This week I have been waging my annual winter battle with chapped winter skin! While my trouble spots are my hands and feet…I remember when my kids were little every winter I battled what I call “winter cheeks.” Chapped, red, sometimes raw skin that made them look like they’d been slapped or sunburned, or both!
Winter is pretty brutal where we live. Not only cold, but very, very dry! The two combine to play havoc with our skin. I’ve tried everything under the sun to combat it….including endless tubes of chapstick. As a matter of fact, we have an entire basket in our medicine cabinet devoted just to tubes of chapstick. Unfortunately, they really don’t do much for healing chapped “winter cheeks” or chapped skin in general.
So yesterday I got what I thought was a brilliant idea! I decided to take all those useless tubes of chapstick we have in our house and refill them with my OWN version of “chapstick”, using all-natural ingredients, including soothing Lavender essential oil.
I started with my All-Purpose Healing Salve and tweaked it to make it solid enough to use in a stick form. Here is the recipe I came up with:
“Winter Cheeks” Stick
- 1/4 cup organic coconut oil
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 2 Tablespoons beeswax pastilles
- 20 drops Lavender essential oil
I could have added other essential oils to this formula…but I really believe in the restorative healing powers of Lavender all by itself. (Be sure you are buying pure, undiluted Lavender.)
And if you are new to essential oils…Lavender is a great one to start with. Not only does Lavender soothe and heal damaged skin, it’s really like a ‘first aid kit in a bottle.’
Directions:
Melt the coconut, olive oil and beeswax in a warm bath, stirring every few minutes until melted. This will take at least 15 min, you want a slow melt.
After the oils & wax are completely melted, add the Lavender essential oil and stir.
Using a pipette (or whatever means you can to pour the liquid into the tubes) carefully fill the tubes with the melted liquid. Allow to cool until hardened.
This batch yielded 8 tubes, one small tin, and a 1 ounce jar (not shown) of my “Winter Cheeks” formula.
Now tuck one in your bag, your kids’ bags, your desk, your medicine cabinet, etc and you will be ready whenever winter starts to get the better of your skin. Now if I could just figure out what to do with a bunch of unused chapstick?? 🙂
