Friday, April 18, 2014

Ways in Which I Am Still a Teenager

I read an article the other day in the May 2014 issue of Glamour that I thought was kind of interesting. In it, the author talked about how different scents can remind you of different times in your life, and proceeded to chronicle the perfumes she had owned and used during many of those times — in high school, studying abroad, falling in love, welcoming a first child. Some of them were inexpensive scents, like the author's favorite in high school — Victoria's Secret Pear GlacĂ© — and others maxed out at $160 for less than 2 oz. of liquid.

And I got kind of curious. I am 26 years old, and every scent I own still comes from Victoria's Secret, where you can get a very large amount of good-smelling stuff for a very reasonable price. I have never owned anything that adults would qualify as perfume, and it made me wonder if I'm the only one who never jumped on the bandwagon of buying really expensive water? Then I started wondering what other things other people "graduated" to that I never did.

I keep all my scents on my dresser on this cute dish my mother-in-law gave me a few years ago. I think it makes my dresser look more sophisticated.

Beauty Products I Use That Are Beloved By All Ladies in the 16-and-Under Set

Body Mist
I have three or four different scents of the Victoria's Secret Body Mist that I've collected over the years, and it literally takes me years to get through a bottle of this stuff. Case in point? I have a bottle of Desire that I owned for at least two years before my wedding ... and I wore it at the wedding ... and I still wear it all the time, almost three years later. And I'm still only a quarter of the way through the bottle. How is this taking me so long?

(By the way, this IS a step up from High School Allie's collection. Back then I had a Mary Kate & Ashley two-scents-in-one set, and I was a big fan of that Calgon spray stuff that smelled like the beach.)

Lip Products
Yep, I still primarily use Bonne Bell LipSmackers when my lips are dry or chapped. I bought my first tube of actual Chapstick-brand chapstick earlier this year. They're exactly the same to me, except that LipSmackers comes in better flavors and you can get an eight-pack at a time so you don't have to buy more of it for a good long while.

Makeup
With the exception of my Mary Kay products (most of which my mom bought for me), I have no makeup from fancy stores. Everything I buy comes from Target, and most of it is by CoverGirl or Maybelline. I've been in a Sephora exactly once, and that was when my sister told me that I needed a new lipstick for my wedding. (The one I bought ended up being too brown, and I've hardly worn it since.)

At what age/point in your life did you start buying the "good"/"grown up" products? Do you still love any products you used as a teenager? What is your favorite fragrance?

9 comments

  1. My mom is really into perfume, so I got into it in high school, too. I did wear Victoria's Secret and Bath and Body Works in high school and college, but now I wear the more expensive stuff. I have very particular taste about my perfume, and my mom usually buys me a bottle for my birthday or Christmas. When I was planning my wedding, she took me to the Guerlain counter and bought my wedding makeup and perfume. It was Meteorites, which is now discontinued, but I will always think of it as my wedding and honeymoon scent. I still have a bottle that I use every now and then. I've always worn a mix of department store and drugstore makeup. I really think it's all about what you like and what makes you happy, so there's no right or wrong here. :) My mom's hobby is perfume, I guess you could say, so some of it just rubbed off on me. If you ever want to try a more expensive perfume, body lotion is always an affordable option for a scent that you like. Plus, it moisturizes and and you only need a little at a time because you can mix it with unscented lotion.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Body lotion is a great idea for starters. It takes me a long time to get through bottles of lotion too, even if I use them everyday.

      Delete
  2. This is awesome. My husband LOVES Vicky's body mists, and it totally throws me back to high school. I "graduated" to "adult" perfumes in college when a boyfriend bought me some Clinique stuff--I was not a fan but kept it because it was pretty and did make me feel grown up. I've got one designer perfume--a Miss Dior Cherie, but I bought it in Thailand so I'll venture to guess that it's fake ;) Actually, my favorite perfumes currently are from Gap and Charlotte Russe, so I'm not sure how much more grown up they are! As for makeup, the majority of mine is Bare Minerals, but again, the main reason I'm using it is because my uncle works for the company and I get it all for free (SCORE!). You'd better believe that anything that I have to buy is straight from the drugstore.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Don't blame ya — if I could get anything for free, I'd be all over that! My sister used to work in retail and I abused her discount like crazy. I miss that discount.

      I have used one of her Coach scents before in those roller-ball thingies, and I like the smell, just can't seem to pull the trigger!

      Delete
    2. That is really awesome to get free makeup!

      Delete
  3. Man, I was all about Victoria's Secret perfume in high school! And it's absolutely true that scents can remind you of different times in your life. Sean and I bought each other fancy new perfume/cologne as wedding gifts so the scents would always remind us of our wedding/honeymoon. And it worked! (Although my $3 deodorant also reminds me of our honeymoon, so I guess Sean could've saved his perfume money for something else. Ha!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ha! I don't think Matt really ever wears cologne, but that deodorant smell does remind me of him! But it's true — there was this guy I liked freshman year of high school, and I still remember EXACTLY what he smelled like, more than 10 years later. Creeper lol.

      Delete
  4. As I see it, keep using the Target stuff if it still works on your face. Your skin doesn't know how much you paid for the makeup.

    ReplyDelete