Beauty Tuesday: Base Camp

Do you ever have this problem?: You run out of foundation and when you go to the store you either forget to bring the empty tube with you or the beauty company has revamped the line and now you have to start from scratch, trying to remember what shade you are. The problem is that many lines have gotten so precise with their shades that they all are just slight variations on themselves.

I have this problem every time I go to the drugstore. Am I a Fair? Ivory? Light Ivory? Light Beige? Light Cream? Vanilla?

And then, of course I just start thinking about ice cream and how, with ice cream it doesn't matter which flavour you choose because there's no wrong flavour. They all taste excellent on a hot summer day.

This weekend I ran out of my favourite foundation - Clinique Super Moisture Makeup.

It's light but creamy, and provides full coverage of any redness, pigmentation or uneven skin tone yet lets your own skin tone shine through - so you don't look like you're wearing any makeup at all. It's realliy a dream.

I'd planned just to go to Shoppers Drug Mart to pick up a new tube, but since we were near Holt Renfrew, I decided to just stop in there instead.

I have never bought foundation at Holt Renfrew. I don't know why. I can't explain it. But it was one of the best experiences of my beauty shopping life. No joke.

I went up to the counter - and unlike in some other large department stores where employees seem to be working 17 different counters at once so you have to wait and wait and wait to be served - at Holt's there were FOUR estheticians working at the Clinique counter. One of them smiled at me and immediately asked how she could help. I told her my catastrophic problem. I didn't know what she'd do but I just assumed she might look at my face and then suggest the shade she thought would work best. And then I would buy it and hope for the best.

Instead, she told me to hop up on the stool beside the counter. Within minutes she'd tested five different shades on my jawline, found the perfect one, blended it into my forehead, nose, cheeks and chin, then handed me a mirror so I could see, wrapped the foundation up and sent me on my way.

It almost made me happy that I have to wear foundation. Almost.