 Hey guys, it's Monica. I think this is the first video that I've recorded that has been sort of in the midst of the coronavirus, COVID-19 virus that we're all suffering from. And when I say that, I know that some of you have been in isolation and in lockdowns and things of that nature and also trying to stay away. So this video is going to be a little bit of an update on what's happening here with my parents and my job, things of that nature with this virus going on. But I'm also going to share with you a super affordable skincare line that I have been using for almost, I think about two and a half weeks now. And I am like so excited about the skincare line. I'm also going to share with you a pillow that was sent to me for anti-aging. I am a side sleeper and if you know anything about side sleepers, you know it's the worst thing for your skin. So I've got a couple of things to talk to you about. If you're interested, please stay tuned before I get there. Please thumbs up the video and be sure if you haven't subscribed to subscribe. So hang in there. So hey guys, thank you so much. It's so nice to see you all here with me. I hope you are all doing well. I hope that however you're dealing with this horrible, horrible invasion, I want to call it, of this virus that you're all doing well, I personally have been in sort of semi-self isolation since I came home from convention. When I went to convention, it was really before this really took off like this, but when I went to convention, I was around 6,500, 7,000 people and that, you know, made me when I came home, made me want to do some self isolation from my parents. I wasn't around anyone that I knew was sick. So I really didn't think that I would have an exposure to it, but gosh, you never know, right? So I didn't want to be stupid and do anything that could inadvertently expose my parents. So when I came home, I never saw my parents except through a window and through the door and on the phone when we talked. I stayed away from them. I made sure that I followed social distancing. I made sure that I took Clorox wipes. In fact, before I flew on my trip, I made some Clorox wipes to bring with me on the plane and just wipe everything down. So when I came home, I continued that practice. So my parents are doing fantastic so far. They're not enjoying the isolation. They're not enjoying the lack of human connections or contacts in that sense like we all are. You know, my mom turned 92 in March and we couldn't even celebrate her birthday. We couldn't and my dad will be 92 in August. If all goes well, we'll be able to celebrate his birthday. So, you know, there's sort of self-isolation. The only people that they have that they've been in contact with has been the nurses that come in my dad's and in-home hospice care. So they've been coming in and taking care of my dad and we are so fortunate to be able to have that service still happening. I don't know if that will end. I hope not. You know, I hope that isn't something that's stopped. But anyways, for the last week, I've been working from home. Jay grabbed my computers, my monitors, made it so that I could function totally from home. I teach a lot of classes. So I've been converting a lot of my classes to online platform called Zoom. So we've been doing a lot of Zoom workshops, a lot of Zoom CE classes. Very different because when I teach, I like the interaction and the engagement with my students, with my, you know, people that are in my room. I feed off that energy. So it's very, very different teaching and seeing them in the little squares on the computer, but it's just different not being able to be there with them. However, for the last week, we have been, I'm so proud of my company because they have just given us all the tools to be able to manage. I mean, you know, you've talked about virtual showings and closings that are still happening and all of that, even though my state now is on a stay at home order, unless you're an essential business or, you know, you're going to do groceries or something like that. So real estate is considered an essential business, but real estate training isn't obviously. So we've been really modifying how, how I present the training programs and everyone has been modifying how they've been doing so far. I don't know anyone in my immediate circle or people that I know of that has, have been sick. I've heard of friends that have been infected, you know, theirs, but I don't know of anyone. So we're just really, really prudent yesterday. The stay at home order was effective last night at midnight. So yesterday, Jenny and I took a ride to the beach and there were other people there, but you know what? It was like, there was huge, huge space. I mean, we just walked along the ocean. It was very, very windy, but it was beautiful. You know, we're at a stay at home order till May 4th. So that's a long time. It's a long time. My, my nails are horrible. I don't even want to hold my hands up. My nails are horrible. I get to try to figure out how to, I have a powder dip. So I'm going to Google how to remove these because I should have had these done two weeks ago, but my salon was closed down. So now I've got these outgrown nails that are, are, got awful ugly. So, but I'm going to have to take care of them somehow. I had decided. It's kind of really funny because, or is it okay? I had decided to kind of do a, a foot peel exfoliation. You know, last one I did was baby foot and I kind of like to do it before sandal season. So I ended up buying this off of Amazon, trying to hide my nails. This off of Amazon. And there's two in here. Yeah, I started it about four days ago. I figured what perfect timing. I'm going to be working from home and hopefully by the time we're out and about again, we'll be able to wear sandals. And I wanted my feet to be really good. If you've never used a foot peel, you can get some really cool foot peels in TJ Maxx as well. I got this off of Amazon. It is a two pack. So I could do it again if I want. But what you do, if you don't know is after you've washed your feet, you open this up. And then there's a package in there with solution in there. You cut along the dotted lines. You wrap your clean foot, you wrap it around like a sock. And then you tape it. This gives you tape. You tape it at the ankles to keep it secure. And you do that on the other one. And then what I normally do is I take a pair of socks and put my socks over it so I can walk around the house. And that's supposed to sort of sit on your feet for about 60 minutes. I've gone a little longer and, you know, just about maybe five, 10 minutes. And then you take it off and you just rinse it. You rinse your feet off, dry your feet. Within a couple of days, you'll start to, you'll start, your feet will look like they're 120 years old. You'll start to see wrinkly skin, puckery, it'll look really, I mean, totally grossly ugly. And then usually within a few days, and I'm still at the ugly face, I haven't started, although I can see the skin lifting. You're not supposed to peel it off. You're supposed to let the skin come off. And for me, the worst part is around my heel. And it's like amazing when I see that skin just start to peel off on my feet. And then my feet look beautiful, beautiful. I'm trying to hide my nails, my feet look beautiful when they're done. And like I said, this I got off of Amazon. I've used this brand before. I think, you know, I think that most of your, I think most everything will work nicely. Just read the directions. You don't have to spend a fortune for it. I will tell you, I enjoyed the baby foot one that I got last year. But I don't, I, you know, that's expensive. I wouldn't buy the baby foot. It was sent to me for a review and I really enjoyed it and I used it. But the one I bought was much more affordable. So I'm in the middle of doing that. And while I'm doing that, I had, before I went away, I had been contacted by a company called Open Formula. And I'm really fussy guys about skincare. I don't want to try a whole bunch of new products. I don't mind trying a little bit of this and that, but I'm just really super fussy. So Open Formula reached out to me. They sent me a lovely letter. They didn't say we want you to do a video. They had, they demanded nothing of me, but they said they would like it if I could try their products. So I went on their website and I immediately got this feeling of like the ordinary skincare. You guys all know the ordinary skincare, how affordable it is. And there's lots of products in the ordinary skincare that I love. You know, I happen to think that skincare doesn't have to break the bank. You don't need to have a hundred and twenty dollar cream or something like that. The most expensive item in my skincare typically is my Retin-A. And I get that overseas. So it's really super affordable for me. I mean, if I was buying it here in the States, it would be crazy. But, you know, everyone's skin is different for sure. So whether or not you're using Retin-A or over the counter, you know, something with a Retin-All in it is perfectly fine up to you, whatever your skin adapts to. So I checked out the Open Formula website. The first thing that impressed me was that I could understand the ingredients. You didn't have to be a chemist to read the ingredients. You didn't have to be a chemist to figure out the instructions. And nothing against the ordinary, but that's how I used to feel. I didn't understand it. I didn't understand that. You'd go to the laboring process and I didn't understand it. So I contacted them back and I said, you know what, I'm a Retin-A user and they do have Retin-All products. So, you know, you guys might want to check it out. I said, I'm a Retin-A user. I said, I'm not willing to give up my Retin-A. So what I use is I don't want to use anything that's going to be in place of, say, Retin-A. I want my Retin-A. So they emailed me back and they said, you know, why don't you pick five products that you think you would like and try it. And so I said, okay. I said, I have dry, mature skin and what of your products do you consider I should probably think about. So he made a recommendation and he said to me, one of the owners, he said to me, try the oil cleanser. It's really nice. It is 80, I think it's 80% of my glasses on olive oil. It's really nice. It's not super greasy. I put a little bit on my hands, rubbed it in, and then put it on my face, especially over on my eye makeup and I just let it, I just let it rub, you know, I just gently, gently massaged it in and then I rinsed it off and my makeup all came off. It was like, it was like, it was wow. I was like so impressed with how, how this really, really worked getting my makeup off and it didn't leave me feeling greasy and gunky. So the other thing they sent me was this exfoliant powder. Now Mylene Fab and Glam had sent me an exfoliant powder to use. I can't remember the name of it. I really liked it. So what you do is you put a tiny bit of the powder on your clean face and your face can be wet, I think they recommend wet, but you put a tiny little bit of powder on your hands, add some water and you kind of make a paste and then you put it on your skin and you just gently massage it into your skin. It is, it is a gentle, beautiful, I think, exfoliation product and when you rinse it off, I think it keeps it like maybe for about a minute and you're just massaging it in and then you rinse it off, you've got beautiful, beautiful, I think really pretty skin underneath it that feels super awesome. So I was like, I was all over these products. I thought these were really awesome. So the next thing they gave me is this Seaweed Toner and I'm going to link all these things so you can go check them out. I think probably the most impressive thing to me was you can join and become a club member and save more, but almost every product that they sent me that I looked at was under $10. They might have been some that was slightly over $10, but they were all super, super affordable. The Seaweed Toner, super nice. I put it all over my face. I just toned my skin with it. I thought it was really amazing. In morning, and everyone does the vitamin C different, but I've been using their vitamin C. This is 20% eloscopic acid vitamin C serum. You know, when I look at 20% eloscopic acid, that's like my timeless and I have a really high time with vitamin C. I've used vitamin C that's been, you know, from Matt Hippie, from a few other places and none of them really react as nice as my timeless with my skin, my makeup. So I put this on and the first time I used it, I put it on. I said, Oh my God, what's going to, what's this going to be like? I don't know, right? So I put it on and I did my normal routine, you know, sunblock, let everything sink in. I put my foundation on. This played really nice with my foundation. I was impressed with it. So I'm loving the vitamin C. The other two things that they also sent me, they said pick five and so I picked five and I wanted to try their cream, but they also sent me as a bonus their eye cream. I have not used the eye cream yet because I'm using a different eye cream right now and I want to continue to see how that is and how, you know, test that because the eye cream I'm using is really nice. So they sent me the peptide moisturizer, which has 8% matrix cell 3000 and something called 2% sin ache. I don't know what that is, but you just, you have to be super careful. It comes out a little, whoops, a little pump. A little goes along a long, long way and I, not going to waste this up, put it on my neck while I'm talking to you guys. I, this feels really good. No, no, no fragrance at all, nothing. The ingredients are all super awesome. You got to check them out. I haven't been this excited about a skincare line actually since I stopped when I started using the ordinary because of the affordability factor, but more so the, the ingredients are awesome and the story about this brand is awesome. So it's called open formula. They sent this to me without expectation. As I said, complimentary wanted me to try it of course when you get sent something people want you to review it, but they sent it to me complimentary without an expectation. They didn't say we want you to do a video. We want you to do this. So I'm looking at my hair. How do you like my hair? Anyway, so I really thought that, that it would be worth trying and I said, okay, send it to me. And I'm so happy I did because there are products that I will continue to use and buy that I really like and I'm going to probably join their club because of the continued discount. The other thing I want to share really quickly with you guys is sleep and glow. I had done an unboxing video. I had done a first look of this, but somehow my, my video got corrupted. I don't know. So I got this. I'm going to link the information below. This was sent to me from sleep and glow. This is an anti-aging pillow. Now I've been using this and that's why you're seeing all the wrinkles. I've been sleeping with this. So it has these two indents on the side. So if you are, you know, you can sleep like this and if you, you know, put your face in there and if you stay put, this works really well. I find this pillow to be extremely, I think comfortable and I know that memory foam pillows tend to be expensive because I have a few. So I really like the idea. I like the idea that this helped a lot. It helps align your spine. I'm going to leave you all the information so you can really read it, but it helps align your spine. And for me, because I'm such a, a, a side sleeper, I actually will position this. You've got a thicker side up top and a thinner one here where your neck is going to go. So you're going to make sure you have it the right way. I actually will put position this, cradle my head in the middle and actually stay put with my head in that position of sleeping on my back. So the pillow is expensive and I know there are many other pillows you can look at, but I do believe that if you are a side sleeper like me and I'm always, always going on my left hand side, which is also the side that gets the most sun exposure when I'm driving, but I think a good solid pillow that can help align you will really make a difference. The problem I have with this is I don't stay put. I travel. So I might start out with my head perfectly positioned and then in my sleep, I'm flipping over. I'm going here. I'm over on Jay's side of the bed. I'm all over the place and my pillow is where I'm supposed to be. So I travel in my sleep unfortunately, but I will tell you that it is in my bed at night. I have my iPad open. I'm reading in my iPad. I positioned the pillow. I put it up to support my neck. It's really, it feels really nice. I really like it. I do have a discount code if anyone really wants to, to look at it, but I, I wish I could find the clip of when I unboxed it came in a big box and really nice presentation. So this is super good. I'm going to give you all the information. I have a discount code if anyone's interested in buying it. I think it's really great, but if you're a traveler like me, you might not stay put on it, but it feels super good. And this is my Raquel Welch Flirt Alert. I really like this wig. I, now I have trimmed slightly a little bit of a layered texture here, not a whole lot. I'm going to go ahead and trim myself a little bit more because I find this piece comes down too much and I would like it to be a little bit, you know, shorter. Flirt Alert is heat friendly fibers. I love Raquel Welch. If you guys are into wigs, I absolutely love their cap. I love their monofilament, their lace front. I like how they have the lighter hair in, you know, I think when you have a wig that has a lace front, that if you have lighter hair, say by the, by your forehead, by your scalp or whatever, that it's going to, I think, look more natural. You're not going to see the knots from when they, you know, from where they tie the, the lace front in. So this is Flirt Alert and this is in the color shaded wheat, Raquel Welch. It needs a good brushing. A lot of times when you see me with this wig, I have my own hair hanging on the bottom, have it hanging loose on the bottom. Instead of pinned up, I have it hanging down, which then gives me, as you can see, my own hair's a lot longer. I just pulled it down off my cap. But when I do that, it's going to give me, let me do it for you now, a longer look, pulling all my hair out here. Of course, I'm not setting it. I haven't really done anything with it, but see, it's a little bit longer and that is actually my preferred length. So this is a beachy, wavy kind of curly look and you can see Monica's hair hanging out. This is my way of modifying my, my wig. So I wear my wig, this wig a lot with my own hair hanging out of the bottom, but usually I kind of adjust it and sometimes I give it a few curls so that it doesn't look quite so, you know, you know, you know. So anyways, you know, anyways, I'm going to stop gathering because I know this is super long, but check out this open formula. Stuff is good. Stuff is good. I hope you all stay healthy. I hope that this, I know that there's been talk that, you know, I mean, my state, we're, we're in a self-imposed stay-at-home order till May 4th. There's no way we're going to be out in time for any kind of Easter, anything, but it would be nice. It would be really nice because I feel really bad for those folks that are alone, like my parents and other people, but gosh, you know, at 91 and 92, I don't, I don't want to risk it. You don't want to risk it. So anyways guys, stay healthy and I'll see you in my next video. Keep a stiff upper lip because that's the right way to say, stay positive.