Filed under: Getting By on Less, Going Green; How and Why..., Non-Toxic Choices, Skin Care | Tags: all natural skin care, skin care, skin care cleanser
I find soap too drying for my face, cleansers are pricy and a lot of the time if they are gentle enough they don’t clean effectively. Several years ago when my daughter, Rachel, became an esthetician we began looking at the products on the market that were all natural, supposedly. We found many to have parabens, even the ones from the health food store. So I used my knowledge as a Chef and my background in herbal medicine to study the traditional oils and ingredients in cleansers. I learned to formulate and them started experimenting. I came up with this cleanser; it is inexpensive to make, works really well as an exfoliate, cleanser and has essential oils that nourish the skin. After I began using it I found it so effective that I stopped using glycolics and other exfoliates. I will also tell you how to do a great facial at home for almost no money.
WONDERFUL CLEANSER
3 cup water
2 cups baking soda
1/2 teaspoon almond oil
2 drops lavender essential oil
1 ½ cup honey
1 Tbsp. Dr. Bonners Almond liquid soap
2 teaspoon glycerin
1 teaspoon Vitamin C
1 teaspoon Salicylic acid – you can crush up aspirin for this or buy it through a formulation site.
3 Tablespoons Xanthan gum
On low heat, combine water, honey, almond, Dr. Bonners, oils. Remove from heat and let cool about a minute. Add honey. Whisk. While whisking, add ascorbic acid and salicylic acid. Whisk slowly, do not inhale powders. Now add baking soda, a little at a time, it will thicken this mix a tad. Add xanthan gum a tablespoon at a time to thicken. Let sit a few minutes, adjust thickness. I like it to be kind of thick, like a hair conditioner. Apply to the skin like a soap and rinse off with tepid water.
You will notice your skin feels incredibly clean, soft with no tightness or dryness. The honey is a humectant, a good moisturizer and an natural preservative.
FACAIL MASK
This mask with make your skin feel as great as any high percentage glycolic peel and it helps even out skin tone by fading the brown splotches some of us get.
Make a paste out of baking soda and lemon juice. Apply to your face and leave on for about 3 or 4 minutes the first time. This is a fairly strong fruit acid so use for short periods at first, you will feel it burn at first. Use Rose Oil to sooth the skin after washing it off. Ultimately use it about once a week and your skin will get used to it. Hold a towel under your chin as you are doing this as it tends to dry out. You can use half of the lemon to re-moisten it if needed.
Deodorant- I don’t use it all the time, as eating clean means every low amount of body odor. But I found that very few all natural deodorants actually worked. Finally, two years ago I found Weleda’s Citrus Deodorant and it works!! Loved it. BUT at $16.00 for 3.4 ounces I was loath to re-buy it. So, I looked at the ingredients and made it myself.
CITRUS DEODORANT
Buy one bottle of grain alcohol. Buy one small bottle of lemon oil, organic.
I used the Weleda bottle and mixed my own, using 3 1/4 ounces of alcohol and added 1/4 teaspoon of oil, shake well, spray on and enjoy.
Filed under: Food and it's Impact on Our Health, Non-Toxic Choices, Nourishment
We have bumper stickers that tell us to be AWARE of cancer and to “Save the Ta-Ta’s”. We have pink packaging on food. We are asked to run marathons FOR cancer research. We have woman REMOVING Their breasts because they MIGHT get cancer.
Our cancer rates are off the charts, along with heart disease, diabetes, obesity, birth defects, learning disorders, depression…..
But guess what? ALL of these conditions are caused by poor nutrition. Malnourishment. Americans have severely compromised immune systems due to low quality food intake.
The problem is that most people have no idea what a healthy diet is!
Common myths;
- Low fat is healthy.
- Red Meat is bad for you.
- Grains, especially whole grains, are good for you.
- Caloric restrictions works to aid in weight loss.
- Fat makes you fat.
- Cereal is a decent, even healthy, breakfast.
- It’s healthy to cook with olive oil.
- Vegetarianism is healthy and better for the planet.
Our cancer rates began to rise in the early 1960’s due to the fact that Americans had at that point continued to eat the alternative fats we were asked to use while we were were rationing food during World War 2. Combined with the proliferation of processed foods, instant foods, eating out more often, woman beginning to work outside the house, TV becoming what we do most of the time…I could go on but you get the point. We do not eat the diet we are meant to eat; plenty of healthy organic fats (remember they ALL used to be organic along with everything else we ate), high quality protein and mostly green leafy veggies and other low glycemic foods.
Cancer is treatable, even curable, when we repair the immune system. That can only occur with the right nutrients, nourishing and repairing the body. Cancer is preventable by keeping our immune system intact and that only occurs with enough of the healthy saturated fats and organic grass fed proteins our bodies need so badly.
For more reading;
The Importance of Saturated Fats for Biological Functions
What If The Whole Low-Fat Trend Has Been A Big Lie?
City gardening is often heralded as a modern solution adopted by crafty urban developers and foodies. But urban gardening during times of economic and political turmoil is as deep-rooted in the American tradition as apple pie. Take the Panic of 1893: The U.S. was caught in a serious economic recession (sound familiar?), unemployed factory workers filled the streets, scant social assistance programs existed, and cities were in full-blown panic mode. Enter “Potato Patch Farms,” an urban gardening initiative that also began in Detroit. Mayor Hazen Pingree’s program connected unemployed families with unused city land and provided them with farming materials and education. More than 1,700 families took advantage of Pingree’s program, and the idea spread to 18 other cities, including Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Seattle—some of the leaders of today’s urban farming boom.
To read the whole article- Good Magazine
