Sunday, December 1, 2013

24 Days of Christmas - Day 1: Lavender Lipbalm

Okay, let´s just see if this works - 24 Christmas posts until December 24, one for each day.
Or, that´s the plan, at least. To help motivate me and you and everybody to keep up with Christmas preparations. And to have at least some handmade gifts ready. A few, okay?

So, the first post in this series features our homemade lavender lip balm:
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Which is really simple to make, once yo´ve gathered your supplies.
I used Shea Butter, which is often used in cosmetics, and which I got on amazon - and lavender from our garden.
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The tiny containers come from a pharmacy, I got them for 15 cents per piece.

So, basically...
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...we warmed the shea butter on a low level to melt, and then...

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...we threw in the lavender. Then we let it sit, for a while, so the oils in the lavender could give their smell and flavour to the butter. I guess it´s really great if you let it simmer overnight, but we wanted quick results, as always, so we went with like... 30 minutes. And yes, it still smells great!

Meanwhile, we lined our containers up...
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...so we could directly start pouring  - through a mesh, though, because you don´t want the lavender blossoms in your lipbalm... well, unless you do, then don´t use a mesh to filter them out, of course :)

Working with the mesh is the tricky part, since the blossoms will clogg the mesh up everyother workstep so you have to clean it in between - I have yet to find a wayfilling the containers without making a mess.
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But then again, making a small mess is not such a bad thing. And the smell, oh the smell is pretty awesome! We made a second batch in Ronja´s classroom, for their anual Christmas sale, and her teacher told me the whole floor smelled like lavender for days :)

You wait until your brandnew lipbalm hardens...
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...and then dress up your containers. Oh, and instead of lavender... you could of course add other herbs or spices. I have a version of this with peppermint and camomile, too, and I´m allready pondering about a christmas-spiced version... would it work with cinnamon sticks and star anise?

Anyway... these small lip balm containers have a really nice size for purses... or Christmas gift bags :)

Music:

What better music to start off into Christmas season? Huh? Just check out this decoration!!! And don´t, just don´t tell me it´s corny or cheesy. Because a) it isn´t, and b), even if it was, it´s Christmas, so everything is supposed to be cheesy, and c), however cheesy their videos are, their music is mindblowing. I can´t even begin to figure out all the various harmonies they threw into this song. 

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