D-I-Y Lotion

Lavender Cream

If your husband says, “Let’s make lotion!” you stop what you’re doing and make lotion.  I’d been putting off making stuff from the Grow your own Drugs book because there’s a lot of ingredients to buy.  We had gotten some basic ingredients, beeswax, almond oil and essential oils.  But there were some ingredients we were missing.  Along with containers too, I didn’t know what to do about containers, so much money to spend!

So Andy’s spur of the moment excitement (“Let’s have fun!”) got me excited and I forgot about my worries.  Plus he found a recipe that only called for what we had on hand, which made the process quick and easy.

Actually, to be more specific the making of the lotion was quick and easy, the clean up was a little tougher.  Beeswax is a bit tricky to clean up, wiping everything down with paper towels worked to get the beeswax off of everything.  Here’s how the creation process goes.

Beeswax melting in almond oil.

First melt beeswax in sweet almond oil in a double boiler.  You want to make sure your oil is warm to the touch, but not too hot you can’t touch it.  At the same time warm water to the same temperature.  Once the beeswax is melted pour the warm water into a blender and turned it on.  Then we poured in the oil/beeswax combination to make an emulsion (you know, like making mayonnaise).  To this we added 5 drops of lavender essential oil, gave it a little more whirring, scraped the sides, another blitz (as the British would say, since it’s been that kind of week), and we’re done!

Emulsifying the oil and water.

Bam, making it was easy!  Next step it so simply scrape out all of your delicious smelling lotion and put it into adorable (and clean) jars.  There you have it!  Home made lotion!  Leave the cleaning to someone else!  The lotions from Grow your own Drugs call for using emulsifying wax, which I believe would cut out the need for a blender, which would mean lots less cleaning.

With half a recipe we made 2 small jars of lotion.

If you look at the ingredients in any natural lotion you should see these same basics, plus a little more.  One of the exciting realizations I’ve had after reading my natural care books is recognizing ingredients in products and understanding what they do.  I’m not entirely sure how the costs compare to buying ready-made lotion, but it certainly gives you control over what kind of scents you want and, obviously, how environmentally friendly your lotion is.  I’m really excited to use this wonderful lotion.  It’s already spread all over my arms and legs just from cleaning up.  My elbows are already softer.