This Shit Rules: Moisture For Your Ashy Bits

Welcome to This Shit Rules, wherein members of the Autostraddle team open up to you about the beauty products they couldn’t live without.

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probably the least make-up you’ll ever catch me wearing.

Yes, winter is indeed coming, and for most people that means chapped lips and rosy cheeks. For those of us designed for warmer climates, however, it means blasting the heat all night and waking up from night terrors about fire ants attacking your legs (which, for the record, is preferable to waking up with nipples cold enough to cut glass. I have never found a happy medium). My knees look like I’ve been crawling around in the fireplace. My lips are so dry you could peel off a layer and roll a joint in it. I’m itchy as hell y’all, but thankfully, I have an arsenal of products to keep me whet as a whistle.

Vaseline Lip Therapy with Aloe Vera

People have mixed feelings about putting petroleum jelly on their lips, but whatever they do to this lip jelly (that is for whatever reason only available in Europe), is magic. It also comes in plain and rosewater flavors, and I use it under my eyes when I run out of eye cream.
Buy It on Amazon: 0.7 oz, pack of two ($5.08)

Life-flo Pure Almond Oil

For days when your skin feels too small for your face and regular face cream just won’t cut it, organic cold-pressed sweet almond oil should do the trick. Use this oil after washing your face and applying whatever other anti-acne/anti-aging/anti-gravity creams you may want to use. WARNING: Use only ONE DROP. This stuff means business, and by business I mean it will leave an oil slick across your face if you use too much. ONE. SINGULAR. DROP. It goes a long way.

Buy It on Amazon: 16 oz. ($10.46)

Aveeno Skin Relief Moisturizing Lotion

via Aveeno

via Aveeno

So normally I just slather on some coconut oil right out of the shower, but this shit really rules. I actually don’t own it. I just steal it from my mom when I’m home. It’s got “soothing oat essence” and shea butter, and a little bit of magic sauce that’ll take the bite out of frostbite.

Buy It on Amazon: Pack of 3 8 oz. bottles ($25.73)

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Hannah Hodson

Hannah Hodson is a 22-year old Brooklyn-bred writer and actor. She graduated Hampshire College with a very valuable BA in Theatre and Black Studies. She currently resides in DUMBO, Brooklyn, where she admires the view while writing poetry about gentrification, climate change, race, class and other heavy stuff, but tries to keep a positive outlook on it all. She recently met Abbi and Ilana from Broad City (IRL), and has photos to prove it. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter, for her thoughts on Beyonce.

Hannah has written 36 articles for us.

11 Comments

  1. thank you for this!!! my hands, lips and feet get their asses kicked when this time of year comes around

  2. Vaseline doesn’t exist in America?! My mind is blown.. How do you cope? I’ve got a pot of vaseline by my bed, in two of my bags, and on my desk at uni. They recently released a special honey one which I am in love with, it’s so great for lips.

    • No, Vaseline definitely exists in America, in large quantities. In fact, I have some in my medicine cabinet right now. I just don’t think that particular product is available.

  4. gonna share my faves too because i live in the DESERT and I’m a SWIMMER, so my skin is basically itching powder during the winter.

    -Gold Bond lotion, any of the varieties at Target. It works because it has a high glycerine content, which acts as a water barrier to prevent your skin from losing its natural moisture. Wear on dry skin overnight; wake up with moisturized skin.

    -On the other end of the price spectrum, the facial lotion from Philosophy called “Hope Is Not Enough”, at Sephora. Worth the money because it’s the only lotion I’ve found that does actually add moisture back to my skin. Most other lotions (Oil of Olay or whatever), they make my skin damp but don’t really absorb.

    Help me find a high SPF chapstick that rules! They phased out production of the 35 spf Chapstick with the red and yellow label, which (bonus) tasted like key lime to me. No one seems to make an SPF above 15 for chapstick anymore, and also they seem to cost 15 bucks instead of 5.

    • ok glycerin is a humectant, so it draws water to the surface of the skin. lanolin and petrolatum are the moisture barriers to prevent water from evaporating from the skin. in combination those ingredients should have net hydration of the skin surface.

  5. That Aveeno lotion is indeed amazing! I also really like their face wash, it’s sort of shimmery and doesn’t make my face feel tight after I use it.

  6. YES as a nursing student who literally washes/sanitizes her hands a hundred times during a shift, I love this. One of my faves is Neutrogena’s “Norweigan Formula” hand cream (2 2-oz containers for $12 on Amazon), which I’ve been able to find on sale the local grocery store pretty often. I put it on before bed and wear gloves overnight and it works wonders. A 2-oz container lasts me between one and two months.

    Also BAG BALM.

  8. Great choices. I really like using organic refined coconut oil. It has so many uses for moisturzing skin, hair & nails plus the refined version has no coconut smell.

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