Makeup Lessons From My Face Nightmare

By Chava Rosenbaum

Chava is a 26 year old mother of two girls living in Kensington, NY.  She has been a practicing makeup artist for nearly seven years and recently began doing makeup for the exploding field of religious women's theater...in which she also loves to perform! Chava offers lessons to women, teaching them how to apply their own makeup like a professional. In addition to makeup, her passions are singing, comedy and keeping her kids out of her shoe rack. Chava is available to do makeup for simchas and productions in New York. You can contact her to book a consultation or job by e-mailing beautybychava@rocketmail.com

Mention LadyMama when you book me for any occasion and get a 20% discount on TWO faces (including the Kallah's). And as usual, kallahs get a free trial! Spread the word! Call me at 718-986-1211. 

Makeup Lessons From My Face Nightmare

I had a nightmare of a week, face wise. 

I seem to have developed psoriasis on my face, which was compounded by an allergic reaction to the cream I was using to treat it! It looked like a bad burn. Add to that the cold weather and my face was so dry and cracked it bled if I smiled! It itched and looked terrible. So how have I been handling this? As a makeup artist it was bad. My face is my billboard. Dry, cracking skin with concealer caked on top doesn't exactly scream "beauty expert!"

After some experimentation I devised a battle plan. First of all, I am moisturizing the bajeepers out of it. Literally as soon as the moisturizer dries I put on more. This helped by keeping the skin from re-cracking over and over, giving it a chance to heal. As the skin underneath slowly begins to regenerate, the damaged cracking skin on top is flaking off, so I exfoliate gently with a washcloth on the healing areas. (If you actually have psoriasis, don't exfoliate places that are too raw because it will hurt like the dickens!)

Now some amazing new products I discovered in this process:

I didn't use cover-up while I'm at home, because I don't want makeup sitting on a wound. But if I have to go out, Dermacolor by Kryolan is a medical grade foundation designed for covering scars and birth defects and it works like a dream. I only had a sample size but I plan to reorder a full size. Just remember what I wrote in my first blog: cover-up covers the colors, but not the texture, so a lot of moisturizer and a primer are essential. Just dont expect perfection.

Right before my face went koo koo I ordered my new favorite foundation from Benefit called "Some Kinda Gorgeous." Being that it's a sheer foundation, I can't use it with skin like this.  However for those who don't need major coverage, it's amazing. It sits on the skin like a primer, rather than sinking in, making pores and veins seem to vanish. It only comes in three shades because the sheerness allows you're natural skintone to show through, mixing with it seamlessly. In that way, many skintones can wear the same color. I can't wait till my skin is better and I can rock this stuff. It feels weightless and i can't wait to use it on a bride (any volunteers?)! I recommend using your own foundation sponge. The one it comes with is kinda flimsy.

Another thing I discovered is the Graftobian Cream Blush palette. Graftobian is another one of my favorite foundation companies. It's a cream that becomes a liquid when it touches the skin - great pigmentation and feels like air. This blush is the same formula as the foundation only in blush colors. The palette of five costs $21 and they give a sheer dewy finish that looks so natural - that glow-from-within color. Want a great tip? For flawless cream blush application, use a regular blush brush (good quality that won't shed). It will blend the blush best without disturbing the foundation underneath.

Reminding you all again, mention LadyMama when you book me for any occasion and get a 20% discount on TWO faces (including the Kallah's). And as usual, kallahs get a free trial! Spread the word! Call me at 718-986-1211.