Midlife cornucopia: a beauty steal, moments, supermarket finds and last of the sales

You know when you phone a friend and ask her what she’s been up to and she says, ‘not much’? Well it’s a bit like that here today. It’s about to change, I have a busy time coming up but for now I’m in that strange summer lull where everyone else seems to be on holiday. August is always an odd month isn’t it? I’ve read a few different people describing it as melancholic recently. For me, this week in particular always feels heavy with expectation because my younger two were both due on 4th August. They were both late and I think your body always remembers that liminality, the quiet expectation of becoming a mother all over again.

There’s definitely a feeling of change in the air. The windfalls are dropping early here because we’ve had such wet and windy weather so when I look out at the garden, it feels autumnal. My Inbox is full of new season press releases, the new skirt lengths, the colours of the season, the knitwear to come. The retail industry is predicting two potential outcomes from the months ahead; either people will be so sick of their summer clothes that they’ll be carried away and spend a fortune on new looks or… it will have been so long since they’ve worn anything with long sleeves that their cool weather wardrobe will feel completely fresh and they won’t spend a penny. On top of that there’s the north|south divide to consider, when the two halves of the country have had such an opposing experience of ‘summer’… what should the product split be? How will that affect demand? The challenge is how to crunch that when you’re apportioning SKUs. And then there’s Christmas. The big beauty advent calendar waitlists have already been released. Autumn, of course, only lasts a few weeks because Christmas begins in earnest on 1st November.

So whilst August feels like a limbo month from a consumer perspective because there’s no news, nothing to see in the shops and everybody is away, behind the scenes retail is in full flow… preparing to sweep you away very soon. I have a big new season project on and so in a couple of weeks time I’ll be pausing the blog for a little while so that I can complete it. For now though I’m not going to wish summer away so it’s a midlife cornucopia today… one of those random conversations you’d have over a cup of tea with a friend who’s had Covid and been confined to the house quite a bit. My mind has been so understimulated that I’m hoping we might even get to a chat about favourite supermarket products in the comments… bear with me, normal service will be resumed.

There hasn’t been a lot of midlife lately going on thanks to Covid. I’m better now and I’ve been back to running and the gym this week but my goodness it hit us hard. You’ll understand that there aren’t many photos but here are a few moments. In Newcastle the lifts were being replaced which wasn’t great with a twelfth floor apartment when I was struggling to breathe. For months we’d been planning to see this period as a peak workout opportunity, aiming to get up the 24 flights faster each time we scaled them. It didn’t turn out that way. They’d put a bench halfway up and I felt very elderly when I found myself having to stop for a while – I learned to take snacks!

Boden blouse (sold out); Me+Em jeans (sold out); Hope wrap (past season)

This was an afternoon of shopping before illness hit, just one of Newcastle’s glorious Georgian streetscapes. I ordered this dress while we were there because the weather was so changeable and it’s the perfect option for transitional weather. It has weight for warmth but the adjustable sleeves cope with the heat and it’s a great cut but I see it’s already sold out in a lot of sizes (I’m in a 12R and it’s true to size). Looking at the reviews I suspect it’s worked better for people in the cooler north than the baking hot south which shows that it’s a great buy for the cooler weeks to come.

Dress; Belt; Boden sandals (past season)

I have a sale bargain for you here because it’s nearly half price. I’m just a bit tired of my ivory blouse with jeans formula so this lilac is a nice tonal lift with denim. Here we were popping into the brilliant social enterprise at Newcastle cathedral.

The cathedral runs a cafe in partnership with the Oswin project. The concept is that they provide a career pathway for prison leavers giving them a fresh start by working in the cafe. All of the cakes, pastries, pies and breads are made by serving prisoners at the training bakery within HMP Northumberland. It has one of the biggest arrays of cakes that I’ve ever seen and with it being a social enterprise, the prices are incredibly low. As I looked through the menu I felt as if I’d catapulted back to 1999!

At home last Sunday here and we have a spectacular 5K run along the coast that we love. We still didn’t feel up to running it last weekend so we decided to walk it instead and I thought I’d give these shoes a proper comfort test. They absolutely passed – I still wish they didn’t have the panel across the toe just because I don’t think it needs to be there aesthetically but my goodness, they’re almost like trainers for walking in.

Books charity t-shirt; Boden tulle skirt (past season); Shoes

We had a properly warm day on Monday – 26 degrees! So we sat by the canal with the boys after work and had our second barbecue of the summer… maybe our summer is coming… You can see the water lilies behind me that we planted during lockdown, they’re really taking hold now.

Cheesecloth blouse; Patch pocket jeans

I fear for the safety of people who are driving their boats too fast as they approach this one – it’s Mal’s pride and joy. I wish I could show it to you open in all its glory but it’s been tightly closed this week – like me, however beautiful the landscape, it isn’t happy in wind and rain!

There are only a handful of skincare products that I buy fervently and Renew + Me’s nightly treatment has been one for a few years now. I’ve talked about it on here before because it truly is one of my skincare heroes – I’ve tried so many other retinol based beauty products and nothing ever matches the impact that this has on my skin. So I gritted my teeth when they got in touch to tell me that were changing it. So many times there’s been a product that I swear by that’s then been ‘improved’ into something I don’t even recognise. Fortunately I’ve worked with the team there for quite a while so when they came up with an introductory offer for Midlifechic readers (great value – find it further down) they were happy to talk me through the differences and let me try the new formula in advance. They knew that I’d update you on whether it was an improvement or a disappointment.

After testing it for a while I’m happy to say that they’ve done a great job. The formula feels just like the serum-in-a-cream that I’ve been using for ages but it now has slimmer, travel-friendly packaging and therefore it comes in a slightly more concentrated dose. This change means that it costs them less to produce, package and deliver and they’ve actually passed those savings to the customer by pricing it lower which isn’t something you see happen very often. There’s still the twist-and-click applicator that releases exactly the right amount each night which is important with a product that contains actives – you don’t want to irritate your skin by using too much and yet if you use too little, you won’t see the effects.

I had a new consultation before the new formulation was sent out and the dermatology team increased the strength for me slightly. I’m starting to notice even more glow but I haven’t had any irritation, just the same skin same softness.  So I feel I can carry on recommending it with a clear conscience. If you haven’t tried it, let me explain again what it is and why I rate it so highly because it really isn’t just another promise of hope in a pot.

What makes Renew + Me different is that it’s made for you and nobody else. You fill in a proper online consultation about your skin, your health and your day-to-day life and send over a few make-up-free, close-up photos of your face. My advice is to do this carefully, they’re there to help you so tell them everything about your skin. The dermatology team then builds a formula around your specific concerns rather than just handing you the same bottle as everyone else. Mine is put together to combat my ongoing midlife loss of firmness, flatness and the brown spots of pigmentation that come from the low SPF summers of my past.

The magic lies in the active ingredients. Depending on your skin, your formula might include niacinamide to support the barrier and brighten, azelaic acid to even out tone and calm redness and an advanced retinoid up to twenty times more potent than the retinol you’d find on the high street. In midlife this potency matters because collagen starts to slip from our twenties onwards and our skin renews itself more and more slowly. By our forties it takes well over half as long again and that’s the point where the gentle high-street products stop pulling their weight. For your skin to keep on looking glowing and bouncy you need something much stronger. Before Renew + Me launched, you’d have to go to a pricey private dermatologist for a product like this.

Of course the tricky thing with actives as strong as this is that it can be hard for the skin to tolerate them but this product wraps them in a gentle base that includes hyaluronic acid, ceramides, vitamin E and oat extract. It’s designed by dermatologists, carefully dosed and it’s easy: you just smooth it on at night after cleansing; I add a moisturiser on top and it works its magic while I sleep. And that’s what I need from skincare now – I don’t want to stand in the bathroom piling on endless layers of product before I can get into bed. As with my wardrobe, I want a few things that work really hard.

Midlifechic Reader Offer

If you’d like to try it, Renew + Me have put together an exclusive offer for Midlifechic readers: your first month of the Nightly Active Treatment for £6.99, which works out at over 75% off and they’re confident enough to offer your money back if you’ve seen no difference by week twelve. You start with the same consultation I did here and the code MIDLIFECHIC. If you’re an existing customer like me, you’ll be transitioned to the new formula at your next check-up.

As always, I only ever tell you about the things I use and pay for myself. This one is a long-standing favourite that’s starting to give me even more glow than ever. Whether you’re a skincare enthusiast or not, you’d be mad not to try it – why would you buy a weak retinol product from a beauty counter when you could spend less on something as effective as this?

I hadn’t. I’m not sure what I thought about QVC other than that it was a strange American-style concept of shopping television that lures people into buying things they would never need. However, the beauty team there got in touch with me a few weeks ago and encouraged me to have a look at the website. It’s very functional, it isn’t a luxury shopping experience and the brands they stock are a bit of a hotch potch but they include Elemis, James Reed, Molton Brown, L’Occitane, Dyson and Estée Lauder amongst others.

What I will say though is that if there are specific products that you swear by, it’s worth looking there. So for example I would never go on a holiday that includes any kind of swimming without Philip Kingsley’s Swimcap. You basically wet your hair and slather it through before you go near sea salt or chlorine. It dries in your hair nicely giving it great texture and protecting it from everything. That is something I’ll now buy from QVC because it’s great value there.

Swimcap

It’s the same with Ulltrasun Sports gel which is a big favourite with Mal and the boys because it isn’t sticky. Much better value than somewhere like M&S.

Sports gel SPF

And the supersize section is interesting. I always think it’s worth browsing supersizes because if a brand goes to the trouble of making them, it shows they’re in high demand and therefore likely to work. I found myself buying a supersize of the Gatineau Golden Glow gradual tan when I was browsing. I wanted to test it against my usual Garnier Summer Body and after a week’s use I still think Garnier is the best – but I’ll be using Gatineau for a while now!

Gatineau Golden Glow – 1 litre supersize

Anyway QVC is a very functional shopping experience but if you have beauty products that you love and buy repeatedly it’s worth going over to have a look at their beauty section because the savings are clear.

It’s a big old sale at Me+Em this year with many things now 60% off including great winter knitwear. I think there are a few reasons for it being so extensive. Firstly I think they’re meandering away from what they originally stood for which was supremely cut classic pieces with a splash of drama. They’re now becoming very directional with a lot of cuts that just don’t work for most women’s real lives. They’ve also invested far too heavily in brown when they’ve always been loved for their navy, black and brights. And there’s too much stuff, it’s no longer the tight but perfect inventory that it was. When it comes to the sale, the filters don’t work so if you try to search by size or category, half of the stock doesn’t appear and in my view that’s specifically why there’s so much left.

Anyway a whole new batch of pieces have gone into the sale this week including this dress which I’ve worn and worn. Cheesecloth is just magical, it keeps you warm when it’s chilly and cool when it’s hot.

Cheesecloth dress

Usually I’d steer you in a particular direction but there’s so much there that you can focus on either your summer or winter wardrobe. One key thing to look at is both the summer and winter knitwear because it’s beautifully made, well cut and it’s impossible for them to make it especially edgy. Don’t use the filters though. If you’re going to browse you need to trawl through everything using the ‘quick add’ button to see if it’s still available in your size before you click through to the product. You can find it all here.

I was having one of those conversations that you can only have with a friend you know really well otherwise it would be utterly boring. I was saying that I was going to have to move my Delivery Saver from Sainsbury’s to Tesco because I just can’t get a delivery slot within five days at Sainsbury’s whereas it’s often the same day with Tesco. (We don’t have Waitrose here and Ocado stops one village away so our options are limited).

My distress was about losing some of the things that Sainsbury’s stock but Tesco doesn’t that I’m going to miss. And so a conversation started because this friend is a dedicated Aldi shopper whereas I can’t bear to spend time in a shop with a trolley – and it also ends up costing me three times as much because I’m tempted by random things. She gave me some great tips on Aldi wines and Torchon ham though and it ended up being a good chat so I thought I’d share it with you as it’s August and life is quiet. These are the things that I will still go into a Sainsbury’s shop for.

This was a sub one week and it’s by far the nicest natural yoghurt I’ve ever tasted. For some reason the removal of the lactose takes away the tart tang. I have yoghurt with fruit, nuts and seeds most mornings and this is soft, smooth and almost sweet (I know it doesn’t make sense when lactose is a sugar). Mal went on a loving hunt for it in-store this week and it wasn’t with the yoghurts, he found it in what he described as ‘the fake food chiller’ which I suspect is the health section.

If you’re a bit of a tomato person which I am (I could probably live on tomatoes) then nothing matches these Pomodorinos. People say M&S Santanas are the same but they aren’t. Pomodorinos are the perfect size, texture and sweetness pretty much all year round. There’s nothing like them.

I can find this elsewhere but it’s the convenience of having it on your supermarket favourites list that I’ll miss. I confess that above all else it’s the fragrance that makes me love this range, the shampoo and conditioner are a bit heavy for every day but they’re great for a luxe hair result once or twice a week. This leave-in glossing serum though is just brilliant if you’re finding your hair is more porous after menopause. I use just one pump on the lengths and it seals, smoothes and makes it shine. Plus your hair smells amazing (I’ve just found the shampoo and conditioner in a bundle for 50% off here and the leave-in serum also 50% off here)

Do you remember the days when Prosecco was a real treat? Before it became the mass market acidic stuff circa 2009? Well this reminds me of that, it’s the perfect picnic wine as long as you remember to take a fizz stopper with you. Not too dry, not too sweet and only 11% alcohol which is pretty critical for me these days.

We gave up caffeine as part of our general blood sugar management this spring and it’s taken a while to find a good decaf ground coffee for a cafetière (yes we still have the Sage bean to cup machine but we like to procrastinate over a cafetière before we go to work). This is the one that I can’t be without, thankfully they have it at the Coop in our village so I don’t have to go to Sainsbury’s for it.

However, Tesco does have new things to offer. In the last few weeks I’ve discovered these:

Have you tried these? Honestly if you make anything tomato based – chilli, spag bol etc you’ll never look back. They’re particularly good for shakshuka type dishes, in fact they have such great flavour and texture that I could spoon them straight out of the tin.

Coming from a dairy farming region I’m very aware of the need to support British dairy farmers. If you think about it, it’s crazy to buy Danish Lurpak and especially New Zealand Anchor (which has a weird aftertaste in my opinion anyway). So I’m delighted that Tesco has Country Life, I didn’t think it existed any more – they also have the lighter version which is equally good. And who can’t sing the whole jingle from the 80s advert “It’s Country Life and it’s English too from the cows to the dairy and the dairy down to you…”? That’s going to be stuck in your head for ages now!

So there you go, an unusual meander but I bet you have things in your life like this. In the marketing industry we call them Love Marks which stands for the products that people are idiosyncratically loyal to… beyond reason… the things where a substitution ruins your week. I’m hoping that this might actually spur some really great new everyday discoveries in the comments! Tell me what your Love Marks are.

I’ve had a few tech gremlins recently and I want to say a big thank you to everyone who’s alerted me when they haven’t been able to get on to the site. It’s a big job fighting bots and hackers these days. I just want to send a plea out to you that if you find the site isn’t accessible to you, please let me know either by email or on social media. It’s incredibly helpful if you send a screenshot of the message you’re getting too so that I can get things fixed quickly.

After this period of bereavement and illness and rubbish summer weather I’m feeling very ready for some good times and there are lots coming up. We’ve made a very spontaneous decision to go to another festival this weekend which will have my favourite mix of disco and house music. It’s in Milton Keynes so there’s hope for sunshine too. The heavy rain here this week has given Mal’s handiwork on the roof a good test and he’s feeling confident. Plus there’s a weekend of fabulous company with some of you fast approaching as we have our reader get together in Bristol. The event sold out but this week the hotel contacted me to say they’ve released four more rooms so if you’d like to join us, let me know (nikki [@]midlifechic.co.uk – written that way to confuse the spam bots). Afternoon chat… drinks… dinner… more drinks… making the best friends you haven’t even met yet… what more could you wish for?

And then there are shoes. Just after I posted the silver ones I was told that there was a heeled version coming… in RED… and asked if I’d like to try them? I mean what could I say? They’re so beautiful that I wanted to show them to you as soon as they arrived. They’re the most perfect shoes for a simple outfit, honestly I couldn’t think of anything better to add a glam touch to a ‘jeans and a nice top’ night.

Red shoes; Guipure Blouse; Me+Em jeans past season

And because they have many layers of padding, just like the silver ones, you could probably wear them all day. I particularly love the low heel because it’s broad enough width-wise for stability but it isn’t clumpy like a block heel. These shoes feel like a talisman for better times ahead… hopefully starting this weekend (although I won’t be wearing these in a field!). I suspect that like the flats they’ll be one of the styles that sells out as soon as new season comes around so don’t dally if you think you have a place for them in your life.

Red shoes; Guipure Blouse; Me+Em jeans past season

For now though I’ve decided to dust off some sequins for this weekend – just because I can. We have other music events booked but this is our last festival of the year so I’m going to give it my all. I wonder if I’ll see any of you there…

Disclosure: ‘Midlife cornucopia: a beauty steal, moments, supermarket finds and last of the sales’ is not a sponsored post but I am working with Renew + Me and the red shoes were gifted, I was also sent an introductory giftbox of selected products by QVC

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