Homemade Skin Care
Summer 2011 , Warmth
Rhythm of the Home1 Comment
If you are anything like me, you might not have considered making your own skin care products. I have always purchased my skin care cleansers, toners, lotions, etc. I go to the store once a month and buy my staple products (on top of anything that came in a little tiny cute container of miscellany that I found at the local drug store.) I never bothered to glance at the ingredients, but once I did….oh boy.
Last year I went to the local spa for a gifted treatment. Instead of getting the actual treatments that they were offering for a hundred plus dollars, I found myself looking over their treatment menu of sorts and what I saw was words like Apple and Honey and Yogurt and Sugar and even Maple Syrup in the titles of the facials and masks they were offering.
After my visit to the spa, I was prompted to go home and check out what it was that the products I used every day were made of. What I found on those containers were words such as alcohol and Phenoxyethanol and Sorbate etc.
YIKES. Isn’t there some saying about not ingesting anything that you can’t pronounce? I can only assume that the same goes for putting something onto your skin.
And so began my adventures in homemade skin care.
Just imagine gathering supplies from your own pantry and refrigerator and mixing them all together into a heavenly-smelling concoction that is not only ridiculously inexpensive, but perfectly healthy for you both internally as well as externally.
Below you will find six recipes for homemade skin care that I have come up with after a lot of trial and error. Each recipe should last five to seven days and they all use fresh, easy-to-find ingredients that you may just have handy already.
::::::::::::
Invigorating Lime Honey Facial Scrub/Cleanser
Suitable for oily/combination skin.
1/3 Cup rolled oats
1/3 Cup unsalted nuts ( almonds, hazelnuts, etc )
Grind the oats and nuts together using either a food processor or an immersion wand blender until they are a fine powdery consistency. This will give some abrasion to the cleanser to help exfoliate.
Add the following ingredients to the oat/nut mixture and blend.
1 tablespoon grapeseed oil
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup milk
Juice of 1/2 of a lime
Add in more milk until the mixture has a thin consistency.
Cleanse face and neck, rinse completely.
Refrigerate in a bottle or jar and use daily.
::::::::::::
Tightening Green Tea and Grapefruit Toner
Suitable for oily/combination skin.
2 green tea bags steeped in 1 cup water and cooled.
1/4 cup witch hazel
Juice of 1/2 of a red grapefruit
Steep the tea bags in the water and let cool.
Remove the teabags.
Add the witch hazel and the grapefruit juice to the tea water.
Mix all together.
Apply to skin with a cotton ball, let dry and then rinse off with water.
Refrigerate in a bottle or jar and use daily.
::::::::::::
Moisturizing Apple Pear Mint Cleanser
Suitable for dry/normal skin.
1/4 cup yogurt
5 thin slices of pear
5 thin slices of apple
5 thin slices of cucumber
1 teaspoon dried mint
Drizzle of honey
Mix all of the ingredients in a blender until the mixture is smooth and thin. The yogurt and the juice for the fruit and cucumber will increase the thinness of the mixture.
Cleanse face and neck, rinse completely.
Refrigerate in a bottle or jar and use daily.
::::::::::::
Calming Cucumber Coconut Milk Toner
Suitable for dry/normal skin.
8 slices peeled cucumber
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup coconut water
Mix all of the ingredients in a blender until the mixture is smooth with no texture.
Apply to skin with a cotton ball, let dry and then rinse off with water.
Refrigerate in a bottle or jar and use daily.
::::::::::::
Masks
By combining different ratios of my two favorite mask ingredients you can come away with two very different reactions from your skin.
For warmer weather, I like the yogurt honey mask. The yogurt has a cooling effect on the skin and it exfoliates and helps with hyper pigmentation of freckles, etc. at the same time.
Begin with a 1/4 cup yogurt. Drizzle the yogurt with honey. Apply in a thin layer over your whole face.
Let dry for 15 minutes, then rinse off with warm water.
For more chilly weather, a more honey-based mask is good as the honey helps to hydrate the skin and hold in moisture.
Start with a few tablespoons of honey. Add a teaspoon of plain greek yogurt. Mix together and apply in a thick layer onto your entire face and neck.
Leave on for 15 minutes. The mask will tighten as it dries. Rinse off with warm water.
Please note that these are my own recipes that I have found useful for my own skin. Feel free to try combining any and all things found in these recipes to find what works best for you. There are so many wonderful and healthy ingredients that we can find right in our own homes to provide a soothing and healing treatment for our skin.
::::::::::::
Julia Daby is a Registered Nurse who lives happily with her husband and little boy in the Adirondack Mountains of New York. She enjoys crafts of all kinds, eating good food, reading, and being outdoors. Most important of all….she enjoys spending time with her family and friends. She has a small store on etsy and she writes about life, family and creativity at Happiness Comes and We Deserve This.
