Spring cleaning your make-up bag

For some reason unbeknownest to me, the Spring season has become infamous as the time of the year to properly clean-out everything. Along with the clothing/bedding switch and excessive cleaning that is most likely to be taking place at this time of year, it is also a great opportunity to tackle a more insidious, under-the-radar mess: your make-up drawer. 

Despite the fact that these products are constantly coming into contact with your face, most women hardly ever think about the cleanliness/shelf-life of these products. The following is a just quick check-list of things to consider as you go through beauty products: 

• Any lotion based make-up product with an SPF in it (such as a foundation) has an especially limited shelf-life. After about 6 months, the active sunscreen ingredients begin to break-down, so that although the make-up appears to work as usual, your skin is not receiving the same amount of sun protection that you intended. If you want to hold on to these products, please be sure to apply another form of sun protection first.
  
• Time to wash all make-up brushes-- including mascara wands. If the brushes (mascara wands included, if older than 3 months) have not been washed regularly, they are most likely bacteria receptacles. You can either use wash made specifically for make-up brushes, or a gentle shampoo, to cleanse the brushes. Once clean, allow to air-dry.
  
  
• Go through and inspect everything you use on a regular basis. If anything appears to have changed consistency, color, or smells strange-- toss it.
  
• During the normal wear-and-tear of being tossed into a drawer or bag, it is likely that loose debris from the multiple colors inside a compact will have shifted onto each other, and possibly coated the interior mirror. Use a tissue to clean the powders off the mirror, and use a butter-knife to gently scrape the discolored layers off to make your compact look like new again (and prevent bacteria from growing).
  
• For your collection of lipsticks and lip-gloss tubes, rubbing the surface with a paper-towel soaked in rubbing alcohol is a great way to clean and disinfect the areas that are coming into contact with your mouth.

Are there any make-up cleaning tips that you would like to share? If so, please do! We love hearing your feed-back!