Homemade Beauty Products: Face Cream

I made some homemade skin moisturizer not too long ago. Mostly because (a) I can’t afford $50+ department skin products, and (b) I wouldn’t want them anyway with all the names of things I can’t pronounce in their neat little jars. I happen to really like the cream that comes out of my kitchen, so I thought I’d share it with you. My skin is considered “normal” except a little drier in the wintertime.

I wanted to have enough left over to share, so you may want to halve the recipe if you don’t want quite as much.

I measured 2 cups of oil. I used mostly infused calendula grapeseed oil. I’ve used almond oil and coconut oil in the past as well; but I was just trying something new. To infuse a herb, just cover it with oil for a couple of weeks, shaking it up every day, and then strain. Calendula is wonderful for healing, but chamomile would also be lovely. Or just use the oil straight. I added a bit of azulene oil I had leftover from a waxing kit (owie). It’s a lovely blue, from chamomile, which isn’t blue…so isn’t that odd?

Then I measured 2oz of beeswax on my kitchen scale. One cup of oil to one ounce of beeswax makes a really easy to remember base for salves, too….which is basically what this is until we add water, later.

And water doesn’t have to be….just…water. I pondered which one I wanted to use here, and decided on the rose. Both smell yummy! You could also use a tea instead of plain ol‘ water, and do a little poking around the net or in books to see what herbs would be good for your skin type, or skin problems, etc. I measured about 3/4cup of rosewater and then plopped in about 2TB aloe vera gel. I’ve been learning a lot about aloe vera, and it is an amazing plant! I’m even taking aloe internally now, too (but not the gel! Ew!). In any case, do NOT use chlorinated, fluoridated, whatever-else-they-do-ated water. Buy distilled or use use a floral water.

Into my water mixture, I added about 20 drops of lavender essential oil, 50,000IU of vitamin A, and 4800IU of vitamin E. I simply cut open a bunch of capsules and added it. Both A & E are great for your skin, and will help keep the cream fresh, too.

Prep your containers, and then some. Because, trust me, it’s a bummer to be pouring out cream and run out of containers to put it into.

Ready? Gently melt your beeswax and oil together. After doing this, I remembered that I should have grated my beeswax fine, because it took so long to melt. I hope I didn’t lose any of my oil benefits from heating too long!

Now it’s time to be a little quick and purposeful. Put the melted oil mix into your blender. It will start to cool and thicken so keep going!

Pour in the water mixture while the blender is going. If you’ve ever made salad dressings or mayonnaise, the concept is the same. You’re blending oil and water together. You may not even use every drop of water; just watch to see it get to a thickness you like. If you accidentally add too much water, no worries…you made lotion instead!

As SOON as you see and like your cream, get it out of your blender! Use a spatula as necessary.

The beeswax will harden your cream to a lovely consistency within the half hour. Keep the tops off until it’s cooled. Don’t they look nice? And they smell good! I use this cream on my face every night before bed.

Don’t forget that it’s not what you put on your face that makes you beautiful. It’s your smile!

And P.S. cleaning everything is not for the faint of heart; it’s all creamy! I have success in cleaning when I use vinegar to cut it all. I add water, vinegar and a touch of dishsoap and run my blender as its very own mini dishwasher.