Author: HairWeavings Editorial Team

I’m so excited. It’s nearly summer! If you’re like me, getting outside and enjoying nature, sunshine, warmth, and family are top of my list. With that though often come sunburn, skin damage, and potential dehydration we all want to avoid.

How can we get the lovely, bronzed beauty look of the sun, without the negative downsides? What’s more, how can we avoid foundation altogether, yet not have the weird look of a pale-face (from using sunblock) with a lovely, tanned body?

Looking weird is, well, bottom of my list, so with that in mind, here are my suggestions to have a sun-kissed look without the sun damage.

Bronzing Gel

In the above video, I demonstrate how to use a bronzing gel without foundation to add color. Bronzing gel can be amazing, or it can make you look like you’ve been vomiting. I used FACE Atelier Pro Ultra Sheer Bronzer, which goes on sheer and adds a lovely warmth to the skin without heading toward the crazy-lady orange-face look.

You can also combine your foundation with the gel bronzer, or apply a sheer foundation on top of the bronzer. I chose to go for the no-foundation look, with a little Amazing Concealer to brighten under my eyes.

Powder Bronzer

Having some definition under your cheekbones, jawline, and forehead can be really stunning in the summertime. It’s a simple trick and makes a huge difference. I used Bobbi Brown Medium Bronzer blended in on top of the gel bronzer to achieve this.

As a warning, if you have oily skin, be sure to powder your gel bronzer before you use the powder bronzer. You know that streaky makeup look you see on some ladies in the grocery store checkout queue? We want to avoid that. It’s an extra step, but worth the time spent.

Cream Shadow, Cream Blush

Break out the cream makeup! Cream eye shadow and blush hold up wonderfully well in hot, sweaty weather. Recently, I worked on a photo shoot in the 90-degree heat of Costa Rica.

Besides getting dehydrated, diarrhea (too much information, I know), and nausea through the whole four-day shoot (yikes), the makeup looked gorgeous and didn’t need retouching because I used almost exclusively cream products.

Thank goodness, because I kept dashing to the bathroom and guzzling Coca Cola to keep me from passing out (always fun).

In the video, I used MAC Pro Longwear Paint-pot in Groundwork all over my eye lid, and Jane Iredale Gel Mystikol Eyeliner in Dark Topaz. On my cheeks I used MAC Glowplay Blush in Cheer Up blended on top of my cheekbone and into my brow bone. It’s a lovely peachy shade that makes my skirt fly up.

Don’t Forget the Sunblock!

There must be a million sunblock products on the market. I love Image Skin Care Prevention SPF 30, and have been using it for years. In truth, you don’t need an SPF higher than 30, as the difference in length of time and quality of protection between 30 and 50 is minimal.

If you’re out in the sun, be sure to reapply every two to three hours. Having said that, we have all been locked inside for a year due to the pandemic, and we need some vitamin D! My advice is to protect the skin on your face but allow your body to receive the full suns rays until your skin starts to turn color, then apply sunblock.

Enjoy the summer sunshine, protect your skin, and look like the bronzed goddess I know you are! Happy family time, outdoor activities, and sunshine!

Let’s Have a Conversation:

What do you expect to do as the weather warms up and summer arrives? How do you plan to protect your skin? Do you use sun tan makeup to look sun-kissed? Which products are your favorite during the summer season?

I have never been an up-to-the-minute sort of person. It takes time for the latest thing to filter itself down to my consciousness. Even the not-so-latest thing.

So, forgive me if I admit that I never really knew much about life coaches at all – much less about those coaches who advise women in their mid-to-late 50s about how to approach their later years.

And yet I have met quite a few of the latter recently, at least online.

This is because they find out about me and want to interview me, as an active 82-year-old woman, who calls herself ‘the granny who stands on her head’. This is the title of both my most recent book about why I like being old and, more recently, my Substack newsletter which goes out fortnightly.

Planning for the Future

As I was planting out some early flowers in my garden this morning, I was thinking about what I would advise if I were a life coach. Or advising my daughter if she were approaching retirement age.

First thought – yikes, she is! She is already 55 and her son is off to university this autumn. She is successful in her work and not about to retire. And not yet worrying very heavily about this stage in life.

Second thought, OK, how would I advise anyone else? Here I am, well past retirement – indeed, 20 years beyond my early 60s, never mind my 50s.

Surely, I should have something to say.

I imagine life coaches work carefully with each individual to bring out what they would most enjoy doing in the last part of their life. What did they always want to do but never had the time for? What talents would they like to develop? What places do they want to see? And perhaps much else.

My thoughts were that yes, all that is good, but they should first take a step backward (perhaps they do, I don’t know). Before you can plan for an active future, you need to do what you can to assure you will have an active future.

Fitness and Health

And when I thought about it, the thing that has most affected my ability to enjoy my life nowadays is real fitness and good health. I am strong, I am flexible – and, surprising as that may sound, I wasn’t in as good condition when I was younger.

I put a lot of this down to yoga, which I have been practising for 30 years. Back then, I chose to do Iyengar Yoga, considered one of the hardest forms of yoga. I did so not because I looked into it in any great detail ­– but simply on the advice of a friend.

It is hard work, it is not always fun to do at the time, but my goodness, it has really made me able to cope with things now. You can see a video of me standing on my head a year or so ago here.

I am not claiming perspicacity. I did not know when I started that this would be the happy outcome. It just seemed a good idea to get a bit more fit, a lot of people had recommended it, and I thought why not ‘give it a go’?

I don’t urge everyone to do yoga. There are plenty of other activities that would keep you fit and healthy. You can swim (I also do that), run (no), play tennis (no), dance (sadly, no) – no end of possibilities. Even ‘chair yoga’ which keeps being advertised on Facebook.

But I do urge all middle-aged and older people to do something – and to keep to it through thick and thin. My daughter also does yoga (a different variant) and bought a treadmill during lockdown, which she uses regularly.

(Of course, it is also important to eat healthily, but there is so much nutritional advice here and everywhere that I see no reason to discuss any of it here.)

Getting Down to It

The real issue is actually getting down to exercise and building it into your day.

Yes, I know you have heard this all before. You have heard it until you want to scream. Moreover, you have been hearing it all your life! Why make a special fuss at exactly that time when feel you should be able to relax a bit?

The answer lies in the fact that this is exactly the time when fitness and health, left to their own devices, are likely to decline. You want to do everything you can to fight that natural tendency. It will make such a difference to your life – the ability to move and walk freely is needed for almost any activity you might want to take up in your later years.

And being strong means you are less likely to fall – and therefore compound the general difficulties of old age. And if you fall, you are less likely to do any serious damage.

Health is not wholly under your control. I am no expert, but I am sure that genes have a lot to do with it. Not to mention all sorts of accidents that might have happened along the way.

But put simply, without being fit, you won’t have much choice in what to do in retirement. You won’t be expanding your talents in new ways. You won’t be addressing your bucket list.

So, from looking back from age 82, I would start with that.

Good luck.

Let’s Have a Conversation:

What kinds of exercise do you do? What got you started? Has it changed your life for the better?

Gabby Prescod’s Striped Pleated Polo Dress / Summer House Season 8 Episode 14 Fashion

I feel like right now we’re in this fashion era where polo style tennis/golf outfits are very in style. Even if it’s not meant to be worn on the court, like the striped pleated polo dress Gabby Prescod wears on tonight’s Summer House episode. I think it’s a super cute trend and a great summer look. Which is why you shouldn’t be afraid to take that next step and commit to shopping a similar one from below.

Sincerely Stylish,

Jess

Originally posted at: Gabby Prescod’s Striped Pleated Polo Dress

Originally posted at: Margaret Josephs’ Gold Y Lariat Necklace

NOTE: If you are just joining us for the first time, you can find my previous Sixty and Me Free Piano Lessons on my Author pages. You can join our lessons any time and move at your own pace!

36.1 Minuet, p.89

Today we revisit the Minuet you played in Lesson 28, but this time we are adding some bass notes to the melody. One of the most difficult things for beginning piano students to learn is that the bar lines between the measures including the repeat bars :|| do not mean to stop, or pause. The bar lines simply serve to divide music into sections of 3 or 4 beats each (according to the time signature) as an organizational tool for the eye.

This is particularly important to remember when you see the repeat bars :||. In the Minuet, you play the 1^st ending, then seamlessly repeat back to the beginning, without pausing. The listener shouldn’t be able to discern where the repeat sign is, because the music keeps playing at the same consistent tempo.

When you practice the Minuet on p.89, you might practice starting from the 1^st ending, then repeating back to the beginning, several times, until you can achieve that seamlessly without pausing. Remember, when you are playing the Minuet for the second time, play the full first line, then play the first measure of the second line, then jump to the 2^nd ending, skipping the 1^st ending. (You only play the 1^st ending the first time.) The bass notes in the 1^st ending are a little tricky, so watch my demonstration of the Minuet in my video:

36.2 Keys, Chords and Swing! p.90

I introduce “Key Signatures” on p. 90. When you see flats or sharps between the Clef and the Time Signature, that is the Key Signature. Clementine has a B-flat in the Key Signature, which means that you will play all Bs in the song as B-flats, automatically.

In my video I speak about the fact that these flats and sharps represent the “Key” or “Scale” in which the song is written. You haven’t yet studied full scales (that comes in Upper Hands Piano, BOOK 2), but for now, remember that the F pentascale (a pentascale is the first 5 notes of a scale) you have used in Exercises #1-4 contained a B-flat. That B-flat in a key signature (usually) means that the song is in the Key or Scale of F. Clementine has a B-flat in the Key Signature, and it is indeed in the Key of F.

36.3 Oh My Darling, Clementine Demonstration, p.90

When a song has the word “Swing” over the time signature at the beginning of the piece, it means that you play the eighth notes (not the quarter notes) in a long-short lazy sounding rhythm. Clementine is played in Swing rhythm, which you learned about when you played Erie Canal (p. 71) in Lesson 23.

Clementine is presented as a “Lead Sheet” or in Fake Book form, meaning that there is no bass staff, but simply chord symbols for the left-hand to play. Notice that I play my left-hand F chord high; it is close to my right-hand melody so that I can play the middle C (in red on p.90) with my left hand.

Piano and Poetry Parties

In my video 36.2 above I discuss what my student Jackie shared at the bottom of p.90 in our Upper Hands Piano, BOOK 1. This student used to gather with friends simply for wine and cheese tastings, and they would listen to playlists she would curate as background music. When she started taking piano lessons, Jackie came up with a brilliant idea to augment the wine and cheese they enjoyed together.

She challenged her friends to each bring a poem, story, or piece of art, or to sing and/or play a song or piece to share. Her friends agreed and brought an eclectic assortment of offerings – an in-progress quilt, a watercolor painting, some photographs, a song sung with ukulele, a poem recited, a story told, a dance performed, a cake baked, etc., – and Jackie performed a piano piece she was working on.

Everyone supported each other’s creative pursuits, and they felt that they had truly elevated their group’s gatherings. They called them Piano and Poetry Parties, and they continue twice per year to this day.

You might consider doing something like this with your friends or family. Having an upcoming performance date helps motivate us to practice more than we might otherwise. Though the idea of playing for others might make you feel nervous, remember that your loved ones love you, and rather than judging you for your mistakes, they will applaud your progress.

If everyone is contributing something creative, you will all feel similarly vulnerable; do it anyway! Just keep taking deep breaths to relax your body. (This really does work!) Once you get a few of these informal performances behind you, it will start to feel less scary, and more fun.

It will feel like an accomplishment, a goal met. Spring and summer might be the best times to host a Piano and Poetry Party (or whatever you might name your creative gathering) when covid, cold and flu cases are low.

Passion Practice

1. Exercise #2 (Appendix iii) in B-flat and F, with hands together.
2. p.89 – Play the Minuet with hands separately and together. Watch my video 36.1 and practice playing from the 1^st ending to the beginning a few times each day, until you can play this transition smoothly.
3. p.90 – Watch my Clementine demonstration video, 36.3 above. Practice playing the chords left hand alone a couple times before playing with hands together. Remember the B-flats! And remember to Swing the eighth notes.
4. Chord Calisthenics #4 – (Appendix viii) Play all 12 of the minor triads with hands together, starting with F minor, then B-flat minor, etc. moving backwards towards C minor. See how many minor triads you can play from memory.

Let’s Have a Conversation:

Would you consider hosting something like a Piano and Poetry Party? What might you play for your friends? What kind of foods might you serve, or would it be potluck? Do you think you would be nervous and perfectionistic, or would you be able to just do your best and have fun with your performance? Have you ever tried taking long deep breaths to calm your nerves? Have you already played the piano for loved ones? How did it feel?