Over the years I’ve collected recipes for various natural beauty products. After frequent sessions of whipping up homemade face creams, toners, shampoos, sugar scrubs, and more in my kitchen, I’ve compiled a ‘cookbook’ of sorts. My recipe book is filled with the best of the best. My favorites, my friend’s favorites, and soon they might be your favorites too.

Some general notes on homemade natural beauty products:

• Not all homemade products work for each individual person.
• Tweaking of recipes is encouraged and unless otherwise noted perfectly safe.
• If you are an individual with highly sensitive skin (this includes your scalp), I’d recommend a test dab. Take a dab of any new product you create and test dab a bit on your inner arm. Cover with a band-aid If problems such as itchy skin, pain, or redness develop I’d think twice about using it, or tweak the recipe until it ceases to irritate during a test dab.
• Natural and organic homemade cosmetic products have no preservatives. While that’s great news for your body and the environment it does mean that you do need to be observant. If a recipe says to keep your lotion in the fridge or throw unused portions away after a week – do it. Homemade product can easily spoil.

Why make homemade beauty products?

Homemade beauty products are great for numerous reasons. Many times you already have everything you need around the house to make them. You can make homemade products, usually in very little time. Because you make them yourself, you know what’s in them – you can cut out preservatives, use organic ingredients, and tweak them to fit your personal preferences.

Making your own products allows you to simplify – both in regards to quality and economically. As to quality, as I stated above, when you make your own products you control what goes in and what stays out. When you buy beauty products you’re paying for labels, packaging, and promotion. The other day I saw a common body scrub at a natural cosmetics shop priced at $25.00. Homemade, this same product would likely cost you less than $3.00, including the container you’d use to store it.

Also, if you know your friends and families likes and dislikes you can prepare homemade products as gifts for holidays and birthdays for a fraction of what a store bought gift might cost – and impress everyone with your sensibility and creativity in the process.

Making your own products at home can be environmentally sound. Often much more so, than commercially made products. You can support local agriculture and organic organizations by making smart choices about what goes into your homemade products. You likely won’t be wasting paper and plastic to make packaging. And on a smaller level you can make a difference by making your own homemade anything, rather than paying to keep large factories (that sometimes do make negative impacts on the environment) running.

Lastly, is the satisfaction you get from making something yourself. It’s fun to be self-sufficient. You can press your creativity to the max by creating new ideas and it’s nice to know that the next time you run out of shampoo there’s no panic – because you’ve got it covered.

Here’s a sampling of a couple great recipes that you can make today.

Amazing Sugar Scrub

Now some people swear by salt scrubs and as far as working with your natural body energy salt scrubs are supposedly better. But if you shave your legs or have a paper cut than salt can sting a bit. As a frequent cook who seems to be accident prone to small cuts with kitchen knives I tend to like sugar scrubs. This scrub works just as well as any scrub you can buy and smells absolutely amazing.

A couple whole vanilla beans

A cup of sugar

A dash of lavender essential oil

Some sort of base oil (apricot is good) for extra dry skin you can use a lighter olive oil.

Mix vanilla beans and sugar in a container. Cover with apricot oil until the sugar is just saturated. Add a dash of lavender. And you’re done. The longer you let this sit the more that the vanilla beans will perfume your scrub. Experiment to find out when the smell is perfect for you. You don’t even need vanilla beans. I’ll admit that once I was out and actually tried using plain old organic vanilla extract. My sugar scrub had a brown tint of color to it (so as a gift I wouldn’t suggest it) but honestly it worked just the same. Alternatively you can add create variations – use essential oils like peppermint and grapefruit, lemon, tea tree, orange and cinnamon – whatever suits your fancy.

Scoop out a small amount and rub into dry areas of your body. You can use a scrub before you shower or during. Either way you’ll feel like you have totally new skin that smells amazing.

Hair Masque

Mash one avocado with some fresh rosemary (sort of like if you were making pesto). Break open a vitamin E capsule and mix in. Add a dash of both orange essential oil and tea tree oil plus a splash of a rich olive oil. The mixture should be sticky and gooey but not so runny that it will completely drip off of your head. Apply to hair. For less mess cover head with shower cap and relax. Keep masque on for 30 minutes to one hour then rinse. Your hair will feel smoother and look shinier. This is especially great if you have natural curls (that tend to frizz in humid weather) like me.

Soon to come; more great recipes for homemade beauty products, both for everyday use and for when you need a special treat.