bird bath: the time i burned my face

i have mentioned before that i am a bit of a sucker for things i see on tv or read on blogs. so when i read about a cool natural face mask, i try it...usually before doing any research on it. if someone says they love it, that is my research. until now (who am i kidding...i will still be a fool). i read about a face mask the other day that was supposed to be the bomb.com. i had all the ingredients in my house, so i mixed it up one morning and slapped it on my face.

ingredients:

1 T honey (read about the awesomeness of honey here)

1 T plain yogurt (read about how great yogurt is for your skin here)

a dash of cinnamon (read more about cinnamon here...if you dare!)

pre-burn

all was going well, i even asked chris if he wanted to use the leftovers. he said no, and then i said, "this is starting to burn". still believing that it would make me look 10 years younger, i kept it on. i started the shower, felt the burn even more, got in the shower, kept thinking to myself, "it's supposed to feel this way", washed my hair, and finally when i couldn't take the pain any more, i washed the mask off my face. i was actually scared to put my face under hot water for fear of more burn. and it had only been a few minutes. the directions i read said to keep the mask on for 10 minutes!

this is what my face looked like when i got out of the shower.

feel the burn!

do you smell what the rock is cookin'?

seriously, do you see the very evident line of red? my face was literally burned from the cinnamon. but do you know what helped? let's all say it on the count of three. 1.2. coconut oil!

ok, so here's the deal, cinnamon burns. well it burns my face, at least. i have very sensitive skin (obvi), and when i finally did my research (too late), i learned that cinnamon is good for acne-prone skin, which i do not have. so do your own research...it might be great for your skin. i don't want to come off as anti-cinnamon. after all, i love it on toast!

and for the redeeming part of this post (if you're still reading) (i may have offended the pro-cinnamon sect)...i did some research (and by research, i mean i googled 'honey yogurt mask' and made the first one i read about. my bad.) and came up with a great one for my face. same as above but instead of cinnamon, i used nutmeg. nutmeg is a natural anti-inflammatory and is said to "plump" fine lines and wrinkles. (i have even heard it's a great mix with cinnamon.) this one was delightful on my face, and i was even able to leave it on the full 10 minutes.

see how much happier i look?

look mom, no burn lines! just freckles!

so i guess the moral of this story is to do your own research. or, if you have very sensitive, normal-to-dry skin like me, feel free to test out the nutmeg version of this mask. i do love it, and will continue to use it on a weekly basis!

have you tried anything great on your face lately? tell me about it, and i'm sure i'll test it out!

xo,

megan bird

ps. on a totally unrelated note, we are super excited about this!