So here’s how things looked around 8 PM at Casa Beauty Schooled last night:

As I was furiously organizing all of my supplies for my Practical Kit. This is everything we have to bring with us to the State Board Licensing Exam (taking place at some currently undisclosed future date), and thus, everything we have to bring with us to the Beauty U Practical Exam, which I’ll be taking later this week.

It’s an actual rule that you have to label everything in your Practical Kit, which makes me very happy because I absolutely adore labeling things. What made me less happy was having to buy everything for this kit, because the first kit we got (after spending $400 on Beauty U-required equipment) contained virtually nothing of use. (I’ve used that Fantasea makeup kit exactly twice. The rest of the time, we bring in our own makeup from home.)

You even have to bring your own sheets and towels to make up the spa bed, and buy your “client” their own spa wrap. All told, I’ve spent at least $100 on my Practical Kit, between a dollar store, Wal-Mart and Sally’s Beauty Supply. (And I’m still tracking down a spa wrap that doesn’t cost the earth.) Even more irksome: Since almost everything has to be disposable, most of that $100 will be a one time deal.

Anyway, let’s take a closer look at the Kit.

You need one box labeled clean and one box labeled dirty (for tossing supplies in once you’ve used them during the exam). You also need spray bottles of water and alcohol for sanitizing things as you go along. And a roll of tape so you can attach a garbage bag to your station for the disposable stuff. And that’s a big wad of Kleenex, used for a whole myriad of purposes.

Here’s the gallon Ziploc with all of my labeled facial supplies. I saved some cash by ransacking my always overflowing bathroom cabinet for products, then transferring them to labeled travel-size containers (since you only do one facial during the exam and don’t need all that much product).

Gallon Ziploc full of labeled makeup supplies. Except for eyeshadow because I bought a perfectly lovely dollar store set of two eyeshadows in neutral shades of brown, and now cannot find it anywhere. Bah. (State Board rules dictate that your makeup application must be a Daytime Look, which means no more than two colors of shadow, obviously.)

I also need disposable lipstick brushes. (Yes, today’s post is a thinly veiled checklist for myself.)

Gallon Ziploc chock full o’ waxing supplies. Ooh blurry, sorry. We have to simulate an arm wax and lip wax on the exam, using honey, not actual wax. Oh, plus an eyebrow tweeze, where you tweeze actual eyebrow hairs (and show them to the proctor). Go figure.

And here I am, all packed up and ready to go. (Sheets and towels are in a separate bag, don’t worry.) Miss Stacy is going to check me over tonight and make sure I have forgotten anything. Like disposable gloves! Ack!

Plus I’m taking my final written exam tonight or tomorrow (per Beauty U’s usual keep-em-guessing attitude towards scheduling) and if you think I can remember what the seventh cranial nerve does, you are wrong.