Five Winter Lip Care Tips

Make taking care of your lips your next resolution with these winter lip care tips!

Lips say a lot about a person. They can be alluring, expressive, soft, or a host of other descriptive terms. That’s why it’s important to keep your lips looking healthy especially during the dry winter months. This can be easily accomplished with a few tips on winter lip care. Knowing a little bit about your lips and how to keep them hydrated are key to keeping them healthy and looking their best.

Let’s start with a few facts about the skin on your lips. Even though your lips are part of your face, they do not contain oil glands like the rest of your facial skin does. This means that they lack natural moisture which is why they need to be moisturized many times throughout the day. The truth is, your lips need more care during the winter months than your face does. Secondly, the skin on your lips is the most driest and thinnest tissue on your body. With those two facts in mind, let’s look at the following five tips to keep your lips hydrated.

Five Tips for Winter Lip Care

1. Use the Best Ingredients: Certain hydrating ingredients are needed to help protect your lips from wintry winds and dry weather. These ingredients, called emollients are easy to find as they’re in many lip balms. Emollients are nourishing to your lips because they help to replace oils in your skin. The more of these emollients in a lip balm product, the better it will be for your lips. Look for any plant oil such as jojoba, olive, coconut, or sunflower oil. Shea butter, aloe vera, beeswax Vitamin E, allantoin, glycerin, and petroleum jelly are also emollients that your lips will appreciate.

2. Look for Humectants: Use products containing humectants which is another group of hydrating ingredients. Humectants will absorb water from the air into your skin and help to keep your lips hydrated. Humectants are oil free ingredients such as urea, glycerin, hyaluronic acid, and propylene glycol. These ingredients are very important for your lips.

3. Avoid Drying Agents: There are also certain ingredients to avoid when choosing a nourishing lip balm. You don’t want to purchase any product that is going to dry your lips and may create problems such as chapped or inflamed lips. Say goodbye to products that have any type of alcohol, corn starch, or other drying agent. Check your lipstick and make sure it doesn’t contain a drying agent. If it does, switch to a lip gloss or at least use a nourishing lip balm under your lipstick whenever you apply it.

4. Exfoliate: One of the best ways to help keep your lips healthy is to exfoliate them. Just as you exfoliate your facial skin in the shower, gently rub the same product over your lips. You can also use a soft toothbrush topped with an exfoliant to remove the dry skin on your lips. Exfoliating your lips once or twice a week will get rid of unwanted dry skin and promote healthier skin to grow. It will keep your lips looking radiant and supple. Products containing papaya are excellent for exfoliating. Papaya contains natural exfoliating enzymes to help get rid of dry skin and to soften healthy tissue. After exfoliating your lips, be sure to finish with a nourishing lip balm.

5. Moisturize at Night:  Moisturize your lips at night by using a lip balm. At nighttime, outside temperatures drop and indoor temperatures rise which creates hot dry air in your home. While you’re sleeping, your lips are affected by this and need to be moisturized. By using a quality nourishing lip balm before going to bed, you’re lips will be moisturized and it will help prevent cracking due to dry skin.