Dry hands (or skin) are a recurring problem and sometimes it feels like there isn’t enough lotion in the world to soften them up. Sometimes, even Shea Butter alone doesn’t, in all honesty, handle the issue of stubborn dry skin.
Yes, there are many reasons to dry, super dry, cracking skin, or other more serious skin issues, and not all are resolved with a topical product. Sometimes you need to keep your water intake up (not sure who has time to drink 1 gallon of water a day, but apparently that’s the thing to do depending on your weight). But I think I have cracked the code on what skin care routine you need to soften up dry skin in a few minutes.
The answer to a natural remedy for never ending dry skin is Sugar and/or Salt Scrubs.
Even better, using brown sugar as in this Brown Sugar Scrub Recipe, has completely solved dry hands for hours at a time.
Brown sugar is different than any other white or cane sugar because it is moist, and when you mix it with a carrier oil in a sugar scrub, it will require less oil and will not dry out.
Is your DIY Sugar Scrub dry?
If you’ve made sugar or salt scrubs in the past, or even if you purchased one pre-made, a recurring issue is that it’s either too oily or too dry. The too dry issue is frustrating me more than anything because you can prepare a wonderful sugar scrub that looks perfect, only to find out after a few uses that it turned into a coarse pile of dried-out sugar.
Brown sugar is a great solution for homemade sugar scrubs that dry out quickly. Look below at the difference between brown sugar, white sugar and cane sugar. There is no oil or water added to any of them, but can you see how the brown sugar is nice and moist? Brown Sugar all the way baby!
Difference between White, Brown and Cane Sugar
Cane sugar comes from sugar canes and it’s minimally processed so it’s a bit darker than white sugar.
White granulated sugar may be made from either cane or sugar beets and it’s processed to be completely white.
Brown sugar is white sugar plus molasses. Depending on the brand, the molasses are either left over from the original sugar refining process, or molasses are added back to white sugar to make the brown granules more consistent in color.
Brown sugar comes in two shades, truly brown and light brown. For this Brown Sugar Scrub Recipe I used the darker one.
Here is how they all compare:
Watch out when you buy a pre-made sugar (or salt) scrub
I jumped over to Amazon and searched for Sugar Scrubs to see what the big brands are selling these days. I found two at the top of the list that have so many weird and useless-for-your-skin ingredients that I couldn’t resist but have a little section in this blog about them.
Tree Hut Shea Sugar Scrub – 18oz for $19.77
Ingredients
Sucrose (SUGAR), Glycerin, Polysorbate 20, Silica, Mangifera Indica (Mango) Fruit, Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea Butter), Ascorbic Acid, Retinyl Palmitate, Carthamus Tinctorius (Safflower) Seed Oil, Oenothera Biennis (Evening Primrose) Oil, Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis (Sweet Almond) Oil, Persea Gratissima (Avocado) Oil, Macadamia Ternifolia Seed Oil, Citrus Aurantium Dulcis (Orange) Oil, Fragrance, Jojoba Esters, Phenoxyethanol, Caprylyl Glycol, Sorbic Acid, Red 30, Talc
The Body Shop Body Scrub Olive – 6.9oz for $17.10
Ingredients
Water, Rice, Olea Europaea (Olive) Fruit Oil, Cetearyl Alcohol, Juglans Regia (Walnut) Shell Powder, Olea Europaea (Olive) Seed Powder, Dimethicone, Sorbitan Stearate, Glyceryl Stearate, PEG-100 Stearate, Benzyl Alcohol, Carbomer, Phenoxyethanol, Xanthan Gum, Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil, Methylparaben, Silica, Fragrance, Sodium Hydroxide, Propylparaben, Isopropyl Myristate, Butylphenyl Methylpropional, Linalool, Disodium EDTA, Hexyl Cinnamal, Daucus Carota Sativa (Carrot) Oil, Daucus Carota Sativa (Carrot) Root Extract, Citronellol, Beta-Carotene, Citral, Limonene, Tocopherol, Geraniol, Alpha-Isomethyl Ionone, Caramel, Chromium Oxide Greens.
This is ridiculous, if you ask me.
Especially when you can make a perfectly awesome, simple and healthy sugar scrub in your own kitchen in about 5 minutes and for a fraction of the cost. And with ingredients that you chose and understand.
Brown Sugar scrub Recipe
Ok, so here’s how I made it:
Ingredients:
- 5 oz salt
- 2 oz brown sugar
- 2 oz almond oil
- 1 teaspoon castor oil
- 40 drops tea tree EO
- 30 drops lavender EO
- 30 drops eucalyptus EO
How To:
- Put sugar and salt in a blender, pulse blend a few times until you can see the the granules are similar in size.
- In a separate container mix the almond, castor and essential oils. Stir them up.
- In a bowl, mix your sugar + salt with the oils, stir and amalgamate until all the granules are coated with the oils.
- Smell it to see if you like it, otherwise you can add up to 10 more drops of whichever essential oil you want to stand out the most.
- Put it in a nice container and it’s ready to use!
Let us know in the comments below how you like sugar scrubs and if you have any comments or tips, we’re all ears!!
Check out our Brown Sugar Scrub Recipe tutorial here (click on the image to be directed to our YouTube Channel):