Help for Winter Dryness

One of my daughters wrote me a note with some of the first few words she learned to write. In her 5-year-old handwriting, with crayon, she wrote, "I am loved. I love you." It touched my heart and helped me to know that she felt loved. A little later she wrote me another note, "You are loved" and taped it to my wall. Her note reminds me that being loved and loving others gives deep meaning to our lives. The love we receive from our Creator and our loved ones, and the love we give is what makes life meaningful. 

I added the phrase "You are loved," to a lip balm label that I made. I hope you cherish the gift that it is to be alive and to be you. You are worthy of being loved and treasured. Serving others and giving them love is significant and rewarding, but giving ourselves the care and love we need, and not waiting for someone else to do that for us is also empowering and rewarding. 

My mid-winter skincare products are made with cheerful summer flowers. Let me tell you about them. Summer flowers are meant to help us in winter.

Lip Balm

Calendula is a bright yellow flower that blooms abundantly and is used for healing and protecting the skin. Thankfully, it grows easily and did well in our garden.  

We cut the calendula blossoms as they bloomed through the summer and fall. The resilient flowers continued to bloom even after it snowed and everything else had frozen. We dried the flowers then covered them in a jar with olive oil. After several weeks we heated them gently in a water bath for a couple days to extract the healing properties of the resins in the flowers. Then they were strained a couple times to make sure all the bits of flowers were removed and the oil was smooth. The calendula-infused olive oil became part of this lip balm, along with other healing oils and butters, like cocoa butter, hemp seed oil, sunflower oil, and argan oil. The lip balm is for $4 per 0.15 oz tube. Each one comes with a label that says "You are loved" and I hope you'll feel loved when you put it on.

Lotion

Another one of my favorite yellow flowers grows on the hillsides close to our home in early spring, it is arrowleaf balsamroot. In late winter, it reaches down to its taproot, gathering its energy to wake up and bloom. These yellow petals seem to call to the plant life on the mountains and hillsides in the early spring saying, "It's time to wake up and grow everyone!" As an herb this plant has a similar use- it helps you wake up and get moving. Arrowleaf balsamroot infused oil is wonderful for the skin, I have loved using it on my face and hands. 

In addition to arrowleaf balsamroot infused oil, our lotion has aloe vera, which is soothing and calming to skin. Hemp seed oil, mango butter, cocoa butter, apricot kernel oil, sweet almond oil, and Vitamin E oil are added for a luxurious, healing lotion that I hope you'll love. The lotions are mildly scented. An 8 oz. bottle is $12. 

In addition to our regular lotions shown above, French Rose is a new lotion I am offering right now. It has aloe vera, arrowleaf balsamroot infused olive oil, hemp seed oil, apricot oil, almond oil, mango butter, cocoa butter, and is made with love for you. It is $12 per 8 oz. bottle. 

I also still have the Cayenne n' Coffee Lotion for circulation support and Nerve Calm Lotion available that I wrote about in my first blog post. Those are $10 per 4 oz. bottle. 

Soaps

With winter, dry skin is a challenge for many of us. Homemade soaps are more gentle than regular soap and are better for the skin. In our soaps we used all natural oils: olive oil, coconut oil, palm oil, and castor oil. Arrowroot powder was added for the smooth silkiness it gives soap. Rose kaolin clay is part of the French Rose Soap and is also wonderful for gentle cleansing and detoxifying. The Vanilla Moon Soap has blended oatmeal in it, which is a soft exfoliator. These soaps are $6 per bar, and weigh between 3.5 to 4.8 oz. Update (03/24/2022)- Vanilla Moon Soap is sold out.

 

For Valentine's Day I am offering a gift bag with a lotion bottle, soap, lip balm and a large handful of Hershey's Valentine's Kisses- an assortment of Dark Chocolate Lava Cake Kisses, Milk Chocolate Kisses filled with Caramel, and Roses Kisses, Milk Chocolate Meltaway, all gift wrapped in a cellophane bag with a red bow for $24. The picture below has French Rose lotion and Soap, but you can pick the lotion and soap you prefer for the gift bag. 

Let me know if you'd like to purchase some of the lotions, soaps or lip balm. You can reach me by email at leslieslotions@gmail.com. I can arrange shipping if needed. My hope is that when you use my handmade skin care products, you feel loved, cared for and blessed by the things our Creator has put in nature for us. 

Do I Use Essential Oils in My Lotions and Soaps? 

Many people have asked me this question. The answer is yes and no. I use Lavender essential oil, it is well known for being soothing and calming, and Lavender Lotion is one of my more popular lotions. I also make a Fragrance Free Lotion. Other than Lavender Lotion, I mostly use fragrance oils, although sometimes I do add a few drops of essential oil to some lotions to boost the fragrance oil.  Essential oils are wonderful, but also a little unpredictable, they tend to lose their fragrance once diluted in a lotion or soap.  The fragrance of essential oils can change if you add them to other oils that have a slight scent of their own, like cocoa butter. Essential oils are wonderful, but not as stable and predictable as fragrance oils in making lotions and cold processed soaps. I may use them from time to time, and you will see them on the ingredients list if they are part of a product.

If there is something you would like to see in the way of fragrances or essential oils, let me know and I will consider it. I would be happy to answer any questions you have.