Pinspiration: Deodorant

I have written before about skin products I use here. I am changing some thing ups though and adding in a cleaning routine with more natural stuff. I have been through 4 different "natural" deodorants and finally, with the help of Pinterest, have found the one.

I started with this, my mom's home made recipe. I am not sure where she found it, but her and my sister both use and like it. Maybe my batch didn't have the right proportions or maybe I am just sweatier or stinkier, but it did NOT work for me. About two hours into my day I started to smell myself. It was unpleasant to say the least. It also called for cocoa butter and I added some sweet orange essential oil. This made the deodorant smell like those chocolate oranges you get at Christmas, not my favorite smell.

I then bought Tom's natural apricot deodorant

It smelled awesome, just like nice natural fruity apricots. It smelled like that when you put it on, but then I got to work and just smelled like BO sweaty grossness.

After that I went with Arm and Hammer natural

This was good, smelled ok, controlled the smelliness pretty good until 3 or 4 o'clock but my shirts were rank by the end of the day. Especially if I had to go work at the nursing home where it is always about 80 degrees indoors. This was also a little to "non-natural/home made" for my taste for not quite doing the trick.

So...onto the Thai crystal.

I only bought the sample size in this from drugstore.com. I wasn't planning on it working. Call me crazy, but rubbing crystal's on my body is maybe a little "too natural" for my taste. I have some personal care/natural lines and this one crossed it. However, the online reviews were all glowing and people claimed it was amazing so I thought I would try it. For 2 bucks if it did the trick it was worth the purchase. You are supposed to wet the crystal slightly and then rub it under your arms. The claim is that it kills underarm bacteria, thus eliminating any odor, something new I learned in my deodorant adventure.

*** it isn't the sweat that smells, it is the sweat mixed with the underarm bacteria that smells***

Does that mean I have more bacteria than everyone else, or just too much for the all powerful crystal to handle? I used the crystal for one day and it was probably my stinkiest day ever, despite claims from the health food store lady in town that says it works for her when I was telling her about my adventure (during my trip to get ingredients for the master deodorant). I also much mention that the crystal I bought was a sample size square that came wrapped in plastic and isn't easily stored. It just made me frustrated. I went back to arm and hammer and called it good, despite the fact that walmart only carried the deodorant for about one day (as can happen at our walmart here, you buy something once and they never have it again).

Then, while on pinterest a random pin on the "everything" page showed home made deodorant. I, of course couldn't resist looking at the ingredient list, assuming it would contain what my mom's did. To my surprise it was totally different.

baking soda, cornstarch, tea tree oil, and coconut oil!

The tea tree oil is naturally antibacterial so that kills the stuff that makes you stink. Also, the coconut oil (make sure you buy the virgin raw stuff) smells heavenly. I loooove the smell of coconut and am always looking for the perfect smelling coconut product. So many of them smell too perfumy, strong, etc. This one, of course is just the oil from real coconuts and has the best smell EVER! I love coconut oil so much not I am using it as lotion and nixing all my other lotion products.

I could go on about it (and have to the point where Eric suggests I use coconut oil for everything just to be funny) but I just can encourage you to try it. The jar I bought is "Now Healthy Foods" brand and looks like this

It was 9 bucks for 12 oz. I figure since the deodorant only takes 3 T per batch (I halved it from the original recipe) and I am using it for lotion too, it end up being way cheaper than buying other deodorants and lotions because a little of this stuff goes a long way. The other thing I like about it is that it's a solid at room temp, but easy to get out of the container (not like natural shea butter), but once it touches your warmer skin it becomes and oil. It's less messy than trying to rub a "liquid at room temp" oil on your skin. Not to mention there are so many other things you can do with it.