Family Affairs and other matters

I attended the above event last night thanks to my lovely blog friend Jennifer Howze, who invited me:-

Interesting. In fact, the beauty industry is like a whole other world for me. Although I bumped into a friend from down the road who I hadn’t realised was one of the judges. Of course, I love it. But I haven’t a clue about it. There is just so much stuff out there – creams, potions, advice, other advice, conflicting advice, cheap stuff, expensive stuff – how do you know where to begin? I’ve spent, on occasion lots of money on one pot of wonder cream. Nothing happened. So then I’ve spent very little on a different pot of cream and nothing happened either. I love having facials but they feel like such a luxury. In my industry (fitness), as an instructor I should be having facials and massages weekly to keep myself in shape and looking good. No. Chance. Too busy. Too expensive. Can’t justify it. Still haven’t worked out who to trust for advice to be honest.

I had no idea Johnson & Johnson were responsible for so many products – did you know for example that Listerine was partly named after Joseph Lister who got together with Robert Wood Johnson in 1876 to create the first antiseptic plasters.

This year the judging pane was chaired by Brian Walmsley (although I see he was rather unfortunately thanked in the programme as “Brain” Walmsley which would have slipped through spell-check). It was very interesting to see the categories and I’m looking forward to read the winning entries. Interesting that the winners were chosen specifically for innovative, in depth well researched and often brave articles. The Financial Times beauty editor won the best national newspaper beauty journalist and Psychologies Magazine won best freelance journalist which doesn’t surprise me either. There was a whole blogging section which was good to see and two winners were chosen who you should definitely check out:-

Sophie Feels Better – http://sophiefeelsbetter.blogspot.com/ about a gorgeous woman dealing with breast cancer who sadly couldn’t be there to pick up her award

A Model Recommends – http://www.amodelrecommends.com/ – looks gorgeous too

We were given goody bags full of products – baby oil but lots more – face creams etc. Perhaps I’ll test some of them out. ALSO I see there were blister plasters – which means, be warned J & J I am coming to ask you to provide 350 packets of them for the goody bag I’m putting together for the end of the Pink Power Walk for breast cancer. Just perfect.