Greetings from wet and soggy Colorado.
As you may already know we have had a little bit more rain here than usual. Things seem to be getting back to normal but a few of our major highways were shut down for a couple of days due to flooding and many folks had to be evacuated from there homes.
I am very fortunate not to be in one of the areas that flooded and I took advantage of the rainy weather by staying all cozy inside and experimenting with some home made beauty products. I say experimenting because well I am never one to just follow instructions verbatim which sometimes works out for me and then other times not so much.
Below are the links to the recipes I used and a few quick comments on how I incorporated some upcycling ideas as well as some really important things not to do.
Wild Orange & Honey Foot Scrub
This project actually went pretty smoothly I was able to measure all the ingredients into an 8 oz plastic (upcycled of course) container and mix it right in the container. The printing on the outside came off with just a little scrubbing. I made a simple label glued it on top and applied a coat of polyurethane to help protect the label a little bit. And also because ever since I discovered polyurethane I just seem to want to use it on everything. :-)
One note: In most cases I adjusted the measurements to fit the container size that I was planning on using.
1 Minute + 3 Ingredients = How to Make Perfume, Naturally
I admit to being a little sceptical about this one but I think it is now my favorite of all the things I made. I used Jasmine, Tangerine and Clove for my fragrance. I had this cute little glass shot bottle which is the 2nd container that I tried to use.
My first attempt was a plastic shot bottle. But did you know that when you try to sterilize a plastic bottle in boiling water......
well yes I am sure you know what happens.
I am going with vanity for the miss-hap on this project. As I have no other choice but stupidity on all the others. And well I do like a little variety and my ego needs a break. The first batch I made with some ridicules amount of water which I can only attribute to the fact that I initially refused to wear my reading glasses. It smelled wonderful but looked like some kind of sizzling cauldron of witches brew.
I also decided to wrapped mine in some tulle netting fabric to hold them together while they dried. They don't need to be unwrapped to use. The whole thing can go in the tub as the bath bombs dissolve right through the netting fabric. This is fortunate as I don't think you could remove the fabric anyway. Every now and then I get really lucky. After "drying" for a day they adhere to whatever they come in contact with. I know this because I set them in the shredded paper and they were shortly covered in oily sticky pieces of paper.
I was able to remove most of the paper for the photograph and am hopeful that they will slide agreeably out of the plastic bags.
Ultra-Moisturizing Foot Cream
I struck out in a major way on my first attempt for this one. But I did at least discover that I wanted it to be a little more solid so I added a little bit of bees wax to the second batch. The reason for the second batch was due to my brilliant choice of upcycled containers. I had made this lovely coconut smelling foot cream but every time I opened the jar it smelled worse and worse. I don't really know why it took me so long to figure it out but well sometimes I just have to learn the hard way.
So here is a tip if you are playing around with fragrance combinations......
coconut and garlic do not smell good together.
What?
You already knew that?
Well aren't you just the smartest. What can I say sometimes I miss the completely obvious and believe it or not this isn't the dumbest thing I did on this project. :-)
I really like how this product turned out inspite of the fact that I broke my microwave experimenting with how to melt the bees wax.
I wish I was making that up I really do. It kind of makes the garlic coconut foot cream and melting plastic bottles in boiling water look like small potatoes right?
The container that I was using had a small piece of foil left on it.... and well you know the rest of the story. God Bless my understanding hubby. When I tell him he just sighs and says
"Didn't you just do that a few month ago?"
and I sheepishly nod my head. :-)
So much for my short cut melting method so I went back to the stove top as per the original directions.
I made this box to put it all in. Without, believe it or not, any major screw ups.
And there you have it all these lovely products for a mere 679 dollars and 42 cents. (including microwave)
Ok I totally made that number up. :-)
Happy Upcycling,