Kitchen Glamour - Coconut Lemon Sour Scrub.

I was sitting on the sofa the other day painting my nails after I'd had a shower, as I was paying close attention to my hands I realised just how awful they looked. The skin on them was dry and lifeless; they were crying out for some summer sun. The UK is barely providing any sun at the moment so I decided to concoct a scrub based on a tropical cocktail, a much cheaper alternative to a sun soaked holiday that's for sure! This scrub will exfoliate and moisturise all in one go and it gives you that little bit of extra love because it is heated over hot water. This means that it is lavishly warm and syrupy on your skin with a super delicious fragrance.

All you need is 2 tablespoons of lemon juice (you could use lime), 1 tablespoon of flaked coconut oil and 2 tablespoons of Demerara sugar. I'm using Demerara here because this is an all over body scrub so I like to use a sugar with larger grains, if you want a gentler scrub use caster sugar. 

Mix these ingredients up over a bowl of hot water so the coconut oil turns to its liquid state and it is ready to use. Scrub it all over your hands, massage it in really well for a couple of minutes then rinse the mixture off with some warm water and towel dry. DO NOT use soap to wash this off because you want the coconut oil to lounge on your hands and soak in. The coconut oil will not take long to quench your parched skin and because of the lemon juice you will not find your hands feeling like a oil slick. 

My hands felt and smelt absolutely amazing after this scrub. You could pay a lot of money for this treatment out trust me. Using the above amounts will easily make enough for your hands and face, but this scrub would be a great one to use all over your body, especially before a shower. Just be careful not to get too slippery before getting in the shower. I don't want you to be covered in bruises, even if you will have beautifully nourished skin!

I hope you try this because it really feels like a treat, a sure 'pick me up' when your are feeling like you need a little bit of scrubbing love. Let me know if you like it.

xkx

P.S. It is so good that even Ed asked if I could make him some hehe.  

Cheap and Easy Face Exfoliator. (Can be made Vegan too)

I did a whole load of work today at the allotment and biked there and back, so when I got home I was ready for a hot bath and a nice relax. When I got out of the bath I decided to whip up my favourite facial exfoliator. This is a really easy and quick little product that you can make with ingredients you probably already have in the cupboard. All you are going to need is honey and sugar. To make it vegan just swap out the honey for maple syrup, it works just as well and smells amazing! Honey and maple syrup are both really nourishing for your skin so which ever one you use will be giving your face a treat. 

Runny honey is preferable (if you are using honey) than the set one, but if set is all you have just warm in it a cup, in a bowl of hot water. I use caster sugar because I find that granulated is slightly more scratchy, but once again granulated is fine just rub more gentle when you apply it. If your skin is really sensitive you could probably even try using Demerara sugar because the grains are smaller so it would make a gentler exfoliator. 

Once you have your ingredients ready just add 1tbsp of honey (or maple syrup) to 1tbsp of sugar and stir it together so it creates a paste like texture. 

It should look something like this when you have finished mixing.

Now all you need to do is apply it to your face with your fingers and gently rub in a circular motion. When you feel that you have exfoliated enough wash it off with some warm water. I finish up by wiping my face with a wet cotton wool pad just to get rid of the last few, pesky sugar grains.

And there you go, super soft, sweet, exfoliated face.