DIY: Homemade Lip Balm

This was a fun (by "fun", what I really mean is: MESSY!) project. On Tuesday, I all of a sudden got the itch to be crafty and make something. I found a simple recipe for lip balm while doing some research online: Vaseline and Kool Aid. That's it, two ingredients. But I also wanted to do some tweaking and experimenting. So, I bough some peppermint and butterscotch hard candies too. Here's what I did:

What You'll Need:

• Small containers
• GLASS measuring cup
• Plastic Syringe
• Kool Aid mix
• Vaseline
• Sugar*
• Any other flavor you may want to try*

**The last two things aren't really needed, but if you're doing a Kool Aid lip balm, the sugar makes it sweet instead of bitter, the "any other flavor you want to try" mine was butterscotch and peppermint, but it didn't work as well as I had hoped, I'll explain why later.

-Note: I suggest buying the containers, measuring cup, and syringe separate from any tools you own, they will become messy and should only be used for making balm. Or, order from me and avoid the mess! ;)

Got this big tub at Wal*Mart for $4.

Dollar Tree, "Everything's a Dollar!"

Kool Aid pouches at Wal*Mart for .20 each.

Glass Measuring bowl was $4 and the syringe was

$1 at Wal*Mart.

(Like my vintage-y pot!?)

Other supplies that I got but is not necessarily needed:

Lipstick can add color to the lip balm and eyeshadow

can add color and shimmer. I also got Avery Mailing Labels

from Wal*Mart for $4.24 to make labels for the containers.

Here's how I started: I made a Kool Aid Pink Lemonade flavored balm first. Fill your pot with a few inches of water and bring to a boil. Put the glass measuring cup in the pan, this creates a make-shift double boiler. The containers I found at Dollar Tree were something like 2.3 ounces, a little bigger than I wanted, but I couldn't find anything normal sized for lip balm, but you can order containers online, Etsy has a ton of them, I just didn't feel like waiting til they came in the mail to do this tutorial. So, since my containers were so big, I had to make a lot of balm to fill them up. I put about 2-3 tablespoons of Vaseline in the measuring cup and let it start to melt, while it was melting I was thinking about making it a darker balm, so a dusted some of the eyeshadow from above into the measuring cup. When the Vaseline turns into liquid, put in the Kool Aid, and stir. A LOT! If you don't stir it enough, the crystals won't dissolve and your lip balm will be grainy. I also added a little sugar to this batch because I wanted it to be sweeter. When it's all mixed well enough, suck it out of the measuring cup with the syringe and squirt it into a container! Then I put it in the freezer for 10-15 minutes to set up and then moved it to the fridge for a few hours.

I know, my labels aren't very pretty, but this was

only my first batch, sort of  "trial and error".



The second and third kind I made didn't go as well as I had planned, this was the butterscotch and peppermint batches. My research online lead me to believe that the candies would just melt in the heat if I crushed them into small pieces. This was false, at least when I tried, all of the small pieces of candy clumped together over heat I hardly got any in the balm.

So, next time I try this, I will probably get peppermint Hershey's Kisses or something that will melt better.

The last flavor I made was just going to be straight Cocoa Butter, but I decided to step it up and add some color to it, so I first put in my measuring cup some lip stick shavings, not a lot, but enough to give off the color I wanted. Then I melted the Vaseline with it and put that in a container.

I'm hoping to maybe be able to sell these in my Facebook shop if people are interested in them. I will sell the big 2.3 ounce tubs for $5.00 or a sampler size with two flavors for $3.00. You can order through a comment on my Accessory page, or just give me your opinion on my recipe by liking the Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Callis-Accesories/166684590014328?ref=hl