One of my goals this year was to make handmade gifts.  Well, I didn’t make every gift by hand, but I tried.  I baked my heart out and packaged up at least 15 plates of cookies and yummy holiday treats.  And, when I was done with that, I decided to try my hand at making some sugar scrub.  I love this type of body scrub and I was first introduced to it from L’Occitane.  No doubt, this scrub is amazing and I love it.  However, it is a bit pricey and I use it a lot!  Then, thanks to pinterest, I saw that people were making their own scrub.  So, I did my research and checked out a bunch of recipes on line.  Here are a few for reference:

• Homemade Brown Sugar Scrub
• Olive Oil Scrub
• Lemon Salt Scrub
• Sugar Scrub

So, with my research behind me, I decided to go at it alone and started mixing in the kitchen.  I decided upon a sugar scrub to start using olive oil.  I first was going to use essential oils, but then decided against it once I realized that I couldn’t taste it.  I know this sounds crazy, but when you are mixing oil and sugar it seems to me that you should be able to taste it.  And, adding essential oils made it not to tasty.  I know…weird, but I didn’t like the idea of adding an oil that smelled like perfume.  I went all natural with the ingredients and decided upon two mixes after some trial and error….vanilla sugar scrub and gingerbread sugar scrub.  I took my research into consideration and then did what I wanted.

Vanilla Sugar Scrub

• 3 Cups plain old white sugar
• 1 Cup Olive Oil - I used extra light olive oil
• 1 Tsp Vanilla

Simple as that…just put all the ingredients into a bowl and mix it all together until the sugar is completely saturated.  I decided that I wanted my scrubs to look a bit festive for the season so I split the batch in half and colored half of it with a few drops of red coloring food.  That way, I could make red and white stripes in the container.

Gingerbread Sugar Scrub

• 3 Cups Brown Sugar
• 1 1/2 Cups Olive Oil
• 1 1/2 Tsp Cinnamon
• 1 1/2 Tsp Ground Cloves

Same as above…mix all together and it is ready to go.

I had the hardest time finding the containers for the sugar scrub.  I found some glass containers (the last four that were on the shelf) at Michael’s.  These had a screw on top like a mason jar.  And, then I found a set of four at Target that had a clasp top which I loved.  Too bad I didn’t pick up more when I got those.  I went back later to find that they were sold out!!  You want to make sure that the jar has a large enough opening that you can get your hand in to scoop out the scrub and that it is not too deep.  One idea for future batches is to include a cute wooden scoop.  I wonder where I could find those.

Last, but not least was decorating the container.  I choose to do a simple label on the top of the jar that I constructed using craft paper and mod podge.  Believe it or not, this was the first time that I used mod podge and I have to say that I was quite impressed.  I spent the evening making in a mess in my kitchen (again) and I loved it!  I kind of think that mod podge just might be elmer’s glue in a different package.  But, it was fun nonetheless.

Labels & Container Adornment

• Craft Paper
• Modge Podge
• Ribbon (I always like wire ribbon because it holds it’s shape)
• Foam Paint Brush (small)

 Tips

• Make sure you wait to add any food coloring in until after the oil is well absorbed into the sugar.
• Use a small measuring cup to scoop the scrub into the final container.
• Use a small flexible spatular to pack in the sugar scrub into the container.  It works really well when you are trying to layer colors.
• Stick with natural ingredients.
• Be patient and let the mod podge dry … it takes a bit.  Don’t keep touching it like I did.
• Have fun and be creative.

Happy scrubbing!!