Sheabutter & Almond Oil Hand Salve

Bergamot & Lavender Hand Salve

I’ve been inspired to make more skincare products as the deodorants turned out pretty well. Littlebird and I tried it for the first time this weekend.

As I’ve been using L’Occitane sheabutter handcream and footcream and love the texture and how good they feel on my skin, I thought I’d try making my own version using all natural ingredients.

This recipe is for both foot and hand salve.

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons of sweet almond oil

1 tablespoon beeswax

4 tablespoons of unrefined Shea Butter

1/4 tsb of essential oils (choose your favourite)

As I live pretty close to Mitcham, I decided to try Mitcham Peppermint essential oil for the foot salve and Bergamot and Lavender for the hand salve.

(Makes about 120 ml)

The instructions I found simply said melt the beeswax and shea butter, add the sweet almond oil and mix together with the essential oils.

I reused a face cream jar which I had just finished with. I washed it out with hot soapy water and biocarbonate of soda to remove all traces of the cream and smell (not pictured), to use for the footsalve.

First I filled the jar with the hot mixture of shea butter, almond oil and beeswax and then I added the Peppermint essential oil and mixed it in before the mixture cooled down, so that it was blended in well with the other ingredients.

For the hand salve, I used the pretty aluminum pot (Pictured) which comes with screw top lids that I found online.

The 30ml ones are the perfect size for travel and so handy for work. Again, I filled the pot first with the hot mixture and then blended the essential oils into the pot. I used lavender and bergamot oil as they’re a lovely combination and have a summery aroma. The fact that the blend is slightly uneven makes it even lovelier as the smell is either more lavender or bergamot depending on what I scoop out of the pot, it makes every application an unique experience.

Home made all natural deodorant

Hand made deodorant with Tea tree & Coconut oil

There are a lot of recipes for heathy skincare that are all natural. Today, I tried out the recipe for natural deodorant.

I already had most of the ingredients in my cupboard  such as coconut oil, some of the websites mentioned that using coconut oil might melt and it seemed messy to use straight from a jar in the summer if it was not mixed with some beeswax.

Melting Beeswax and coconut oil over a saucepan full of boiling water

Ingredients used:

1/4 cup coconut oil

2 tablespoon beeswax

1/4 cup baking soda

1/4 cup corn starch (Most of the recipes indicated arrowroot).

15 drops of tea tree oil

5-10 drops lemon or lavender essential oil.

(Makes about 4-6 ounces).

The instructions I found simply said melt the coconut oil and beeswax ingredients in a bowl over a pan of boiling water and then quickly stir in the dry ingredients of corn starch and baking soda. After blending the mixture over the stove, I added the essential oil to the mix whilst it was still runny.

It turned out pretty well. I poured the mixture in a couple of containers that I cleaned out which I had that is one of the popular high-street brands of deodorants. The containers were just the right size and shape.  I poured the mixture into the containers and waited for them to cool, can’t wait to try it out to see if it works.