Thursday, June 19, 2014
DIY Laundry Detergent (and how to use every last drop of doTERRA's detergent.
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
DIY Slime = Kiddo Fun
It's been awhile, but here's a new way we learned to use essential oils recently. Kiddo fun! I found this post on doterrablog.com and our oldest decided it was definitely something we needed to try. Some may say this is a waste of precious essential oils, but I have to say, with the amount of time it kept our son occupied, I am SURE he got some therapeutic benefits whether aromatically or topically.
Essential Slime Recipe:
2 cups corn starch
1-1.5 cups water (we used closer to 1 cup)
1 teaspoon dried herbs (for coloring)
3 drops essential oil
Lemon essential oil was requested so I chose to use 1 teaspoon Turmeric to make it yellow. Wasn't sure what it would look like, but I think it turned out great. No complaints.
The directions say to use a shallow dish. I did not start out this way, but quickly realized that without one it wouldn't work the way it is supposed to.
Add the cornstarch and dried herbs and mix together.
Add your essential oil and then slowly add the water. Start out with 1 cup and add if needed. The recipe says to keep adding until it resembles slime. Now I'm not 100% sure ours was the right consistency, but it worked for us and seriously kept our son occupied after church one evening for quite a while. Which is surprising to me since he is usually bonkers that time of night.
Here are the results.
Note that if you keep it overnight to be used the next day it will likely dry out. Hubs informed me that he added water the next day, stirred with a fork, and voila. So...it will last a couple of days perhaps.
Go ahead, try it. Let me know how it goes.
Essential Slime Recipe:
2 cups corn starch
1-1.5 cups water (we used closer to 1 cup)
1 teaspoon dried herbs (for coloring)
3 drops essential oil
Lemon essential oil was requested so I chose to use 1 teaspoon Turmeric to make it yellow. Wasn't sure what it would look like, but I think it turned out great. No complaints.
The directions say to use a shallow dish. I did not start out this way, but quickly realized that without one it wouldn't work the way it is supposed to.
Add the cornstarch and dried herbs and mix together.
Add your essential oil and then slowly add the water. Start out with 1 cup and add if needed. The recipe says to keep adding until it resembles slime. Now I'm not 100% sure ours was the right consistency, but it worked for us and seriously kept our son occupied after church one evening for quite a while. Which is surprising to me since he is usually bonkers that time of night.
Here are the results.
Note that if you keep it overnight to be used the next day it will likely dry out. Hubs informed me that he added water the next day, stirred with a fork, and voila. So...it will last a couple of days perhaps.
Go ahead, try it. Let me know how it goes.
Thursday, February 20, 2014
Chocolate and Lavender
Who knew it could be so good? My husband does not agree, but we can ignore him on this one. My new discovery started last week during our snow days. For the first time, in the 8.5 years we've been in North Carolina, we had an actual decent snowfall...that lasted more than a few hours. So, on day one, in between playing in the snow and watching movies, I experimented with essential oils for our snow day treats. The chocolate and lavender discovery came when looking up recipes for hot cocoa.
Esssential Oil Infused Hot Cocoa
Mix together your favorite hot cocoa recipe, use a toothpick to get out the essential oil of your choice, and stir it into your cup of hot cocoa. Hubs used Peppermint (and did like this mix), our oldest chose Wild Orange, and I chose Lavender.
The toothpick method worked great for hubs and mine, but our oldest apparently couldn't get enough of the Wild Orange and requested a full drop in his mug. He LOVES Wild Orange.
Lavender Infused Chocolate Fudge
There are a variety of "healthy fudge" recipes running around the internet. I've tried a few different ones, and they are pretty forgiving as far as measurements go. The recipe I used this time was:
1/2 cup coconut oil (melted)
slightly less than 1/2 cup maple syrup (some recipes call for honey, but the honey usually sinks to the bottom for me)
pinch of sea salt
dash of vanilla
1/2 cup of cocoa powder
1 drop of Lavender essential oil
Mix it together, put it in a pan/dish of your choice. I have lined the pan with parchment paper in the past, but this time I just lightly coated the bottom with coconut oil. I thought it tasted really good. Hubs....not a fan. We'll see what the boys think tomorrow.
Remember that not all grades of essential oils are the same. When using essential oils for internal use, please make sure you are ingesting only pure, therapeutic grade oils. doTERRA's CPTG (Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade) essential oils are a trustworthy option.
Esssential Oil Infused Hot Cocoa
Mix together your favorite hot cocoa recipe, use a toothpick to get out the essential oil of your choice, and stir it into your cup of hot cocoa. Hubs used Peppermint (and did like this mix), our oldest chose Wild Orange, and I chose Lavender.
The toothpick method worked great for hubs and mine, but our oldest apparently couldn't get enough of the Wild Orange and requested a full drop in his mug. He LOVES Wild Orange.
Lavender Infused Chocolate Fudge
There are a variety of "healthy fudge" recipes running around the internet. I've tried a few different ones, and they are pretty forgiving as far as measurements go. The recipe I used this time was:
1/2 cup coconut oil (melted)
slightly less than 1/2 cup maple syrup (some recipes call for honey, but the honey usually sinks to the bottom for me)
pinch of sea salt
dash of vanilla
1/2 cup of cocoa powder
1 drop of Lavender essential oil
Mix it together, put it in a pan/dish of your choice. I have lined the pan with parchment paper in the past, but this time I just lightly coated the bottom with coconut oil. I thought it tasted really good. Hubs....not a fan. We'll see what the boys think tomorrow.
Remember that not all grades of essential oils are the same. When using essential oils for internal use, please make sure you are ingesting only pure, therapeutic grade oils. doTERRA's CPTG (Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade) essential oils are a trustworthy option.
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
A little DIY fun....body butter, sanitizer, salve, and spray
I went a little crazy the other night...especially for a weeknight (at least it wasn't a weeknight when hubs was teaching. That would've been really insane). I started out just wanting to make a couple of gifts for a friend, but after doubling the body butter recipe, I decided to just continue and knock a couple other things out. Weeknights are not the time for me to do this. But alas, I had found (rather my sister had found) an idea from Pinterest that I thought would entertain the kiddos for a bit. It looked messy, but fun, so I decided that would be the perfect distraction.
It started out like this...
Quickly turned into this (notice the floor)...
And because my boys wanted to wash their hands every 20 seconds, we had footprints tracked everywhere!
It never ended up looking like the instructions said, but the boys had fun and I was able to accomplish a lot. Let's just say that if you attend any of my classes in the next month or two, it is probably a good bet that the door prize will be Wild Orange Body Butter.
The how-to pictures are hit or miss, but you'll get the idea.
Wild Orange Body Butter
I started with body butter. This is my favorite recipe that my friend found for us. I tweaked it a bit by splitting the 1 cup of cocoa butter with equal parts shea and cocoa butter. For the jojoba, I actually used a bit less than what the recipe calls for because I was running out, but it still worked out well. I doubled the batch, not sure why, but I did. So, 1 cup cocoa butter, 1 cup shea butter, 1 cup coconut oil, but only about 1/2 a cup of jojoba oil. I also added about 20-30 drops Wild Orange EO (can't remember the exact amount...it is 2 days later). I normally don't add any EO's to this recipe because it smells so yummy from the cocoa butter, but I really love the smell of Wild Orange, and also needed a new post idea so there ya go.
You basically add all the solid liquid ingredients in a double boiler get up of your choice. I use a glass measuring cup and stick it in a pan of water. This works well, and glass seems to be easier to get the melted mess out of versus the stainless steel bowls I've tried in the past. Let the ingredients melt, remove from heat and add the liquid oil (jojoba), stir it all together and when it is cooled enough to not break, I put mine in the freezer and just keep an eye on it. When it gets semi solid, get out the hand mixer and whip it up for a few minutes until it looks like whipped cream. I added the Wild Orange mid mixing. This is how it looked when it was ready.
Here are only a couple of the many containers it landed in.
Now, while the body butter mixture was in the freezer, I used the same pan to melt the ingredients for the salves I wanted to make.
Healing Salves
Here I have the beginnings of a couple salves: homemade "Vicks Vapor" Rub mix using Breathe and a muscle rub using Deep Blue. Click on the names if you want more info about the oils and their properties/benefits.
I used virgin coconut oil and some shaved pieces of beeswax (melts more easily that way, if you don't have the beeswax beads). There was no measuring for this one, just kept adding the coconut oil until it was close enough to the tops of the containers. Once these cooled slightly, I mixed in about 15 drops Breathe in the "Vicks" salve and 15 drops Deep Blue into the muscle salve. You want to make sure that the liquid is not hot because heat will reduce the potency and therefore therapeutic benefits of the EO's.
On Guard Hand Sanitizer
My favorite hand sanitizer recipe comes from the doTERRA blog. The first time I made it, I followed their instructions exactly. I now just mix a 50:50 solution of water and Aloe Vera Gel and add the On Guard and Vitamin E oil based on the size of the container. You'll see in the pictures below a few white plastic bottles. Generally plastic is not recommended with essential oils, but because it is so diluted and won't be used internally, it works. For these containers I used about 5 drops On Guard and 3 capsules of Vitamin E oil.
And the final DIY product of the evening...
Lemon Room Spray
Easy recipe. I used a 1 oz glass spray bottle. Filled it a little more than 1/3 of the way with water and 1/3 vodka (leftover from my Christmas vanilla extract making). I then added 15-20 drops Lemon EO, shook it up, tried it out, smelled lemony fresh.
All in all I think it was a productive evening and thankfully, as much as I enjoy it, I won't have to worry about making anymore for awhile.
Now, if I could only get my friend to open up her etsy shop so we can slap some cute labels on these goodies, I'll be all set. Shisso Design....Musing Tree...what will it be. As soon as it's up, I'll let you know so you can have some cute labels for all of your DIY goodies as well!
It started out like this...
Quickly turned into this (notice the floor)...
And because my boys wanted to wash their hands every 20 seconds, we had footprints tracked everywhere!
It never ended up looking like the instructions said, but the boys had fun and I was able to accomplish a lot. Let's just say that if you attend any of my classes in the next month or two, it is probably a good bet that the door prize will be Wild Orange Body Butter.
Wild Orange Body Butter
I started with body butter. This is my favorite recipe that my friend found for us. I tweaked it a bit by splitting the 1 cup of cocoa butter with equal parts shea and cocoa butter. For the jojoba, I actually used a bit less than what the recipe calls for because I was running out, but it still worked out well. I doubled the batch, not sure why, but I did. So, 1 cup cocoa butter, 1 cup shea butter, 1 cup coconut oil, but only about 1/2 a cup of jojoba oil. I also added about 20-30 drops Wild Orange EO (can't remember the exact amount...it is 2 days later). I normally don't add any EO's to this recipe because it smells so yummy from the cocoa butter, but I really love the smell of Wild Orange, and also needed a new post idea so there ya go.
You basically add all the solid liquid ingredients in a double boiler get up of your choice. I use a glass measuring cup and stick it in a pan of water. This works well, and glass seems to be easier to get the melted mess out of versus the stainless steel bowls I've tried in the past. Let the ingredients melt, remove from heat and add the liquid oil (jojoba), stir it all together and when it is cooled enough to not break, I put mine in the freezer and just keep an eye on it. When it gets semi solid, get out the hand mixer and whip it up for a few minutes until it looks like whipped cream. I added the Wild Orange mid mixing. This is how it looked when it was ready.
Here are only a couple of the many containers it landed in.
Now, while the body butter mixture was in the freezer, I used the same pan to melt the ingredients for the salves I wanted to make.
Healing Salves
Here I have the beginnings of a couple salves: homemade "Vicks Vapor" Rub mix using Breathe and a muscle rub using Deep Blue. Click on the names if you want more info about the oils and their properties/benefits.
I used virgin coconut oil and some shaved pieces of beeswax (melts more easily that way, if you don't have the beeswax beads). There was no measuring for this one, just kept adding the coconut oil until it was close enough to the tops of the containers. Once these cooled slightly, I mixed in about 15 drops Breathe in the "Vicks" salve and 15 drops Deep Blue into the muscle salve. You want to make sure that the liquid is not hot because heat will reduce the potency and therefore therapeutic benefits of the EO's.
On Guard Hand Sanitizer
My favorite hand sanitizer recipe comes from the doTERRA blog. The first time I made it, I followed their instructions exactly. I now just mix a 50:50 solution of water and Aloe Vera Gel and add the On Guard and Vitamin E oil based on the size of the container. You'll see in the pictures below a few white plastic bottles. Generally plastic is not recommended with essential oils, but because it is so diluted and won't be used internally, it works. For these containers I used about 5 drops On Guard and 3 capsules of Vitamin E oil.
And the final DIY product of the evening...
Lemon Room Spray
Easy recipe. I used a 1 oz glass spray bottle. Filled it a little more than 1/3 of the way with water and 1/3 vodka (leftover from my Christmas vanilla extract making). I then added 15-20 drops Lemon EO, shook it up, tried it out, smelled lemony fresh.
All in all I think it was a productive evening and thankfully, as much as I enjoy it, I won't have to worry about making anymore for awhile.
Now, if I could only get my friend to open up her etsy shop so we can slap some cute labels on these goodies, I'll be all set. Shisso Design....Musing Tree...what will it be. As soon as it's up, I'll let you know so you can have some cute labels for all of your DIY goodies as well!
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Our Recent Uses for Essential Oils
I thought I'd share a few of the ways we've been using essential oils in our home over the last couple of weeks. doTERRA oils can be used three ways, aromatically, topically, and internally. We utilize each of these methods on a regular basis whether medicinally, for cleaning, for body care products, or even cooking.
So, here we go...
Buttermints
If any of you know me at all, you know I love to eat and I especially love chocolate. My dear friend knows this and recommended I try buttermints. These delicacies are supposed to help curb sugar cravings and satisfy hunger. I used this recipe from Empowered Sustenance. The recipe calls for 10-12 drops of Peppermint EO. Because the recipe calls for 1 cup of butter, I halved it to make sure we all liked it. I also only used 2 drops of Peppermint EO rather than the 10-12 called for. The result was quite tasty I must say. Our 4 year old and I loved them, the 16 month old was eh, and hubs thought they were good. Mine looked more like blobs than the pretty picture in the link, thus why there is no pic of how ours turned out.
Flu Bomb aka Trial and Error of Mass EO's
So, I'm not really sure if the flu made it into our house or not. Fingers crossed, knocking on wood, prayers being lifted, that whether it did or didn't, it either doesn't come back or stays away. It started with cold like symptoms with our 4 year old...hoarse throat and watery eyes. Yet, he had plenty of energy during this time. Next our 16 month old developed a cough and chest congestion and finally hubs had aches, cold hands and feet, nasal congestion, and low grade fever. This was all over the course of about a week, during which time I felt like I was on the brink of something, but never actually fell over. I wish I could tell you exactly what we were doing, but since our counter looked like this...
I'm not 100% sure of the protocol we used. On Guard is always our go-to. We use this nightly on our boys feet and increase the use when a cold/virus attacks. When this happens we'll also roll it on their spines and do it multiple times a day. For the cough runny nose, I know I used lemon and thyme (diluted in coconut oil) on the boys chests and feet. For the little one, we are still working on the congestion but it has gotten much better. Peppermint and Wild Orange on the feet and chest have helped with that, along with diffusing the blend Breathe in our diffuser at night. I noticed a huge difference with LO's breathing last night when the diffuser was off versus on. We woke up at some dark hour to him struggling, but shortly after Breathe started diffusing in the room his breathing had calmed/airways opened and he was right back to sleep.
Now when hubs came down with symptoms, he and I both started taking our own version of the flu bomb. Many recipes can be found online if you google "doTERRA flu bomb." We used what we had and improvised when needed. The basic recipe was 3 drops On Guard, 3 drops Lemon, 3 drops Melaleuca, and 3 drops Oregano. When we ran out of Oregano, I found Thyme was an excellent substitute. It would be a good idea to make a mental note of that because I had a hard time finding that online when I needed it. I also added Peppermint and Frankincense here and there. We used veggie caps, filled them with the EO's listed here and took 4 each day that symptoms were present and 1-2 for the next two days after.
I 100% noticed a difference using the oils for this bout of sickness in our family. Essential oils by no means will prevent you from getting sick, however, by using them, along with a well-balanced lifestyle, they can help bring the body back in to the balance it needs to get through things more quickly. Something to note though, it will help A LOT, if you start at the on-set of symptoms versus waiting a day or two.
Toilet Bowl Cleaner
I found this recipe on an essential oil board I am a part of. I again halved the EO drops (they can last a long time, but if you are like me and use them for EVERYTHING, the bottles empty a little too quickly). I have no way of testing how "sanitized" my toilet bowl was after doing this, but our 4 year old enjoyed the fizzing of the vinegar and baking soda and this mama was quite pleased with the scent in the boys bathroom, for a little while anyway.
Finally...
How to Keep Avacodo's Looking Fresh After They've Been Cut
This was my exciting find of the day today. Most normal families have lemon or lime juice in their fridge. We did not however, so when I cut through half of an avocado to take with me to work today, I realized after cutting that I'm not a fan of brown avocados. My EO brain kicked in, I grabbed a small glass spray bottle I had, filled it with some water, added a drop of Lime essential oil, shook it up a bit, spritzed the flesh of each half of the avocado and packed it in my lunch. When it was time for lunch, I checked out the avocado and was pleasantly surprised that the avocado looked like it had just been sliced.
Oh, and I also regularly add a drop or two of lemon in my water (if anyone ever wonders what is in the mason jar I carry around, water and lemon EO) as it helps to flush out petrochemicals in the body, frankincense on the roof of my mouth for headaches, Past Tense tension blend for headaches and muscle aches, Lavender on the tip of the nose to ease a runny nose, and Balance (one of my favorites) behind the ears for calming.
There you have it. I'd love to hear your favorite uses for Essential Oils.
So, here we go...
Buttermints
If any of you know me at all, you know I love to eat and I especially love chocolate. My dear friend knows this and recommended I try buttermints. These delicacies are supposed to help curb sugar cravings and satisfy hunger. I used this recipe from Empowered Sustenance. The recipe calls for 10-12 drops of Peppermint EO. Because the recipe calls for 1 cup of butter, I halved it to make sure we all liked it. I also only used 2 drops of Peppermint EO rather than the 10-12 called for. The result was quite tasty I must say. Our 4 year old and I loved them, the 16 month old was eh, and hubs thought they were good. Mine looked more like blobs than the pretty picture in the link, thus why there is no pic of how ours turned out.
Flu Bomb aka Trial and Error of Mass EO's
So, I'm not really sure if the flu made it into our house or not. Fingers crossed, knocking on wood, prayers being lifted, that whether it did or didn't, it either doesn't come back or stays away. It started with cold like symptoms with our 4 year old...hoarse throat and watery eyes. Yet, he had plenty of energy during this time. Next our 16 month old developed a cough and chest congestion and finally hubs had aches, cold hands and feet, nasal congestion, and low grade fever. This was all over the course of about a week, during which time I felt like I was on the brink of something, but never actually fell over. I wish I could tell you exactly what we were doing, but since our counter looked like this...
I'm not 100% sure of the protocol we used. On Guard is always our go-to. We use this nightly on our boys feet and increase the use when a cold/virus attacks. When this happens we'll also roll it on their spines and do it multiple times a day. For the cough runny nose, I know I used lemon and thyme (diluted in coconut oil) on the boys chests and feet. For the little one, we are still working on the congestion but it has gotten much better. Peppermint and Wild Orange on the feet and chest have helped with that, along with diffusing the blend Breathe in our diffuser at night. I noticed a huge difference with LO's breathing last night when the diffuser was off versus on. We woke up at some dark hour to him struggling, but shortly after Breathe started diffusing in the room his breathing had calmed/airways opened and he was right back to sleep.
Now when hubs came down with symptoms, he and I both started taking our own version of the flu bomb. Many recipes can be found online if you google "doTERRA flu bomb." We used what we had and improvised when needed. The basic recipe was 3 drops On Guard, 3 drops Lemon, 3 drops Melaleuca, and 3 drops Oregano. When we ran out of Oregano, I found Thyme was an excellent substitute. It would be a good idea to make a mental note of that because I had a hard time finding that online when I needed it. I also added Peppermint and Frankincense here and there. We used veggie caps, filled them with the EO's listed here and took 4 each day that symptoms were present and 1-2 for the next two days after.
I 100% noticed a difference using the oils for this bout of sickness in our family. Essential oils by no means will prevent you from getting sick, however, by using them, along with a well-balanced lifestyle, they can help bring the body back in to the balance it needs to get through things more quickly. Something to note though, it will help A LOT, if you start at the on-set of symptoms versus waiting a day or two.
Toilet Bowl Cleaner
I found this recipe on an essential oil board I am a part of. I again halved the EO drops (they can last a long time, but if you are like me and use them for EVERYTHING, the bottles empty a little too quickly). I have no way of testing how "sanitized" my toilet bowl was after doing this, but our 4 year old enjoyed the fizzing of the vinegar and baking soda and this mama was quite pleased with the scent in the boys bathroom, for a little while anyway.
Finally...
How to Keep Avacodo's Looking Fresh After They've Been Cut
This was my exciting find of the day today. Most normal families have lemon or lime juice in their fridge. We did not however, so when I cut through half of an avocado to take with me to work today, I realized after cutting that I'm not a fan of brown avocados. My EO brain kicked in, I grabbed a small glass spray bottle I had, filled it with some water, added a drop of Lime essential oil, shook it up a bit, spritzed the flesh of each half of the avocado and packed it in my lunch. When it was time for lunch, I checked out the avocado and was pleasantly surprised that the avocado looked like it had just been sliced.
Oh, and I also regularly add a drop or two of lemon in my water (if anyone ever wonders what is in the mason jar I carry around, water and lemon EO) as it helps to flush out petrochemicals in the body, frankincense on the roof of my mouth for headaches, Past Tense tension blend for headaches and muscle aches, Lavender on the tip of the nose to ease a runny nose, and Balance (one of my favorites) behind the ears for calming.
There you have it. I'd love to hear your favorite uses for Essential Oils.
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Why Essential Oils?
I had the realization that while the purpose of my blog is to share with you how our family uses essential oils, it may be helpful for those not as familiar with what they are if I did a post explaining the what and why of essential oils.
First the what. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, essential oils are "any of a large class of volatile odoriferous oils of vegetable origin that give plants their characteristic odors and often other properties, that are obtained from various parts of the plants (as flowers, leaves, or bark) by steam distillation, expression, or extraction, that are usually mixtures of compounds (as aldehydes or esters), and that are used often in the form of essences in perfumes, flavorings, and pharmaceutical preparations." In short, they are the aromatic compounds found in plant parts. Much of what this definition is describing are those essential oils that are considered synthetic (perfumes) or food grade (flavorings). Our family uses Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade (CPTG) oils from a company called doTERRA.
Now the why. It wasn't until a few months ago that I was introduced to CPTG oils. Prior to this, I had always bought the brand you could find in a health food store, or online at Amazon or Vitacost. I would use them for homemade cleaning and body products never realizing pure oils could be used for more than that. A friend introduced me to doTERRA's On Guard blend when I was looking for natural ways to help our boys when they got sick. They seemed to get sick on a regular basis last winter, and our youngest maintained a runny nose for 3 months straight. Thankfully, most were always viral things that didn't last long, but with working full time, having to take time off regularly each month got a little frustrating. I prefer to save my time to do fun things with my family, not have it be used up for illnesses. Although I will say I am grateful for the amount of paid vacation I do have for those things. A day home with my kiddos is still a day I don't normally get, so I won't vent anymore on that.
All that said, back to the oils. I noticed a difference in the On Guard blend and sought more information. My main purpose was to learn how to use essential oils to provide more physical wellness for our family. I was impressed with the company however, and especially the purity of the oils. So, we decided to give it a try and have been using doTERRA oils for a variety of things in our family and home since November.
Oils can be used three ways. 1) Aromatically, or what many of us know as aromatherapy. This can be done by diffusing it in the air, putting a drop on your hand and cupping it to your mouth/nose, or putting it on a cotton ball, tissue, or some other means. 2) Topically, usually using a carrier oil (plant based such as coconut oil, sunflower oil, almond oil, olive oil, etc.) either to a specific area in the body or the feet, which have large pores good for fast absorption. 3) Internally, which should only be done when using pure, therapeutic grade oils, noting that there are some that should never be ingested. More info on these three here.
Essential oils cannot prevent, treat, or cure anything, but can be viewed as an added component to a wellness regime. Eating healthy, exercising, getting sleep (haha), and using essential oils can lend to prevention. When issues do occur, essential oils can help to provide balance to the body which then allows the body to heal itself.
They are also great at disinfecting and research has been showing certain oils effectiveness against the flu, H1N1, and MRSA!
Hope this mini-lesson has been helpful. If you are local and want to learn more, feel free to contact me as I hold classes regularly. You can also check out more about the oils at my website here.
First the what. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, essential oils are "any of a large class of volatile odoriferous oils of vegetable origin that give plants their characteristic odors and often other properties, that are obtained from various parts of the plants (as flowers, leaves, or bark) by steam distillation, expression, or extraction, that are usually mixtures of compounds (as aldehydes or esters), and that are used often in the form of essences in perfumes, flavorings, and pharmaceutical preparations." In short, they are the aromatic compounds found in plant parts. Much of what this definition is describing are those essential oils that are considered synthetic (perfumes) or food grade (flavorings). Our family uses Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade (CPTG) oils from a company called doTERRA.
Now the why. It wasn't until a few months ago that I was introduced to CPTG oils. Prior to this, I had always bought the brand you could find in a health food store, or online at Amazon or Vitacost. I would use them for homemade cleaning and body products never realizing pure oils could be used for more than that. A friend introduced me to doTERRA's On Guard blend when I was looking for natural ways to help our boys when they got sick. They seemed to get sick on a regular basis last winter, and our youngest maintained a runny nose for 3 months straight. Thankfully, most were always viral things that didn't last long, but with working full time, having to take time off regularly each month got a little frustrating. I prefer to save my time to do fun things with my family, not have it be used up for illnesses. Although I will say I am grateful for the amount of paid vacation I do have for those things. A day home with my kiddos is still a day I don't normally get, so I won't vent anymore on that.
All that said, back to the oils. I noticed a difference in the On Guard blend and sought more information. My main purpose was to learn how to use essential oils to provide more physical wellness for our family. I was impressed with the company however, and especially the purity of the oils. So, we decided to give it a try and have been using doTERRA oils for a variety of things in our family and home since November.
Oils can be used three ways. 1) Aromatically, or what many of us know as aromatherapy. This can be done by diffusing it in the air, putting a drop on your hand and cupping it to your mouth/nose, or putting it on a cotton ball, tissue, or some other means. 2) Topically, usually using a carrier oil (plant based such as coconut oil, sunflower oil, almond oil, olive oil, etc.) either to a specific area in the body or the feet, which have large pores good for fast absorption. 3) Internally, which should only be done when using pure, therapeutic grade oils, noting that there are some that should never be ingested. More info on these three here.
Essential oils cannot prevent, treat, or cure anything, but can be viewed as an added component to a wellness regime. Eating healthy, exercising, getting sleep (haha), and using essential oils can lend to prevention. When issues do occur, essential oils can help to provide balance to the body which then allows the body to heal itself.
They are also great at disinfecting and research has been showing certain oils effectiveness against the flu, H1N1, and MRSA!
Hope this mini-lesson has been helpful. If you are local and want to learn more, feel free to contact me as I hold classes regularly. You can also check out more about the oils at my website here.
Monday, January 20, 2014
DIY Cleaning Day
Today was day 3 of a glorious 3-day weekend. What did I do? Well, I decided to try out some DIY cleaning with my doTERRA essential oils and my new pretty blue glass spray bottles.
First up? All Purpose Cleaner and Window Cleaner. I sort of had a helper, but it ended up as more of a frustration with me saying many times, "why can you not follow instructions?"
These recipes are based on an 8 oz bottle.
All Purpose Cleaner:
3/4 cup water
1/4 cup vinegar
1/2 t dish soap
4-6 drops essential oils. I chose lemon and On Guard. You can read my prior post about lemon here and you can learn more about On Guard here.
Mix it up and add to your spray bottle.
Window Cleaner:
1/4 cup water
3/4 cup vinegar
4-6 drops essential oils. I chose Purify. Learn more about this one here.
Mix it up and add to your spray bottle.
Now while my little helper was not so helpful in the making, he was helpful in the cleaning and had a lot of fun with it as well. We decided to take advantage of the sunny warm day to clean the windows of our vehicles. I also used the All Purpose Cleaner to clean the inside of my car. Cars, especially those that regularly have little children in them, can harbor many germs. Using the lemon and On Guard is a great way to freshen and disinfect.
Next up, stovetop cleaner. Now, as promised, I said I'd share findings/successes/failures. This one, while not a complete failure, was not as successful as I had hoped.
Stovetop cleaner, recipe found here.
Step 1: Get a helper to sprinkle baking soda all over the stove top.
Step 2: Have him/her spread it all over.
Step 3: Use 4 drops lemon essential oil and then cover with hot dishcloths for 20 minutes. I repeated this step twice to see if I could get better results.
Before picture...
After picture...
As you can see there was much improvement. AND little helper had a ton of fun with this process.:) It didn't get the extra "gunk" that commercial cleaners will get. A razor blade is helping to remove the rest, but I think if I keep this up semi-regularly, I can prevent this "gunk" in the future. Now to remember to do that...
First up? All Purpose Cleaner and Window Cleaner. I sort of had a helper, but it ended up as more of a frustration with me saying many times, "why can you not follow instructions?"
These recipes are based on an 8 oz bottle.
All Purpose Cleaner:
3/4 cup water
1/4 cup vinegar
1/2 t dish soap
4-6 drops essential oils. I chose lemon and On Guard. You can read my prior post about lemon here and you can learn more about On Guard here.
Mix it up and add to your spray bottle.
Window Cleaner:
1/4 cup water
3/4 cup vinegar
4-6 drops essential oils. I chose Purify. Learn more about this one here.
Mix it up and add to your spray bottle.
Now while my little helper was not so helpful in the making, he was helpful in the cleaning and had a lot of fun with it as well. We decided to take advantage of the sunny warm day to clean the windows of our vehicles. I also used the All Purpose Cleaner to clean the inside of my car. Cars, especially those that regularly have little children in them, can harbor many germs. Using the lemon and On Guard is a great way to freshen and disinfect.
Next up, stovetop cleaner. Now, as promised, I said I'd share findings/successes/failures. This one, while not a complete failure, was not as successful as I had hoped.
Stovetop cleaner, recipe found here.
Step 1: Get a helper to sprinkle baking soda all over the stove top.
Step 2: Have him/her spread it all over.
Step 3: Use 4 drops lemon essential oil and then cover with hot dishcloths for 20 minutes. I repeated this step twice to see if I could get better results.
Before picture...
After picture...
As you can see there was much improvement. AND little helper had a ton of fun with this process.:) It didn't get the extra "gunk" that commercial cleaners will get. A razor blade is helping to remove the rest, but I think if I keep this up semi-regularly, I can prevent this "gunk" in the future. Now to remember to do that...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)