March Favourites: Light Weights, Comfy Flats and a Mortifying Reach-Around

I’m writing this in the hair salon, both a) satisfying my need to multitask and b) effectively distracting me from the mortifying thing that just happened in the supermarket. I only nipped in to Waitrose to grab myself a noodle salad so that I could eat it as my roots were being coloured: it was, on paper, a straightforward mission. I knew exactly what I wanted to eat and precisely where that item was on the fridge shelf. The only problem was that there was a man (seventies, very smartly dressed) dithering about right in front of the stack of salads.

I didn’t want to ask him to move aside because he looked to be in one of those fugue states that people go into when faced with decisions over supermarket meal deals, when they have been there so long they cease to even see the options set out before them. He was holding a small box of mixed sushi, staring directly ahead into the top of the fridge where the energy drinks and protein shakes lay.

Something about his gaze made me reluctant to startle him and so I tried to reach the noodle salad from one side of him and then the other, darting from side to side like an amateur pickpocket. No good. My hands would have been too close to the danger zone of his crotch area, which especially wouldn't do considering his distinguished gentleman status. He was wearing an actual hat. He only lacked a pipe, otherwise he could have stepped straight out of a Sherlock Holmes novel.

So yes, brushing cloth with my hand en route to a noodle salad would have been catastrophic: I opted for the less embarrassing alternative, which was to say - really loudly -

“I hope you don’t mind, I’m just going to do a reach-around”

- at the same time as putting my arm in front of him (wide berth) to signal my intentions. Why does my brain not have any kind of safety check before I blurt these things out? Surely there should be a small delay, like on the telly when they do live shows. Really what I need is a by-my-side-at-all-times editor, to sense check what comes out of my mouth and, ideally, veto all of the bad decisions I’m about to make.

Anyway here are this month’s favourites. A nice mixed bag. As always they are also on video here - it’s quite nice, I think, in this day and age of six second reels, to hear someone speak for a while and go about their business. Fortunately not all business, because you would have to suffer the painful second-hand embarrassment of watching me in Waitrose, offering a reach-around to a stranger on the sushi aisle…

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Makeup Bag Staple

Here’s something I think should be a non-negotiable makeup bag staple but that has been missing from my own stash for quite a while: a truly matte, low-key bronzing powder that’s only a shade or two darker than your natural skintone.

Sometimes you don’t want to look as though you’ve “spent a weekend in Biarritz” or “a week in the Bahamas” or whatever other comparison gets thrown out there. Sometimes you just want to add a little bit of warmth to your complexion so that you don’t look like a Renaissance Prince who’s dying of consumption.

And you want to be able to bosh it on with a very large, fluffy brush without having to worry too much about how it’s all turning out.

These low-key matte bronzers aren’t all that hard to find - see MAC, Guerlain, Bobbi Brown, just off the top of my head - I just don’t think that they’re the sort of glamorous, PR-able makeup items that get much airtime. They’re the workhorse of the cosmetics bag. The discreet, understated Volvo of the complexion-enhancing world. A velvety finish that’s barely there - this isn’t the sort of OMG, like, that’s, like, so amazing! transformation that would set the social media world alight.

My previous matte bronzer, used until all of the middle part of the compact was completely exposed, all silver and shiny (very satisfying), was the L’Oreal Back to Bronze. Which I think is now called Bronze to Paradise, which is a strange string of words.

My new one is the Clarins Ever Bronze compact, which has two shades in one. It may as well have just one shade, really, all in the same colour that’s about midway in between, because all I do is puff my big fluffy brush over both sides and swirl them together and apply. The key is that the shades are only just darker than my skintone, really. The powders look more peachy than beachy, but this what works so well - that aforementioned foolproof “boshing on” with a big brush relies on the bronzer not being too dramatically deep in tone when compared to your natural hue.

The Clarins range is very limited (three shades, and I’m a medium!) and so it’s not this particular product that’s a monthly favourite so much as the type of product. In a moment of sheer timeliness, Rare Beauty have just brought out a line of matte bronzing powders; their contour stick and liquid contour are some of my most-used cheek products, so I have high hopes for the powders. They are here and come in seven shades. I will report back once I’ve tried!

Big Boshing Brush

Talking of huge makeup brushes with which to bosh things on: this gigantor from No7 has become my indispensable finishing tool for when I want a seamless, professional look to my makeup. I whisk it over my face once my foundation and bronzer have been applied, to fine-tune the finish: not only does this melt away any blending lines where I’ve been a bit haphazard, it sort of “lifts” off a very fine layer of excess makeup so that it all looks really bedded in and more natural.

I have a similar boshing brush for my eyes - one from Caroline Barnes’ collaboration with brilliant brush-makers Otis Battersbee. You can’t buy it now, and it is my mission in the next couple of weeks to find a similar one so that I can make a video about it. But it’s so big that it’s almost the size of a small precision contour or powder brush - far too big to actually apply any eyeshadow with. Why it’s great is that once I’ve finished all of my eyeshadow, I close my eyelids and bash about on top of them with the Caroline Barnes mega-brush and again, all lines are buffed and blended into the skin and any excess makeup is air-lifted away.

This appears to be my new approach: apply things and then take half of them off.

Actually I think I’ve been doing this for years, but it has only recently occurred to me that it’s a thing in my routine. A step. Must do a video on this so that you can all see what I mean, try not to lose any sleep whilst you wait for it.

The No7 Big Boshing Brush (not official name) is here.

Weight lifting

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention: I’ve started weight lifting! I use the word “weight” in its loosest sense, because we’re talking bags of sugar here, not two Mini Coopers on a pole and a prolapse-inducing deadlift. I’m not harnessed to an artic lorry, seeing how far I can pull it up my driveway.

I used to do Body Conditioning and “Body Pump” classes in my twenties and loved them: once I stopped the gym, any sort of weight-lifting went out of the window. My muscles generally dissolved back into my bloodstream (or something) and I became a female version of Mr Burns from The Simpsons.

I’ve always stayed quite fit, or fit-ish, because I’m moderately active anyway and can’t sit still for long and, over the past five years, I’ve done spin classes on my Peloton bike every other day. (Need to write more about my love of Peloton, it’s possibly one of the best investments I’ve ever made, in my entire life.) But never has it been stressed to us - so much - that we should be doing weight-bearing exercise. And do you know what? It feels good! It feels satisfying to witness all of your own muscles working together like a machine, and to feel your balance improving and your strength amassing. This all deserves its own post - which is coming, it has a great title! - but suffice to say for now that I am muddling on through with my Peloton weight classes and my pairs of 3kg, 5kg and 8kg weights that I bought on Amazon.

(I have to pay for the Peloton app anyway, so it’s a no-brainer to use the strength classes on there. You can, however, find all sorts of classes on Youtube, for free. I also like that the Peloton app keeps a record of my progress and recommends suitable classes and all sorts of other things. I think it’s much cheaper if you don’t need to do bike classes on it…)

Trapeze-ish Dress

Summer is creeping nearer, oh so steadily. Usually I’d be delighted but once again I have failed to be prepared and have not yet bought the plants I need for my garden slopes and so all I feel this year is a faint sense of disappointment in myself. These two massive slopes have been under weed membrane for three years now and every spring I say that I’ll plant them in the autumn and every autumn I say I’ll wait until the spring.

The truth is,

a) I have no idea what I’m doing and there are too many plants and too many options and it’s far too steep a learning curve

b) a lot of stuff I plant dies, for various reasons unknown to me

c) I just can’t be arsed. It’s so much work! It’s like planting two small gardens, but almost vertically. I’m going to have to wear crampons and anchor myself to the top of the slope with an abseiling rope.

Rich thinks I should just turf both slopes and be done with it. Is he insane? It would look like Teletubby hill! I think we should put a slide down one side and a climbing wall up the other and then I can ease my sense of failure by saying I sacrificed my beautiful wildflower/grass plantations for the enjoyment of my children. They’re only little once!

Where was I? Summer. This dress, I feel, will be invaluable. I’m not saying it’s the shape for everyone! But I do like to have one very lightweight, loose-fitting, trapeze-shaped dress for incredibly hot and sticky days where all clothing annoys me but I still need to look sharp and pulled together-ish. This one is from brilliant Wyse London.

I have a great one from Whistles that’s more structured than the Wyse, and they come out with different versions of it year after year, but I’m trying not to wear so much black. Pale blue stripes it is, then…

Trainer Alternatives

I honestly thought these Mary Janes would divide opinion on Instagram and that I’d be defending my decision to the hilt, but amazingly, the love for them was almost unanimous. OK so the leopard print that looks sort of “painted” onto the suede is a wildcard, but the general shape of these ultra-comfy (will return to the comfiness) flats is elegant and they are so incredibly useful as a viable alternative to trainers.

When I say I can run in these flats, I don’t mean hobble along, I mean break into a sprint. For flat shoes, they have very clever shaping in the soles that makes your feet feel fully supported, yet the comfort level is borderline “slippers”. The strap could be slightly narrower, I feel, which would make these pumps quite the dupe for some £650 leopard flats on Net-a-Porter that have been following me around the internet.

But would the narrower strap be conducive to unparalleled comfort, that’s the question? The Delicato Mary Janes are genuinely so comfy and capable that I wouldn’t hesitate to wear them in almost any intense city-walking situation. The time last year that I walked off a severe hangover in London by covering eleven miles in a pair of ballet flats would have been a cinch in the Fitflop Mary Janes!

Oh yeah, they’re from Fitflop. A lot of you might have already assumed that, if you’ve ever owned shoes by Fitflop! I wear their trainers all the time, which is mainly why I’ve been looking for alternatives, but it does mean that if I try to wear normal shoes it feels as though someone is battering my arches with a rolling pin.

The Delicato are here online - I used a 15% off code that was on the homepage, WELCOME, but I’m sure there are a few floating about if you look. (I always look for a code. It’s mandatory at this point!)