Of all the cosmetics to make, lotions are one of the hardest. The reason is basic grade 6 science: oil and water don’t mix. This lotion recipe, however, contains no water, just fats. It goes on smoothly, leaves no greasy after-feel and keeps skin soft for days. The best part? Any botanical or skin-healthy oils can be added to it for extra nutrient-rich punch. I adapted it from this recipe, on wellnessmama.com, a great site for finding DIY beauty product recipes that can be easily made at home.
DIY Natural Nutritive Lotion
Just like the rest of our body we need to feed our skin. While good skincare starts on the inside, sometimes it’s helpful to apply nutrient-rich lotions and moisturizers to give skin a vitamin boost. Antioxidants, vitamins and minerals can help heal skin of a variety of conditions, such as acne, the signs of aging, uneven tone, wrinkles, sun damage, dryness or allergic conditions. Rather than investing in expensive creams and lotions that have limited effects, create your own lotion that will last you forever, is far more cost-effective and only contains ingredients that are good for your skin, no fillers or preservatives.
Ingredients:
1/2 cup of a light oil, such as olive oil, apricot kernel oil (which has excellent moisturizing and anti-aging properties), grapeseed oil, jojoba oil, etc. For extra skin-healing powers, I used 1/2 cup of my calendula oil infusion. Calendula is anti-inflammatory and healing for skin. To create a botanical-rich lotion you can create an oil infusion with calendula, camomille or even green tea and add it in here.
1/4 cup of beeswax pellets (to help lock in moisture)
1/4 cup of coconut oil
1/8 cup shea butter (2 tablespoons). Shea butter is packed full of skin-healthy vitamins that help moisturize skin and neutralize free radicals that can cause aging.
1 tsp vitamin E oil (an antioxidant that is very nutritive to skin)
Optional: Any skin-healthy items you want to add. I added 20 drops of sea buckthorn (a hot ingredient in natural skincare that is a potent skin antioxidant and helps nurture and heal skin cells) and 20 drops of neem oil, which is great for skin that is prone to acne or allergic conditions. Watch out, though, it can be drying.
Optional: essential oil for fragrance, if that’s your thing. Adding a few drops of vanilla extract makes this lotion smell like cookie dough. However, if you’re going to apply it as a face lotion, I’d refrain from adding fragrance.
Directions:
In a double boiler, add the shea butter, beeswax and oils together, stirring until they’ve melted.
Remove from heat and add in the rest of the ingredients. Allow the mixture to cool to room temperature while stirring frequently to keep the lotion airy and light.
Sea buckthorn gives the lotion a yellow colour. It should only be applied within a lotion, never directly to the skin, as it will turn you yellow! The lotion has a soft and creamy texture once applied and may give skin an oily sheen. It absorbs nicely, however, and keeps you moisturized for the entire day. It’s also a great base for creating a super lotion: packed full of whatever healing ingredients your skin needs.
This recipe makes 1 cup of lotion, which should last you a long time. There’s just one disclaimer: this product was tested on animals. I rubbed some on Coco’s paws!
This is good stuff Talia! I made the body butter and deodorant the other day- it’s great!
Thanks, Janine! I’m glad you liked them!
Homemade lotions are a little hard to make but they are really useful. Thanks for sharing the DIY recipe.
I made the body butter this morning–very rich and will be good overnight to put on my hands and feet with gloves and sock because it is so concentrated. Three questions. I have ordered the calendula flowers to make your calendula oil infusion to create this nutritive lotion. First, I’d like to use the sweet almond and jojoba oils I have to make this. Is there any problem heating them in the slow cooker? Second, I’d like to make exactly 8 oz of the nutritive lotion so I plan to use 1/8 cup coconut oil and 1/8 cup shea butter, instead of the larger amount of coconut oil in the recipe. How would this affect the consistency or richness so that I get a product I can use during the day? Thanks so much for these delightful recipes. As soon as I get the beeswax, I’m making your lip balm as well.
Hi, Margie, thanks for the comment! I’m glad you liked the body butter. There is no problem heating either of these oils in the slow cooker. Using shea butter will make the moisture thicker and richer. For day use a very modest amount. Take care!
I just finished making the nourishing oil and the lip balm. All I can say is “Wow!” The nourishing oil really does absorb well so I’ll be able to use it during the day. I stirred in some rose hips oil as I was cooling the nourishing oil and added palmarosa essential oil. For the lip balm I poured it into tubes after adding the Vitamin E and vanilla. It set up well.
A friend recently lost her husband and we’re seeing her for lunch tomorrow. Given our recent ice storm, I made her a care package with body butter, nourishing lotion and lip balm, with cotton gloves and socks to butter her hands and feet at night. I think she’ll enjoy it a lot as she’s a great do-it-yourselfer.
Thanks for all the recipes. My skin is feeling better than it has in awhile.
Great to hear, Margie. And good for you for helping to take care of your friend. There is no greater gift than the gift of reminding someone to self-care.
Have you developed a sunscreen recipe? Could you use this lotion recipe with zinc oxide to make sunscreen? Would you know how much zinc oxide to add and would the amount of ingredients in the lotion stay the same?
Hi, Margie, I haven’t delved into the world of sunscreen. I can tell you that straight up shea butter has an spf of 4, so that would factor into the amount of zinc oxide you need. Straight zinc oxide has a very high spf, but you’d have to check other sources to play around with your numbers and amounts. I imagine it would also leave a white film on the skin if used in too high concentrations. Definitely a great idea, though!
I made the sunscreen (and added rose geranium as a bug repellant). I reduced the beeswax slightly, increased the coconut oil slightly and added 3/8 cup zinc oxide. It ended up more like a lotion than the nutritive lotion, but when I rub it in, it does not leave a white film. The rose geranium is a known tick repellant which I’ve started using successfully on my dog, so it made sense to try it as a bug repellant on me. We aren’t in the heavy bug season yet, but we have ticks and, so far, it’s working.
Good to know. Thanks for sharing!