yummy spa-rific stuff

Ok, so this is not entirely food, but since it's food-related, I'll just stick it in here for safekeeping.

Foodstuff as spa products has grown out of my curious nature with kitchen experiments, so here are a few. Enjoy!

Scrubs:
Baking soda, sugar, salt all make excellent scrubs. Mix any of them with your favorite cleanser and instantly give yourself a post-microdermabrasion glow. Cetaphyll is an excellent, mild product that's good for any type of skin.

Masks:
Just about anything goopy works. For dryer skin, try oilier stuff like mashed avocado, banana, mayo, etc. I've heard people using honey, which is an anti-inflammatory agent, but I've never tried it for the sticky factor.

For oilier skin like mine, my favorite has been just plain yogurt. The stuff has lactic acid in it, helping skin renew itself. Mix to it some ground up oatmeal (I used a coffee grinder to ground mine up). Rub a generous dollop on. It acts as a scrub for a while when you're rubbing the goop on, then a mask when you're letting it dry. The leftovers make a lovely breakfast for yourself too.

Body moisturizers:
Reading the ingredient lists on a lot of the natural products, I've found that a lot of them contain stuff we have in our kitchen cabinets, or at least the cooking isle from the supermarkets. Grape seed oil, olive oil, sesame oil, almond oil. I haven't tried using these yet, since most of these have a pretty distinct aroma. I'll have to do a bit more research before trying them. I do believe that there may just be cosmetic grade oils for their specific use.

Bath bombs:
These have been really popular lately. Fragrant balls of fizz that's activated when they are in water. Some contain oils or different kinds of grease-type stuff like coco butter, shea butter, mango butter, coconut butter, etc. Be careful not to use too much oil as any kind of liquid sets off the bombs. You don't want them to start fizzing up before you're ready to use them. The basic recipe calls for just baking soda and citric acid. You can leave them loose and in a jar and just use scoopfuls of them at bath-time, or you can mist the dry mixture with some kind of a binding liquid like witch hazel, vitamin E oil, sweet almond oil, etc. and put the mixture into molds to form balls, or whatever other shape you choose. The butters can be mixed in after the dry ingredients are mixed and before the misting. Other stuff can be incorporated: corn starch to keep things smooth, Epsom salt as additional bath salt and water softening agent, dry flowers, etc.

Pick a dry day to make it. I made two batches. The first batch came out great; the second one started bubbling when I was trying to mold it. I used plastic Easter egg shapes and just filled the two halves and mashed them together. I haven't quite gotten the hang of keeping the two halves together when I unmold them, but will keep practicing.