Pg. 96-100 6 minute read
What’s blooming in your backyard? Surprisingly, even just one bloom can become a creative inspiration and a nourishing skin product. Where did the IDEA came from? My friend Vennie Chou, who lives in Vancouver, BC, Canada, came up with the idea of collecting live plant material for creating colour in her natural self-care products. Vennie has taught for the International Perfume Foundation as well as Essence of Thyme College of Holistic Studies.
Last year, I noticed that availability of distilled products had shifted and the prices in many cases of what was available had sky rocketed. Also, with the talk of sustainability, I wanted to overcome those obstacles locally in a creative way. I LOVE body scrubs! My goal was to create beautiful body scrubs using live plant material – and of course the colours they produced was an extra bonus!
Live plant material dries in Epsom salts. It does not dry in dead sea salt! It stays damp (at least from what I have witnessed). The salts can be collected over the summer and safely stored for use. My property has a variety of herbs including rhododendrons that bloom in the spring in a variety of colours. This spring I also collected and dried dandelion flower. Which – yes, is surprisingly good for skin! My husband has his own garden at the Care Facility where he lives due to a stroke and aphasia. He lives in the ROSE Garden area and we were able to use some of those beautiful roses as well since it only takes ONE rose to make a whole batch of salts. Its not so much the scent that is preserved in the Epsom salts, but rather the plant material itself and of course the colour! As Aromatherapists, we can adjust the scent accordingly.
Softer plant material such as the roses and carnations are lovely for sensitive/ facial skin, while plant material from rosemary, lavender, sage, geranium and lemon verbena offered more exfoliation. As an experiment I also added some of the rose petals to dead sea salt, but it stayed damp and had to be refrigerated. Over time the colour also faded, but it could still be effectively combined with roses dried in epsom to create a softer exfoliant for more sensitive or facial skin.
SO, HOW EXACTLY DO YOU DRY THE PLANT MATERIAL? 1. Research the plant that you want to gather to be sure that it is safe for use. (ie. Google edible plants) In the Chakra system of knowledge, the colour a flower blooms in is related to the colour of the Chakra that it relates to. Energetically, it will naturally serve to harmonize issues related to that chakra.
2. Ensure that what you intend to use has not been sprayed with a poison or 'peed' on by an animal! 3. Collect what you need with gratitude to the energetic offering that the plant in its divine flowering beauty offers. Even just one flower can be enough. 4. Add the plant material to your blending machine. 5. Fill with epsom salt and grind. I used about 2 cups of Epsom salts, but more or less can be used to adapt the colour. Just write it down for reference. 6. Spread the mixture and pat lightly in a flat pan covered with parchment paper. 7. After a day or two - depending where you live and the humidity in your area – you will notice the mixture feeling dry and crunchy. It can can then be crushed and stored in a glass jar in a dark place for use as needed ie. perhaps over the winter as a creative project!
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