Organic Cosmetics Review

Usually, I buy Clinique's foundation because it doesn't break me out, and the color "Petal" is a perfect shade for me. Because of some health problems, I've decided it is best to give my largest organ(my skin) a break from chemicals. I did a bit of internet research and purchased Physicians Formula Organic tinted SPF 15 moisturizer in "Fair to Light" at Target. Amazingly, it moisturized my skin without breaking me out, and the shade is not bad. It's just the tiniest bit chalky, but I can warm it up with a little bronzer or blush. I tend to have a difficult facial shade to match with foundation - I am fair with freckles and a bit peachy/rosy.The foundation is called a "tint", but in my opinion it was much darker than a tint. I liked the way it spread easily and dried quickly with no oily residue. It's also quite a bit less expensive than Clinique.

From the Physician Formula's website:

Organic wear^® is the first ECOCERT^® Certified Organic Line of Makeup in the U.S.
Most Organic wear^® products are certified by ECOCERT^®, an internationally recognized guarantee that environmentally-friendly practices are upheld in all aspects of the product.

All Organic wear^® products are

100% Free of

• Harsh Chemicals
• Synthetic Preservatives
• Parabens
• Synthetic Fragrances
• Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO’s)
• Animal Cruelty

I had some trouble finding the full line of Physician's Formula Organics at Target, so if I want to try some of their other products, I'll probably have to order them online. I'd like to try their lipstick, called lip veil.

My other change has been my lipstick. I usually use Rimmel of London because they have fantastic shades for my skin tone, but I've switched to all natural Burt's Bees tinted lip balms, Lip Shimmers. I purchased raisin(more like dark pink) which goes one well, but like most lip balms, comes off easily. I still like it though, especially the way it moisturizes and tingles from the peppermint. It's a very fresh lipstick, and it was less than $5.00 at Walmart. I actually wanted something with more brown in it, but the raisin color is okay on me for summer. They do have some brown colors I like online: papaya and nutmeg, but I didn't see these at Wallyworld.

That's all I wear out of the house: a little foundation, lipstick, and some blush. I still need to purchase some organic blush.

As I was searching the Burt's Bees website for this post, I noticed that they sell a herbal deodorant with sage as the main ingredient. I've got tons of sage, more than I know what to do with, so now I've got another project - sage deodorant.

Burt's Bees Herbal Deodorant - ingredients: alcohol denat., water, salvia officinalis (sage) leaf extract, lavandula hybrida (lavandin) oil, citrus medica limonum (lemon) peel oil

Easy make at home ingredients. I've got the sage, lavender, and a lemon essential oil.

I already use Lafe's Deodorant Spray, but I love trying new things.


BTW, sage tea is nice...I'm drinking some with a little lemon balm and spearmint leaves fresh from my garden.

Also see: Budget Green (and Safe): Personal Care

Museum Field Trip

We did a museum field trip today to the Chrysler Museum in Norfolk, Virginia. It was free admission today. They have a nice ancient history and 16th-17th century European painting collection, enough to review many highlights of the Old and New Testaments in painting and sculpture. The Greek collection was a perfect complement to my son's readings on Greek myths this week.

We viewed several 16th-17th century paintings of saints : Saint Sebastian with the arrows, Saint Elizabeth, Saint Anthony of Padua, Saint Catherine, Saint Margaret, and a good many of Saint John the Baptist. There were some nice Albrecht Durer wood block etchings of the Jesus's life, paintings of Our Lady, and a small illuminated Book of Hours in the tiny medieval gallery.

We browsed a gallery of Dutch and Flemish paintings showing common everyday scenes with rich details near the end, as attention was waning.

There was a wonderful large painting of Lot(first painting above) and his daughter's fleeing the city of Sodom. We stood in front of this painting for quite a while because it was full of symbolism - lust, deceit, and lecherous folly vs. chastity, virtue, prudence and self-knowledge.

There was another lovely painting which sticks out in my mind, and that was the one of Mary and the baby Jesus surrounded by a garden wall (chastity/purity) where not even the angel enters. He hands her a lily from the other side.

It is a smaller museum, but has a decent collection of art and sculpture. It was a beautiful day, warm and sunny, nice enough to wander through the Victorian garden on our way out of the museum.

Ancient Greek Studies for Middle Elementary

Two new vintage ebooks my son is beginning tomorrow:

The Story of the Greek People By Eva March Tappan, 1909.

The Heroes, or, Greek Fairy Tales for my Children, by Charles Kingsley, 1914.


Both public domain ebooks are free to read and download at Google Books. We load our free ebooks onto a flash drive and then read them on a laptop.

I even got my three year old daughter to read a book online with me today. We read My Book House: In the Nursery by Olive Beaupré Millera, 1920 which has cute illustrations.

Hints and helps:

In order to print or save pictures to your computer, you'll need to switch to the HTML version at the site. Look to the bottom right sidebar. Make sure you right click on the image of the page, or you'll get the entire web page.

I had trouble downloading these books with dial-up, so I use a free download manager which works very well, even with dropped connections.

If you need to return to a main page, click on "review book", and then "about book".