Natural Beauty DIY Tutorials & Information

I’ve shared my homemade powdered makeup recipes before but I’ve been playing with a liquid foundation or creme recipe for months (ok, years). Until now, it has just frustrated me and all of the trial recipes turned into tinted body butters or cremes because they didn’t offer enough coverage or offered too much. Some looked …

Note from Katie: I’m excited to welcome my friend Elizabeth (also a mom of five) to share her recipe for solid shampoo (shampoo bar soap). If my homemade natural shampoo didn’t work for your hair type, this may be the answer. I know you’ll love it as much as I do! Enter Elizabeth… When I began my …

I recently posted the natural remedies for acne that helped me finally achieve and maintain clear skin. One thing I mentioned was the benefit of probiotics on the skin, and a probiotic face mask is one of my favorite inexpensive ways to get them on the skin naturally. Why Probiotics on the Skin? As I mentioned in my …

In our family, we have a tradition of holding one gift to open on January 6th, which marks the feast of the Epiphany and the end of the Christmas season for us. I wanted to find a fun way to teach our kids about this traditional feast which celebrates the arrival of the three kings …

I’ve been fascinated by perfume since I was a kid. Scent is intimately tied to memory and I realized that my earliest memories were tied to particular scent: my great aunt’s hand lotion that I would smell when she sang me to sleep, the smell of medicine I had to take as a baby, tempera …

Tis the season for making homemade gifts, at least at our house! A few days ago, I had a mom’s night out at my house and we made all kinds of homemade gifts like lotion bars, vapor rub lotion bars (recipe soon!) and homemade lipstick. The lipstick was the biggest hit and it was so …

I’m a big fan of healing clays. I put them in my own bath and in my children’s bath water. I use them on my face as a face mask and my armpits to help detox and avoid odor. Another way I love to use them that is much easier than a full bath is …

Burt’s Bees Original Beeswax Peppermint Lip Balm was my gateway product into the world of natural living…really. I was a devoted conventional makeup girl and had a drawer full of the latest glittery, scented, brightly colored lip glosses available. And my lips were chronically dry (wonder if it was from the chemical cocktail I was …

Ever since I made my first basic lotion bars, I’ve been experimenting with fun variations and natural scents. Lotion bars are wonderful because they are used on dry skin and are a concentrated lotion that leaves skin feeling like silk. Along the way, there have been Pain Relief Lotion Bars and End the Eczema Lotion …

I’m a huge fan of coconut oil and its many uses. At our house, we use it in everything from cooking to toothpaste. These coconut oil lotion bar sticks are my most recent DIY project with coconut oil and I’ll be making a few more batches to have on hand for Christmas gifts. What are …

I love making my own cosmetics. I’ve made foundation, natural bronzer, homemade lipstick and even mascara (recipe coming soon!). In the comments of my homemade lipstick post, I had multiple people ask if there was an alternative to the beet root powder since theirs didn’t seem to be incorporating correctly. A natural option that shines… …

I’m a natural skin care product addict. In college, my bathroom was filled with dozens of hair products, skin products and make-up that were likely filled with hundreds of chemicals. Natural Alternatives… Since switching to natural options, I still have dozens of personal care products in my bathroom (much to my husband’s frustration) but now …

Writing a book is stressful! It caused my first autoimmune flare in months and the first time I’ve had a skin breakout in years. I’m back on the autoimmune reset diet and my symptoms are all fading quickly, but to help speed up the skin healing, I’ve been doing my deep cleansing mud mask recipe …

My homemade natural deodorant recipe is several years old and is one of the most popular on my site with almost 800 comments. I still use it and it is really effective, but some people don’t react well to the baking soda and are looking for another option. It seems that baking soda gives some …

Hormones affect every aspect of health, and lately I’ve seen the affect of hormones on hair and scalp health. After eight years of pregnancy and nursing, my body was tired and after that many years of my hormones being elevated from pregnancy/nursing, the postpartum hair loss finally occurred… and did it ever. This happens because …

I’ve shared my natural hair spray recipe and my Beach Waves Sea Salt Spray before. I like both of them but wondered if I could combine them to make one everyday hair product. Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice Turns out, combining these two recipes is not only possible, but awesome. I have naturally baby-fine hair …

I get a lot of emails about eczema, and I know many people who struggle with it personally. I’ve talked before about how there is often a connection to a dietary problem for those struggling with eczema and while it is definitely important to address diet, there are some topical solutions that can help offer …

What Are Lotion Bars? Lotion bars are a very moisturizing body lotion in solid form. They look like a bar of soap but are used on dry skin. My original lotion bars recipe is one of my more popular recipes and I’ve shared several variations of the basic recipe: Bug-Off Lotion Bars Pure Silk (Sensitive …

I love the smell of coffee and I love drinking coffee (but only this way!) Turns out, coffee can have benefits when used externally! I talked about this in my cellulite post: “Coffee scrubs can be beneficial in reducing cellulite as well. The massage and exfoliation benefits skin by stimulating blood/lymph flow and the caffeine …

I’ve been experimenting with homemade makeup for years and have a powdered blush that I love and that works really well, but I’ve gotten several requests for a creme/liquid option. I was working on a liquid foundation recipe anyway so I decided to work on a creme blush as well. Check out the original liquid foundation …

I’ve written before about how I use soap nuts for laundry, and I’ve gotten several questions since that post about how I also use them for shampoo. Finding a natural shampoo that works for your hair type can be difficult. Coconut milk based shampoo works great for some people, and some people do great with …

I’ve written before about how I use homemade shampoo, but I’ve found that many people don’t do well with this option. I recently discovered a way to use bentonite clay and some other ingredients to detox and deep clean the hair. As I explained in a previous post: “Turns out, clay can be very beneficial …

Hairspray is one of the worst offenders when it comes to chemicals in beauty products. It typically has aerosol, plastics, VOCs and more. Luckily, like most beauty products, there is a simple, natural and easy to make alternative that is also less expensive and healthier for hair. Surprisingly, it uses only a couple ingredients, including …

A reader emailed me and asked if I’d ever heard of using clay to wash or detox your hair. I hadn’t, but was intrigued, so I started researching… Mud in Your Hair? Turns out, clay can be very beneficial for hair in the same way it can be beneficial in the rest of the body: …