Regulations for my area

How do I find out what the guidelines are for facepainting in my area? i.e. new sponge per person, etc....Thanks for all your help!

Hmm.... I would give the health department in your area a call and see if they have any rules there first. After that if you still don't know, I would just try as best you can to follow the methods you find on this forum. If you live in the US there often isn't a lot of enforcement in certain areas on how body art boothes should be set up and kept up.

Where are you?

Public heath boards, local health authorities, etc. Whomever is responsible for overseeing public health and licensing things like hairdressers and salons.

Shannon and Punky, thanks for your help. I am in Kansas. I called the Kansas Dept of Health and Environment and the Kansas Board of Cosmetology this morning. I am completely floored (mostly as a parent) that there are no guidelines or regulations whatsoever for facepainting. As a (new facepainter) I am very happy as it seems like a lot of you have to jump through a lot of hurdles! I do plan on using a clean sponge for each new person and sanitizing brushes in between people.

It all depends completely where you are... these are the regs that we in Alberta have to follow http://www.calgaryhealthregion.ca/publichealth/envhealth/program_areas/special_events/documents/Requirements_for_Personal_Services_at_Special_Events_&_Trade_Shows_2007.pdf
It used to be JUST for Calgary but it is province wide now.

Shannon, Thanks.....do you sanitize your paints then? Can you spray alcohol on them? tia...

Actually, you'd be surprised to find that most states in the U.S. have no regulations on facepainting. It really is just wrong. My mom and I are seriously considering bringing it up to the Indiana Health department to see if we can't get that changed... but I fear it would be nearly impossible. We are however taking the initiative to run clean boothes on our own accord. We use only one sponge per client or two, depending on the design... we just don't REUSE sponges. We use two water basins... one to rinse which is changed every 30 minutes and has alcohol in it to help sanitize the brushes , and then we dry the brush and dip it in clean water to activate the paints or pick up new paint. We really sanitize our brushes ever 30 minutes and/or after a questionable client, and we use hand sanitizer between every client.

There are no regulations where I live, but I still keep a very clean kit for my own peace of mind.
I use a sponge per client & rinse my brushes between clients in clean water. I don't usually use my brushes on the eyes, so I feel they're pretty safe.
I deep clean & sanitize the kit after each gig.
I rinse out my sponges, wash them w/ ivory soap. Rinse again & then send them through the washing machine in a mesh bag on hot. I don't use them till they're completely dry.
I wash my brushes w/ ivory soap, rinse them & then dip them in rubbing alcohol. I don't use them till they're completely dry. I'll sometimes dip them in boiling water for a few seconds, but this is more for reshaping.
I will wipe out my paints w/ a baby wipe, but don't add any chemicals to them as I don't want to change the chemical make-up of them.

Thank you all very much! Very helpful information and I'm going to use it all ;o)