This is fairly horrible videography, but it gets the point across, I hope! The glare makes it seem brighter outside than it really was, but it was truly overcast. Oh, and I didn’t really get my shoes, so you’ll have to take my word for it that they are cute indeed! This is less than 2 minutes, so give it a watch!
While were at a birthday party at the park last week a friend handed me a bottle of sunscreen and asked me to look it over to see if it was something I recommended. This is a sunscreen I have recommended in the past, although since then I have developed more specific criteria for my sunscreen analysis and I thought I’d walk you through my thought process in evaluating this and all sunscreens!
The sunscreen she was using was Neutrogena’s Pure and Free Baby.
Image: Bicycling.com
The first thing I look for are the words broad spectrum, as this label shows. Broad spectrum means the sunscreen protects from both UVA and UVB rays. SPF only measures how a sunscreen protects the skin from UVB rays. I aim for SPF of 30-50. Anything higher can cause a false sense of security while you are getting no extra protection. It feels like false advertising to me and makes me question the product reliability. In fact, European and Australian sunscreen claims are capped at SPF 50! Neutrogena Pure and Free Baby isn’t too outrageous with their SPF 60 rating. This alone would not keep me from buying the bottle.
I always avoid the sunscreens my children and other parents love, sprays. I don’t do it to ruin your fun, I promise. I explain why I avoid sunscreen sprays in my first FAQ post. Neutrogena Pure and Free Baby is a lotion so it passes this step!
Another things to avoid when you are evaluating a sunscreen is the active ingredient oxybenzone. Oxybenzone is a potential hormone disruptor. I have also read it described as a synthetic estrogen. If you are interested in researching more about this, there is a plethora of information available with a simple Google search. I choose to avoid oxybenzone with my children because I fear hurrying puberty along!* Neutrogena Pure and Free Baby passes this test since it’s only active ingredients are zinc oxide and titanium dioxide.
The last thing I avoid in sunscreens is the inactive ingredient Retinyl Palmitate or Vitamin A. Vitamin A is a fabulous anti-aging ingredient but studies have shown that when it is used on sun exposed skin, it can cause skin tumors or lesions to grow MORE QUICKLY! Eek! Save the Vitamin A for night creams and avoid it in sunscreen! This is a pain to check for in sunscreens! It is often close to the bottom of the inactive ingredient list and in tiny print! I found this ingredient in too many sunscreens I checked a few weeks ago at my local CVS. It was VERY frustrating! I also noticed that different SPF levels by the same brand’s inclusion of Retinyl Palmitate varied, so it is worth checking each formulation if you prefer a certain brand. Neutrogena Pure and Free Baby does NOT pass this test. Why on earth they have an anti-aging ingredient that can speed up cancer growth in their sunscreen is beyond me. But, because of it this sunscreen has FAILED the Martha check.
As if to prove my point about formulations, when I went on Neutrogena’s website to link to their sunscreen, I looked at Neutrogena Pure and Free Baby Faces Ultra Gentle‘s formulation and with SPF 45 AND no retinyl palmitate in the ingredient list, it DOES pass the Martha check! The Pure and Free Stick seems to check out as well. So, there is a good alternative to the Pure and Free Baby we ruled out tonight. Often the “faces” formulations are more expensive, so hopefully Neutrogena will change their formulation of the Pure and Free Baby soon!
To summarize, when evaluating sunscreen…
Hope this helps as you tackle the many choices of sunscreens available!
*I must confess that my beloved Blue Lizard contains Oxybenzone. We are trying out a new sunscreen now to avoid the ingredient, but we had made a decision that as high risk as our children are for developing Melanoma, it was worth the exposure to the ingredient. Especially since Blue Lizard is known for it’s staying power throughout the school day. The Sensitive and Baby formulations of Blue Lizard ARE oxybenzone free, however!
Not an ad. I purchased this product on my own dime. The link above is an Amazon affiliate link. If you buy with the link, I get a very small percentage of what you pay to help offset my review costs. I only review sunscreens which I would use on my family and myself based on basic requirements such as broad spectrum and a minimum SPF of 30.
I get asked this a lot. I understand the draw of spray sunscreens. They are SO quick and easy! But, I can’t recommend any spray sunscreens. To be clear, I am meaning spray sunscreens in an aerosol or compressed air form, not the sunscreen with a pump spray.
Almost all spray sunscreens are chemical based. I am very concerned about the long term effects of chemicals that may be inhaled while spray sunscreens are applied, especially for children who may not be able to hold their breath as reliably as we would like to believe. My 8 year old son told me last week that he’d been holding his breath for 15 minutes (he wrote me a note to tell me.) I told him to plug his nose and he lasted about 4 seconds. He genuinely thought he was holding his breath before. It made me reconsider just asking him to hold his breath when spraying him with sunscreen!
I wouldn’t recommend sprays for sensitive skin. Almost all contain denatured alcohol which is horrible for skin! Drying and irritating.
Sprays are also infamous for not providing compete coverage. The chemical forms that go on clear are extremely difficult to check coverage.
So, I still haven’t talked you out of using a spray sunscreen? That’s alright! I won’t judge you if I see you spraying your kids down at the pool or the park! I know sprays are easy. ANY sunscreen is better than NO sunscreen! May I offer a few tips about applying that spray?
1. READ and FOLLOW the directions on the bottle. Chemical sunscreens need to sit on the skin for 20-30 minutes before the sunscreen begins working!
2. Spray until you can see the sunscreen on the skin. This is the only way to make sure it hasn’t all blown away in the wind!
3. RUB it in. ALL sunscreens need to be rubbed in!
I did try an all natural spray sunscreen by this month. The ac
tive ingredients (as in all mineral sunscreens) are zinc oxide and titanium dioxide. If you try it make sure you shake it and it should spray white. The first three times I sprayed this on my screen, it came out clear. I don’t believe I got any protection during any of these applications. Yikes! After shaking it comes out super thick and is tough to rub in. I didn’t like it much, but if you really want to try a spray, I’d recommend Goddess Garden Continuous Spray SPF 30.
Not an ad. I purchased this product on my own dime. The link above is an Amazon affiliate link. If you buy with the link, I get a very small percentage of what you pay to help offset my review costs. I only review sunscreens which I would use on my family and myself based on basic requirements such as broad spectrum and a minimum SPF of 30.
Applying sunscreen can be a pain when it is a runnier formula and has a screw or flip top. Fingers get slippery, the bottle gets greasy, in the worst case it gets dropped and your floor gets a slick new UV coating! Yuck!!! About a year ago, I realized I could replace the flip top that came on my sunscreen with a pump top that I borrowed from an old bottle of lotion. For another bottle, I bought a pump bottle of hand sanitizer from the dollar store just for the pump top. A pump makes dispensing and portioning sunscreen SO much easier for adults and kids! Don’t forget that sunscreen application is an important life skill that children need to be taught.