Silky, Soft and Oh So Shiny

I'm going through a bit of a phase at the moment.  I'm intrigued by the idea of home beauty treatments as they claim to have the same benefits (if not better) than many of the commercial products, are a fraction of the price and often are more environmentally friendly (less packaging, using natural ingredients, no preservatives, no SLS or SLES etc).  I have been collecting ideas on my Pinterest boards (there seems to be a minor Pinterest addiction going on here) to try out at home.  I've already tried the Nutmeg and Milk Facial Scrub and was really pleased with the results.

On Friday night I put three more treatments to the test; a leg polish that claimed to give you ridiculously silky and smooth legs, another facial scrub and finally a hair rinse that claimed to give you shiny and glossy hair.

All of them used ingredients I already had in the kitchen.

I ran a bubble bath and got mixing in the kitchen.

First up, the leg polish.

For this I needed 1 1/4 cups sugar (I used caster but granulated is also good), 1 cup olive oil and three tablespoons lime (or lemon) juice.  You could use fresh but I cheated and used the stuff you get in a bottle from the fridge.  Mix them altogether and you are good to go.  I soaked my legs for five minutes then shaved them with no foam.  I then scrubbed with the mixture, rinsed, shaved again, scrubbed again to really lock the moisture in and rinsed a final time.  The results were better than I could have imagined.  My legs felt soft, smooth and silkier than I have ever felt them.  I ended up using the rest of the mixture as an exfoliant all over my body as it was that good.   There is a slight disadvantage - the mixture makes the bathtub really slick so be careful!  It is also a pain in the backside to clean up afterwards.  Next time I may substitute the olive oil for coconut or baby oil or add some essential oils to make it smell a bit less like a salad dressing... Overall though, this is an outstanding treatment - I highly recommend it!

Next, the facial scrub.

This was simply 2 tablespoons baking soda and a splash of milk (you can also use water) mixed to a thin paste.  After I had finished with the leg polish I scrubbed this all over my face using small circular movements for about five minutes.  I have to be honest, this wasn't as good as the nutmeg and milk one I used previously and it had a major disadvantage in that it tasted absolutely foul when I accidentally got it in my mouth.  However I cannot deny that it gave fantastic results, my face felt smooth, skin tone was even and pores were smaller.  I may stick with the nutmeg formula though!

Finally the hair rinse.

This was simply a glass of equal measures apple cider vinegar and water.  I have heard so much about how amazing cider vinegar is for hair and I was really excited to try it.  I washed my hair normally and then tipped this all over my head, let it soak in for about five minutes and then rinsed.

Lesson 1 - be more careful.  I got this in my eyes and it hurt.
Lesson 2 - use warm water.  I should have thought of this before hand but cold water does make for a bit of a shock to the system!

Now I am of two minds about this.  After I had rinsed it out I towel dried my hair and then blow dried it.  To my disappointment my hair was sticky, stiff, dull and felt like it was full of product.  Steve also said it 'smelt like poo!' - not the reaction I was hoping for! It was so bad I had to go straight back in the shower and wash it again.  However, after the second wash it was really, really shiny, soft and easy to style.  I don't actually know if it was the cider vinegar that did it and I just didn't wash it all out the first time properly or if it was just because I washed it twice in 20 minutes.  I'm going to try this one more time next weekend just to see if it is worth the hype.

So there we have it.  Three home beauty treatments.  One was an amazing success, so much so that I doubt if I will ever buy an exfoliant ever again and the other two are ok and worth a second trial.

I am going to keep exploring home beauty treatments but what do people think?  Would you like me to act as a guinea pig and review more on this blog?  Have you tried any at home that you recommend?