amazing lavender

Headache?  Bad burn?  Insect bites?  Dig into the first aid kit and pull out any number of ointments, pills and creams.  An alternative?  A nice natural hippie alternative?  Lavender oil!!

If there is no lavender oil in your house, you are crazy.  Not only is it a natural antibiotic, antiseptic and antidepressant but it also promotes healing and the growth of skin cells as well as helping to prevent scarring.  It can be used to help manage high blood pressure, is a natural sedative and is extremely calming.  In addition to all of those benefits, lavender oil smells incredible. 

what are essential oils

Essential oils are extracted from plants and are extremely concentrated.   Lavender oil is derived from the flowers of the lavender plant.  It is a very potent oil and you often only need a drop or two.

how to use it

As it is very concentrated and powerful, lavender oil should be used with care.  Here are some ways you can use it:

Burns – after applying ice cold water to the burn area for at least 10 minutes, put a couple of drops of neat lavender oil directly on the burn. 

Insect repellent – mix lavender oil with a carrier oil such as sweet almond oil and apply to your skin to keep insects such as mosquitoes away.  A good ratio is 1 drop per 30mL.  At this ratio, a little oil goes a long way. 

Insomnia – a few drops of lavender oil in a bath before bedtime will help you wind down.  Don’t use any more than 3 drops however as any more than that and the oil could become more of a stimulant than a relaxant.  You could also put a drop under your pillow. 

Headache – massage some lavender oil on your temples and along the hairline at the back of your neck.

Insect bites – apply neat lavender oil to the affected area.  For more aggravating bites such as ticks, apply a drop of lavender every 5 minutes up to 10 times.

Blisters – apply neat lavender oil to the blister and pat gently. 

Body oil/moisturiser – add some lavender oil to a carrier oil such as grapeseed oil and use it all over your body as a massage oil or even as a moisturiser.  As lavender oil promotes skin cell growth it is a good anti-ageing oil.    

Acne – dab some lavender oil onto acne blemishes to assist with healing and prevent infection.

what now

You can buy lavender oil from any health food store.  Just make sure that you are buying lavender essential oil and not fragrant oil.  Fragrant oil is all synthetic and will have none of the health benefits of the essential oil. 

Lavender oil is one of the most versatile essential oils around and has many more uses than what I have mentioned here.  So throw out your burn cream, sleeping pills, horrible insect sprays and any other tubes of rubbish that you will no longer need.  Once you have some of this miracle oil, you can take another giant step on your purification journey.

dry winter skin.

It's winter.  Everything is dry.  Everybody's skin is itchy, dry, tight.  It almost feels like your skin is getting older before your eyes.  I have this theory that most of our ageing occurs in winter.  Makes sense to me...

Living on the Gold Coast I probably can't complain too much about the cold.  But the dryness?  Crazy!!  I'm used to humidity.  And to make things a little worse, I spend a lot of time in a chlorinated swimming pool so my skin does not like winter.

Luckily, I have an incredible hippie solution, one I have been using for years.  This is simple, cheap and EXTREMELY effective.  And, did I mention this is a completely organic solution?  My solution is body oil. 

All you will need for this one is your favourite oil, an essential oil and a pump bottle.  The essential oil will make it smell nice as well as give you a couple of special benefits depending on which one you choose.  Fill the bottle with your oil and add a few drops of essential oil.  If you want more fragrance add some more drops of essential oil.  Pretty easy.

Grapeseed oil is my favourite carrier oil and you can pick it up from the oil section in any supermarket.  The reason I love it is because it has no smell, it is hypoallergenic (so there is an extremely low risk of having any adverse reaction) and it is full of antioxidants which mean it is great for your skin.  

As for essential oils there are loads to choose from.  If you're confused, here are a couple of suggestions:

Frankincense - one of the most luxurious of the essential oils, mostly due to it's incredible smell.  It is great for anti-ageing, reported to smooth out wrinkles.  It also has a soothing effect on your mind and body. 

Lavender - there is no other essential oil that has so many uses.  Lavender is great for skin as it promotes cell growth, encourages relaxation and assists with ageing.  You can use lavender on all different skin types.

Neroli - smells good and is great for skin elasticity .  It assists with skin cell growth and it is best for dry, sensitive skin.

Sandalwood - this is the essential oil I am using at the moment.  Sandalwood has been used as a fragrant oil for centuries.  It has a softening effect on your skin, which makes it good for eczema, dehydrated and ageing skin. 

The success to body oil is as much about application as it is about the ingredients.  If you use too much you will feel greasy and your towels will start to smell.  Keep your body oil in the shower.  Once you have showered and turned off the water, rub the oil all over your body.  I only use about 2 pumps for my whole body.  As it is going on wet skin, it is very easy to apply and you don't need much at all.  Pat yourself dry with your towel.  Much easier than cream or body butter, loads cheaper and far, far, far less ingredients. 

If you change from a typical moisturising cream to this body oil, you are removing parabens, mineral oils, added fragrances, fillers, preservatives and other rubbish from your lifestyle.  I could safely say anywhere from 7 to 15 ingredients will no longer be absorbed into your body. 

Now my hubby isn't a huge fan of a lot of my little hippie solutions but this one he loves.  And my kids?  Even my two year old walks around pulling his shirt up asking for oil.  Because it's all natural and beneficial with no nasties, they can use it as much as they like!

Hand Sanitiser - a Healthier Way

Soap and water is the absolute best choice for keeping your hands clean.  But lets be realistic, sometimes that isn't always available.  Sometimes there are...shall we say bathroom issues to deal with at the park.  Sometimes there are viruses or bacteria running crazy through your house and you need a little extra help to stop it spreading.  Sometimes you need hand sanitiser. 

a little info about hand sanitisers

Hand sanitisers need an active ingredient to kill the germs.  Most of the time this ingredient is alcohol, either ethanol or isopropanol.  Ethanol is plant based while isopropanol is petroleum based.  Non alcohol based sanitisers often use benzalkonium chloride (which is banned in some countries due to its toxicity) or triclosan.  There are also a lot of other ingredients thrown in there such as triethanolamine or TEA (which helps break down oils and is found in loads of cosmetic products), thickeners, preservatives, fragrances and fake skin softeners.  Most of these ingredients are known skin irritants and can cause allergic reactions, contact dermatitis, eczema or worse.  Some of them have more carcinogenic concerns.

the hippier, happier alternative

Yep, it still contains alcohol but without all of the other rubbish.  This is a really simple solution which uses three simple ingredients which you probably already have in your house:

• Vodka.  Stay away isopropanol (also known as rubbing or isopropyl alcohol) as it is derived from petroleum.
• Witch hazel.  It is a natural cleanser which is also good for skin irritations and inflammation.  Witch hazel is available from the beauty section of your supermarket. 
• Essential oil of your choice.  My choice is the amazing lavender oil due to its incredible skin soothing and healing abilities, plus it smells good. 

Mix equal parts of vodka and witch hazel.  Add a couple of drops of essential oil.  Mix it up and put it in a nice little tiny bottle.  Done!

Of course, as it contains alcohol it is flammable and you probably shouldn't leave it unsupervised around children in case they drink it but I'm assuming that is just common sense.

It's a shame that my first blogging post isn't something a little more organic and natural.  However, to kill germs you need potent ingredients.  Hand sanitisers are something that most of us can't live without these days.  The good news is that by making your own you are taking this first step with me on my quest to live a cleaner life.  We have already removed around 7-12 ingredients, half of which are highly toxic, from our lifestyle.  So congratulations to us!

It's a hippie life.

Many people create many blogs for many different reason.  My reason is simple. 

I am a mummy to two beautiful boys and a wife to a pretty incredible guy.  For years I have been following a fairly organic lifestyle attempting to stay away from most of the harmful chemicals around.

Recently I have been getting pretty relaxed in my hippie natural lifestyle and my poor family and I have endured an incredible two months of pretty much non-stop sickness.  Hard work!!  Now I can't be totally sure if this is the reason but it certainly didn't help.  At the end of all the pills, antibiotics and medication I have developed my first allergy and my little boy who is not even two has just completed his second course of antibiotics within a month.

Time for a lifestyle change...and I am really hoping this blog will keep me on track as well as help others lead a more natural, organic and in the end a much healthier life.  I'm a trained beauty therapist who has spent all of my beauty years researching and putting into practice bits and pieces to equip me in my quest.

This is not another food blog, you will have to look elsewhere for your vegan recipes and raw food concoctions.  This is about products, ingredients and the little things you can do to get hazardous chemicals out of your home. 

Stay tuned for simple tips and tricks you can use to reduce the amount of toxic rubbish in your house.  Wish me luck!!