Oregano's amazing properties!

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas! Mine was great! We were able to go visit my family. The only downside to this was I came down with the flu on Wednesday. My poor siblings all seemed to be affected as well.

On to oregano... Mister gets athletes foot about 3-4 times a year. Usually he just uses lamisil and after about a week its gone. This latest bout I thought about having him try some essential oil. After checking my book I read that oregano has anti-fungal properties. So I mixed about 1/4 c olive oil with 3 drops of the oregano oil. Just three nights of doing this and it was gone. He did smell like pizza though.... 3 days with an essential oil vs 1 week with an anti fungal OTC treatment that you have to keep away from children... I think I'll keep the oregano treatment for the future and Mister agrees!

In the next couple of weeks there will be a contest just in time for Valentines Day so keep tuned!

Pampering Yourself for the Holidays!

How many of us worry about what gift to give the kids teachers, your friends, the family lottery, and the kids but forget to take some time out and pamper yourself? Me, me! I admit it. I stress about the perfect gift for the sister-in-law we got  this year for Mister's family, My brother and my sister's boyfriend that we got for my family, the kids teachers, the list goes on.

I've mentioned before that I have two sisters-in-law that have allergies to ingredients commonly found in things like lip balm. One is allergic to aloe and the other is allergic to coconut. While neither bothers me I prefer to be considerate when I know I am going to spend some time around one or the other. So here are some recipes that I use to pamper myself, de-stress and pamper others!

Bath Salts- Honestly this is quite possibly one of the easiest things that I make and I have the boys help me. I use 1 part epsom salt and 1 part rock salt (ice cream salt works great too!) The last batch I made was for both me and Mister's youngest sister so I put 2 cups of each kind of salt into a gallon zipper bag. I added about 10 drops peppermint oil (remember I LOVE peppermint ) and handed the bag to the kids to shake. I poured most of it into a jar that we sent to her and the rest I used in the bath that night. I use about 1/2-1 C per bath. Epsom salt is known for helping aching muscles and softening skin. Add peppermint to that and it is my personal nirvana.

Body Spray- Also easy to make! Mix 1 part rubbing alcohol with 1 part witch hazel.  For each cup of solution I like to add 5 drops of essential oil. The one I use that day depends on my mood. I like to mix it in an old water bottle. I pour the ingredients in and hand it off to the boys to shake. I use the little travel spray bottles from Target to hold the spray. I shake it again just before use then spray on me. The rubbing alcohol and the witch hazel evaporate and leave the scented oil behind.

Vapor Disks- If you haven't read the Peppermint and Frankincense post already go back and read it for the directions on this one. I love them and so do the boys!

Lip Balm- doTerra makes their own peppermint and wild orange lip balm that I love to death! The only problem that I can see is that it is made with coconut oil. So in deference to my sister-in-law I hunted down every lip balm recipe I could find on pinterest and found this and this.  While the first uses coconut oil the second uses almond oil which I don't have on hand. After looking at what seems like hundreds of recipes I decided to just dive in and try it from scratch. The basic recipes use beeswax to keep them solid and vegetable oils to allow them to melt onto your lips.

1.2.3.

1. My containers I used. Hobby Lobby doesn't carry lip balm tubes so I found some small bead containers instead.

2.They are clear on the bottom and the perfect size. Too bad the lids are pink, I just can't see my brother or dad using the lip balm from a pink container.

3.This is part of the ingredients the Vitamin E oil and half of the beeswax. I used 1 TBS each of Beeswax, Shea butter, and Cocoa butter. I also uses 1/2 TBS sunflower oil. I melted in my makeshift double boiler. I usually use a can from beans or vegetables that I have cleaned out and used pliers to make a spout on (just one of the many smart things I learned from my mom).

4.

4. Once everything in the double boiler was melted (less than 5 minutes later) I added 8 drops of wild orange EO and 4 drops of peppermint EO. It was just enough to give the lip balm a light and pleasant scent. I ended up with just enough lip balm to fill 8 containers. After it solidified I put the lids on and now they are ready to go to the girls in my family. As soon as the lip balm was cool enough I had to try it. I love it! It has a creamy texture and the blend of the oils moisturizes my winter ravaged lips like I wanted.

None of these recipes takes very long and can be done with items you usually have around the house.

Now go and pamper yourself and take some time to relax this holiday season!

Past Tense!

Guess what! You are all in for a treat today. Since I can't use the lavender products from doTerra, I've asked a friend to write about Past Tense. It's one of the proprietary blends from doTerra. Arienne and I go back to when we were young teenagers (longer ago than either of us cares to admit). Enjoy!

Hello readers!

Jenn asked me to do a guest spot about Past Tense essential oil blend here on her amazing blog! I really believe in Jenn’s purpose and I hope you’ve been enjoying her posts as much as I have.

Past Tense blend by DoTerra is a miracle worker as far as I’m concerned. There are 9 different oils in it: Rosemary, Basil, Roman Chamomile, Marjoram, Cilantro, Frankincense, Peppermint, Lavender, and Wintergreen. You have to buy the blend because you can’t get all of the individual oils separately. It does wonders for headaches and even migraines if you catch them soon enough!

The first time I tried this oil, I was getting migraines from being pregnant with baby #4. I was very tense, and when I’m tense it goes right to my head! So I followed the directions on the totally awesome roll-on applicator bottle it comes in which are to roll it across your forehead, a little on each temple, and down the back of your neck. I rub it in just a little in my temples and neck. Then I kicked back and inhaled the delightfulness. I felt my entire head just relax.

It is now my go-to blend when I have a headache, so I take it with me everywhere. A couple of months ago I went to my math class and my teacher was in visible pain from a migraine induced by the smells and chemicals in the building. She mentioned having already taken the max amount of both ibuprofen and acetaminophen to no avail. After class, I went up and offered some to her, and she happily accepted. She told me later that while it didn’t make it go away completely, it helped a lot as nothing else had, so I felt that was a success. If we had caught her at the beginning of it, it would have worked even better.

I hope you get some of this in your next order and try it for yourself! You won’t be sorry (unless you have bad reactions to one or more of the ingredients like Jenn.)

Arienne (http://sweet-hour-of-prayer.blogspot.com/)

Crazy week of injuries and business

I know that I normally try to post something new every couple of days and I just want to apologize for missing that self imposed deadline this week. We spent time in Urgent Care for both boys this week, I had the worst migraine of my life and then got a scuzzy throat.

The boys injuries both needed looking at but the migraine and my scuzzy throat had EO help! Not help getting here but help going away. For the migraine I rubbed peppermint on my wrist in addition to ibuprofen. Normally the kind of whopper I got this week would be cause for taking heavy narcotics like percocet for at least two, maybe three days. I was able to get by with percocet on day one and ibuprofen and the peppermint on days two and three. I'm so grateful that I was able to be clearheaded and do the mom kinds of things that drive us all crazy this time of year.

 Tuesday night I was talking with a friend. She and her sisters run Greener Eating a blog dedicated to eating a  plant based diet. I love the recipes that I find there and am constantly finding new foods to eat! She told me that when she starts getting a scratchy throat she gargles and then swallows about 1 oz of water mixed with 1 drop oregano oil and 2 drops lemon. She also told me it would burn and burn it did. However, it was a good burn and my throat felt instantly better. One word of warning on that, if your lips are chapped please take care of that before you gargle with the oils. Your lips will thank you for it!

Home made cleaners using EO! or Living Providently.

Do you have a homemade cleaner recipe that you love? I have several that I want to share. I have a ton of allergies and sometimes I like to make things for family. Mister (my husband) has a sister-in-law that is allergic to aloe and I have a sister-in-law that is highly allergic to coconut. I am on the hunt for homemade eco-friendly cleaners and pampering recipes constantly that I can share with them. I would have to mix up which recipes I send to people. The result could be disastrous. So I am sharing some recipes that I love and how I use the EO in them.

The first is for homemade laundry detergent. I know that there are a lot of recipes out there on the net. The one I use I've found in several different places but this site has several other recipes as well. Play around and find what works best for you.

The ingredients: 1 bar Fels Naptha soap (I find this in the laundry car aisle), 1c borax, 1c washing soda, 20 drops essential oil. This is the first time I have put the CPTG EO in my laundry soap so I went with the On Guard proprietary blend.


Step one: Grate the soap bar. I use the one I use in my kitchen since the soap does come off really well in my dishwasher. The pot I put them in is one that I normally use in the kitchen but I used it to make candles and I still haven't quite gotten the wax that spilled cleaned out of it yet.

Pour enough water to cover the grated soap and heat the mixture until the soap melts into the water. It will become clear at this point.

I like to have my borax and washing soda sitting in a bowl ready to dump in. That is the same bowl that I grated the Fels Naptha into.

 Once you dump that in your heated soap mixture it will be grainy and get more opaque. At this point I like to fill my 5 gallon bucket halfway with the hottest water I can get out of my tap.

Once I am sure that everything is mixed together I pour what is in my pot into the bucket and stir it all up. The reason I use the hot tap water is so that the soap doesn't become cold and hard and not mix with the water. Once that is done I filled it the rest of the way with more hot water. I added the 20 drops of On Guard at the very end and once again stirred it up.

I'll let this sit overnight (more like until Monday) with the lid to my bucket on it loosely. Then I'll move it into my laundry room. I have two leftover laundry detergent bottles from before I started making it and just fill those from my 5 gallon bucket. Now you have great laundry soap that cost you less than $5 for 5 gallons and comes with the anti-bacterial and anti-funk (my boys clothes get a lot of what I call funk to them, its a unique smell) of a CPTG EO!

Now that you have your homemade laundry detergent would you like a fabric softener to go with it? Yes you  would, well once again my go to recipe comes from another blog. I love it! My husband however doesn't. The reason for the difference of opinion? He has microfiber dress pants that are static prone and this particular recipe doesn't work that well with the microfiber. I have no problem with any of my clothes.

For the recipe, in case you didn't click the link, you need 6c water, 2 c hair conditioner of your favorite scent, and 3 c white vinegar. I have a juice bottle that I pour everything into, shake it up and then pour it from there into the fabric softener compartment on my washing machine or into a spray bottle to spray the clothes that are in the dryer before I start the load. The next time I plan on making it with lemon EO to help the clothes keep a fresh smell and cut down on the boy-funk that clings to my kids clothes.

The recipe for my homemade all-purpose cleaner is thanks to a mid-week meeting for the women's auxillary in my church. One of the ladies presented a TON of recipes for making your own cleaners and one that I LOVE to death is the all-purpose cleaner.

You need: 2c rubbing alcohol (70%), 1 TBS mild hand dish detergent, 1 TBS ammonia, and 2 qts water. I'm a dump and mix kind of girl and this recipe is just that. Dump into a bowl to mix the ingredients and pour into the container you will use to store your cleaner. I have some in a 2 liter soda bottle and some in a spray bottle. It is this cleaner that I added the On Guard to in my previous post. No more rubbing alcohol smell!

One more household cleaner and then I promise I am done for the night.

How many of you have had a child miss the toilet? or carpets that get a weird odor to them? I do and we have a pet free home. I mixed about 1c baking soda with about 3 drops lemon EO. Remember I'm not really good with measuring ingredients? This is one of those times that its not important to be. I put the mixture into a shaker bottle. It's similar to what you would use for parmesan cheese or crushed red pepper at a restaurant  I then sprinkled this amazing concoction in the bathroom and the boys bedroom carpet. I vacuumed up the powder on the carpet and swept the bathroom floor. The smells were GONE! I am pretty impressed with this one.


In the next week I will be posting some beauty treatments that I love to pamper myself with and use EO to make them even better! Do you like bath salts? lip balm? body spray? You will love the post on these items, look for it my next Saturday.

On Guard and Wild Orange or Wassail!

Some of you may be scratching your heads on the title. To me the On Guard proprietary blend smells like wassail. If your not familiar with it is basically spiced hot orange Tang. I will get to that one in a minute but first I want to talk about the Wild Orange oil.

Wild Orange, and most of the citrus oils, have degreasing and sanitizing properties. That is why a majority of cleaning brands offer orange or lemon varieties of their cleaners. Wild Orange also has a sedative characteristic. According to Modern Essentials (2012) the French use orange oil for heartburn, constipation, diarrhea, insomnia and menopause.

So far I have used the Wild Orange in only a couple of ways. I make homemade body wash (recipe to come in a post about provident living) and have been using it for a while but it was lacking something. I added about 3 drops of the oil to my container (about 13oz). The scent in the shower is a refreshing scent that gives me a boost in the morning.

The other way I used it was actually an accident. I am a total klutz, no joke. I was getting some oil into sample vials and spilled a bunch on my hands. I don't know about you but I have tendency to sleep on my hands so I got a massive dose of Wild Orange aromatherapy that night. Most nights I wake up 2-3 times a night. Not because I'm a light sleeper or my husband snores, just because my body likes to twitch and startle me awake in the middle of the night. I slept great that night and the next night as well! This oil carries the same caution about the sun as the lemon oil.

I love the members of the citrus family and will continue to find new uses for them in the future.

The next oil I want to write about is On Guard. It is one of the proprietary blends from doTERRA. It contains Wild Orange, Clove Bud, Cinnamon Bark, Rosemary and Eucalyptus Radiata. On Guard is meant to help your immune system deal with the constant onslaught of viruses and bad bacteria that you are exposed to on a daily basis.

My cousin told me that she sprays down her bathroom with it so I though why not try it? I added 3 drops to 11 oz of my homemade all purpose cleaner (recipe to come in the provident living post). The smell of rubbing alcohol is gone. I have been spraying my shower down with the cleaner daily for a couple months now but in the last week I can already see an improvement in how clean my shower is. I also used it in the tub and had my son use it in his bathroom big improvements all around.

The other thing I tried the On Guard for was a cut that Monster got on his foot. He had been playing with toothpicks in the living room and left them out even with being reminded repeatedly and of course he didn't. Well he stepped on one and got a little poke on the bottom of his foot so I thought I would try the On Guard instead of the normal neosporin. It worked! It stopped bleeding instantly and he said that it didn't hurt anymore.

The next post will be mostly recipes of homemade cleaners that I have gathered from here and there and the essential oil uses I have found for them. Look for it by Friday!

Are natural remedies new?

The initial reaction to this question is of course no, but for most people born in the west the answer gets a bit complicated. Western medicine is wonderful! We have things like vaccines, antibiotics, x-rays, CT scans and MRI's. Most people in the west have grown so accustomed to these that we forget that nature also supplies health aids.

I have to admit I was a bit skeptical of doTERRA and essential oils in general. However, I have used natural remedies in the past without a second glance. Epsom salt in a bath for achy muscles or in a bowl for dealing with ingrown toenails. When I was pregnant with both of my children I lived on peppermint and ginger to help manage my raging morning sickness. When my oldest, Scientist, was born and he had coughing fits, later diagnosed as asthma, we would sit with him in the bathroom and run a hot shower for the steam. We have used a warm glass of milk or chamomile herbal tea to help us fall asleep. Lemon herbal tea and warm salt water for sore throats. Baking soda and oatmeal pastes were used for insect stings and rashes.

I'm sure that most of these remedies have been used by most people at one time or another in many different forms. So today I'm issuing a challenge. Think of all the natural remedies that you use now or used growing up and share them with your friends and with me!

If you have a natural remedy that isn't listed above please share in the comments section!

Pictures!

This is the picture that I didn't get to add last night.

These are my finished disks! In the background you can see my 5lb bag of baking soda. I found mine in the pool maintenance section of the local Walmart but I think I've also seen them in the laundry care aisle. Happy DIY!

Jenn

Peppermint and Frankincense or Christmas Time!

I LOVE PEPPERMINT!!!! Okay now that I have that off of my chest I can explain. December is one in my top times of the year because of Christmas, I still love the holidays, and peppermint. Peppermint candy canes, peppermint hot cocoa, peppermint chap-stick  peppermint Andes mints, need I go on? Imagine my surprise when I found out that peppermint essential oil helps with headaches!

I already knew that peppermint could help with opening the airways, but finding more uses for peppermint is a life changing experience. Can you tell I love peppermint? I was suffering from a headache last weekend and had a sore back from cooking all day Thursday, did anyone else hurt after cooking all day? To deal with that and the fact that I am nearly always cold I ran myself a bath. We have a large jetted tub, can you say heaven? I filled the tub all the way with hot water added about 1c epsom salt and 3 drop peppermint essential oil. My headache disappeared the aches eased up and as a bonus my sinus' cleared themselves. We have used peppermint with the kids when  their asthma acts up and love that we don't have to have them puff on the inhaler. As a side note I am not a doctor so consult yours before you drop medications especially those that are meant to be used in an emergency like a rescue inhaler!!!!!


Today I made some vapor disks that I found the recipe for on pinterest. This link should take you right to her recipe. I did make a few modifications though, I only used peppermint, I'm a purest that way :), and like her, I didn't measure a thing. I have a really bad habit of not measuring unless; I am using a recipe for the first time, or I am baking.

I poured a bunch of baking soda into my normal mixing bowl until it was about as much as comes in a muffin mix box and added water until it was the pasty mixture she describes. I then added 15 drops Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade (CPTG) peppermint Essential Oil (EO). I then scooped the mixture into a muffin pan with the cupcake liners in it. I ended up with enough to make 12-1 inch thick disks of the regular muffin size. I wanted to use one tonight when my kids got in the shower and I am not really what you would call patient. I baked them in my oven at the lowest temperature of 170 for about an hour. I baked it at such a low temp because most of the CPTG EO's have really low smoke points. The smoke point is where you start to loose a lot of the benefits from it being a CPTG EO, among other things. My house smelt amazing while they were baking.

After I pulled them out I allowed them to cool and unwrapped one and stuck in in the kids shower. I will post the picture when I'm done because I took the picture with my phone. They have been barking all afternoon and it stopped. That could be the warm steam from the shower but knowing that peppermint works like it does I'm inclined to believe that they worked together to get the result experienced! I'm looking forward to all the ways I can use peppermint to help my family.

The other oil I wanted to try and work with is Frankincense. Does this oil name sound familiar? It is one of the three gifts brought by the wise men to the Christ-child. It is one of the oldest therapeutic oils known to man. This oil has a ton of uses, most of them are for brain health, anti-aging or it antiseptic properties and as a bonus it's a sedative.

Last night I once again found myself with a headache. I really should go to bed around 9:30 to be ahead of them and be a productive mommy the next day and not zombie mommy. The biggest problem last night? NBC's new show Revoltion, Eric Kripke writes some of the most compelling stories and I fear for us all should he team up with Joss Whedon and Steven Moffat, but that is a post for another day.

I diluted 2 drop of Frankincense EO in about 1/4 cup coconut oil (again, I don't measure just eyeball it). I rubbed some on the soles of my feet. I did it a bit stupidly though, I did it in the kitchen on my tile floor! Then I had to walk to my bedroom and not fall. The only way I made it was through a minor miracle. It really didn't take long for my skin to absorb it and by the time I was done brushing my teeth I was able to get into bed and not leave oil on my sheets. Yay!

My younger child who we should call Monster has had a hard time adjusting to being in school this year. He's had a few discipline issues and in talking to the teacher its more than normal behavior for that age group. This morning I rubbed my coconut oil and frankincense EO concoction on the bottom of his feet and will continue to do so. I'm hoping it will help calm him in that environment as one of the indications in the book I referenced in my last posts states that frankincense can help the user have a better attitude! I sure hope so!

May you each find a way to use the "Christmas oils" in your house!

Do you love peppermint? Have a new way to use it? I would love to hear from you! Leave me a comment and I will respond.

The beginning of a new life....

Every story needs a beginning and this is mine. My name is Jennifer and like many others I have a few health problems. I suffer from debilitating migraines most days, I have been diagnosed with poly-cystic ovarian syndrome, which includes a bunch of other issues, I have joint pain and muscles that can't quite seem to work together and my family and I all suffer from nasty allergies and asthma. I am also currently working on the education I need to be certified to teach High School Biology. Now, I am not typing all of this to complain or to whine about how my body seems to be against me. I am typing this so that those who read this will understand how essential oils have helped our family. My aunt has gotten into doTerra Essential oils and shared her enthusiasm with the rest of the family. I will try to review most of the oils that doTerra offers, however there are a couple that I just cannot try, lavender and melaleuca. Unfortunately for me they are some of the oils that set me up for the migraines I mentioned earlier. If you have tried one of these oils and would like to write a guest entry let me know I would love to hear from you!

The first oils I received were lemon and Breathe. Lemon is supposed to help with anxiety, cleansing, depression, disinfection, grease, heartburn and stress. (2012, AromaTools). Last weekend I took what is, at this time, the most important test of my academic career, the equivalent in my state to the Praxis I. This is the general education test for future educators and must be passed before a student can take the Praxis II. In the past with test like the ACT or the SAT I have had severe anxiety about the test and have never felt confident about them. This time I added a drop of the lemon essential oil to my water that I was drinking as I drove to the testing site. I felt more clear headed than I normally am at that time in the morning and for once I was headache free. I love the scent of the lemon oil, and plan to keep using it in various ways. The one caveat about lemon essential oil is that it can cause a sensitivity to the sun so wear sunscreen! As I find more ways that it helps me and my family I will share them. 


Breathe is a proprietary blend that is meant to help with keeping the airways open. As I mentioned my family all has asthma and allergies so this blend was something I was looking forward to trying. It is blended of laurel leaf, peppermint, eucalyptus, melaleuca, lemon, and ravensara oils. My children were having a particularly rough night with their asthma so I rubbed a small bit on the bottoms of their feet. It helped them quite a bit however, the melaleuca in it cause this mom to be dealing with a migraine. It did work as expected and my children were able to get a good nights sleep without having to puff on their inhalers or take the liquid albuterol that we have been so dependent upon. I will be trying the different components of this blend to see if I can get the same results with the kids without the migraine for me. Would I recommend this oil to friends? The answer is an emphatic yes!
In the next entry I will discuss peppermint and as it is the holiday season, frankincense!

AromaTools. (2012). Modern Essentials: A Comtemporary Guide to the Therapeutic Use of Essential Oils (4th Edition) Orem, Ut : Aroma Tools