Happy Valentine’s week everyone! I love spending this time of year with friends watching sappy movies, drinking tea and making projects. Our challenge this week is perfect to make at girl’s night or for getting pampered before a romantic Valentine’s date.

Homemade Body Scrubs!

Scrubs are an excellent way to exfoliate, improve circulation, refresh, and moisturize your skin.  You can customize them with hundreds of different combinations, and they can easily be made with items you can find in bulk at a health food store!  A scrub at the bare minimum will have two ingredients but can have more than a dozen depending on what you want to use.  Plus- if you’ve never been one to enjoy following a recipe you can just dump things into a container and mix 🙂

You will need an exfoliating ingredient, an oil, and any other mix-ins you want to use (dried herbs, dried flowers, essential oils, soap flakes).  Because this is a product you’ll be rinsing off you don’t necessarily need to use Organic ingredients and you can have lots of fun creating combinations!  Since you’re not using a preservative plan to use these up within 4-6 months.

Ingredient Options:

Cane Sugar

Cane Sugar

Exfoliant– Choose one or combine a few.

Take into consideration the size of each crystal.  The larger the size, the more exfoliating it will be and sometimes large crystals can be a bit painful.  You can always grind them to your desired size.

Sugar– white, brown, raw or cane
Salt– Epsom, sea salt, table salt, Himalayan salt (this comes in a wide variety of colors and can add a fun extra touch to your scrub)

Olive Oil and Glycerine

Olive Oil and Glycerine

 

Oil- choose one or combine.

Jojoba, Grapeseed, Sweet Almond, Coconut, Olive, Avocado, Sunflower or Safflower.  You can also add a little bit of glycerine for extra moisturizing.


Mix-ins-
Choose any combination you desire or leave out entirely:

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Dried Ground Calendula

Dried herbs– these can be ground if they’re larger or left whole. If using whole herbs they’ll also exfoliate so use less of your exfoliating ingredient

Dried flowers– these work best ground or in small pieces and add extra scent and color.  Use about a teaspoon per cup of exfoliant.

Essential oils– 5-7 drops per cup of finished scrub is a good rule of thumb.  Remember you’ll be rinsing this off so you won’t get much of a scent from it like you would with a body butter.

Packaging– I usually use repurposed jars that I’ve washed.  You could buy pint-size mason jars or plastic containers as well.

Preparation– For those of you who enjoy experimenting go ahead and start mixing ingredients.  A good rule of thumb is 1 part oil to 4 parts exfoliant. If you’re more like me and do better with a recipe, here you go (this will fill a 4oz container full to the top with a bit left over):

Body Scrub

1/2 cup sugar 
1/8 cup olive oil
1 t glycerine (optional)
1 t ground herbs (optional)
3-4 drops essential oils (optional)

Mix olive oil and sugar together ensuring all the sugar has been covered in oil.


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It will look something like this when mixed.  You can use as is or add other ingredients.

It will look something like this when mixed. You can use as is or add other ingredients.

Add glycerine, herbs, and essential oils if using and stir well to coat all sugar.

IMG_3998

Take a bit in the palm of your hand and test in the sink with warm water.  If you prefer more exfoliation add more sugar, if you prefer more moisturizing add more oil.  Make sure you don’t add so much oil that your mixture becomes runny.

Package in a container with a tight-fitting lid and label as desired.

These scrubs are awesome for the body but a bit harsh for the face (for a face scrub try ground oatmeal mixed with a dab of water!).  Make sure to be careful when you get done because you’ll be slippery- don’t want to fall in the bathroom.

Enjoy trying these out and let me know in the comments below or at blog@keeper.com what combinations you come up with!

Happy Valentine’s Day.
~Olivia

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Olivia lives in Boulder, Colorado with her husband and 4 year old son.  She enjoys spending time in the mountains, studying about essential oils, natural remedies and herbs, as well as upcycling/ DIY projects.  Olivia’s family made the move last year towards becoming a Zero Waste household.  They have gotten down to one bathroom sized trashcan a month of garbage but hope to be totally Zero Waste by the end of 2015.

 

Like this?  Check out the rest of our Waste Less and Be Green in 2015 series for more tips!

 

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