Thursday, September 1, 2011

Behind The Scenes: Herbal Baby Oil How-To

I thought today would be fun to share what goes on in finishing up & packaging my Herbal Baby Oil. At the same time I'll be giving you a how-to for making your own herbal infused oils so you can give it a try. It's soooo easy!

The first step in making the oil is to infuse the herbs into it. There are a few ways to do this. I'll briefly cover each before moving on.


On the Stove
Pour your oil in a saucepan & turn your heat on low. Add your herbs, stir occasionally, & let it "brew" for 2-3 hours.

In the Crock
Put your herbs into a glass jar. Fill jar half full if you're using dried herbs & fill it full if you're using fresh herbs. Pour oil over the herbs in your jar leaving 1 inch headroom at the top. Put lid on. Place jar on top of a cloth in your crockpot. Add water. Turn on low heat for 8 hours or so.

In the Sun
Same directions as "In the Crock" except you'll set your jar out in the sun for 1-2 weeks. I'd cover your jar in a thick cloth so that the light from the sun doesn't actually get to it. Sunlight will kill the properties of the herbs. All you want is the heat!

Now, what do you do once the oil is infused with the herbs? Well, I'll show you what I do.


I take a strainer & pour my herbs & oil into it so that the strainer catches the herbs & my oil comes through into a bowl. Make sure you smash the herbs into the strainer because there's good oil in them & you want to get as much of it out!


Next I take the oil from the bowl & strain it again through an old but clean t-shirt to make sure I get any little particles out. You can see from the pic above that there are a lot there!


Finally pour your oil into your containers, label, & store. Be sure to store it in a cool, dark spot. Remember too much heat & light will damage the medicinal properties of the herbs!


Here's some oil I sell in my shop. I'm weighing it to make sure there's 8 oz in the bottle!



Okay, it's all ready. Labels on, photos taken, listings in the shop! Click here to check out my oils!


2 comments:

  1. What kind of oil are you using? I think this is a fantastic idea!

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  2. It depends on what I'm making the oil for. Most of the time I use a light oil that's good for your skin, preferably one that's not too greasy. Usually along the lines of Jojoba or Sweet Almond Oil. HTH!

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