How I spent my winter vacation

Okay, not really. I had to finish these before my vacation so I could give them as presents! Strange to me that I have starting making body care products, because those are always the booths that I walk right by at craft fairs, really, I barely glance at them. I think what got me thinking about making my own, was Rosemary Gladstar's book "Herbal Recipes for Vibrant Health". I got it towards the end of the summer. The book itself is great, and also encouraged me to place a very large order with Mountain Rose herbs this fall. Maybe what drew me in was the use of herbs, and the blending and experimenting with what works for you, either for specific ailments, or for general health and happiness. These things always take me such a long time. It was probably a month after I decided that I wanted to try to make lotion using her recipe that I had finally gathered all the ingredients and set out to try it. Previously, I had been using straight coconut oil as a moisturizer, but after I made this stuff I was hooked! It is thick and luscious and creamy and smells like honey because of the beeswax in it. You could literally eat it...there's nothing artificial, or chemical in this one!

I also made my own lip balm recipe...loosely based on the ingredients of the Dr. Bronner's lip balm that I had and liked, and with ideas from Janice Cox's book "Natural Beauty at Home". This is another great book if you just want to try some fun beauty treatments from things you may have in your kitchen. I don't love all of her ingredients though. She doesn't mind throwing petroleum jelly into things, which I prefer to steer clear of, but she's got tons of recipes and is very thorough with the range of products she lists. Everything from scrubs, cleansers, hair, nail, lip treatments, men's products, soap-making, hair styling products, the list goes on...I don't think I've read them all, it's amazing what she fit in one book.

The third product I made was a healing salve from a recipe in Rosemary's book. It says it's for any type of bumps, bruises, rash, scars, etc. can even be used for diaper rash. I hadn't really tried it until a week or two ago when I went sledding. I kept trying to run and jump on the sled and I kept missing and slamming my knee right into the edge of the sled. I'm sure it was comical to see, but I blame my giant moon boots tripping me up. I was sure I was going to wake up with a swollen and bruised knee, but right before bed I remembered the salve, so I massaged it into and around the area that was hurt. It wasn't a miracle, I still got a bruise, but it wasn't really swollen and the bruise has healed fast and was not as painful as I had expected given the repeated beating. The three herbs in the salve, are comfrey, calendula, and st. john's wort. Calendula has been known to promote cell repair, comfrey can encourage healing of tissues, and St. John's wort is known for its treatment of damaged nerve endings (hypericum, its latin name is also the homeopathic remedy made from the plant).

So yes, perhaps I'm hooked on all three. Despite not wanting to really market and sell the stuff, (though I'm happy to sell it to people who want it) I do want to spread the word about how great and easy this is to do. To that end, I recently had a make-and-learn session at my house for the lotion and the lip balm. It was a great turnout, 9 lovely ladies and everyone got to take some of our concoctions home. I'm hoping to have at least a monthly event like this, and possibly travel with it, as my sister in Ohio promises me she could get her crunchy friends to come if we planned a date. Fun!

I'll post the recipes in a separate post so I can add the rest of the photos. And I think I'll do the salve separately, as it was probably the most time consuming...although it doesn't have to be if you plan ahead. Enjoy!