Bathing Suit Tips for Body Flattering Swimwear for Women and Teen Girls

Every year, it happens. Bathing suit weather arrives, and with it, sales on swimwear (or for some, suntan wear.) The good news is, the variety has never been greater. The bad news, the variety and decisions have never been greater.

Decisions, decisions. Now it seems there is a bathing suit for every type of woman or situation as there are mastectomy suits, maternity swimsuits, plus-size swimwear, suits for tall or petite women. And then the real decisions start.

Do I want a one piece, two piece bathing suit, bikini, or tankini. Should it be slimming, help camouflage (you know) with an underwire, or be one of those what they call miracle suits. Should I be bold and go with something hot, sheer, sexy, exotic as in something skimpy like a thong or brazilian g string. Do I splurge and look for a brand name designer like Tommy Hilfiger, Victoria Secret, Anne cole, or sporty with Nike or Lands End. Or do I do as I always do and look on the discount rack or wait for my bathing suit pick to go on sale. And lets not forget color, black, white, floral or florescent. Decisions decisions.

What womens swimsuit fashion is best and most flattering for your body type

Apple shaped body frames have broader shoulders and smaller hips. Two-piece bikinis or tankinis with a solid color top and a patterned bottom will give you a more balance appearance.

Pear shaped body types have larger hips and smaller shoulders with a waist that is larger than the shoulders. One-piece bathing suits with tummy control or other design feature that create the illusion of a waist line will be the most flattering.

Small Bust - To enhance a smaller bust try a halter bikini top that has a seam just under the bust line or a lightly padded or line top. Swim wear with texture can also help detract attention away from your bust line if you feel self-conscious.

Fuller Bottom - Skirted swim suits are back in style and can be found in many different patterns and styles. The skirt flatters a fuller bottomed body type and will give you a more balance look. You may also want to try on a few boy short styles as well. Both of these options offer a little more coverage on the bottom.

Slender, athletic bodies have shoulders, waist and hips that are the similar in width. One-piece or two-piece suits with detailing around the waist will help create a more hourglass shape. Try a wrap style top or a belted bathing suit bottom to create more waist definition.

Hourglass figures have balance shoulders and hips with a smaller waist. If this is you, you're lucky because just about any classic styled bathing suit should flatter your figure.

Buying a swimsuit is about perception

Buying a swimsuit has a lot to do with beauty because it’s more about perceptions than it is actual good looks. The fact is, with the right attitude, nearly any woman’s swim suit will look good to men, provided there’s a woman in it. Other women are much pickier about what suit looks good on what body, and the worst critic of all is that chick in the mirror. I have a few beauty tips about bathing suits and bikinis, which I will pass on to you in the hopes that they will inspire confidence. Some of them are just theoretical for me, and others I use whenever I shop for a suit. Use what works for you.

How much are you willing to spend for designer swimwear?

Like good shoes, good bathing suits cost money. You’re paying for design here, and for things like built-in controls or enhancements. Thanks to the fairly recent craze for selling binkini tops and bottoms separately, retailers have found they can charge a lot more for a whole suit than they could five or six years ago when bottoms and tops were inseparable. On average, a decent suit will cost you around $60. On the other hand, if you have a great body, it doesn’t matter if your suit is cheap because you don’t have anything to hide. Just make sure you buy something that won’t come apart when it hits the water.

When to buy a cheap swimsuit.

If you’re only going to wear a bathing suit the three days you go to the beach each year, or for sunning in the back yard, you can go cheaper too. In fact, there’s no reason not to wear a pair of shorts and a bathing suit top or even a camisole or tank top. It’s crazy to spend a lot of money for a suit you aren’t going to wear.

One piece or two piece bathing suit? Who will be looking or who do you want looking?

A shy friend of mine went to Mexico, and because she was very modest and didn’t feel very pretty, she wore a pair of men’s trunks and a bikini top in the pool at the hotel. A Mexican fellow who frequented the pool told her that if she wanted to blend in, she’d better drop the trunks and wear bikini bottoms. She did, and they went dancing several times after that. She came home with a golden tan and a happy expression.

Comfort is important, and depending on the beach or pool scene, either no-one will notice you at all, or everyone will be watching everyone else. If it matters to you, or if your boyfriend’s ex is going to be at the party, fork out the big money and look great, even if you only wear that suit that one day.

How much coverage do you want from your beach wear?

Crucial to the question of bathing suits is coverage. Again, the nicer your body, the less coverage you need, unless you’re shy or you’re smart and want to save your skin from sun damage. You can apply sunscreen and sunless tanner and have a beautiful glowing tan without the sun exposure. Just be sure to evenly distrubute and don't over apply the self tanner and end up looking a shade or orange. If you plan to be swimming or playing volleyball or surfing, you may want more coverage because a suit that covers more of you also tends to hang on, where flimsier, actually make that skimpier, things might fall off or out.

With board shorts, boyshorts and hipster bikinis, we can buy suits that fit even in the middle of a plus size day or PMS fat attack. A well-cut one-piece can hide and camoflauge an assortment of figure flaws. Contrary to what some experts will tell you, large floral designs do not minimize a heavy body, and you don’t have to wear black either. Depending on where the chubbiness lies, a smaller-coverage suit may turn out to be more flattering than the high-coverage suit you didn’t want to buy anyway. No one can possibly see all the lumps and bumps as the girl in the bathing suit in the mirror does, so pick the least worst suit you can find, and get out there and play!

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Home Remedies and Treatments to Repair Damaged Hair

Dry, damaged hair is one of life's little horrors: it won't ruin you, but it won't do you any good. Maybe your hair was caught in a freak, hot roller accident; perhaps chemical straighteners or perms have tortured it into a permanent, frizzy fright wig. You may seek treatment from a local salon, but the stylist might recommend a crew cut. So, what can you do to repair extremely damaged hair that doesn't require a period of enforced baldness? Or what if you're darned close to bald already from chlorine, hair color, blow drying and other hair related emergencies?


People most likely to have damaged hair include those with fine hair and African Americans who use straighteners or keep their hair in cornrows (this tightness can damage the hair follicles and cause hair loss) . African American's hair is very delicate –usually drier than Caucasian hair, and can be easily ruined by chemicals and heat.

How to Grow Out Your Damaged Hair

If your hair has been truly wrecked, sometimes the best thing to do is have professional advice and then cut off as much damaged hair and split ends as possible so you can start fresh. You know when to cut off your hair: it's when you'd rather be bald than look the way you do now! A super-short haircut can be appealing if you go to someone who will shape the cut to your face. Understanding face shape is the difference between a ten dollar, ten minute hair cut and an admittedly more expensive, hopefully much nicer one.

Remedies for Dry, Damaged Hair

Home remedies for "hair gone wrong" include restoration of moisture to hair not too severely damaged and making way for regrowth. In the case of hair ruined by hot rollers or straightening, you may have a few inches of relatively undamaged hair on the scalp. Get a medium-severe haircut to get rid of the frizzled hair tips, or leave the damage right where it is and concentrate on protecting the good hair. Leave off the chemicals, avoid the blow dryer and other heated hair appliances, and use gentle shampoo as infrequently as you dare. Shampoo strips oils from your hair, making it more brittle, so if you don't really need to shampoo, cut it down to once a week or so. And forget vitamins in shampoo: they don't work. You can try taking vitamins internally to keep your hair strong as a side effect of your increased health, but there aren't any vitamins that help when applied externally.

Home Deep Conditioning: Over the Counter & Natural Products

Buy deep conditioner hot oil products at the drugstore, or go the homemade route for less money. Hot oil treatments (actually, the oil is warm, not hot), work by starting with dampened hair, softening the cuticle and locking in the water by sealing the outside of the hair with a coating of oil. You can make your hair drier by using hot oil if you then go and wash it all out with a harsh shampoo. When you give yourself a moisturizing hair treatment, leave it on overnight and then wash it with a gentle shampoo the next day.

Deep conditioning home remedies and recipes for fried hair include mayonnaise, avocado and egg, but some of us prefer to eat our salads, not wear them. You can get the job done using any cooking oil (but peanut oil will make you smell peanutty!) Coconut suntan oil is a favorite, and it smells terrific, too. Rinse your hair with warm water, apply the oil from the palm of your hand, working it into your hair. Now comes the warm part: wrap your head in a towel or a plastic hair bag that comes with hair color kits, or in some cling wrap, and sit around in it as long as you can. Cover your pillow with a safety-pinned towel and sleep on it overnight. Next day, use a moisturizing or baby shampoo to wash out the greasiness.

If your hair has been ruined from color treatments, consider switching to a repairing henna, which has been used for centuries to keep hair shiny and bright. Unlike permanent colors, henna has no ammonia to strip your hair; the henna sits on the outside of the hair shaft, so it can't do any damage. But test it first; some people are allergic to this all-natural herb!

Moms Need to Take Time for Themselves to Feel and Look Beautiful

When you spend your life running after a toddler or shepherding bigger kids around town, you may be feeling less like a happy mother and more like a disenfranchised maid. When you’re thinking of running off the Mexico instead of picking Jimmy up from soccer, it may be time to take a break from being Super Mommy and just be yourself.

You don’t have to send the kids to boarding school to get a little me-time. In fact, you can put the little dickens to work. Children as small as four years old can be taught to brush your hair (although they probably can’t learn to brush their own just yet). You can share a face mask with your kids, letting them rub it on your face. You can rub a little on theirs too, and then everybody can wash it off together.

Having time to yourself is an important part of life, and mom’s need time too. If your children are still at the napping age, invite a girlfriend over at nap-time and do each other’s nails or hair, just like you did when you were a teenager. Trade babysitting with another mom and take yourself out for a movie, or hire a sitter to take your kids to a movie while you shop or stay home to read.

--Editors Tip ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Have a Home Spa with Common Grocery Store Items

You don't have to spend lots of money to feel like a princess, even if you spent the morning chasing kids to the school bus and then getting yourself ready for work. Shopping's hard work for people on the go, and you may forget the necessary luxuries in the rush of trying to get home to make dinner. What happened to your favorite bubble bath, a tin of caviar and a bottle of champagne? Who says you can't lounge on pillows and eat grapes? (Out of grapes? Put them on the list).

Things in the grocery store can turn your house into a veritable spa. Natural cosmetics and beauty treatments abound in the dairy and grain aisles. If you want to start living a more splendid life but don't want to spend your quality time and cold, hard cash in expensive salons, get the advice you need on finding fabulous things right where you buy your butter and eggs.

Learn to shop for beauty groceries and treat yourself to a home spa.

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An understanding dad takes his kids out once in awhile without Mom. If you know an understanding dad, help him plan a weekly or semi-weekly play date where he can spend time with the kids and you can do your own thing. Can’t remember what your “own thing” is? Don’t worry; you’ll fret for a couple of weeks, and then find something that catches your imagination. I have a friend who finally got some time to herself and didn’t know what to do with it, after spending three years with her boy. She felt so guilty, she almost considered taking a full-time job instead of the part-time one where she currently spend 30 hours a week, plus a long commute. But she gave it some thought, and returned to a long-time interest: art.

Having your own interests makes you more fun to be with. It reduces wrinkles, gives you something to talk about with people who aren’t necessarily moms, and shows your kids that being a mom isn’t all work and no play. A well-rounded, satisfied mom (or dad) tends to be in a better position to raise well-rounded, satisfied children. Spending every moment with your child does more than cheat you of time spent on your own; it deprives your child of the same opportunity. Kids need time to draw quietly, to daydream and tell themselves little stories. Just like moms do.

But you’re still a busy person, and quick beauty means you’re saving time for more important things. So use the following time-saving tips to make the most of your time.

Use a moisturizer-sunscreen combination. That way, if you decide on the spur of the moment to take the kids to the park, your face is ready to go. Slick the kids down with sunscreen, and off you go.

Use lipstick with a sunscreen to protect lips too. Professional makeup people prefer brushes for perfect lips, but lipstick is faster and can be smudged with your finger.

If you can find a shampoo-conditioner that works, go ahead and use it. I haven’t found one that works as a detangler, so it saves me time to use separate products. My hair brushes a lot easier and faster when I use conditioner.

Keep Kleenex and towelettes in the car and in your purse for quick ice-cream clean-ups.

Keep meal bars in your purse to snack on between trips to the store, the school, the tennis court, the ballet lessons etc. etc. A hungry mom is a cranky mom!

Buy salad mix instead of spending your time washing and drying lettuce or spinach. In packages or bulk mixes, it’s already washed, and baby greens are cleaner than mature ones.

Teach your kids that unpeeled veggies are the way they should be eaten. Peels have nutrients and fiber that should be eaten. Even mashed potatoes are better if you leave the peelings on. Just give your veggies a scrub in the sink and they’re all set.

One-pot meals save time on preparation and washing-up too.

Do little chores during TV commercials. Dust a table, put dishes away and get back on the couch. Use commercials for getting kids into their pajamas, brushing teeth or making tomorrow’s lunches.

Start teaching your kids chores as soon as they start walk. Even little kids can smooth their beds, put toys back in the chest or help set the table. If your children learn early that everyone has chores to do, there will be fewer struggles later on.

Take turns with your partner to be the one who does more work around the house. Bring each other coffee, and alternate making dinner. If there are chores you each prefer to do, make them part of a daily routine and trade off on the rest. Help each other out with chores to increase household harmony, to teach the kids how pleasant it can be to help each other.

Real Beauty.

If you spend much time watching TV or movies and reading magazines, your perspective starts to suffer when it comes to real life. The way the media influences expectations isn’t just applicable to children and teenagers: we all get a little warped when we’re exposed to the fake worlds of fashion and entertainment.

During the Depression (the one that started in ’29,
not ’92), the big movie studios made splashy, high-fashion, lets-all-have-fun films to help take people’s minds off the misery and hunger that they were living in. You could see a movie for a nickel then, and crowds thronged to the theaters to watch the world where people danced and drank champagne and wore marvelous clothes. Pretending that someone somewhere was having fun was the next best thing to being there.

Movies have changed a bit since then, with many popular films being based on audiences watching scenes of horror that would disgust less “civilized” cultures, where people aren’t inured to violence as a form of entertainment. But what hasn’t changed is the importance of feminine beauty to carry even the lousiest films out of the red and into the black. And if you can get them to take off their clothes (or find a body double to fill in), the film will be even more successful.

I love movies, especially good movies with strong plots and good dialogue and excellent acting, which is why these days I watch a lot of foreign films. But if I really, truly believed that the actresses I see on-screen look the way I’m supposed to, I’d get depressed and stay that way.

Fortunately, I have a strong reality orientation and a pretty healthy ego. I’m not going to look like Winona Ryder anytime soon, I guess, but I get by. And if I feel my reality slipping, I tune into a fashion show on the Entertainment channel and watch a half-dressed model slink down the runway like some sick animal seeking its lair. It’s hard to take media representations of female “beauty” seriously when you’ve just finished counting the ridges on a model’s ribcage.

(I’m thinking of starting a non-profit called Save the Models. Its primary purpose would be to provide models with nourishing soups, delivered on-site, 24 hours a day.)

So this morning I was watching an unending series of Jimmy Cagney movies and trying to concentrate on my work, but I kept getting distracted by Bette Davis, who played a nice girl, a nurse, in this 1933 movie. It was before Bette got her Bette Davis Eyes and the crazy, dark role she was later type-cast in so well.

It wasn’t so much Bette who distracted me as it was Bette’s makeup. Her eyebrows were pencil-thin and penciled in, and her face looked pasty—stage makeup has changed a lot since 1933. If I hadn’t read the credits, I wouldn’t have known who she was: she was that ordinary (in an actressy kind of way).

So I was watching Bette fall in love with Cagney, and thinking about, how before she was freaky and noire and so very Bette, she was just another pretty girl in a film. And I wondered, what would have happened to Bette if she had happened on that crazy eye shadow and that hard-edged look she later acquired? Would she have ever become a Famous Star? Maybe not, but we’ll never know, because she was a great actress, and might have made it even with looking like just another pretty face.

This kind of brings me back to what I wanted to say when I started out. There’s the glamour and sophistication we’re “supposed” to have, that we struggle for and despair of ever having, and then there’s the real, day-to-day beauty that so many women exhibit when they’re doing the laundry or hauling the kids around, or buying groceries in their sweats with the hair scooped up in a ponytail and not a scrap of makeup.

What women don’t know (and I’m including myself here, because “knowing” intellectually and knowing on a real and regular basis are two totally different things), is that men often fall in love with women who, for once, aren’t thinking about their looks. I had a friend once, a shy guy, who fell madly in love from afar with a woman he’d never noticed before. He saw her with the Brownie troop she was leading. She was wearing a goofy uniform and her long, chestnut (his word) hair was down, and she was playing tag with a bunch of little girls and laughing her head off. He fell so much in love that he couldn’t stop talking about how she looked laughing and running, with the sun in her hair.

Years ago, I was sitting on one of the side-facing seats on a cross-campus bus. I was wearing a rayon summertime skirt, one of those Indian prints, not exactly a fashion statement. When the bus took a sharp turn, I nearly slid right off the bench. Not one of my more elegant moments. This sexy professor took one look at me, embarrassed and clutching the steel pole that had saved me from sitting in the aisle, and we were an item for a year.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, there’s very little rhyme or reason behind why people find us appealing. I’m not sure it has much to do with looks as much as it is about being yourself and eventually tumbling over the people who happen to appreciate you that way.

I might be wrong, but I don’t think I am.

Beauty Comes From Within

Sexy is definitely a state of mind, and with the fast pace of today's lifestyle, women and men too are finding themselves too distracted, too anxious or too tired to feel sexy. Some companies are cashing in on the big slump in Western libidos by creating pills containing herbs or chemicals designed to stimulate exhausted, stressed-out people to ever more frenzied sexual activity. I think it's sad that we're using pills when what people really need is more time to relax.

If your sex life has taken a dive, there are usually entirely natural and reasonable causes. Rather than doping yourself to feel something, try the following tips first. They are time-honored strategies.

Get real. If you're working 60 hours a week, commuting, competing, keeping up with kids and still expecting to get it on three times a week, you're expecting too much of yourself. If your health isn't what it should be, if you're having problems at work, or if you're in financial difficulties, your sex drive is also going to be running on empty. A natural response to hard times, a reduced sex drive could be your body's way of protecting you from pregnancy during times of stress. (Of course, that's no reason to forget your birth control: bodies aren't that smart!) If your sex drive is nil in response to an overly stressful lifestyle, don't just target your sex life; take some serious time to think about how to change your overall quality of life.

Get a sitter. Parents (especially new parents) are so focused on their children that sex goes right out the window. Getting a sitter is more than just planning an evening alone: it's something you should do on a regular basis to give you some of your pre-parenting life back. New parents should have a sitter lined up before the baby's born, and should start going out alone and together right away. Getting out in the world again helps combat post-partum blues, and contributes to re-starting a healthy sex life. If you're not sleeping because of a baby, hire a sitter to come in while you're home so you can nap while someone else watches the baby.

Get some rest. To feel sexy, you have to be relaxed, but not exhausted. You need to have had enough sleep in the past twenty-four hours to put in an hour or two of sack time with someone else. If your lover wants to fool around and all you can think about is how tired you are, it isn't going to be much fun. Schedule time for resting as well as sleep. Doze on the couch, hang around in a hammock. Reconsider your priorities. Let the lawn go another day and skip the PTA meeting in favor of lying in a chaise in the backyard.

Get organized. Couples who have a good sex life often say that while spontaneity is a nice idea, planning gets things done. Make a date with your sweetheart in advance, then plan your day around it so that nothing else interferes.

Get together. Most women can't just turn sexy feelings on at a moment's notice. Make sure your partner understands that you need more togetherness than just sex. Make time to cuddle on the couch, to do fun, non-sexual things together, and to talk. Feeling closer in other areas of your life can help you get closer in the sexual aspects too.

Get playful. Read erotica. Visit a hot-tub place together. Experiment with massage oils and sexy games. Light candles and drink champagne in bed. Dress up in lingerie (get a cute satin corset from www.lovefifi.com) and have some fun. You don't have to play games all the time, but occasional side trips to the Land of Kinky can keep things spicy and fresh.

Shape Eye Brows with Threading, Waxing and Plucking with Tweezers

Eyebrows are tricky creatures. You know how they’re supposed to look, but sometimes they don’t want to cooperate, and because they’re growing out of your head, they have a semi permanent character that defies wishes and good intentions.

One of the many problems of eyebrows is the fact that if they aren’t the right color, they can either dominate your face or disappear entirely. Their unfortunate (but necessary) proximity to your eyeballs makes it a pretty major no-no to just sweep the haircolor across each brow and hope it doesn’t drip into your eyes. That’s why the goddess of practical beauty created the eyebrow pencil, an unsatisfactory solution, but sometimes better than nothing if your eyebrows happen to be very pale.

--Editor's Note --------------------------------------------------------------

Proper Beauty Tools Make Eyebrow Shaping a Breeze

Plucking the perfect eyebrow shape can be a stressful task because no one wants painful, over tweezed brows. Follow the lead of to make up artists and get the right tweezers and eyebrow care beauty tools. For very little money you can get the same eyebrow tweezers most professional salons use.

Learn from the professionals and see some eyebrow care kits that come with everything you need for perfect brows.

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Shaping Your Eyebrows: How to get the perfect arch shape

Shape is also crucial, and if your eyebrows are coarse, creating and maintaining the ideal shape is difficult because pulling out individual hairs can leave large gaps, or severely shorten the length of a brow if you happen to pull out the half-inch hair on the very end.

The perfect eyebrow starts above the inside corner of your eye (over the tear duct), and ends at the outside corner, above your eyelashes. Eyebrows should have an arch: in nature, it’s rarely where it should be, which is a frustrating commentary on standards of beauty. Ideally, the arch happens over the iris, the colored part of your eye. It should be gentle, so if you’re planning to reshape your arch, take it very, very slowly. Do a hair or two a day, and err on the side of caution. Hasty plucking can give you a surprised look that lasts for weeks.

How to Pluck Eyebrows with Tweezers: The Do's and Don'ts

Many women pluck their eyebrows with tweezers. Some wax them, but wax is tricky because it’s hard to get an accurate shape. And some go to a hair removal salon to try "threading." Although threading is newly popular in the United States, it is a centuries-old technique of hair removal practiced in India. The eyebrow experts say never, never to pluck your eyebrows from above, but always to pluck from the bottom of the brow. I say, if you have some wild or stray or bushy hairs growing above your brows, feel free to pluck them. I did it once, and nothing bad happened to me.

I read somewhere that it’s okay to trim your eyebrows. I think this is good if the single hairs are long and thick. You can pluck some hairs and trim the others, brushing them up, evening the ends (be careful not to trim too much!), then brushing them down checking again and again as you go along.

Use Eyebrow Gel to Keep Your Brow Shape Neat after Tweezing

Finally, keeping your brows neat can be done with special eyebrow gel, or you can use a little hair gel to smooth them and keep them shapely.

You can buy an entire professional-style brow kit that includes tweezers, pencils, grooming gels and brush from Anastasia at www.drugstore.com.