With college admission offers received and accepted, we can now relax and enjoy the excitement of soon to be college-bound women, which means prepping for the big move, whether it’s a city away or out of state. And while most of us gals will be buying and crossing off all the essentials on our list for college, let’s not forget our makeup collection. We’ will be tempted to pack up all our makeup because how can we even consider leaving anything behind or even know what could be handy or not? To avoid an overload of makeup in college, we’ve created a list of makeup dos & don’ts to help compartmentalize our makeup collection come September.
Don’t Pick Blindly
Forgetting to clean out and organize our makeup is definitely a no-no. Not only does this lead to over packing, we also run the chance of using expired makeup. And, makeup does expire. So those 15 tubes of opened mascara we’re adamant about taking with us might not be quite a good idea down the road. Instead let’s take the time to sort through all our makeup—looking for expirations and cataloguing everything into categories such as blush, bronzers, lipsticks, face, etc. This way we have a clear overview of what we have, and therefore able to better choose our makeup instead of grabbing blindly only to find out when we’re in college that we’ve packed three blue eye shadows. If we do the prepping beforehand, we eliminate the stress and the money beforehand having to buy or replace makeup essentials we left behind.
Do a List
This goes hand in hand when we’re organizing our makeup. Whether it’s on a notepad or in our IPhones, lists can be really important in making sure we’re checking off all the things we need to have, especially in college. First step to do is to look at our daily makeup routine and ask ourselves what are the products we usually use for everyday and special occasions. This will help us narrow down what we need, what products help us to accomplish our desired look and eliminate the things that we simply never use. Many of us will find that college can be very fast paced with early classes in the morning and sometimes classes at night, so while we want to look our best, sometimes we will have to forgo the makeup and hurry to class. Trust us, list make a difference.
Don’t Forget the Essentials
Although our makeup is now organized and have a list on hand, many of us will forget some of the essentials. Ask ourselves, what are our must-haves and what can we live with out? Chances are that we will be able to eliminate some of the excess like forgoing our expensive Chanel foundation that we sparingly use for our Revlon whipped foundation we use on a daily basis. The more we’re able to compact our makeup to what we will really use, the easier it’ll be to set a routine in the mornings. This way we have more time with our makeup application, and less time scavenging for our Anastasia dip brow we thought we put in our makeup bag. Eliminate the stress. Works wonders!
Do Trial Runs
It might seem excessive to do a few makeup trial runs, but nothing beats preparation. Plus how will we know what type of makeup we need to accomplish the looks we’re looking for? College is the opportunity to try new horizons, and this can definitely translate to our makeup. Are we looking for natural everyday looks or do we want to add a little more edge with heavier eyeliner and brows? With the added workload, intense classes and exciting campus clubs, we won’t have a lot of time to spare everyday to hunting down the makeup we need. We’re going to want to just reach into our makeup drawer, grab our peach blush, bb cream and waterproof mascara and be out the door. We suggest trying a makeup challenge like the popular 15 minute makeup challenges (or 5 minute for those daring enough) to get us in the routine of quickly applying our makeup and running out the door. These practices are what will show us the products we heavily lean on and the items that weigh us down.
Do Versatility
Time goes like a blink of an eye in college. One day we’re getting ready for our class presentation and the next we’re knee-deep in notes and study guides for upcoming midterms. It’s safe to say, our time is valuable so why not help eliminate some of the stress and cut down our time by choosing products that have multiple uses. BB creams for example, can be doubled as a primer and light foundation. This eliminates the need for us to take out our primer and then apply our foundation—something we don’t always have the energy or time to do at 7 am. Also choose makeup that can withstand long periods of use such as waterproof and smudge-proof products. We need to prepare ourselves for long classes, and even longer days on campus, so we need products that are long lasting and high performance.
Don’t Overlook Travel-Friendly
If we’ve learned anything about wearing makeup in college is that travel-friendly is the way to go. Sometimes if we’re lucky our first class might start later on in the day, and we’ll be able to have a leisure morning to do our makeup with extra care. But this won’t always be the case. And as beauty enthusiasts, we love wearing makeup. Why not? It’s incredibly boosting to our confidence, and gives us a venue to creatively express ourselves. Unfortunately the stressful buzzing of college life doesn’t always go hand in hand. Pick makeup products that not only versatile but easily fit in a small makeup bag we can throw in our bag and be out the door if we need to touch up our makeup in between classes. Palettes are great ways to compact our essentials, especially if they include eye shadows, blush/bronzer and lip products. One of our favorites is the Too Faced On the Go Glamour palette. Not only does it have all the products we need for our eyes, cheeks and lips, it’s also incredibly travel friendly. Z-palettes are another great way to customize the makeup we need in our collection into one convenient palette without having to compromise on one palette alone. Instead of bringing our full-size foundation and loose powders, let’s opt for small travel-size containers with a lid, this way we can have what we need without the overload.
