The season for bugs has begun in earnest so it is time to make some fresh repellent to spritz on. I make mine with lots of different essential oils in a base of fractionated aloe, witch hazel and alcohol.
Aloe Bug Repellent
Ingredients:
- Glass or PET Spray Bottle
- Fractionated Aloe Vera 35 %
- Witch Hazel 35%
- Grain Alcohol or Vodka 20%
- Essential Oils Anything from the mint family- Worldwide there are over 200 genera and over 6,000 species
- Extracts
Fill the bottle with each item, give it a light shake and use. It turns a white milky color when shook up. I've never had it stain clothing as I use a light mister.
Optional: You can add potassium sorbate as a preservative. You can also add Lecithin or polysorbate 20 to emulsify the oils with the other liquids.
Essential Oils
You may want to start your own essential oil collection! They are expensive but there are some good starter kits out there too. And don't get sucked in by the "therapeutic grade" bologna. There isn't a standard for essential oils, there is no such thing as therapeutic grade essential oils. Check it out for yourself. They are making claims that simply are not true. Find out how the essential oil was processed and make wise choices. Distillation is the most common way but some use pressing or solvent extraction. It depends on the plant. There is no guarantee that just because a company charges more that their essential oil is any better than a supplier who charges less. There is no guarantee that all the plants used were perfect and pesticide free, however, please understand that the people who do the distilling want to get top dollar for their product-it's in their own best interest to use better materials! For example: 1 acre of lavender can produce 12-20 pounds( 2 gallon jugs!) of oil through steam distillation. That's why the price of ALL essential oils is high-it takes a lot of plants to make a small amount of essential oil. Also make sure you are buying pure essential oil-not diluted. A quick test is to put a drop of essential oil on a piece of paper. It should disappear within a short time. Some will leave color or slight residue. If it is just an oily blot you may have a diluted essential oil. Gas Chromatography is the best way to test essential oils but that is expensive. It is also why certain companies charge more-they did the testing and are passing the cost on to you! There are lots of good articles out there about this topic such as this one: essential-oil-quality-purity If you're really gung ho and interested I suggest taking an online course to learn more about Aromatherapy and essential oils. It's an amazing subject! And building a still sounds like an interesting project...I may have to get my hubby interested! ;)
There are other ways to gain the benefits of herbs without spending so much money. One way is to make extracts from the mint family plants. Extracts are easy to make and you may have some wonderful plants growing in your yard! Plantain is plentiful around Kentucky as are mint, oregano, thyme etc. My herb garden is loaded with plants from the Lamiaceae (mint) family! I always keep extracts on hand for my soaps, balms and creams. Now I'm adding them to the bug repellent too!
For my formula I used about 1 ml each of:
Basil EO
Clove Bud EO
Cedarwood Himalayan Bark EO
Geranium Rose EO
Helichrysum EO
Java Citronella EO
Lavender 40-42 EO
Lemongrass EO
Peppermint EO
Rosemary EO
Sage EO
Spearmint EO
Catnip Extract
Nettle Extract
Glass, or PET spray bottles both hold up well when using diluted essential oils. You can also use polysorbate 20 (made from coconut and sugar) to emulsify the mix so no shaking is necessary. Essential oils aren't a good thing to shake up. It can mess up the efficacy of their strength. If you decide you want to use distilled water instead of witch hazel or alcohol you need to add a preservative. Using a very tiny percent of preservative can keep you from getting sick! Anytime you add water, any kind (tap, distilled, spring, Reverse Osmosis) of water to a formula-you need a preservative. Natural preservatives will not cut it. I see too many DIY recipes with ingredients that scream for a preservative. Be careful with your DIY recipes. You may be doing more harm than good.
I recently saw a blog that had a few good uses for essential oils, many seemed ok but one scared the stuffing out of me-"Add Lavender to Your Mascara". Don't ever put essential oils into a product that has a preservative without checking to see how the essential oil will impact their preservative/formula! Not only that, you could cause blindness by doing such a reckless thing! Test any essential oil 1 drop to 10 drops of regular oil. Make sure you aren't allergic to essential oils before you go dropping them in something! Even breathing essential oils can be dangerous. Anyone who wants to "borrow" my Aloe Repellent gets a quick quiz and lecture before I'll let them use it! Essential oils are wonderful and beneficial if we use them very carefully and intelligently.
A few days later....
My kids were down visiting on the weekend and had been at the pool. Both had nasty sunburns. I told them to spritz some Aloe Repellent on. They're used to my natural way of life and spritzed away.
They were both very impressed with the way it kept the bugs off and killed the pain of their sunburn! They wanted to take my bottle to Mexico as they are going on vacation. I got out a new bottle, poured some in, labeled it for customs and off they went! It will be interesting to see how their trip goes. I pray for them a safe journey and a hedge of blessing and protection everywhere they go, including what they eat and drink. :)
Hope you're having a wonderful spring and ready for summer!
God bless,
Marla Riedling
MJR Soaps
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