Allah's signs in the world - part X

Allah and Muhammed on Fish

 

 

Glycerine Aloe Cream Recipe

My previous recipe for Glycerine Wax cream had worked out quite nicely, so I was ready to try again. This time I wanted to make a cream that was a bit less waxy, but had aloe vera in it. I began with the basics. 

1 cup olive oil
2 cups distilled water
3/4 cup aloe vera
1/4 cup glycerin
1 Tbsp + 4 oz beeswax
10 caplets lecithin
1 tsp vitamin E
12 drops lavender
4 tsp UltraMaize 

I started out by heating the olive oil alone for 1 minute in the microwave, then mixing together the water, aloe vera, glycerine, 1 Tbsp of the beeswax and lechitin and nuking those for 1.5 minutes. I whisked the two together quickly to begin mixing them, then I blended them with a hand blender. No good - it was soupy. I added in the vitamin E, lavender and UltraMaize but the UltraMaize didn't help with the soupiness. 

The reason I had used so little beeswax to start is I have a hard time shaving it and my boyfriend was addicted to a video game. I finally got frustrated and pried him away from the game to chop up an 4oz container worth of dried flakes of beeswax, put it into 1/2 cup of the "soup" and nuked that. You can't really nuke solids, so this was a way to help it melt better. Then I added that back into the main mix and blended it. Voila!! Now it thickened. Now of course I had put TOO much wax into the mix, and as it cooled it got a little TOO solid. It was still usable, but a bit too waxy. Also, the water separated out almost immediately. I had 1 1/8 cup of water that was left when I scooped out the ending cream, which is over half of what went into it. Still, the cream was quite nice. Waxy, but nice. 

The lesson here was to add in more lecithin, and more beeswax from the start. The reason I hadn't added more lecithin this time is (again) my boyfriend was busy - and we only had caplets that had to be cut open with a knife and have their insides squeezed out. The caplets are rolly and I had ALL sorts of trouble doing this. I was lucky to get the 10 caplets into the mixture. In experimenting afterwards, I found if you drop the caplets into boiling water, they pop open and you can then fish out the caplet part, leaving behind the insides pretty easily. So that's my plan for the next batch.

Glycerine Wax Cream Recipe

I have done a number of trials to create a hand creme / lotion that is smooth without being sticky or clingy. Here there is a recipe that you could try:

2 cups distilled water
1 cup olive oil
3/4 cup glycerin
4 caplets Vitamin E
10 caplets Lechithin
10 drops lavender oil
3 Tbsp beeswax 

Start by mixing all of the items together. For the caplets, cut them open and squeeze the liquid inside into the mixture. Microwave in a glass container for 2-3 minutes, stirring every 1/2 minute, until the beeswax is mostly melted. You have a smooth liquid at this point. 

I initially tried to blend it right away. Then I began cooling it. It began to separate as it cooled, as you can see here.

 You have to add in 10 more Lechithin caplets worth of liquid and now that it was more solid,  I tried blending again for a few minutes. It got much more creamy now, although there was still some liquid left in the mix. 

The cream itself was *great* - very smooth, moisturizing, and didn't leave a sticky residue. For me it was slightly waxy. I will try another run (as soon as I use this batch up) with less beeswax to see how that affects it. Also, I obviously have a little too much water in here. I will drop down to 1 cup of distilled water to see if that is still liquid enough. 

The final result does not smell much of lavender, even though the initial mix was very lavendery. It appears you have to add the oils in after heating, to allow them to keep their fragrance.

Glycerine Olive Oil Lotion Recipe

There are a number of recipes that fall into this category. The basic idea is that you have glycerine, distilled water, olive oil, and then random other items for vitamin or fragrance. So here is the specific recipe I tried: 

1/2 cup distilled water
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup glycerin
4 caplets Vitamin E
4 caplets Lechithin
10 drops lavender oil 

This is a recipe that just like the basic Glycerine Lotion Recipe involves very basic ingredients and no heating. In this recipe's case at least you do have some oil in there, which gives the lotion a little (but only a *little*) thickness. The lechithin is supposed to act as an emulsifying agent, to bind the oil and water together.

You mix all ingredients together - which means for the caplets that you cut them open and squeeze the liquid out into the mixture. Be careful when you do this! They are quite rolly.

However, whether I shook this up by hand (which some recipes instruct) or whether I blended it for 2 minutes straight (a la other recipes), it still separated out rather instantly. It had the consistency of ... a slimy soup. It was still exceedingly drippy. This recipe might do well in a spray bottle, to spray on you as a mist, but it really doesn't cut it for what I consider a lotion to be.

So if you spot these recipes or give them a try, be forewarned that they are VERY drippy.

Glycerine Rosewater Lotion Recipe

You would think that glycerin and rosewater would be the perfect ingredients for a lotion recipe. I suppose it's what you consider a lotion! Here's the recipe I tried, that was discussed on many different websites: 

1 1/2 cups mineral water
1/3 cup glycerin
3 teaspoons rose water 

Some recipes included rose water and glycerin, some were glycerin and mineral water, some were glycerin and distilled water. Really, it comes down to this style of recipe including glycerin, water of some sort, and nothing else.

The recipes say either to shake the stuff for a few minutes, or to blend it in a blender. The problem here is that the mixture is REALLY thin. We're talking chicken-soup thin. Also, since there is no binding agent involved, the glycerin tends to separate back out from the water pretty quickly.

You can certainly try this recipe to see how you like a very-thin hint-of-glycerin lotion, but for me it was just TOO drippy. You'd try to get some on your hands, and it would drip off all over the place.