Homemade Moisturizing and Exfoliating Hand Treatment...Yum!

The shower scrub that I was supposed to make turned into a hand treatment (which could be used in the shower, but I prefer it on my hands), but I am perfectly fine with that. I even showed my husband how to make it. It's so simple that pretty much anyone could do it right now with ingredients that they have in the pantry.

I used three ingredients:

organic sugar,
olive oil,
and lime essential oil.

*You could use a wide assortment of essential oils for this, it's your choice.

*You don't have to use organic ingredients, you can use regular granulated sugar.

Materials:

~a small dish (preferably glass) to mix ingredients in
~a spoon to mix with
~a glass container with a lid to store extra product

*I try to save jars that would work good for storing these kinds of things.

...and I have to show you this because it was so darn pretty. I noticed the reflection of the lace curtains in the oil. How neat is that?

 

 

I worked on mixing in a little sugar at a time until I came out with this. I added drops of lime essential oil to the mixture, stirring frequently, and making sure I didn't add too much by using this method: add a couple drops, mix well, smell, and go through this process until it was just right. I came out with this...

 

 

To use this stuff I simply just grabbed a little with my fingers, and started to rub it *gently* all over my hands. The sugar was quite rough, but I used it to scrub my knuckles and between my thumb and other four digits. I scrubbed for about a minute, and then added a little bit of water to my hands and just let the sugar dissolve while still rubbing gently. To remove excess product just use a very tiny amount of soap and wash your hands as you normally would. If you want to keep the treatment on, I suggest gently towel drying your hands and sitting back with a warm cup of tea, but wipe your hands enough to not have slippery hands!

Did you think I was going to *not* mention a cup of tea?

Now that you did it once, I would love for you to repeat this process. You should do it twice a day for a couple/few days. In between treatments, you should apply a lotion or oil to your hands to keep them soft.

Just grab that great smelling stuff and rub it on.

If you want to keep your hands smooth throughout the winter I would consider using a cream with beeswax or something similar. In case you are allergic to beeswax, there are alternatives. I also use a lot of things that are olive oil based, or some other oil base such as grape seed and jojoba oil. Oils are great!

We need oils inside and out to stay healthy. With that little tidbit, I bid you ado, and I wish yourself and your family great health and happiness on this cold January evening...and forevermore.

Much love,

~Amanda Star~

Natural, Homemade Lipstick!

I am very excited to try this. I would like to get to it soon, but sometimes things don't happen like that! I wanted to post the link to the recipe in case someone else was interested, and so I have a handy link to it. This looks like it would be so much fun trying different colors and consistencies.

Alright, so here it is! Enjoy.

Homemade Natural Lipstick Recipe at WellnessMama.com

I also have a post coming up about my homemade hand scrub moisturizing treatment. It's going to be delicious!

*Update - I haven't been able to upload pictures in a couple days. I'll try again today.

Spiritual Cleansing

It's coming up on mid January, and it's that time of year when spirits can get tired and need recharging. I have decided that I need to do as much cleansing as I can right now. The new moon is upon us, it's occurs tonight. Tomorrow we are planning on doing a big cleanse of our house, my husband and I. We will be using lavender flowers as incense and opening every window for a few minutes. Sage is great, but the lavender is not quite as strong. We happen to live in the "Land of Lavender" so it's very suiting, and smells so sweet. I save the sage for some really serious cleansing, but if you like it definitely use it.

The new moon is a time to put a rest to your magical workings (if you do them) and focus on yourself. Some examples of great things to do at this time would be:

~Take a spiritually cleansing bath or shower.
~Smudge your home or other living and working spaces you may have that need some work.
~Reassess your physical and mental health, and prepare to deal with any issues.
~Think about any grudges that you may be holding and make a plan to let go.
~Think about how you may apologize to anyone you may have hurt.
~Make some plans to work on your finances.

Sometimes we just need to sit back and think about what we can do to improve ourselves. How can we be a better friend, parent, or lover? How can you make one of your dreams or aspirations come true? It's time to make some plans and move forward.

The best way to do all of this is to WRITE THINGS DOWN. You could record your plans in a journal, notebook, or your blog. Whatever you have or want to use. However, I have found that lists on a single piece of paper always get lost. I have this blog and a pretty journal that I call my "Book of Shadows and Light". Find some time to yourself, even if it's just a few minutes and jot things down AS THEY COME TO YOU. Sorry about the caps, but I can't stress enough that this is such a crucial part of this process. If you put the sentence together it says "Write things down as they come to you". Perfect. Exactly what I'm getting at. It is so important that you get the things that are on your mind out in the open. It's the first step! Sometimes we just have too much going on up there, and we need to slow down and let it out. Writing is so very therapeutic, mentally and spiritually.

We are hoping to get some things done, separately and together. My husband, Chris, is working on his workshop, I will be working on mine, and in process we plan on having a meeting about organizing the house better and our finances. We are both hoping for a productive weekend. We have a babysitter. I have to add that!

I also plan on taking a cleansing shower. I just need to shed off some tightness and get my body moving better so I can accomplish my goals! I will post the recipe of what I end up using in my shower with pictures (not of me, silly). I always like looking at pictures in blogs. It's almost always inspiring.

Writing this was very therapeutic for me. I feel like I'm headed down a good path, and from now I just have to keep moving forward. Tomorrow is going to be a busy day.

Ta-ta for now!

~Amanda Star~

Oh! I almost forgot. I wanted to post this link for anyone who might be interested in peeking at it.

Moon Phases 2013

We Pray

I don't do this very often, but today has been a hard day for my family. We are dealing with "princess" complex, and a torment of emotions.

I can say for sure that our day is not as hard as it is for the families all over the world and here in the states that are in pain and heartache right now. Today we will be praying and lighting candles for the world. If you wonder what pagans that do spellwork do, now you know. We pray, just like you. Today we will be doing that. We will raise positive energy and send it out to everyone in the world who needs it. I hope that you will join us and do that in your own way.

Witch Hat Cookies!

I like the way this is going right now. I actually remembered to write an entry today. We did a fun little project last night and I would love to share it with you all. We have more coming up as well!

We all love Pinterest, and every once in a while I get to actually do one of the projects or try one of the recipes that I've pinned. Well, last night we did that. I usually like to bake my own cookies, but last night at about 9pm (yeah, I know that's late with a 4 year old) we were headed to the store and hit up the cookie aisle. I saw these cute little witch hat cookies on Pinterest, and said to myself "Those look so frickin easy, I would be a fool not to try it." So here they are. Our fancy little witch hat cookies, and one little Hershey's kiss broom.

- We went to the cookie aisle and grabbed some Keebler fudge stripes dark chocolate cookies.

- We picked up some dark chocolate Hershey's kisses from the candy aisle.

- I already had some store bought frosting. (I really don't like store bought frosting, but it was good that I had something on hand.)

- I used some hot pink and blue food coloring to make the frosting purple.

- I put the frosting into a cake icing bag, and screwed on a tiny flower tip (because my little one had actually stolen the tiny round tip, I found it after the matter) I stock up on these supplies because I know I will get use out of them. I bought a simple Wilton cake decorating kit in the baking aisle of Walmart, and it has come in very handy for decorating cookies and other goodies.

- I used some leftover decorating sprinkles to decorate the ugly seams!

This was a really fun project! My four year old had a little bit of a hard time using the icing bag, but she tried very hard and the Hershey's kiss did stick to the cookie. That's what really matters.

I give this project a 5 star review.

A Little Update...Married, New House, and Settling In...

It's been a while since I have posted a new blog. Well, it's time. 

We got married in August, and I spent three and a half months back home in Maine. That was stressful and a little bit of fun. I'm glad to be home now. Oh! About that. We bought a house. I still can't believe it. We were not planning on buying a house, but the opportunity jumped out at us, we thought about for a while, and here we are. It's not a big fancy house or anything, but it is perfect for us.

I am still at home with our little Willow, but I would love to be bringing in an income. It's frustrating, but I am working on it.

So on to the fun stuff! Samhain is coming up and we have some fun things planned. The little Willow and I have some craft projects planned, some cooking and baking, we need to pick out big pumpkins to carve, and have some treats on hand just in case we have trick or treaters.

We also have a "house" altar in our living room. It's on top of an old dresser that we got with the house we bought. Right now it is covered in small pumpkins, gourds, a porcelain witch, a corn husk doll, and some other fall time/Samhain things. This altar gets smudged regularly, since there are so many things changing on it all the time. Willow is four and she can always find new things to add to it.

I figured that after this update I can start posting about sabbats and pagan parenting again. I'm pretty passionate about those things. I will also be posting some recipes, crafting projects,book recommendations,  family photos, house progress pictures, and I will be sharing more natural housekeeping recipes, tips, and tricks.

In the future I would like to post more about meditations, spells, and rituals. I would like to keep the spells simple, but powerful, and not expensive! To me, that defeats the whole purpose...spending a fortune on spell supplies all the time.

Positive Energy