Funny story to start off this week’s challenge.

Sandy and Sharon are two beautiful women living in the beautiful and so peaceful Sarasota Bay-Florida. They will never be friends…no way, they both have a huge crush on Steve. Steve is a hip and handsome plastic surgeon whose only focus is his patients. One little facelift here, some nice implants there….result of the story, his love life was DOA!

Fall finally showing off its fresher and cool evenings, parties where scheduled in the nicest places for all trendy agendas to mingle. Sandy and Sharon jumped on the wonderful opportunity to catch Steve in their net.

The chill lounge was there, they were sure to see him, cross him, and to get THE opportunity of their life…

Getting all pampered for a final touch up in the ladies room, both Sandy and Sharon went for the final touch, lipstick!

Sandy chose a classic deep glossy red lipstick she bought on University Parkway while Sharon chose a nice deep orange lipstick made with natural wax and vegetal oils she bought downtown.

During the evening, Sharon was unremittingly visiting the powder room to apply more orange lipstick on her lips. Of course, natural oils and pigments don’t stay on the lips forever!

Sandy took the opportunity to tackle Steve, pretty fast, the man succumbed to these full proof red lips. Sandy is getting closer, their lips are now skimming each other…and suddenly Steve jumps back…did Steve had too much of this wonderful cocktail? Does Sandy have bad breath?

“Don’t get any closer to me crumble lips” said Steve (fyi Steve happens to be a bit of a jerk), “behind your glossy satiny red lips, vile cracks are hidden”…

At the same time, Sharon makes her way back into the lounge with her “lipstick” mission completed, she crosses Steve’s eyes who was coming dangerously close and bewitched by her lushious lips…He leans in for a lustful kiss with Sharon (yes he is a jerk but that is not the moral of the story!)

Sandy is furious…but what could she do? As far back as she remembers, she always had cracked lips…and no amount of balms or creams ever worked.

Poor Sandy, she didn’t know that most commercial lipbalm brands contain mineral oils and parafin which actually dry out your lips and guess what? Keep coming you back for more!

Short and long term studies show that some oils and wax from mineral hydrocarbon have toxic and dangerous accumulative effects on organisms. And as lipsticks are basically ingested… users are basically intoxicating themselves without knowing it. Let us be clear, we are not saying that you will pass out and poison yourself from using lipstick once, or twice or even 50 times. But it does accumulate in your body, especially if you are a lipstick kind of girl! (and who isn’t?!)

Sandy is now besides herself…how can she distinguish parafin in this jungle of cosmetics and lipbalms?

Here is the list of mineral hydrocarbon substances:

Cera microcristallina, Ceresin, Paraffin, Paraffinum Liquidum, Petrolatum, Ozokerite.

All these named ingredients have a ADI (acceptable daily intake), so they HAVE to be named by the company on the packaging for legal reasons.

Here is our homemade lipstick made only with natural ingredients:

-4 drop spoons of titanium dioxide

-1 drop spoon of Purple Mineral Oxide

-Carnauba Wax: 0.7 gramms

-White beeswax: 0.9 gramms

-Vegetal glycerine: 3 gramms

-Karite Butter: 3 gramms

– Abyssinian vegetal oil: 0.5 gramms

-Nude Beige mineral mica powder: 2 TAD spoons

–  2 drops of vanilla oil for its fragrance

-Vitamine E: 5 drops.

Mix all the ingredients together, except the frangrance and vitamine E.

Use a “bain marie” and allow all your ingredients to melt.

Once melted, take it out of the bain marie and mix in the fragrance and vitamin E.

Pour immediatly in your lipstick mould or balm container.

And now here are the Maybelline lipstick ingredients review

Lanolin : Is a natural substance secreted by sheeps to protect their « wool », in other words, it is animal sebum. Depending on the quality of lanolin (filtered or not…), it can be irritating.

Sesamum indicum oil: Sesame is a vegetal oil which prevents dehydration.

Oleyl Erucate: Oleyl Erucate is a liquid wax ester (oleyl alcohol and erucic acid) very similar to jojoba oil

Cera Microcristallina :is a mineral hydrocarbon chemical substance. Not natural, not healthy, not good for environment.

Ppg 5 Lanolin Wax: is a synthetized wax, not safe. Texture agent.

Acetylated lanolin: is a synthetic or natural substance. Irritation and allergies can occur.

Cera Alba, Beeswax: is a natural filming substance.

Alumina: (oxide) is found naturally in nature, not harmful

Disteardimonium Hectorite:  is a vegetal derived suspending agent used to thicken oil based products and serve as stabilizer for emulsions.

Parfum/Fragrance:

Tocopheryl Acetate:  

It is an antioxidant, which is in the same family as vitamin E. It is commonly used in cosmetics, however according to the Cosmetic Ingredients Review Assesment, it can cause bad reactions. One or more animal studies (we do not support animal studies just to be clear!) show tumor formation at high doses according to theEnvironment Canada Domestic Substances List.

Acrylic Acid/Isobutyl Acrylate/Isobornyl Acrylate Copolymer: is a plastic synthetic filming agent, nothing is found on the web about any research on this substance.

Calcium Aluminum Borosilicate: is a non toxic form of aluminum.

Pentaerythrityl Tetra-Di-T-Butyl Hydroxyhydrocinnamate: not toxic for human but bioaccumulative for environment.

Synthetic Fluorphlogopite: is a bulking and viscosity control ingredient.

Pentaerythrityl Tetr-Di-T-Butyl Hydroxyhydrocinnamate:

Animal studies (again if we feel the need to test it on animals to make sure it’s safe, maybe we should think about not using it in the first place!) on rats and rabbits by ingestion and by inhalation showed severe skin irritation.

Silica

Silica is a mineral found naturally in sandstone, clay, and granite, as well as in parts of plants and animals, and is used as a versatile ingredient in the cosmetics and skincare industry. Silica is seen in many make up formulas because its spherical particles not only absorb sweat and oil, but prevent light reflection, and improve spreadability.

Benzyl Alcohol:

Is a preservative. Benzyl alcohol can cause cancer, skin irritations, allergies, neurotoxicity and hormonal disturbances.

Polyethylene Terephtalate:

The Cosmetics Database finds Polyethylene Terephthalate to be a moderate hazard ingredient, and notes concerns regarding endocrine disruption. It is also considered a potential carcinogenic, and animal studies (albeit from 1955) show tumor formation at moderate doses.

Mel, Honey,Miel:

First of all, this is a natural ingredient presenting numerous benefits for skin and hair.

No need to translate the name in 3 different languages here. They don’t translate polyethylene terephtalate as plastic and plastique. This is purely for marketing effects and to give more importance to natural ingredients.

There you have it, not a pretty picture we know. And again, we are not saying that you will get big health problems from using this very sporadically (sometimes you see a pretty lipstick colour and you just have to try it, we get it!).

But if you use lipstick on a daily basis, it may be worth looking into more natural options here. You can have a lot of fun making your own lipstick at home as well and you get to chose the exact shade that suits you!

Any comments or questions please let us know in the comment section below!

Lots of Love

The Spoiled Bee Xx