Let me guess, you are a girl between the ages of 9-14 who just really wants to look pretty but doesn't have any money to spend on stuff? No worries, I have a list and guide here to help you look good and healthy with stuff you can find around your house!
For Your Skin:
Having nice, healthy looking, acne free skin will automatically make you look nice, but buying the stuff to make your skin look pretty, is well, expensive. But here is some stuff you can use to make it look better.
1. To keep it more acne free and clean as a whistle, once a day, sometime in the morning because that is when your face is dirtiest most likely, try taking some Hydrogen Peroxide (Be careful! Most hydrogen peroxide sold in drugstores and supermarkets comes in a brown bottle and says 3% on it, 3% is the concentration of it, and that is the common one. Most people only have 3% in their houses, but in my house we have some stuff that is more on the 30% scale, which is dangerous. So just ask an adult about the percentage before using it!) Get a cotton ball, tissue paper, paper towel, or clean wash cloth damp with the Hydrogen Peroxide, and gently wipe it on your face, (Avoid your eyes.) Hydrogen Peroxide kills bacteria, so it will kill the bacteria on your face and clean it! If your skin starts to tingle pr hurt a bit, to get scared, that is a normal thing that happens, it is just the Peroxide doing its job!
2. Take a day where you pull your hair and bangs away from your face, like, all day girls, no cheating, and wash your face that morning, it will help your skin out nicely.
3. If you have a sunburn or a rash, put
COCONUT oil on it, and only coconut! Canola oil or any other would just a mess, but coconut heals and soothes.
5. If you have a random lotion nobody uses just apply it to your hands, legs, and arms. Soft, healthy skin is nice. ESPECIALLY during winter when dry skin is common.
For Your Hair:
Clean shiny hair is like wearing your best dress everyday, it is awesome! But stuff like fancy shampoos, and deep cleansers are pricey. This is the cheap alternative!
1. Just wash it when it needs washing. Washing your hair everyday when you don't need to is actually really bad for your hair, it strips the oils out and damages it.
2. Take a day (Maybe that day when you have your hair pulled back) when your hair is oily and dirty, and leave it like that. The oils will help heal your hair and that night or the next day when you wash your hair it will be healthier.
3. For shiny hair, rinse your conditioner out (I suggest always doing conditioner last thing every time you shower) with COLD water. Rinsing your hair with cold water makes it shiny!
4. To make hair shiny and softer and healthier, have your mom or sister or someone help you, or carefully do this by tilting your head back so it doesn't get into your eyes or mouth, and rinse your hair with vinegar. White vinegar might be best, but it doesn't matter that much. Vinegar rinsing is a great way to clean hair and make it look AMAZING. But don't do it too often, try once every month or once every two weeks, on the days you aren't rinsing with vinegar just rinse your hair with cold water.
5. If you have super greasy hair but you want to leave it down while going out, find some baby powder, (I don't know why but everyone seems to have it.) place a little in your hand, and place it through the oily parts of your hair and pat, rub, or move it around until you can't tell there is baby powder in it, the powder can help absorb the oils and make hair feel a bit dryer.
For Your Lips:
Soft, healthy lips make a smile look much more beautiful. You don't need gobs of lipstick to make them look gorgeous!
1. The best thing to keep lips soft is to have something moisturizing on them. Even when they aren't dry or chapped. Chap-stick isn't that expensive, but it is annoyingly easy to lose. Something better would to be, before you go out and before bed, try putting some Vaseline (Also known as Petroleum Jelly) on your lips! You probably have some in your house, and it works miracles! Ditch those lip glosses and just use Vaseline for glossy, healthy lips!
For Your Nails:
Fingernails don't need to be covered in gobs of colorful nail polish, so try saving it for parties, events, etc, plus, removing it once it chips and trying to fix it is a large pain.
1. Just keep your nails trimmed, I keep it in mind that when I clip my nails I let them be at the same length as the tip of my finger or just longer then that when trimming them, and letting them grow out is good though. I let mine grow out to be very nice and averagely long, but I only clip them back when one breaks. That is a good rule, you can grow your nails out for at most a month without clipping, but if one breaks during that time you needs to clip it so it is a normal shape, and clip the rest of your nails down to that length as well.
2. I love wearing nail polish, but I also like NOT wearing nail polish. So if you have a dollar to spare, I would suggest going and finding the cheapest possible
CLEAR nail polish, yes, I said clear. I apply clear nail polish all the time because it makes natural nails nice and glossy, just like a models'! Plus, if it chips it is easier to fix than a colored nail polish.
3. And for toenails, well, keep them trimmed, avoid nail polish, use a clear polish if you want, but in general just keeping them trimmed is enough.
Budget Makeup:
So you need some makeup for something? An event, a party, school or family photos, well your house can have a couple handy things in it!
1. Blueberries. That sounds weird, but mascara is SUPER expensive, so instead, if you are on a budget and out of time, try putting a blueberry or two in a bowl, and sticking them in the freezer for five minutes. Once done, mash them up with a fork until you have a nice paste. After that take a q-tip, dip it in the blueberry paste stuff, and apply it to your eyelashes. Bonus! If you need longer eyelashes apply some baby powder to the tips of your lashes and apply the paste, and if you need thicker lashes apply baby powder to the base of your lashes and then put the blueberry paste on! Nobody will ever know you are wearing homemade mascara!
2. Again, Vaseline as lip gloss.
3. Remember, a smile is the best thing to wear on your face!
For Your Overall Body:
1. Drinking a lot of water is hard, up until recently I never drank water because it made me nauseous. (VERY nauseous.) You are supposed to have eight glasses a day, but that is a lot! Especially if you are in school and not allowed to have food or drink with you! So instead, when you are home or whatever, try and drink one or two small bottles or glasses throughout the day. Take some in a thermos if you are going to be out and about. You don't have to chug the water either, you can just be sipping on it every few minutes while on your computer. Water is great for healthy skin, lips, and body!
2. Drink a glass of milk or two if you can, it makes teeth and bones strong as I'm sure you have heard. But if you can't, because like, milk is expensive and you can't really drink four glasses a day, that is excessive, to get the calcium you need eat some cheese or yogurt, but if you don't have any, one thing most everyone has, is Tums, or Antacid Tablets, which is the name for generic off brand Tums. Tums can cut down on the acid in your stomach, BUT, they have a HUUUGGEEE dose of calcium in them, taking one a day can help make up for the milk you can't drink.
3. Exercising is hard, I know. I'm pretty lazy unless we are talking about bike riding. (I LOVE bike riding, I can go on ten mile bike rides because it is so FUN!) But, you don't need a fancy workout to exercise, you don't have to jog, instead, during commercial breaks while watching TV, try getting up and doing fifteen jumping jacks! You have no idea how great it feels to get up, do them, and then sit back down to enjoy your show! You can also... Do two lunges every time someone says the word Hi, Hello, or Hey, while you are watching TV, videos, etc. You can do that while reading as well! Every time someone is eating or drinking on the show you can get up and run in place for twenty seconds! It is very easy to work out and enjoy yourself!
4. Eat an apple a day. Yeah, it is supposed to keep the doctor away, but they have more vitamins than an orange and they are the best fruit for keeping teeth healthy! (That must be why I've never had a cavity, I eat so many apples because I love them.) Also try eating, bananas! They have LOTS of potassium and can also stop stomach aches from happening! Oranges, while low in other vitamins, do have quite a bunch of vitamin C! So try that as well. Remember, you don't have to eat ALL of these a day, but one of these every day or two is really great!
5. This is a mini guide to how much sun you need to get,
If you have extremely pale skin all the way to a light medium color, you need between ten and twenty minutes of time in the sun without sunscreen, hats, or sunglasses. You only need ten minutes if you are very pale, and you need more around twenty if you are up to a medium skin tone. Because lighter skin absorbs the sun's light faster and better and converts it into vitamin D very easily! Which is why pale people burn really fast. If your skin is more in the range darker medium (Olive tones, etc.) to very dark (African American/Black/whatever you chose to have your skin tone called.) you need more like thirty to forty five minutes of unprotected time in the sun. That is because dark skin doesn't absorb light easily, so being in the light up to forty five minutes ensures you are getting your needed vitamin D.
Those are all my tips for you for now!
Abbie R,
