Got Sunscreen?

[canyonwalker]

I've got a bunch of travel coming up— 6½ trips in the next 5 weeks, depending on how I count it. Several of those trips are to warm-weather, lots-of-sun places. With my light skin tone I'm the kind of person who burns easily. I'm not pasty white, thankyouverymuch, but the light pear color I have turns to pink and red if I'm not careful.

When I was in a drugstore a few days ago I though, "Hmm, I should see if suntan lotion is on sale and replenish our supply." Moments later I thought, "Hmm, before I buy anything I should check what we've got at home and only buy whatever level of sunscreen we need."

It turns out we have more than I thought.



Yup, I sorted the sunscreens by SPF. Highly analytical mindset or very slightly OCD; you pick. Anyway, the point is we have a lot, and a lot of variety. Even though none of the bottles are full (and one or two are almost empty) we have enough for the immediate future. Though I might shop online for more varieties in 3-oz. bottles because they're convenient for air travel. I took one of those travel size SPF 30s on our Phoenix trip a few weeks ago, and it worked perfectly— both for avoiding the need to check a bag and protecting me laying out atop a raft in the lazy river.

Comments

[sorcyress]

My understanding is that sunscreen becomes much less effective once it's past its "best-by" date, although I admit to not remembering where I got that info (so it could just be propaganda by the sunscreen companies to sell more sunscreen).

You are reminding me that it's about the right time to check my stores as well though! Hopefully I still have some from last year, if not, I'll wind up buying another new bottle at a random CVS.

~Sor

[canyonwalker]

A web search quickly reveals that a bottle of suntan lotion must stay fully effective for 3 years, per FDA requirements. As with many things that expire over time, I infer that (a) it loses effectiveness slowly after that and (b) storing it properly, in a cool, dry place, prolongs shelf life.

That said, having all the bottles in this picture (and there's at least one that's not in the pic, it's still in the convertible) is not intentional. What's happened is that we've had to buy a new bottle on various trips after forgetting to pack an existing one. At the end of said trip we're not going to throw it out so we bring it home & add it to the sack o' sunscreens.