DIY: Basic Shea Coconut Lip Balm

Ever since I made my homemade + natural moisturizing lotion recipe , I've been on a quest to eliminate as many chemicals from my home as possible. Some of it involves making my own products like these homemade baby wipes. I've also been trying out a few cleaning and body care products from different brands.

It's been quite an intense journey to be honest, mainly because my life has been on overload recently, but also because I never realized just how many chemicals are around us on a daily basis, it's actually kind of scary! Anything from our skin care routine, to bathing, to cleaning our home, in our food, even our mattress and our car contains harmful chemicals, can you imagine?

With that being said, I have no intention of turning into a full on Green Holistic Naturalist (or whatever you call people that are 100% natural living) but I do hope to find some kind of balance and be more intentional in my everyday life without compromising my happiness and that of my family. Life is just to short to not enjoy everything you love.

Today I want to share with you a super easy basic shea coconut lip balm recipe. I'm using raw, pure and fair trade Shea butter from Kariderm. It's my absolute favorite product from their company. The texture is super light, it absorbs quickly and has intense moisturizing action. I use it in practically all of my homemade body care products.

Materials

1 tsp Shea butter
1 tsp Coconut oil
2 tsp Beeswax (grated)

Tools

Glass bowl
Pot
Pipette
Lip balm tube

Steps

Heat all ingredients in a glass bowl over a hot pot of water, on low heat. If you have a double boiler, you can use that too. When I'm in a hurry, I do it in small increments in the microwave, but I really don't like using the microwave too much so the stove top is my favorite way. Once everything is melted, mix it a bit, then transfer the mixture to the lip balm tube using the pipette (the recipe is enough for 2 tubes). Wait until it cools and enjoy!

This is super quick and easy to make and it's surprisingly moisturizing. It's been my go-to natural lip balm for quite some time now and although I keep trying different brands once in a while, I always return to my homemade one. It's also a super fun, thoughtful and intentional gift to make for your friends and family.

What kind of skin care products have you tried making at home?

Disclaimer: This post was sponsored by Kariderm. The Shea butter was sent to me at no cost. All thoughts expressed in this post are my own.

Wear: Spring in Mexico

Flowers!!! Colors!!! Sandals!!! Oh my god guys, I am just too excited for spring.

Being in Mexico brought a taste of warmth back into my life and I just had to capture the moment. It's been so long since I've done an outfit post. This shoot was completely random and unplanned (read: no makeup and crazy hairdo). I just wanted to remember the vivid colors, just in case the last few snowfalls back home discouraged me.

Ok so this may not be the fanciest of outfits, but it's so fun and so comfortable. I especially love my new sandals from Steve Madden. It was the first pair of shoes I bought there and I did find they were a bit on the pricey side, but after wearing them for 2 weeks I can tell you it was well worth the money. I just hope they last and retain their quality for a long time!

As for the leggings, they're an old pair I had lying around. As a matter of fact, they're getting a tad washed out. Tell me you didn't notice.

The shirt is new though, I got it at Bikini Village a couple of months ago. I'm so in love with the casual style, length and its loose fit. The fabric is super light and soft, too bad it doesn't come in vibrant colors, I would have bought them all!

WEARING

Sandals: Steve Madden
Leggings: Old
Shirt: Bikini Village
Earrings: Winners

Nail Art: Black on Silver, Dotted

It's been so long since I've shared any nail art! To be honest, I haven't done any in a while. I don't know why, I guess I've just been prioritizing other things lately. I miss it though, it's always fun to take a few minutes a week to have a girly moment.

For this nail art I didn't really plan anything. I just picked a random color and painted my nails and went from there. It's always fun to experiment without a plan to see what you can come up with. It kind of forces your brain to be creative. By doing so, you learn more about yourself and your process.

In any case, I've been really busy lately, we're going to Mexico in a few weeks to visit family and I've been planning everything we need to bring. It's the first time we're going out of the country since we discovered our son is allergic to eggs. I'm not sure if I should bring food like bread and noodles with us. Stuff I know could be hard to find without eggs...

I can't wait though, we planned on going to the beach! It'll be our kids' first time so we're super excited to see their reaction and show them a whole new bunch of things; digging holes, building castles, getting buried in the sand... you know, the usual. :) Until then, I'm going to be working in my newly painted office and doing pretty Easter crafts.

You'll have to excuse my hands in this tutorial, they're so so so dry. The winter's being particularly difficult and I've been washing my hands like crazy to not catch any viruses before we leave on vacation. I also have been neglecting moisturizing... shame on me!

So yea, here's my super dry hands with pretty simple nail art. Lol. Enjoy!

MATERIALS

Silver nail polish
Black nail polish
White nail art pen
Top coat

STEPS

1. I applied 2 coats of silver nail polish. I do this on all my nails to give it a bit of time to dry before step 2.

2. Using the brush the polish came with, I made a brush width line down the center of each nail. Don't worry if it's not exactly straight. When I do this, I don't usually wait until the base polish is dry, even if it's still a bit damp I keep going.

3. With the white nail art pen I made little dots in a straight line right in the middle of the black stripe I just made. Again, you don't really need to wait until the previous step is dry.

4. Apply top coat and that's it! I use seche vite.