Earth Day Natural Lip Balm Recipe

Time for an admission: I am a lip balm fanatic. If I were forced to choose one desert island skin care item, it would be lip balm. I can't stand for my lips to feel dry or chapped, so I have varous tubes of lip balm stashed all about my house, office, car, and handbag. I've tried a lot of brands, but I always come back to handmade. There is just something about the quality of the ingredients that sets handmade lip balm apart from shop brands.

I can't think of a nicer way to celebrate Earth Day than producing something as lovely as lip balm with wonderful, all-natural ingredients. This balm works best in twist up tubes, as it is quite firm. If you wanted to make a softer balm for packaging in pots, increase one of the liquid oils by about 3% and reduce one of the butters by the same amount. Ingredients

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• 30% Cherry Kernel Oil
• 23% Beeswax
• 15% Cocoa Butter
• 10% Mango Butter
• 9% Aloe Butter
• 6% Avocado Oil
• 3% Plum Kernel Oil
• 2% Vitamin E
• 1% Squalane
• 1% Peppermint Essential Oil

Directions

• In a pyrex or microwave-safe container, melt the beeswax with the liquid oils. I do this is 2 minute intervals to avoid anything boiling over or burning. Once the beeswax has melted, add the butters and stir until they've melted, too. They may melt rather slowly, but it's important to add the butters this way so that your lip balm doesn't become grainy later.
• Once the butters have melted, add the rest of the ingredients and stir well. Once everything is incorporated, your balm is ready to go into the containers.

Luxury Lip Balm with Olive Oil

Since giving up my soap business back in January, I rarely make cosmetics any more (unless I'm testing fragrances in soap), so last weekend my daughter and I decided to make lip balms. I had some new colourants I'd been meaning to try, so it was the perfect opportunity to get started on items for our Christmas hampers. This year friends and family are getting lots of handmade bath and body products.

I usually use castor oil in my lip balms because I love the feel of it, so you can imagine my disappointment when I discovered there was none in the house. I decided to look at the ingredients I had to hand and come up with an entirely new recipe -- and the result is the nicest lip balm I've ever made.

Some of the ingredients are a bit exotic (I get samples of lovely oils and butters frequently), so I'll give easy-to-find alternatives that will work just as well. The main ingredient in this lip balm is olive oil which neither expensive nor hard to find.

Gracefruit's Best-Ever Lip Balm

30% Olive Oil (use a good virgin olive oil here, not pomace)
22% Beeswax
15% Cocoa Butter
10% Mango Butter (you can use shea butter or avocado butter)
10% Macadamia Butter (or olive, sunflower or almond butter)
9% Avocado Oil (any oil will work -- sweet almond, apricot kernel, etc)
2% Vitamin E*
1% Squalane*
1% flavour oil or essential oil (peppermint essential oil is lovely)

In a pyrex or microwave-safe container, melt the beeswax with the olive oil. I do this is 2 minute intervals to avoid anything boiling over or burning. Once the beeswax has melted, add the butters and stir until they've melted, too. They may melt rather slowly, but it's important to add the butters this way so that your lip balm doesn't become grainy later.

Once the butters have melted, add the rest of the ingredients and stir well. Once everything is incorporated, your balm is ready to go into the containers. I've designed this balm to be firm enough for lip balm tubes. I wouldn't recommend tins or pots as the balm will be fairly hard.



I added a speck of colour to these, but it isn't necessary. They are just as lovely without.

I hope you enjoy this recipe. I've made a lot of lip balms in my time, and this is by far the best.

*if you don't have these, just increase the amount of your oils a little to keep the oil/wax/butter ratio correct.