Tea Bag Bath Soaks
Ingredients:
Empty Tea type bags (or muslin linen bags)- found at any craft or health food store
Epsom Salt
Dried Lavender
Lavender Oil
Oatmeal (NOT the quick cook kind)
Dry Powder Milk (I like to use dry powder goat's milk for this)
Directions:
To make your tea, you will also need a large mixing bowl.
First, measure out two cups of Epsom salt and add it into the bowl.
Next, add 4 tablespoons of lavender.
Then, add 25 drops of pure lavender oil into the bowl.
After that, add one cup of oatmeal. You can leave the oatmeal whole, or give it a few spins in the food processor. I chose to keep mine whole.
Last, add 1 1/2 cups of dry milk.
Stir your ingredients up until they are well combined.
Gather your tea bags, and fill 3/4 of the way full.
Sew the open tops of your tea bags closed. You can either do this by hand or by machine. I choose to do mine by hand to keep with the handcrafted feel. When you stitch to the end, string an identification tag onto the remaining thread and tie into place. I also left a loop of thread at the end so that the tea bag could be hung from a faucet head.
* To give as a gift of your tub tea, an oblong or rectangle box works best. I found a paper recipe holder at my local craft shop for $2 and it worked perfectly! I was able to fit in 8 tea bags.
Tie up your display box with a pretty piece of ribbon, or you can do as I did and use the same embroidery floss that I used to close the bag.
* I included the directions for using the tub tea on the back of a tag. (see below)
"Drop two tea bags into a hot bath. Let steep. Ease yourself into your tub and relax. For a stronger scent, use three bags".
The best thing about making tub tea is it’s customizable! You can make any mix that you would like. Or even better, mix two scents and create something new! Simply change up the dried flower buds and the oil- everything else remains the same. For example: use dried rose buds and rose oil.
Tip!
As an alternative to using tea type bags- try using small muslin/linen type bags that have a cotton draw string. Simply add the above ingredient and tie closed. After use; empty contents and discard, rinse bags that were used and allow to dry completely. You can then refill each bag- and use again and again - using this same method.
Glass Bottles and Bath Soaks
I confess! I am a glass bottle junkie.
I absolutely abhor plastic bottles and consider them to be a blight on humanity. I am equally not fond of drinking out of a plastic cup or bottle. In this day and age when it is becoming increasingly harder and harder to find anything packaged in actual glass I find myself actively seeking out glass bottles that are visually interesting and hoarding them like a squirrel preserving nuts for winter.
The problem then becomes what to do with all of those visually interesting glass containers that I just had to have.
Solution: Homemade Bath Soaks
I came by the idea when my daughter gave me a recipe for a Mimosa Cocktail- which turned out to be a beverage that I love! and have to have upon occasion {all things in moderation; as you know} for Sunday brunch. However; champagne doesn't have a very long shelf life once you've opened the bottle and really! who likes a flat cocktail?
The same holds true for Wine Spritzers. Unless you are drinking them on a daily basis then you end up with a collection of half full bottles of flat wine looking pretty sad sitting the the back of your refrigerator. Sure, sure. You say that you are saving them with the intention of adding them to some exotic recipe that you downloaded off of the Internet but really? If you are honest you'll admit that you are also saving your money for all of the exotic spices you have to have to go with the exotic recipe that you downloaded off of the Internet and in the meanwhile all of those half full bottles of wine are staring at you every time you open the refrigerator door.
So; here is what you are going to do. Scrap the exotic recipe that probably won't taste near as good as it looks and use the money you have been saving to buy more visually interesting glass bottles. To which you will add the following recipe.
Red Wine and Champagne Bath Soak
Simply add your red wine or your champagne or a combination of both to your glass bottle.
Pour a glass (or more) of red wine or champagne (or both) into your running bath. Soak for 20 minutes. Feel decadent.
Don't worry. Unless you filled the tub up with red wine it isn't going to stain your skin.
Info!
The polyphenols in red wine are incredible antioxidants and the tartaric acid in champagne lightens skin and helps reduce discoloration and fine lines. Both red wine and champagne are also great for cleansing pores and then reducing their appearance.
So never again will you have to throw out that flat champagne or wine that’s sat alone in the back of the fridge. Now, you can bathe in it. Genius!
Simple Mimosa (for those interested)
Ingredients
1/2 oz triple sec (or) grenadine
1 1/2 oz cold pineapple (or) orange juice
3 1/2 oz chilled Champagne
pineapple (or) orange slice for garnish
Preparation
1.Build the ingredients in the order given in a Champagne flute.
2.Garnish with the pineapple or orange slice.
3. Enjoy!
Beauty for Ashes
Isaiah 61:1-3 (NIV)
The Year of the Lord’s Favor
1 The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners,
2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn,
3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion — to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.
