How To Trim Your Own Hair

I got this tip from a hair stylist a long time ago, and for the life of me I can't remember who told me. But I'll never forget the tip.

If you have long hair with layers and you're desperate for a trim, but you can't find the time to go to the salon, here's what you do:

Bend over at the waist and flip your hair in front of you so it's hanging like a curtain. Take scissors (sorry - stylists call them shears) and trim from one side towards the other in a straight line, and when you get about a fourth of the way in, angle the cutting so it makes a shallow upside-down V shape. So going from side to side in fourths is like: straight, up at an angle, down at an angle, straight.

For the record I have never tried this so I don't personally know if it works. I do remember him saying to only do it once or twice at the very most, because any more than that will make your hair start to look wack. If anyone does it with some success, please let me know.

How The Hell Do You Use A Fan Brush?

Now I know!

I was chatting with makeup artist extraordinaire Pati Dubroff (she most recently did Julianne Moore's makeup for the Golden Globes) about one of my favorite topics -- super bright blush -- when she blew the lid off something I've been wondering for years, but never thought to ask.

And that is, the purpose of those darn fan brushes.

When working with bright powder blush, Pati says, "My new way of doing blush is to use fan brushes, because they pick up very little color. I used to use those dense blush brushes and it would deposit a whole lot of color. Now using a fan brush, I use very little blush so I can give lighter veils of color. For years I had those fan brushes and I never knew what to do with them -- I just figured it out."

So now I don't feel so lame for not having any clue what those brushes were for since Pati just figured it out herself. And there you have it!

I Love the Clarisonic!

I need to prep this post with a little skincare anecdote. At the height of glycolic acid popularity in skincare, I overexfoliated my skin to the point where it looked tight and shiny, kind of like I had had plastic surgery. I was using glycolic acid skincare day and night, and I was scrubbing with a grainy face scrub a few times a week. It was also around that time when one of the so-called "best" facialists in NYC ripped my face apart with microdermabrasion. My intervention came when Annet King from Dermalogica saw me and said, "What did you do your face?"

Ever since the Glycolic Incident of '05 I have been exfoliator-phobic. Sure, I've dabbled here and there, but I always back off from exfoliating regularly because I'm scared of overdoing it. So even though the Clarisonic came out a few years ago to great fanfare, I never tried it. But about 2 months ago I finally broke down and started using the Clarisonic Mia after a bunch of dermatologists told me that they use them.

So I used it 2x per week* for about a month and a half, and I thought it felt good and make my skin feel smooth, but I was kind of meh about it. Until I left town for two weeks and didn't bring it with me. My skin looked like ass. Once I got back and used it again, I swear I saw an instant improvement. In fact, the Clarisonic followed by Caudalie Premier Cru (applied while my skin is still slightly damp) makes my skin super duper soft. I love it.

*Clarisonic says you can use it every day, but for me 2x per week is plenty. Any more and my skin starts to get that scary look again.