Mother’s Day Spa

bath salt12Mother’s Day is May 10! Give Mom a relaxing spa day at home with these spa science gifts you can make yourself using mostly household items. Bath salts add luxury to an ordinary tub while teaching about hard and soft water. Fizzy bath bombs delight the senses through a skin-safe chemical reaction. Homemade sugar scrub introduces exfoliants and humectants and their effects on the skin.

What you need:
• Plastic mixing bowl
• Plastic mixing spoon
• 1 cup Epsom salt
• 1 cup sea salt
• 1/2 teaspoon glycerin
• Fragrance or essential oils (craft or health store)
• Colorant (craft store)
• Liquid soap
• Jar with lid, baby soda bottles* or other airtight container

What you do:
• Mix together the Epsom salt and sea salt in the mixing bowl.
• Add glycerin to the salt mixture and mix through. (The glycerin is not necessary, but it helps the colorant and oil get dispersed evenly through the salt.)
• Add a few drops of fragrance or essential oils.
• Add a few drops of colorant. We recommend getting oil-based skin-safe colorant from a craft store or else leaving out the colorant.
• Wet your hands with tap water, add a drop of soap to your hands, then rub together to form a lather.
• Observe how much lather forms, then rinse off your hands.
• Fill a sink with water and add about 1/8 cup of salt mixture to it.
• Use your hands to stir the water to help the salt dissolve.
• With your hands still wet from the salt water, add a drop of soap to your hands and rub them together to form a lather.
• Store the remaining salts in a jar, keeping the lid on tightly to keep moisture out. Use about 1/4 cup of the salts in your bath.

What Happened: Most likely you found it easier to form lather (and more of it!) when using the water with salt rather than the water with no salt. This is because of the difference between hard water and soft water. Most households in America have hard water. Hard water has a high mineral content, usually with calcium and magnesium, whereas soft water contains less of these minerals. Calcium and magnesium ions in the hard water react with the soap, forming insoluble gray flakes called soap scum rather than a lather. This means you need more soap to get clean and the bathtub gets a grimy ring around it from the leftover soap scum. One way to soften hard bath water is to add bath salts. The calcium and magnesium ions in the water are replaced with sodium and potassium ions from the salt, allowing the soap to lather much more easily. (If your home has soft water, you may not notice too much of a difference in how well the soap lathers in the water with your bath salts and the water without the bath salts. However, the salt and essential oils will still have a beneficial effect on your skin.)
Another benefit of adding bath salts to your bath has to do with osmosis. Osmosis is the movement of water through a membrane (such as your skin) to achieve equilibrium. Your body contains water and salt, whereas an ordinary bath contains mainly water and very little salt. Therefore, water passes through your skin in an effort to balance the concentration of water and salt in you and in your bath. This excess water causes “pruning” (your fingers and toes wrinkle). Adding bath salts to the water causes a more equal balance of salt and water in both you and in the bath, so less water enters your skin and less wrinkling occurs. Salt is also thought to draw impurities and toxins out of your skin and soothes sore muscles!

DIY Soap
DIY Honey Scrub
DIY Fizzy Bath Bombs
DIY Lip Balm

DIY Soap

Over 2,000 pounds of left over soap  is thrown away every year in the USA. It is $4 billion dollars in 6 years.oatmeal soap2

Here is the way to save the planet, be creative and have fun.

What you need:
• soap left overs
• heavy cream, water, green tea
• paper plate
• butter knife
• mold
• oats ( optional)
• essential oils (optional)
• vitamin E (optional)

What you do:
• Collect all of your little pieces of soap. These are usually the ones that have become small.
• Gather all of the mutant soaps and put them on a paper plate. Get your knife  and cut all of the soap into tiny pieces. The smaller the better usually.
• In a double boiler, heat the liquid you chose (milk, water, tea, etc.) to 170ºF-180ºF (76ºC-82ºC). The water must be warm, not boiling.
• Add the chopped soap while stirring slowly and constantly.
• Reduce the heat so that the liquid/grated soap come to a simmer.
• Stir slowly (but not constantly), until the grated soap turns into liquid.
• Add additives if you want. This is not required but might be something you’d like to do to improve the final soap. Additives would include such items as exfoliating items (for example, oat flakes, lavender flowers, etc.), essential oils, food coloring and so forth. If adding, stir them in well.
• Immediately pour the mixture into the mold(s) and let it cool.

Soap Making Tips.

St. Patrick’s Crafts

Lucky Rainbow CoverLucky Rainbow

 

 

 

Snake for KidsSnake for kids

 

 

 

Spring FlowersSpring Flowers

 

 

 

Lucky Banner

Lucky banner cover

 

 

 

Macaroni kid shamrock craftMacaroni Shamrock

 

 

 

Shamrock Pin CoverShamrock Pin

 

 

 

 

Lucky RainbowLucky Rainbow Cover

 

 

 

Little TreeLittle tree

 

 

 

 

 

Leprechaun TrapLeprechaun Trap cover

Watercolor Mug

What you need:Watercolor mug
• Ceramic white coffee mug
• Old or Disposable Bowl/Container
• Hot water
• Nail Polish
• Gloves

What you do:
• Fill the bowl with warm water.
• Add a drop of nail polish to the water and let it spread out.
• Dip your mug in the water. (You can use nail polish remover to remove any excess nail polish on the bottom and inside of the mug or sections that got messed up.)
• Carefully pat mug dry with paper towel.
• You can repeat with additional colors if you want.
• Once you’ve achieved the look you want, let it sit for at least two hours.

Tip: Do it outside. Hand wash the mug.

Sock Nicholas

What you need:Sock Nicholas
• White sock
• 2 Rubber bands
• Stuffing
• Fabric markers

What you do:
• Fill the sock with stuffing.
• Rubber band the top of the sock closed.
• Put another rubber band 3/4 of the way to the top of Nicholas.
• Draw yeas and nose.
• Use the top of your sock for a fashionable hat for Nicholas.

Sock Snowman

What you need:Sock Snowman
• White sock
• Scissors
• 2 Rubber bands
• Rice
• Fabric markers

What you do:
• Cut off the top of the sock from the foot.
• Turn the top of the sock out.
• Attach the rubber band tightly to the bottom  of the sock.
• Turn the sock right side out again.
• Fill the sock with rice.
• Rubber band the top of the sock closed.
• Put another rubber band 3/4 of the way to the top of your snowman.
• Tie a scarf around your snowman’s neck.
• Draw yeas, nose and buttons.
• Use the toe of your sock for a fashionable hat for your snowman.

Bird Art

What you need:Bird Art
• Paper
• Watercolor
• Sharpie

What you do:
• Draw the poles and the wires with a black sharpie.
• Dip a finger in the paint.
• Make finger prints in different colors on the wires.
• Draw the rest of the birds with the sharpie.

Bloody Candle

What you need:Bloody candle
• White candle
• Red wax candle or red crayon
• Matches or Lighter / hair dryer if your are using a crayon

What you do:
•Light a red candle and let it drip down onto the top and sides of the white candle.
• If you are using a red crayon, just hold it over the edge of the white candle. Using the hair dryer blow the air downwards.
• Display.

Chalk Art

What you need:
• Corn starchChalk Art1
• Water
• Baking Soda
• Food Coloring
• Film Canisters
• Alka-Seltzer
• Paper

What you do:chalk Art2
• Mix together 1/3 part corn starch, 1/3 part soda, and 1/3 part water.
• Fill each film canister 1/3 of the way with the mixture.
• Add few drops of food coloring, mix.
• Take one alka-seltzer tablet and break it into 3-4 pieces.
• Drop the pieces into the canister, and then quickly pop the top on and flip the canister over.
• Stand back and enjoy the art.
• The film canister will fly through the air like a rocket, leaving beautiful art behind.

Egg Art

What you need:Egg Art1
• Emptied eggshells
• Paint
• Canvas

What you do:
•F ill the eggs with paint.
• Toss the eggs to the canvas.
• Let the masterpiece dry.
• Display.

Treasure Chest

What you need:treasure chest
• Small box with lid
• Seashells
• Tacky glue

What you do:
• Organize the shells, according to size, shape, and color.( The kinds of shells you have will play a big role in your design. The ones you have most will be your “filler” shells, covering most of the box. The ones you have fewest perhaps will go on the corners. If you have any special shells, use them for the focal point on the top.)
• Start gluing. Begin with the corners. Glue in place any large or special shells.
• Then fill in around them with your smaller, “filler” shells.
• Fill in all empty spaces with shells. Add any additional shells as you see fit.

There can never be too many!

Hummingbird Food

What you need:Hummingbird Feeder
• 4 cups filtered water
• 1 cup regular white sugar

What you do:
• Bring the water to a boil.
• Take the water off the heat and add the sugar.
• Stir to dissolve completely.
• Let the nectar cool.
• Place in a clean hummingbird feeder and hang outside for the birds.

Note: Change the food at least every three to five days with a new batch to keep it fresh. Remember don’t use food coloring. Check the bird feeder regularly and every time you change the food to see if any gray mold has formed inside the feeder base, or, any ants have crawled inside to get at the sugar water. If you see any take the feeder down and throw the bird food away. Clean the hummingbird feeder by rinsing with warm water. Then, put a few drops of bleach into the water inside the feeder and clean with a bottle brush. Once clean, rinse thoroughly with fresh water and let dry. Fill up with new food and place outside.