Home-made hand cream with beeswax

Hand cream makes sense. If the skin on your hands is in good condition and intact, then the less likely you are to get infections, cuts and abrasions will heal better, your nails will be less brittle and dry rough skin will decrease. Men and women alike should use hand cream. Our lifestyle means our hands tend to get washed a great deal due to the work in the garden, kitchen, workshops and wood store. Having the cats and handling them at regular times of the day also means hands are washed more frequently. Maintaining skin integrity is important and therefore we use hand cream.

Commercial hand cream is often scented heavily or it contains numerous additional ingredients that we'd rather do without. The advance of technology and the development of nano particles is also something that concerns us as we wonder why it s necessary and the long term effects of using them is questionable in our minds.

We came across this recipe some time ago and adapted it to our own. The main ingredients are natural beeswax, almond oil, olive oil, water and pure essential oils. It is an easy recipe and results in a usable, natural hand cream that seems to work well.

The wax and oils are slowly melted in a bain marie until blended smoothly together. The bowl is removed from the heat and the the distilled water is carefully whisked into the mixture until emulsification takes place. If you add the water too quickly, it will separate when cooling and your end product will be unstable, When completely mixed and smooth, 50 drops of essential oils are mixed in until totally blended. The essential oils are chosen for their healing, antiseptic or therapeutic properties. The cream is divided up and placed in suitable containers and left to totally cool before the lids are placed.

One observation we have noted is that when we use commercial hand cream, our cats Wentworth and Gawber, do not like being stroked or held but with our home made product it does not seem to bother them, in fact they seems to quite like it and will often take an inquisitive sniff of our hands.

Basic ingredients: 80grams of Bees wax,  150 ml of almond Oil, 150 ml of olive oil, 50 drops of pure essential oil, 75 ml of distilled water.

Please note: essential oils have various properties, please conduct your own research before using them,