La Poudre, Encore

Come with me my pretties on a little trip down the yellow brick road, in search of magic powder. No, not that kind.

When I first tackled this subject, I'd been trying to get away from liquid foundations, was disenchanted with Bare Essentials, and wanted to minimize my morning maquillage routine. At that point, I thought I'd found true love with T. LeClerc powder, as it worked wonders on my shiny nose and made my pores disappear. But after a while I started to notice that the rest of my face looked, well...powdered, which conjured an image of my own dear grand-mère. Not really the look I was going for.

It was just about that time that Linda Grant posted about her first meeting with Mary Greenwell, and her recommendation for Chanel Teint Innocence cream-to-powder formula. Having had good experiences with Chanel foundations in the past, I gave that a try, and thought I'd found my makeup match. My skin looked smoother and more even, and not powdery. I could use this under my eyes in place of concealer and it didn't settle into the fine lines. It was a match made if not in heaven, then in the makeup department at Saks, which is pretty close. Except that my nose, like a lighthouse beacon gleaming through the most pea-soupish of fogs, always re-emerged triumphant after an hour or so. Touching up with more of the foundation just made it look cakey after a while, so my fickle heart wandered again.

Then, La Belette Rouge mentioned the miracle-in-a-compact she'd found, Jane Iredale. Hoping to strike foundation gold, I dashed out to the nearest beauty supply store carrying Jane Iredale products, and grabbed up a compact and brush. I like the texture of this, it does go on quite invisibly, but I started noticing that I was scratching my forehead periodically, and not in befuddlement over Excel formulas. While I won't say I'm allergic, it made me itch just a little bit. I might have been able to live with that, except that I did notice that over a couple of weeks, my skin was looking drier. Even the D2O spray didn't help.

So back to Chanel I slunk, like a prodigal spouse. But I've bolstered our marriage with some additional help: a compact of Chanel translucent powder, which seems to work well as a touchup to keep my nose from blinding passers by. For now anyway, I'm committed to making this relationship work.