Guest Blogger: Heather on Cover Girl Tinted Moisturizer

I’m Heather, mom to three little ones and three cats, wife to one
husband, and learning to live in the unforced rhythms of grace.  You
can find me at Me In The Madness.

Were you to enter my somewhat cramped master bath, you’d find three things:  my kids’ bath toys in my garden tub (doh!); a hideous lighthouse border that, in five years of living in this house, we haven’t had the time to change; and an explosion of color and product unparalleled anywhere outside of a Benjamin Moore store.  This is the pièce de résistance, the crown jewel of my beauty collection — my makeup.  Did I mention that large portions of it (read: lip color and eye shadows) are stored in an industrial-sized fishing tackle box?

As a former makeup artist for a Big Three cosmetic company, you can imagine that I’ve amassed what amounts to thousands of dollars of beauty products over the years.  The lure of pretty packages and glitz of super brands is akin to addiction, but a beautiful addiction to be sure.   

The Chanel lip gloss calls, the Lancome mascara beckons, the Benefit BeneTint sings its siren song.  Further to the right, we see… what’s this?  A drug store brand?  In this Who’s Who of the cosmetic world? 

No, your eyes do not deceive you.  The heavyweights (and heavy price tags) move aside in the foundation department.  I have all the tubes and vials a girl could ask for, and what do I reach for most these days?  CoverGirl Smoothers SPF 15 Tinted Coverage, Light To Medium 810. 

I know, I know.  At $7.xx, it’s a bargain which intoxicates my math-riddled brain.  That’s roughly 85% less than my Chanel foundation, and 80% less than its Lancome counterpart.  Could it possibly pass muster? 

I’ll admit that I stumbled upon this product after hearing good things from my non-makeup artist friends.  I hemmed.  I hawed.  I threw it in my medicine cabinet, land of the broken dreams where many a product has lamented, “I coulda been a contenda”.   

But one day I was out of my Glamourous Expensive Sleekly-Packaged product.  And I was tired, as a mom to three kids ages 3 and under often is.  So I gingerly picked it up (hoping the inexpensive price tag wouldn’t bite me), dusted it off, and grabbed my foundation brush.  At first application, my skin evened out.  With a damp sponge on the areas that were a little more red, I got passable coverage.  After a dusting of my favorite powder (Everyday Minerals Finishing Dust), I looked as good as with a full coverage foundation.

If you have dry skin that peels like a salamander in the winter, this is a great product.  If your skin is so sensitive that the mere mention if alcohol in a product produces red, itchy bumps, you might want to give it a shot.  If SPF 15 will do the trick, Cover Girl is your girl.  All in all, I’m sold on this for everyday use. 

I will say that if your skin is as dry as mine (and I really hope for your sake that it isn’t), you’ll still need a regular moisturizer underneath.  Nothing battles winter wind and cold better than double coverage though, so I’ll never turn down extra moisturizing opportunities.  Even in the summer I get the dubious dryness around my nose and forehead, so I just use a summer weight moisturizer, let it soak in for about five minutes (I take this time to do my eye makeup, generally while singing loudly and hoping my children don’t ask me to pipe down.  I’m just THAT talented), and go on about my day. 

If you want to give tinted moisturizer a try without wincing at the price tag, this is a great place to start.  Now if I could just find the perfect liquid eyeliner for less than $27.  Dare to dream…