazy. Colored mascara can be fun, but it's not something to wear if you want to be taken seriously. For proof, remember Princess Diana and her blue eyeliner and matching eyelashes. I'll confess to having developed a certain degree of fascination with colored mascaras, and I'm trying like crazy not to succumb to Yves St. Laurent Fascinating Violet or the Benefit BadGAL in Plum.

I remember the 80s and I don't think the world has yet recovered from my experiments with Princess Di-style cobalt blue.

Or my Two-Faced glitter lashes in the 90s when seriously? I was old enough to know better.

But while I busy myself locking up my credit cards and backing away from the Sephora website, I urge you to think about whether the black mascara you've been wearing for years and years is actually doing you any favors. Or could you, like the women pictured here, benefit from a softer look around the eyes?

Elsewhere:

The Beauty Blog has a great post on mascaras for redheads here.

Did you know that there is a beauty blog devoted to mascara? There is. It's called Clumps of Mascara. Currently on hiatus, but still packed with useful reviews. Click here.