Stick Ups: Solid Balms by Green Beaver, Palmer's Cocoa Butter and The Soap Girl

Rosy cheeks fresh off the mogul hill may look triumphant, but let's face it: windburn isn't a medal-worthy event. If you're hitting the slopes, trails or snowmobiles, you'll want Green Beaver Après-Ski Cheek Balm ($9.99) to take the sting out of winter's bitchslap.

I didn't think I had much use for a cheek balm. But boy, I wished for this one during a sleeting, blustery walk up to Congee Time resto from Finch station a few weeks back, when a painfully wicked wind had me swathing my face in my scarf. After dinner, I prepped my poor cheeks with the Après-Ski lip balm I had with me instead, and marvelled at the no-more-ouch difference on the horrid trek back to the subway. The cheek balm, which has organic sunflower seed oil, cupuaçu and shea butters, and beeswax, is a less sticky choice of course. And like Palmer's Cocoa Butter Formula Swivel Stick($6), which I now appreciate too, its format is also handy for getting at rough skin patches, elbows and lips.

My newest stick love is The Soap Girl Coconut Lime Solid Body Butter ($15), which is made in Halifax, Nova Scotia, by Sarah Crawley. A solid of organic soybean oil, organic cocoa seed butter, beeswax, organic coconut oil and vitamin E, it's so quick and easy to apply, and every emollient stroke over skin releases its soft yet zesty scent. Surprise, I'm addicted. (FYI, Rocky Mountain Soap Co. also does body butter in this convenient format -- my attention is caught by the Cold & Flu body rub version, a petrochem-free blend of camphor and essential oils.)

Do I need to point out these are travel friendly? And all paraben free. Gotta love a beauty stick-up.

Green Beaver, well.ca; Palmer's Cocoa Butter, Wal-Mart; The Soap Girl, thesoapgirl.ca; Rocky Mountain Soap, rockymountainsoap.com.