Homemade All-over Brown Sugar and Honey Scrub
I love pretty much all products from Lush, they smell ridiculously delicious and are made with all-natural (and vegetarian) ingredients. I'm especially into their exfoliating body butters and shower scrubs but they are really expensive for the amount of uses you get out of them. Fortunately, scrubs are super easy to make at home as there are lots of natural ingredients that can do the job just as well as the Lush or drugstore products. I've come across quite a number of different versions of homemade scrubs but this one, made with brown sugar, honey and walnut oil, is my favourite. It's super moisturising, plus it smells amazing. Brown sugar is a great gentle exfoliant and honey is anti-bacterial and helps the skin retain moisture. You can use many different oils as a base; I use walnut oil, because it's very emollient and, like honey, it has anti-oxidant properties and can help to heal wounds faster. This mixture lasts quite a while but be warned: since you aren't using any preservatives the ingredients might separate a bit, just mix them up again before using the scrub. I call this an all-over scrub because there are lots of different ways to use it:
- As a body scrub, because it exfoliates well but also moisturises at the same time, leaving your skin feeling super soft and allowing you to skip the body lotion. Plus, it's a much cheaper alternative than for example a tub of Lush body scrub, which only lasts for maybe five times.
- As a face scrub: the mixture is soft enough and the honey fights both acne and wrinkles. Unless you have really dry skin, make sure to use a toner afterwards to get rid of any excess oil.
- As a lip scrub: For smooth lips, use the scrub about twice a week or whenever you want to wear an unforgiving (i.e. very bright or matte) lip colour.
- As a hand and foot mask: apply the scrub liberally and then wrap some foil around your feet and put on some rubber gloves. After about 15-20 mins, the scrub will have softened any dead skin and your hands and feet will be amazingly soft and moisturised.
You need honey (any kind, but ideally something organic), soft brown sugar and walnut oil.
Fill half of a glass container with the sugar.
Add two tablespoons of honey.
Add the walnut oil.
Mix well. You can adjust the consistency of the scrub by adding some more sugar to make it thicker or more oil to make it thinner and more moisturising.
If you want to use the scrub for you lips or your face, you can fill some of it into a smaller container to keep on your bathroom shelf.
Do you have any DIY beauty recipes to share?