Jack has been suffering from a case of patchy dry skin for the last couple of weeks and we have tried quite a few different lotions, creams, oils, etc but nothing seems to have completely cured it. Today at his 4 month checkup our family doctor looked at his skin and confirmed what we already suspected, he's got eczema. Now here is where I would like to do a jig while hugging the bejeezus out of our family doctor. Instead of prescribing a steroid or some other medicated cream, she suggested I make my own lotion to apply to his entire body. She gave me the ingredients that she would recommend and said that I could find about a bazillion different recipes online. In the back of my head there was a little bell going off the entire time she was talking about the simple ingredients for homemade lotion. It wasn't until I got home and Googled it (or Tim-ed it like we say in our house but that's a totally different story) that I realized why that little bell was going off. I had previously found a recipe for homemade lotion when I was looking for other homemade cleaning recipes.
Here is the recipe that I originally found for homemade lotion. Below is my exact recipe that I tried. Hopefully I will remember to come back and write an update on how it works for poor Jack's eczema.
Homemade Lotion Recipe
1/2 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1/4 cup Organic Beeswax Pastiles
1/4 cup Organic Extra Virgin Coconut Oil
Approximately 2 tablespoons Organic Raw Cocoa Butter (I used a tablespoon measuring spoon as a guide and eyeballed the chunks of cocoa butter instead of grating it to measure it exact)
Add all ingredients to a quart size mason jar. Place the lid on loosely. Place jar in a small sauce pan filled about 2 inches with water. Heat on the stove over medium heat. As ingredients begin to melt, shake jar occasionally to mix ingredients together. Once all of the ingredients are thoroughly mixed together, pour into whatever jar, tin, or other container you are planning to store it in. The finished product will be too thick to use with a pump bottle so a tub or low jar works best for storing. I used two small canning jars (4 oz each I believe) to keep one upstairs on the changing table and one downstairs in our diaper change basket and a little travel tin that I purchased at Target for in the diaper bag. Just a warning, use this lotion sparingly. A little goes a long way!
