Lavender

Orange-Jasmine-Lavender Solid Perfume

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Jasmine flower

Jasmine flower by Martin Snopek. Rabyne, Central Bohemian Region, Czech Republic

In Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant, she calls this perfume simply “Jasmine,” but it’s more of a lovely dance between Jasmine and Lavender Concrete, while the Blood Orange also adds a delicious and plush fruity top note.

Here’s what you need to create Orange-Jasmine-Lavender solid perfume:

Raw Materials*

  • Jojoba oil
  • Grated beeswax
  • Jasmine Grandiflorum absolute
  • Jasmine Sambac absolute
  • Blood Orange essential oil
  • Lavender concrete

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop burner)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, measure out the lavender concrete into the beaker of oil. Aftel’s recipe calls for the lavender concrete in grams, because it is typically a paste. The version I have is liquid, so I added drops until they equaled the required weight. I found that 6 drops matched the gram weight she specified.
  4. Then add both kinds of jasmine, and finally the blood orange. Smell after each addition to experience how the blend is evolving.
  5. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This prevents cross contamination.
  6. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole. Hold the lab casserole over the burner until the wax melts.
  7. Quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture.
  8. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
The blood orange top note is gorgeous! This is a full-bodied, voluptuous orange – and it pairs well with jasmine. I can see why Mandy picked it rather than a thinner or more bitter citrus note (wild orange, bitter orange, etc.). It enhances the rich, fruity, and sweet qualities of the jasmine and this is my favorite phase of the perfume. The two types of jasmine produce a more complex effect, capitalizing on both the lush, rounded sweetness of the Grandiflorum and the greener, fresher, spicier quality of the Sambac. The Lavender concrete provides a soft, herbaceous and green base for everything and is fore-grounded more in the dry down; it’s slightly “soapy” in Mandy’s words, and I have to agree. The Lavender concrete is perfectly fine, but I don’t looooove it the way I love Lavender absolute, which is more floral, so I can’t help but wonder what this would smell like with the absolute instead of the concrete. Better? Or less interesting because less contrast?

I also have to wonder how different my own blend might smell simply due to different natural materials. I contacted Mandy about the Lavender Concrete issue (mine is liquid, her recipe calls for a solid) – and she said her own was a paste which is why she used the weight-based measurements, so she was unsure how mine would compare. I managed to source two concretes – one from Liberty Naturals and one from Samara Botane – but BOTH were liquid. So who knows, maybe it’s just how this year’s harvest behaved? Both companies noted that the consistency of this material could vary. I would love to smell Mandy’s composition and this one side-by-side to discover the difference.

Notes on Notes

  • Jasmine Grandiflorum Absolute, India, Eden Botanicals – Jasmine, white floral, SWEET, smooth, round, narcotic
  • Jasmine Sambac Absolute, India, Eden Botanicals – GREEN, spicy. Smells surprisingly different from the Grandiflorum. Harder to find the flower. Sweet in its own right, but it’s harder to smell the sweetness after being beaten senseless by the Grandiflorum.
  • Blood Orange EO, Italy, Eden Botanicals – Tart/Sour Citrus; “more” than Bergamot. More body. More heft. Less ephemeral. Tart like a grapefruit, but still sweet with a juicier, orangier character.
  • Lavender Concrete, Lavandula Officinalis, France, Liberty Naturals – herbaceous, green, soft
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In Search of the Perfect Bubble Bath

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Bubble Bath

Bubble Bath by Quan Ha

I love all things that smell divine, and that includes a good bubble bath. With two small children, we take a LOT of bubble baths at my house, so I thought it’d be fun to make a deliciously scented one that was good-for-us, too. How hard could it be?

No Effort: Buy It
The effortless way is just to buy the stuff. Some good brands that use eco-friendly and baby-safe ingredients are:

Custom Scent Bubble Bath (Easy-Mode DIY)
But what if you want a custom scent? Well, there’s an easy DIY way to make your own aromatherapy bath:

  1. Use an unscented gentle, eco-friendly kids’ bubble bath (we use California Baby)
  2. For babies and children, mix 6 drops of your favorite essential oils* per 1 oz of bubble bath (for adults, you can safely use 25 drops a.k.a. 1/4 tsp per 1 oz of bubble bath)
  3. Add 1/2 to 1 tsp** bubble bath to running water as tub fills – and voila! – a scented bath with no harsh chemicals and delightful foam!

*Some of the best and safest essential oils for children are lavender, tangerine, mandarin, neroli, frankincense, petitgrain, and Roman chamomile. Source: Aromatherapy: A Complete Guide to the Healing Art.
**You can add more bubble bath for more foam, just be aware that with babies and kids – 1/2 to 1 tsp is the recommended amount to keep the essential oil exposure low. Same source as above.

True DIY Bubble Bath
But what if you really want to make your own eco/kid-friendly bubble bath from scratch? The above brands cost a fortune, and you just don’t get the same “I made it myself!” satisfaction from using a pre-made bottle. I bounced around Google and Pinterest and the usual natural/crafty blog suspects, and every bubble bath recipe seemed to be a variation on the Castile soap + vegetable glycerin formula. Some with water, some without. Some with sugar or salt, some without. Some with more or less vegetable glycerin. Hunh.

Crunchy Betty offers two well-thought out bubble bath recipes, so I thought I’d give them a whirl this weekend.

The Castile Soap + Vegetable Glycerin Recipe
This one promised the most bubbles, so I thought I’d try it first. I’ll save you the suspense: in our hard water, the bubbles fizzled out almost immediately. BOO! Bubble disappointment! But, to be fair, Betty totally warned us. That said, the vegetable glycerin (harmless stuff, btw) left our skin feeling soft and silky smooth, and the bath smelled yummy too!

Here’s what you need to make ~5 ounces of not-very-bubbly bath:

Ingredients

Steps

  1. Whisk ingredients together in a small bowl.
  2. Transfer to a jar with a lid.
  3. Let sit 24 hours before using.
  4. Pour ~1/4 cup (2 oz) into running bath water.

This recipe makes enough for ~2-3 baths. Stores up to 3 mos (supposedly, I have not tested this) in a cool, dark cabinet.

Okay, so what about the second option? By this point, I’d dropped all expectation of bubbles. This was another easy recipe that came together in a snap. It smells yummy and makes your skin feel delicious – but, no bubbles.

Creamy Honey Bath (also from Crunchy Betty)
This makes ~7-8 ounces of bath mixture, enough for ~1-2 baths. Store in a cool, dark cabinet and (supposedly) it will keep for 3 mos.

Ingredients

  • 1/4 cup sweet almond oil
  • 1/8 cup honey
  • 1/2 cup Castile soap
  • 3 teaspoons pure Vanilla extract (get the kind with no added sugar or artificial flavors)
  • 5 drops essential oils (you can use Vanilla or something else)

Steps

  1. Whisk ingredients together in a small bowl.
  2. Transfer to a jar with a lid.
  3. Pour 1/2 to entire amount into running bath water.

So…now what? I still have not fulfilled my quest to find the perfect DIY bubble bath recipe. Now, some might say that the problem is surfactants – the chemicals that create a nice lather – and that these harsh things are just not what a person with common sense would want in the tub.

And I’d agree, except…a little sleuthing of ingredients revealed that California Baby, Honest Company, and 100% Pure all use gentle/plant-based surfactants that seem like the sorts of stuff I’d want to use!

So now I just need to find a recipe with a combo of those ingredients and figure out where to source them. With the exception of saponified coconut oil, I suspect they are not as easy to get. So, the search continues! Do you have an all-natural bubble bath recipe that actually makes bubbles? If so, I’d love to know!

Frankincense Alcohol-based Perfume

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Now let’s do the alcohol version of the Frankincense perfume (an earlier post shows how to make Frankincense solid perfume). Whew! We’re on experiment No. 6 in blending along with Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant. I adored the solid version of this delicious walk-in-the-forest perfume, and I like the alcohol version even more.

Here’s what you need to create Frankincense alcohol-based perfume:

Frankincense Alchol Perfume Supplies

Supplies for creating Frankincense alcohol-based perfume.

Raw Materials*

  • Perfumer’s Alcohol
  • Balsam fir absolute
  • Frankincense essential oil
  • Phenyl ethyl alcohol – natural isolate
  • Styrax essential oil
  • Lavender absolute
  • Tarragon essential oil
  • Wild sweet orange essential oil
  • Frankincense CO2

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of rubbing alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Curette (for scooping fir absolute out of jar)
  • Stirring rod
  • ½ oz dark glass bottle (for storing perfume)
  • Tiny funnel
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the perfumer’s alcohol to the graduated beaker.
  3. Add the essences one at a time. Start from the base notes and work your way up to the top notes. Start with the fir absolute. You’ll need to scoop it out of the jar with the curette, and swirl it into the alcohol to dissolve it. Once it has dissolved (there may still be some particles), add the other essences using a separate eye dropper for each one.
  4. Stir after each addition, and sniff to experience the blend.
  5. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of rubbing alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This will prevent cross-contamination and also dissolve any EOs left on the dropper to make clean up easier.
  6. Using the tiny funnel, pour the finished blend into a small dark glass bottle.
  7. Cap the bottle tightly and shake it to be sure all the ingredients are well mixed. Label it, and store it in a cool, dark place.
  8. Let the blend mature from a week to a month to let the essences marry and create a smooth blend. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
The fir absolute is a bit tricky to work with, but it dissolves relatively easily into the perfumer’s alcohol with a little stirring. The other essences are easy enough to add. The final blend is mossy green from the fir absolute and a bit cloudy, so it could probably stand some filtering (after it matures, I think?) but I haven’t attempted that yet with mine. So how does it smell? After a week of maturing (it could probably stand to go longer, but is already nice), the opening is sharply green, very “green pine needle sap” and a tad grapefruity – an impression largely created by the wild orange essential oil merging with the frankincense CO2. The sharp green pine/citrus opening serves as reminder that citrus oils contain the same limonenes and pinenes as conifers, and so the two blend well together. I don’t detect the tarragon, but it’s probably adding a green sweetness to everything. This all transitions beautifully to the delicious balsam fir absolute at the heart/base of the perfume – hooray for the edible pine forest! The lavender is only slightly noticeable, and is supporting the fir balsam, making it even softer and richer. I have no idea what the phenyl ethyl alcohol and the styrax are doing! Everything about this scent, similar to smelling frankincense resin, makes you want to inhale deeply and fill your lungs with fresh, clean air. It’s peaceful but joyful in the same way as a walk in the woods. The drydown is gentle, softly balsamic and lightly sweet. Very nice.

Notes on Notes
I have notes on frankincence eo, balsam fir absolute, lavender absolute, and frankincense co2 in the frankincense solid perfume post. Here are my notes on the other essential oils in the alcohol blend.

  • Phenyl Ethyl Alcohol Natural Isolate, Organic, France, Aftelier – This is a natural isolate extracted from Cassia. To my nose it smells simple, sweetish, and fruity/rosy. As an isolate, it does not have the same complexity as an essential oil, so my nose finds it hard to place. The Aftelier web site describes it as follows, “This transparent and warm middle note features notes of honey and rose.”
  • Styrax, Asian, Essential Oil (Liquidamber orientalis), Turkey, Wild Harvest, White Lotus Aromatics – I like this! Sweet, spicy, slightly floral, and musky in a balsamic way. Slightly dirty. Ambery? Interesting. Reminds me of a little of a fresh horse stable, but in a good way, lol! Not the manure, but the hay and the horses themselves.
  • Tarragon Essential Oil, USA, White Lotus Aromatics – Sweet, bright, minty, anise, friendly, happy, cheerful, GREEN. Smells like the fresh herb itself. Very pleasant.
  • Wild Orange Essential Oil, Dominica Republic, Wildcrafted, Eden Botanicals – Citrus. Sharp. Bright. Happy. TART. Dry. Bordering on grapefruit. Like an orange-grapefruit blend. Or orange with bits of the bitter white inner rind left in.

Frankincense Solid Perfume

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Now it’s time for Experiment No. 5 from Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant: Frankincense Solid Perfume. This perfume claims to be all about Frankincense – but the true star is the amazing deliciousness of Fir Absolute. Heaven! This smells like a walk in the forest in the best possible way.

Here’s what you need to create Frankincense solid perfume:

Frankincense Solid Perfume Supplies

Supplies for creating Frankincense Solid Perfume.

Raw Materials*

  • Jojoba oil
  • Grated beeswax
  • Frankincense essential oil
  • Balsam fir absolute
  • Lavender absolute
  • Frankincense CO2

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Curette (for scooping viscous fir absolute out of jar)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, measure out each of the essences into the beaker of oil. Start with the fir absolute. It’s incredibly viscous (like tar) – so what you need to do is use the curette to scoop out a drop-sized blob of it, and then stir it into the oil. It won’t dissolve – that’s ok. It will melt when you add it to the beeswax. Then, use the eye droppers to add each of the other essences.
  4. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This will prevent cross-contamination and also dissolve any EOs left on the dropper to make clean up easier.
  5. Once you have your oil blended, switch to working with the beeswax. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole.
  6. Hold the lab casserole full of grated wax over the burner until the wax melts. You don’t want to burn it, so keep the temperature at “medium” or lower.
  7. When all the wax has melted, quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture. The fir absolute should melt just fine! It may leave some sediment, but that’s okay – it still will look fine as a solid perfume.
  8. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Don’t touch it or you’ll burn yourself and/or mess up the nice smooth surface. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
Oh my stars in heaven, this stuff smells AH-mazing! You really get the fir absolute, supported faintly by the lavender. It’s very sweet and balsamic, almost edible. Love, love, love it. This was a more challenging solid perfume to create simply because working with the fir absolute is a hassle – but WOW, is it worth it! The frankincense I can’t detect as much – but interestingly, this DOES remind me somewhat of the way a chunk of frankincense resin smells (sweet, balsamic, piney). Whereas Frankincense EO doesn’t have precisely the same character as the resin itself. So it’s almost like this is a recreation of the raw material. But, frankly, better. Did I mention I am now in love with fir absolute? It’s strangely edible. A magical edible pine forest of wonderfulness.

Notes on Notes

  • Frankincense EO, Organic, Aftelier – Pinenes. Piney. Turpentine, but cleaner. Pinesol. After it’s been on the strip awhile, it mellows and becomes soft, balsamic, nicer. On the Aftelier web site, this is described as, “This essential oil, from boswellia neglecta, is my favorite frankincense for perfumery. This light, but tenacious, base note is fresh and fruity with hints of lemon.”
  • Balsam Fir Absolute, Abies balsamia, Canada, White Lotus Aromatics – Sweet, jammy, edible, balsamic, pine forest
  • Lavender Absolute, France, Liberty Naturals – Beautiful. Soft but also very intense. Blanket quality. Calming. Herbaceous. Cooling. Soothing.
  • Frankincense CO2 Select, Somalia, Wild Harvest, White Lotus Aromatics – Similar to the EO but more pleasant. Piney. Still very pinene-y but more ethereal.

Next time I get Frankincense, I want to use Enfleurage. They seem to be Frankincense experts and I’d love to sample their stock. I’d like to try the Frankincense from Oman, boswellia sacra.