I've always been a bit of a killjoy when it comes to any of our children wanting their faces painted at parties or other events.  With all three of our children being particularly prone to eczema, I've always been concerned about the likely irritants in the paints, especially when used on the more delicate skin on the face.  I've also always hated how close to their eyes the designs often tend to go, particularly as my eldest wears contact lenses.  Equally though, I've always been conscious of the additional problem of how to effectively, yet gently, remove the often very stubborn face paint afterwards.  So in order to avoid my kids feeling left out when others are having their faces painted, I've tried to steer them towards having their hands, rather than their faces painted, but in a child's eyes, this is a rather feeble compromise! 

A few years ago, our eldest daughter wanted a birthday sleepover party with face painting and I thought I'd found the answer with Snazaroo face paints, which are water based, unperfumed and are described as non-toxic, hypoallergenic and "friendly to the most delicate skin" so I bought her a set.  This week, with Red Nose Day nearly here and all my children wanting to head off to school or nursery with painted red noses, I didn't think twice about buying an individual red Snazaroo paint for the children's red noses.  However, I left my local stockist empty-handed, because when I had a quick curious look at the ingredients, I was really disappointed to discover that they contain parabens. 

After searching on-line for paraben-free face paints, I was delighted to discover Grimas Pure face paints which are made in top quality cosmetic-grade colours.  The colours are rub-resistant, yet are easy to remove with tepid water and a skin wash.  To help keep them safe to use, their containers are marked with a use-by date and have a shelf-life of three years after opening.  They're unperfumed, paraben-free, gluten-free, non-toxic, water-based and are not tested on animals.  (Please note that these face paints do contain lanolin.)

Grimas's original range of face paints has now almost entirely been converted to Grimas Pure, but do just specify that you'd like only Grimas Pure kids' face paints when placing an order at UK-based www.grimasfacepaints.com, where you can also find some handy face painting tips. 

You can either buy individual paint colours from a wide range of colours, or there are choices of different paint palettes and paint kits, the latter of which contains application tools such as sponges and brushes and a face painting booklet with colour chart. 

My only disappointment is that I didn't discover Grimas Pure face paints quite in time for my order to reach me in time for this year's Red Nose Day!