Making your own skincare remedies is a fun and easy way to enhance your regular beauty routine. Spa treatments, face masks and body scrubs can be expensive if you intend to use them every week.
The ingredients for a wide range of beauty treatments are most likely in your kitchen right now. You can create cheap, healthy and effective skincare products using the following home remedies.
1. Baking Soda
Baking soda is a miracle product that can be used for just about anything from cleaning the home to creating homemade skin care treatments. Baking soda absorbs oil and neutralises acid making it ideal for those with oily skin.
After cleansing your face, massage a handful of baking soda over your skin for a really deep clean. You can even use this remedy on your entire body, but be sure to follow it with a good moisturiser.
2. Avocado
Avocado makes a wonderful deep moisturising treatment for both the skin and hair. Mash the meat of one soft, ripe avocado in a bowl, and add a spoonful of raw honey.
Mix well, and then slather it all over your face avoiding the eye area. Leave on for 15 minutes before washing off to reveal brighter skin. You can use the same mixture as a conditioning hair treatment.
3. Olive Oil
Olive oil has been used for centuries as a beauty staple. Olive oil soap is a natural, non-toxic alternative to traditional soaps that contain skin irritants such as sodium lauryl sulphate. Olive oil soap can be purchased from most pharmacies.
Create your own Dead Sea salt scrub by combing Dead Sea salt, olive oil and a drop of essential oil to make a thick paste. Massage into wet skin to slough off dead skin cells.
4. Apple Cider Vinegar
Apple cider vinegar is one of the most versatile products that you should include in your beauty arsenal. Vinegar acts as a natural astringent and firms and tightens pores.
Apply a few drops of vinegar to a clean piece of cotton, and wipe it over your skin after cleansing. You can also apply vinegar directly to pimples using a clean cotton bud to reduce swelling and fight infection.
5. Aloe Vera
Aloe Vera is the mother of all healing plants. You can purchase Aloe Vera gel from health food stores relatively cheaply, but growing your own is cheaper and far more effective. Cut one of the leaves from an Aloe Vera plant, and extract the clear, soothing gel from inside.
Apply it directly to burns, cuts, insect bites and cracked skin to heal and rejuvenate the area. You can also apply Aloe Vera gel to your face. Leave it on for 15 minutes for a deep moisturizing face mask.
More: 7 Great Uses for Aloe Vera You Should Know about
6. Honey
Honey is a wonderful ingredient to add to homemade facemasks, and it can also be used on its own as a wonderful treatment for dry skin. Smear a generous amount of raw, organic honey over your face, and lie back to allow it to penetrate deep inside the skin. Alternatively, you can mash a ripe banana, and mix it with one tablespoon of honey and a cup of oatmeal for a delicious facial scrub.
More: 9 Surprising Ways to Use Honey
7. Cucumber
A slice of cucumber placed over each eye is an old but extremely effective treatment for sore, tired eyes. Cucumber is naturally soothing and calms red, irritated skin. Remove the skin from half a cucumber, and then roughly chop the flesh.
Place it in a blender, and add one teaspoon of olive oil, one teaspoon Aloe Vera and a few sprigs of mint. Blend until creamy, and then smear over the skin as a soothing face mask.
8. Coconut Oil
Coconut oil has become the new beauty must-have and has an endless amount of uses. One of the easiest and most effective ways to reap the benefits is to slather it onto wet skin immediately after a bath or shower.
It also makes an effective eye makeup remover, and its natural antibacterial properties make it an effective treatment for mosquito bites. Try warming a little coconut oil in the microwave for aromatic tropical massage oil.
More: 10 Surprising Beauty Uses for Coconut Oil
9. Oatmeal
Oatmeal is a fantastic natural exfoliate that can be used as an ingredient in body scrubs, face masks and peels. It also provides relief for those with allergies or itchy skin conditions such as eczema and dermatitis. Add a cupful of oatmeal to bathwater to soothe itchy skin, or create an exfoliating scrub using ½ a cup of oatmeal, ½ a cup of brown sugar, one tablespoon honey and 3-4 tablespoons olive oil.
More: 10 Beauty Boosts That Take 5 Minutes or Less
10. Banana
Overripe bananas are rich in antioxidants and contain a substance known as tumour necrosis factor that actively fights against cancer cells. A mashed banana is a wonderful addition to face masks and hair conditioners, but the peel also has its own benefits.
Rubbing the inside of a banana peel over your skin will remove dirt, bacteria and oil from your pores. You can also rub banana peel over your teeth for an effective whitening treatment.
More: 7 Amazing Benefits of Bananas
Natural ingredients are not only kinder to both your skin and wallet, they are far more effective than store bought beauty products. Learning how to make your own beauty treatments and toiletries such as soaps, shampoos and body lotions is a worthwhile skill that will serve you well throughout your life. There are many tutorials available online that show you how to make toiletries, or you could even enroll in a workshop.1