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Best Essential Oils for Body and Hair Care
The best essential oils for body and hair care depend on factors such as your skin and hair type, your sensitivity to a particular essential oil, and personal scent preferences. Most importantly, you must avoid skin-irritating oils.
Making your own aromatherapy body and hair care products lets you avoid the potentially toxic ingredients of commercial products. Plus, you get to customize the scents for your personal needs and tastes.
Here are some starting essential oil suggestions from Authentic Aromatherapy:
- Dry skin: lavender, patchouli, roman chamomile, rose
- Oily skin: geranium, juniper, lemon, tea tree
- Mature skin: clary sage, lavender, myrrh, neroli, rose, sweet orange
An essential oil can benefit more than one skin type, as many oils have adaptogenic properties.
More of the best essential oils for body care from The Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy:
- Sensitive skin: german chamomile, roman chamomile, lavender, mandarin
- Dry skin: carrot seed, german chamomile, clary sage, frankincense, geranium, ho wood, jasmine, mandarin, neroli, petitgrain, rosewood, sandalwood
- Oily skin: bergamot, clay sage, cypress, frankincense, ho wood, jasmine, juniper berry, lavender, lemon eucalyptus, myrrh, neroli, niaouli, palmarosa, petitgrain, roman chamomile, thyme linalol, ylang ylang
- Normal skin: all the aforementioned oils except myrrh and thyme linalol
Dilution of Essential Oils for Body Care
When making body care products, you generally want a one to three percent dilution, depending on the essential oils you use, your sensitivity to them, and how strong you want the scent. Guidelines:
- 1% = 6 drops essential oil in 2 tablespoons carrier oil
- 2% = 12 drops essential oil in 2 tablespoons carrier oil
- 3% = 18 drops essential oil in 2 tablespoons carrier oil
Example: If a recipe contains 1/2 cup (8 tablespoons) carrier oil, and you want a 2% dilution, you can add up to 48 drops essential oil.
Remember, stronger essential oils need to be more highly diluted.
Best Essential Oils for Body Care
This website offers many options in the following body and hair care articles.
Essential Oils for Facial Care
Essential Oils for Hair Care (with blends for normal hair). Also see:
Essential Oils for Feet (with foot massage blends and essential oils to help bunions and corns, a rough foot cream, and foot powders). Also see:
Essential Oils for Skin Conditions (with blends for skin tags, age spots, warts, boils, hives, and blisters). Also see:
Essential Oils in Bath Water (with aromatherapy baths for muscle soreness, depression, anxiety, insomnia, and more). Also see:
Essential Oil Body Lotion
Make your own aromatherapy body lotion.
Essential Oil Body Scrub
Salt
and sugar aromatherapy body scrub recipes you can use to exfoliate
your skin and leave it feeling smooth and refreshed.
Essential Oil for Nail Care
How to use essential oils for conditioning or strengthening your nails and to get rid of fungus.
Essential Oils for Body Butter
Body butter recipes and body butter essential oil blends.
Essential Oils for Hand Cream
Make your own aromatherapy hand cream.
Essential Oils for Insect Repellent
Essential oils that keep insects off your skin include citronella, eucalyptus radiata, and lemongrass.
Essential Oils for Oral Care
Homemade toothpaste and mouthwashes, plus essential oils for bad breath, toothache, gingivitis, mouth sores, and more.
How to Make Body Powder
How to make body powder with essential oils.
How to Make Hand Scrub
Hand scrub recipes with essential oils.
Natural Essential Oil Deodorant
Ten natural deodorant recipes for rub-on, stick, and spray-on deodorants using essential oils.
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