Click here to visit Stanley's Avon Store

Avon Calling

I am an Avon Lady or more politically correct, an Avon Representative. I have been selling Avon products for over 25 years. 

You probably noticed the banner ads for my online Avon Store that I have been posting here for the past few days. I decided to open the store to help Femulate readers obtain what they need online, have it shipped directly to their home and avoid dealing with civilian merchants, who may or may not be sympathetic. Shopping in my store, you have a trans-sister as a merchant, who will answer all your questions with a sympathetic and knowledgeable ear.

If you are not familiar with Avon products, we sell everything that a lady needs including cosmetics, nail polish, fragrances, skin and hair care products, jewelry, clothing, footwear, shapewear and more.

In addition to being an Avon Lady, I am an Avon customer and have been using Avon products for over 30 years. My makeup regimen is almost exclusively composed of Avon products, as are all the skin care products I use. As they say, the “proof is in the pudding” and after using Avon products for over half my adult life, I think I look presentable for a 70-year-old femulator. 

So, here is the link to my Avon Store. I hope you will visit, look around and maybe find something you can use. 

Wearing New York & Company

Harland Williams (right) femulating in “Mr. Headmistress,” a 1998 episode of television’s The Wonderful World of Disney.

Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

My Magic Moment

My Magic Moment occurs after I dress up, slip on my high heels, take my handbag, walk out the door and hear the click of my heels on pavement. That moment never fails to thrill me because at that moment, I know I am a woman.

I cannot recall ever getting a similar thrill when disguised as a male. As a man in name only (MINO), my clothing and appearance are purely utilitarian. I am not a slob; I dress neatly. But what I wear is not important; I dress just so I can pass as a guy when need be.

On the other hand, when I dress as a woman, I look in the mirror, see a woman and want everyone to see that woman, too. 

What is your Magic Moment?

Wearing Sale to Sable

Reinhard Mahalie and Rumano Fabrishh

Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

Coming Soon: The Candy Store

Aunty Marlena sent me an email containing a link to a YouTube video titled CANDY STORE SIZZLE. So I watched it and it seemed to be a trailer for a new television show about a couple inheriting a brick and mortar store. The trailer was a tease and did not specify what kind of store. Since Aunty sent me the video, I assumed it was trans-related and I guessed that the store might be a crossdressing emporium. If that was the case, I was excited that this might be just the television show I was asking for – not another program about drag queens, but a program about crossdressers and femulators like you and me.

I quickly checked out The Candy Store website and Facebook page and discovered that I had guessed correctly.  

The Candy Store is an “original dramatic TV series (currently in development) about the complex lives of crossdressers and the struggles that crossdressing brings to families and communities.”

“The purpose of The Candy Store is to help the world better understand and accept the motives behind crossdressing and the different ways it affects individuals, families and communities.”

This is very much a work in progress and nothing may come of it, but I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Wearing ShopBop

Paolo Pazzaglia and Franco Caracciolo femulating in Dove vai se il vizietto non ce l'hai? (Where Can You Go Without the Little Vice?). This 1979 Italian comedy has a lot of crossdressing and you can view it on YouTube.

 Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

Someday Funnies

License to Femulate

By Paula Gaikowski

Still exiled to the front desk at Femulate headquarters, I have a lot of time on my hands when I'm not doing my nails, online shopping or taking two-hour lunches. I’ve recently began toying with the idea of a vanity plate for my car. So, I went to the Maine DMV website to see what was available. Now, I just must make a decision!

Wearing Boston Proper

Nándor Bihary femulating in the 1943 Hungarian film Csalódás.
You can view the film on YouTube.

Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

Why Would Anyone Want To Be A Woman?

When I came out to my ham radio friends and acquaintances, almost everyone was supportive. 

One friend, who I had known for over 35 years was pleased to see me once he recognized me en femme.

He listened attentively to my story. Then he asked some questions, which I answered.

Finally he said to me, “Why would anyone want to be a woman?”

My jaw dropped. I felt like everything I had said to him had gone in one ear and out the other.

It was not a choice. I didn’t decide one day that I needed a change of pace and would become a woman. I didn’t decide to become a woman to spice up my life.

Life would be so much easier if I was not a woman who found herself in a male body.

Like author Joy Ladin wrote, “There’s nothing so bad about being a man... as long as you’re a man.”

I'm certainly not a man. Never was. That explains why I feel uncomfortable when en homme, but at ease when en femme. 

Anyway, I did not unfriend my old friend for asking that question. I look forward to seeing him and we still interact with each other the same way we did before my coming out.  

And so it goes.

Wearing Guilty of Glam

Christian De Sica femulating in the 2018 Italian film Amici Come Prima (Friends Like Before). If you search YouTube for Amici Come Prima, you will find a number of film clips from the movie.

 Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

Everything I Know About Wigs Continued

My previous post described everything I know about buying wigs. In this post, I will describe everything I know about wearing and maintaining wigs.

Before I get to that, I should have mentioned yesterday that I don’t know a lot about real hair wigs because I never owned one. I do know they are more expensive than synthetic wigs and they are high maintenance. 

Now on with the show.

Wearing a Wig

Not too much to say about wearing a wig. 

If it is the right size for your head, it should stay on your head. All those tales about the wind blowing a wig off some poor femulator’s head are mostly just tales. I recall walking around the UCONN campus on a very windy day – so windy that it blew off one of my clip-on earrings, but it did not bother my wig. It did mess up my coiffure, but ny wig stayed in place.

Swimming is another matter. I recall a friend, who shall remain nameless, losing her wig while swimming in the ocean.

Like real hair, you can use hair spray on your wig to keep every hair in place. But unless you have a real human hair wig, do not use human hair spray – it can ruin a synthetic wig. Instead, use a hair spray made for synthetic wigs. 

Put a Cap Under It

As a novice femulator, I always wore a wig cap under my wig. Not sure why. Other wig wearers wore wig caps, so I assumed they knew what they were doing and I just followed their lead. I thought that maybe it helped hide your real hair (if you had any), but I was never sure.

Large cap size head that I have, most wig caps were too tight and left red welts on my forehead. Occasionally, a tight wig cap would give me a headache, too. Also, wig caps added an extra layer underneath the wig, which cooked my head and resulted in perspiration especially in the warmer weather. Sweat running down loads of makeup did not make for a pretty picture.

The last straw was when a tight wig cap worked its way off my head and ended up all balled-up under my wig! After that, I swore off wig caps and since then, I had no more wig cap welts, headaches and perspiration. And my wigs did not notice the difference – they stayed in place and did not stray from my head.

There are some benefits to wearing a wig cap. You can read about them here, but they do not apply to me and I will remain wig capless ’til the day I dye.

Caring for Your Wig

Like real hair, a wig gets dirty and should be shampooed after a few wearings. I usually clean my wigs after three or four wearings – sooner if I used hair spray.

And like hair spray, don’t use human hair shampoo to clean a synthetic wig. Use a synthetic wig shampoo. In a pinch, I have also used liquid Woolite® to shampoo my wigs. 

Detangle the wig with a wide tooth comb before shampooing it. Then fill a sink basin with cold water, add the shampoo, add the wig and swish it around in the basin for a few minutes, then let it be for a few more minutes. 

Drain the basin, refill it with cold water and swish the wig around in the cold water to remove the soapy water (three to five minutes should do the trick unless it’s a long wig). Drain the water, lift the wig out of the basin and hold it over the basin to let the excess water drip off. Wrap a towel around the wig to sop up more water, but don’t wring out the towel/wig to remove more water and don’t use a hair dryer on a synthetic wig (you’ll melt it). 

Don’t take a comb to a wet wig. Instead, hang the wig somewhere to dry – like on a wig stand (I usually hang it on my shower head) – and it will dry overnight or sooner. When dry, just shake it out and it should return to its original shape if it’s a synthetic wig. Only then, use a wide tooth comb to neaten it up if necessary. 

When your wig is not on your head, you should store it carefully. A wig stand is the perfect way to store your wig. But I own own lots of wigs and just don’t have the room for a wig stand for each of my wigs. So I resorted to storing my wigs in a dresser drawer. I simply lay the wigs flat in the drawer, usually on top of other wigs that are laying flat in the drawer. 

Some say to turn the wig inside-out when storing it this way, but I don’t see any advantage to that. It just means more work styling the wig when you are ready to wear it. So I just lay the wigs flat in the drawer au natural and they seem to get along fine.

That’s All, Folks

That covers it as far as what I know about wigs. If you have any questions, I will gladly answer them; just e-mail your questions to stana-stana at-sign sbcglobal.net  

Warning: I have no formal training in the femulating arts. However, I do have over 50 years experience practicing those arts and have become so adept at them that I pass more often than not.

Wearing Rue La La

Michael Cavadias femulating in the 2000 film Wonder Boys.

Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

Everything I Know About Wigs

Old ladies like me can knock ten years off our age just by femulating. Makeup hides some of our faces’ signs of old age. Girdles hide some of the pounds we put on as we mature. But I think wearing a wig makes the biggest difference. Replace thinning gray hair (or no hair) with a beautiful hairdo in a pretty color and a 60-year-old guy becomes a 50-something lady.

I bought my first wig in 1970, have purchased probably 50 more since then and have learned a lot about wigs in the process. I will relate to you everything I know.

Wig Shopping

You can buy wigs online or at a wig store. I have done both, but I highly recommend that novice wig buyers shop at a wig store because the shop staff can assist you when it comes to the best color, style and length of wig for you. You may pay more at a shop than online, but the added expense is worth it. 

Inexpensive wigs are attractive to femulators because they are inexpensive. Their attractiveness ends there because a cheap wig by any other name is still a cheap wig. 

When you wear a cheap wig, there is no fooling anyone that the hair on your head is fake. And when people see that you are wearing a wig, they might examine you more closely and find other clues that give away your natal gender.

I have owned a few cheap wigs in my time and my photos wearing those cheap wigs convinced me to go upscale in the wig department. “Upscale” meant spending $99 rather than $49 for a wig. That was an improvement, but not good enough. A $99 wig was still relatively inexpensive for a wig (it was just a more expensive “cheap” wig).

Also, starting out, I did not know what wig was best for me. I tried different styles, different lengths and different colors, but always avoided blond shades because I thought that blond was oh so drag. All the boys who wanted to be girls wanted to be blond girls. Also, I avoided short lengths because I thought my head was too big to be properly covered with a short wig.

A trip to a wig shop convinced me otherwise. I told the wig seller to have her way with me. So she sat me down at a mirror and went to the back room to fetch a wig she thought would be perfect for me. A few minutes later, she returned with a short blond wig.

I thought to myself, “Oh no, she's is making a mistake.”

She pulled the wig over my head, finger-combed it a bit and then let me look in the mirror.

In a very soft voice, I said, “Oh, my god!”

The wig looked absolutely fabulous on me and I did not think twice about purchasing it. That wig (“Ryan” by Noriko) was not cheap by any means ($342 is its current list price), but it was worth every penny. It pushed my femulation skills up a few notches. (That’s me wearing Ryan in the photo above.)

Wearing that wig, I lost count how many times people complimented me about my hair. (I never received such reactions wearing my $99 and $49 wigs.)

The bottom line is (1) seek out a professional wig seller for advice concerning the best wig color, style and length for you and (2) be willing to spend much more than $99 for a wig.

And don’t be afraid of shopping in person at a wig store. En femme or en homme, I assure you that you will not be the first male customer at the wig store. 

Shopping en femme is better than shopping en homme because you are all made up and dressed up, so as you try on various wigs, you will know exactly how they look on you when you femulate. 

So go for it. I am sure the store will welcome your business. If not, there are plenty of other wig stores that will.

However, if you prefer to shop online, there are plenty of online wig stores. Many offer assistance as to what wigs are more suitable for you, but they can only offer general advice, nothing like the advice you will receive in person from the staff at a wig store. 

And choosing colors online is an inexact science. Sometimes the color you order is different than the color you receive. The wig store is not trying to pull a fast one – it’s just that colors often appear different on your computer/tablet/smartphone screen than they do in person. Some stores will loan you a color ring that has a sample of all the available colors, but some don’t. And some stores will let you return a wig if you don’t like the color, but some don’t, so caveat emptor.

Large Caps

In general, ladies like us have bigger heads than civilian girls. So it behooves us ladies to adorn our heads with bigger wigs (also known as “large caps”).

In my youth, I did not pay attention to wig sizes – I assumed that wigs trying to escape from my head was par for the course in WigLand. Then I bought a large-sized wig and happily discovered that it did not try to runaway from me like my average-sized wigs!

Here are some signs your wig is too small (according to wigs.com):

👠 If the wig slides back on your head and reveals your scalp or hairline, it’s too small.

👠 If the wig has a lace front, check it out. If it’s rolling under instead of lying flat, you need a bigger wig.

👠 Likewise, if your wig has a monofilament top, it should lay flat too. If the monofilament cap sticks up like a point on the top of your head, that’s a symptom of a wig that’s too small.

👠 Lastly, if it’s too tight, it’s obviously too small. If it squeezes your temples or pulls your biological hair, it’s too tight. (It may also give you a splitting headache.)

I learned my lesson and now I only buy large-sized wigs. They not only fit better, but they look better because they are properly proportioned for my large head.

The only problem (and it is a big problem) is that the selection of wigs in large sizes is limited. For example, I searched one online wig retailer (wigs.com) and found 28 large-sized wigs, while that same retailer had over 825 average-sized wigs! So I am always on the lookout for new large caps.

My Prefs

I favor the monofilament wigs from Noriko, specifically the models that are available in gradient dark-rooted colors. The dark roots add authenticity to the wigs.

Since I began wearing the Noriko brand, I have been told countless times that my wigs look like real hair. Some people were very surprised when I told them I was wearing a wig.

In the next installment  of “Everything I Know About Wigs,” I will write about wearing and maintaining wigs. So, stay tuned.

Warning: I have no formal training in the femulating arts. However, I do have over 50 years experience practicing those arts and have become so adept at them that I pass more often than not.

Wearing Venus

Jimmy Eagles femulating (to Bing Crosby's surprise) in the 1933 film short Billboard Girl.
You can view the film on YouTube.

Click here to visit Stanley's Avon store.

What would be your reaction...

...if you walked in on a guy trying on a dress?

Source: De (de_chasing) on TikTok

Wearing Paige

Piotr Gawron-Jedlikowski femulated Jessie J on Polish television's Twoja Twarz Brzmi Znajomo. You can view the femulation on YouTube.

Someday Funnies

Wearing Madeleine

Jack Haley (right) femulated in a lost scene from the 1945 film George White Scandals.