Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Tanning.

I have been getting a lot of questions about how I tan, where I tan, how often, what products I use, etc. so I wanted to blog about my experiences and what I personally do. (Remember, this is just what I do. I'm not telling you that you have to go out and do this. This is just my personal preference.)

What I Do: I tan in both the tanning bed and I spray tan.

 Since I'm already pretty dark and don't burn easily, I usually switch between the highest level regular bed (UVB bed) and the "bronzing" bed (UVA bed). The difference between a UVA and UVB bed is  that a UVA bed emits UVA rays and they penetrate your skin deeper giving you a darker, longer lasting tan. You need to have a decent base tan before using this bed though. A UVB bed can also get you a good tan, but the UVB rays that are emitted from this bed don't penetrate your skin as deeply and it doesn't last as long. The UVB bed will get you darker, the UVA bed will bronze you. I also switch between the lay down and stand up booth because if you only do the lay down it's hard to tan your armpits and you can also get white spots due to the pressure points on your back/butt.

There are two different types of spray tan booths available to use at my tanning salon.


The Versa Spa is my personal favorite. It's newer, more open (especially good for those that don't like confined spaces) and gives me great color payoff. I like that it has a built in heater and the tanning liquid is always distributed evenly.


The Mystic Tan booth isn't bad either, but like I said I use the Versa Spa much more often. The Mystic Tan booth is more closed in and it's a little more outdated. Supposedly you can get darker color using the Mystic Tan but I haven't noticed a difference.

For each spray tan booth there are 3 levels of color. 1 is the lightest color and 3 is the darkest. Because I already have a good tan, I always do level 3. This really helps darken my tan and gives me that extra boost of color. If you want to know more about spray tanning let me know in the comments below and I can write about the process, before, during, and after. :)

Where I Go: Currently I go to LA Tan. They have a ton of locations, great beds, and they're very close to my house. They have competitive pricing and are overall a great company. My favorite company is Ultimate Exposure as they have beds that are a little bit newer but they are much more expensive. I always get memberships as it's cheaper and they are billed to my credit card automatically each month.

How Often: I tan in the tanning bed 2-3 times per week and spray tan about once a week, sometimes once every 2 weeks.

What Products I Use: Currently I rotate between a bunch of different products. By rotating products, your body doesn't get used to one lotion and I can get over that "tanning plateau" and really achieve my darkest color. Here is a quick run down of what I've been using currently:




Goddess (Designer Skin): This tanning lotion is a tingle with a bronzer. It has 200x bronzers and decent tingle. Designer Skin's Goddess is an anti-aging and firming formula enriched with Vitamins A, C, E, and Avocado oil for healthier skin. Extreme tingle lotion increases microcirculation of the skin.


Trinity 3 (Devoted Creations): This lotion is an intense tingle, triple bronzer lotion with silicone emulsion. It does have a strong tingle so if you don't like tingle or have never used a tingle tanning lotion, I wouldn't recommend this. For people that have used a tingle lotion before and like a strong tingle, this lotion gives off amazing color and it's one of my favorites.


Saving Face (Designer Skin): This is a tanning lotion specifically for your face. It's fragrance free, hypoallergenic, enriched with CoQ-10, Vitamin C, Carrot Oil, and soothing botanical oils. It's potent antioxidants minimize the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. This lotion is super gentle on the face but still gives good color, even to acne prone people like me or people with sensitive skin.


Cherry Bomb Red Hot Dark Accelerator (Supre): This is another tingle tanning lotion. Out of all the tingle lotions I've used this is the most gentle tingle. I'm very used to tingle lotions so I can barely feel the tingle in this one. It's also a tanning accelerator which speeds up the tanning process and gives you great color.

Those are the top 4 lotions I'm using currently. I've used sooo many different lotions throughout my tanning experience (lol) so if you want a lotion review blog of all the lotions I've used, leave a comment and I'd be happy to do that. :)

Why I Tan: I tan because it makes me feel good about myself. Tanning is a confidence booster for me. I think everyone looks better with a little color on their skin. This is my personal opinion.

Here are some pics of my tan:

taken the other day (I use the heart sticker to see how tan I'm getting.)

tan stomach

my arm next to Tom's arm. (he doesn't go tanning.)

a pic of me with Lexi last year when I was spray tanning a lot.

Well I think I pretty much covered everything. If you want me to go more in depth with things like lotion reviews, tanning salon reviews, etc. let me know and I'd be happy to write a separate post about it. For all of my readers that also tan, let me know what you do and what products you use.

xo, Sarah

13 comments:

  1. I am not a big fan of tanning, however I do like to use tanning lotions (at least for spring break where the sun isn't strong enough for a real tan yet!)
    You have such a lovely tan going on! I actually like that heart you drew on.. I think I might do this just because I like it lol.

    http://www.mybrokeneggshells.com

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    1. Thanks for the comment Mindy. :) The heart is actually a sticker I use every time I tan. When I take the sticker off, it shows me how much color I'm getting. The white part is how pale I was before I started tanning again! lol. Big difference!! :))

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  2. Okay lady, we are so different because I am trying SO HARD to NOT get tanned and you are getting tanned so much! LOL! And like Mindy said, that little heart is so cute and creative o.o I would never have thought of that if I am ever to go for a tanning session and Tom's so fair hahaha <3

    Yay, early Happy April Fool! =P how do I follow you, Sarah? You don't seem to have GFC or BlogLovin. Do you plan to get one? If you do, let me know so that I can follow you to keep track with your new post <3

    mish
    www.mishberries.com

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    1. Haha :) I don't do it all the time but usually during the spring/summer months I do because my skin gets ghostly pale (if I don't tan) while everyone else's has such nice color to it. Lol!

      I've never heard of GFC or BlogLovin. What are they and what are the website addresses for them? I'll definitely look into getting one because it sounds like a good idea. For right now I only have Google friend connect. xo

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  3. Duhhh to me. GFC = Google Friend Connect. LOL I do have it, I'm not sure why it's not showing up on my page.

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  4. I love you tan! You look pretty and healthy. I watched your vid with Lexi and she's super adorable :)

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  5. Hey!! I just wanted to tell you that i am your first follower on bloglovin!!

    http://www.mybrokeneggshells.com

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  6. hi!! You asked a question on my blog and I just wanted to make sure you saw the answer! =)

    I take ~90% of the photos on my blog by myself. I just place it on something such as a chair and I set it to a self timer. It takes a while, but I find it to work nicely!

    http://www.mybrokeneggshells.com

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    1. Thanks for replying. :) You do a really good job, it looks like a professional takes a lot of your photos. Very cool. :)

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  7. It's hard to find good information on the tanning beds these days - everybody is so against it. So thanks for writing this, it will come handy for me :)!
    Thanks for stopping by my blog & have a nice Sunday :)!

    xx
    http://gita-oddsandends.blogspot.com/

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    1. I'm glad it was helpful. :) Thanks for the comment and for stopping by my blog.

      xo, Sarah

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