Another stab at honey lip balm - and it worked!

For better or for worse, I haven’t given up hope that I can mix the world’s greatest honey lip balm.

I guess the world is turning against petroleum jelly, so I’ve stopped using it in my recipes, even though I happen to like the consistency it gives the balms (search google for “petroleum jelly side effects” read the news and decide for yourself)

This time I decided to test the following recipe:
½ tsp beeswax (I like the prills from www.thesage.com)
2 tsp lanolin
2 tsp Coconut oil
¼ tsp honey

I melted everything except the honey in a measuring cup set in boiling water. Once everything was melted, I removed the measuring cup from the pan, added the honey and then stood there and mixed it (and mixed it) until it started to thicken. The mixture stays hot for awhile so I mixed for quite some time.

It appears to have worked. The honey didn’t separate from the other ingredients. The color is a nice, natural honey color, and the consistency it pretty good. I put it in a pot, but it would probably work in a tube.

I can’t see making large batches of this because of the long mixing time involved, but a small quantity isn’t that big a deal.

Give it a try and let me know what you think. Please feel free to ask if you have any questions!! Thanks!

Finally! A real lip balm

I finally got something I like.

I found this recipe from Martha Stewart at http://www.marthastewart.com/good-things/homemade-lip-balm. I used the “glossier” version.

It works like this:
2 teaspoon beeswax
4 teaspoon “Carrier Oil” (I used Olive Oil)
1 teaspoon honey
6-7 drops essential oil (I didn’t have any, so I left it out)
I melted the beeswax and oil in a double boiler, added the honey, stirred and poured into my little jars.

I have to admit that my biggest disappointment was (again) the honey. It separated out in the pan and essentially never made it into the little jars. Next time I’ll leave it out of the recipe altogether.

I like my final result. It looks great and feels good on my lips. It’s a little hard so I think I’d like to put it into tubes instead of pots, but I can leave that for next time.

Any thoughts about the honey? I’d really like to make a honey lip balm…

My first stab at creating my own lip balm

I’m not what anyone would call crafty, and I’m not especially into “natural” or homemade. I just really love the cute little containers full of good smelling balms - I always have. I have a huge collection of half-used pots, jars and tubes. I guess I just figured I’d like to give it a try.
Here’s what I did…

First I looked for lip balm recipes. There are lots of different versions, some use the microwave, and some use a double boiler. I think I’ll start with the microwave version (in case I have to ruin a pan with the double-boiler plan)

3 tablespoons of petroleum jelly

1 teaspoon of honey

Melt in a microwave-safe glass container on low

Pour into containers and let cool

Okay, I need containers. I found some at http://www.thesage.com/I ordered a set of 10 little jars - although I briefly considered ordering 100 with visions of a home-based business passing briefly through my mind.

5 days later my cute little jars arrived. I had to keep my kids from pilfering them so I enlisted their help with my lip-balm project.

First, we threw everything into a glass measuring cup and melted on low power in the microwave. Guess what? Honey melts WAY faster than Vaseline. THAT didn’t work.
Okay, we threw that batch out, cleaned and dried the measuring cup and tried a second time. This time we melted the petroleum jelly first and then whisked in the honey. It looked better than the first batch. We poured it into the cute little jars and let them cool. Unfortunately, after a couple minutes the honey and Vaseline separated. We decided this didn’t work either.
I’m on a mission. I love the idea of a honey lip balm, so I’m giving up on the petroleum jelly base and opting for beeswax. Makes sense, right? Beeswax…Honey… I guess I should have thought of it earlier. Anyway, I went back to http://www.thesage.com/ and ordered some beeswax “prills” (which I guess are little pellets). Let’s see if I can do better with those.

I’ll keep you posted, do you have any advice?