A good friend of mine has been using hemp seed oil to moisturize his face for as long as I’ve known him. He has excellent and clear skin so I’ve always wondered if the hemp seed oil had something to do with his great complexion. What stopped me from trying it myself was my fear of using straight oils on my face, and the fact that his pores were enlarged (even though you had to look really close to see them).
It reminded me of a time years ago (before I had acne) when I used to make my own skin care products with waxes and essential oils. They’d always make my pores look visibly a lot larger so my creations always ended up in the bin.
However (and this is the really, really good bit), recently he started adding aloe vera into the hemp seed oil with amazing results!
Aloe vera naturally tightens the skin, especially fresh aloe. You’ll be able to feel it if you squeeze some of the aloe gel out of a leaf and apply it to skin on any part of your body. The skin will almost immediately begin to feel tighter.
So aloe vera is a perfect mix for the hemp seed oil. After a few moments the “oily sheen” that is often left after using straight hemp seed oil will have left completely. It’s as if the aloe vera helps the hemp seed oil to be absorbed into the skin. The aloe also prevents the pores from looking enlarged. As it tightens the skin, it tightens the pores too.
It’s also important to note here that I’ve now finally discovered a resource that lists the comedogenic rating for hemp seed oil. And it was awesome to find that hemp seed oil has a rating of 0. This means it’s super safe to use on the skin, will not clog your pores and will not give you acne. Check out the resource by clicking here.
How to make your own hemp seed & aloe facial moisturizer
One application of this moisturizer requires around 5 drops of hemp seed oil mixed with 1-2 teaspoons of aloe vera gel. Use organic ingredients if you can. I was too excited to pass on this recipe so I haven’t experimented yet with quantities for making more of a bulk product.
You can use aloe vera gel bought from a store, but of course it’s always best to use fresh aloe directly from a plant. If using fresh aloe vera gel and making up bulk quantities of this moisturizer, you will need to preserve the gel in some way. To make your own aloe vera gel, follow the recipe in this article – How To Harvest Aloe Vera & How To Make Your Own Gel
Oil is a bit of a dirty word for me. I steer clear of most oils out of fear of a breakout .. which is why I’ve been completely dismissive of essential oils in the past. It wasn’t until learning from my ex that lavender oil magically clears up a mosquito bite itch in a couple of minutes (yes I tried this with great success many, many times), then reading the real story about how essential oils were first discovered that I began to realize that hey, there’s something more to this than what I first though.
How Essential Oils Came To Be
“Aromatherapy is a phrase coined by Rene-Maurice Gattefosse, Ph.D., in 1920, who was a French cosmetic chemist. While working in his laboratory, he had an accident that resulted in a third degree thermal burn of his hand and forearm. He plunged his arm into a vat of lavender oil, thinking that it was water. To his surprise, the burning slowly decreased and then stopped within a few moments. Over a period of time, with the continual application of lavender oil, the burn healed completely without a trace of a scar. As a chemist, he analyzed the essential oil of lavender and discovered that it contained many substances referred to as chemical constituents or chemical properties. As a result of this, Dr. Gattefosse determined that essential oils contained tremendous healing properties.”
Huzzah! Who wouldn’t want to use essential oils after reading that!? Very exciting indeed. So as you can see, essential oils have tremendous healing properties when applied topically to the skin. But what exactly are they and why are they more special that “normal” oils?
Over the last few weeks I’ve been testing using salt (both sea salt and himalayan crystal salt) and honey as my facial cleanser.
Both have been great! I especially love honey because it’s moisturizing, soothing, very naturally anti-bacterial and extremely cheap (unless you use manuka honey of course).
Ps- What I forgot to add in this video is that honey has a pH of 3.2-4.5 which is relatively acidic. In my opinion this makes it even better to use as a cleanser because it is matching the natural acidic nature of our facial skin.
It’s also important to note that the skin of our face and neck is generally the most acidic of any skin on our body, because of this natural “acid mantle” or natural protective combination of oils, sebum and sweat (sounds a bit yucky but really it’s wonderfully protective and our skin does a great job at producing this perfect balance of protective stuff).
In this video I do reveal way more of myself than I’d usually like in my blog! Although sadly the resolution on the camera doesn’t pick up a lot of detail, so my fluffy little underarm hairs don’t show up on the camera as well as I imagined they would. Check it out-
As for the question, when did women start removing their “objectionable hair”, the answer seems to be a little hazy. Hair removal for both men and women seems to stretch as far back as into ancient times, although the hair that was removed wasn’t always in the usual places (eyebrows and scalp for women for example).
For modern women, from the research that I’ve come across, it seems quite evident that women didn’t really care about their body hair when they had to hide most of their body. It wasn’t until we started wearing sleeveless dresses in the early 1920’s that we decided we preferred the hairless look. This to me indicates that we shaved our underarm hairs originally for aesthetics and not to reduce the smell. Interesting.
As for legs, stereotypically we didn’t particularly care until skirts started to get really short and stockings really sheer sometime in the 1940’s. So there you have it, it really hasn’t been that long since it’s become the standard for us to shave as much body hair as we can.
Either way, I’m glad I’ve done my little experiment and felt the liberating feeling of just letting my body be as natural as it possibly could be.
I’ve decided this year that I’m going to put a little extra love into my Christmas presents by making some of them myself.
I’m also doing this for selfish reasons. Apart from a good excuse to write a blog post (hey, it’s work!), it’s also a wonderful way to make a few Christmas presents to give myself. It’s one of those “one for them, one for me” things.
So here are the presents I’ve been working on (and hopefully my friends and family won’t look at my blog before Christmas otherwise the surprise will have been given away!) ..
Home Made Bath Salts
I love, love, love having baths. Having a good soak is a great way to relax, loosen up sore muscles, and even detox if you’re using the right bath salt mix. So here are a couple of recipes I’ve been working on for friends of mine:
1. Rose petal bath salts
This is a beautiful girls mix because it’s pink and smells like flowers. This mix is made for luxury. Continue reading →
A good friend of mine has been using hemp seed oil to moisturize his face for as long as I’ve known him. He has excellent and clear skin so I’ve always wondered if the hemp seed oil had something to do with his great complexion. What stopped me from trying it myself was my fear of using straight oils on my face, and the fact that his pores were enlarged (even though you had to look really close to see them). 
Oil is a bit of a dirty word for me. I steer clear of most oils out of fear of a breakout .. which is why I’ve been completely dismissive of essential oils in the past. It wasn’t until learning from my ex that lavender oil magically clears up a mosquito bite itch in a couple of minutes (yes I tried this with great success many, many times), then reading the real story about how essential oils were first discovered that I began to realize that hey, there’s something more to this than what I first though.
I’ve decided this year that I’m going to put a little extra love into my Christmas presents by making some of them myself. 
