Salve the Date

I had a fever ridden child last week. The good news: It was a very low-grade fever, nothing dangerous. But, he couldn’t go to school, so, we sewed, made food, learned about the stock market, Lego-ed, and made salves. The even better news: I love being stuck at home, and so does he.

We acquired some teeny tiny glass jelly jars that are the most perfect size for filling with my salve recipe. I sterilized the jars and removed the labels. *pro tip: If you can’t remove a label try using some lemon essential oil.* My tiny helper was a bit reluctant at first, but when I told him he could make his very own salve with orange essential oil, his fave, he took the bait.

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I have a tiny crockpot that is designated for beeswax. I turned that on the low setting in the morning and gathered our other supplies, our house smelled delightful all.day.long.

This is the recipe I use.

2-5 drops of vitamin e oil (dependent on how hard the bottle is squeezed). I figure you can’t really have too much vitamin e.

4 tablespoons of coconut oil, gently warmed on the stove top in a double boiler.

1 tablespoon of olive oil at room temperature.

1 tablespoon of that warm beeswax. Ooh I should mention we used some Montana Beeswax from Glacier County Honey Company, we had some leftovers from our tiny toy shop.

I put all of these ingredients directly into the glass jar. I would recommend using glass or a tin rather than a plastic container. When I add the beeswax to the other ingredients the beeswax tends to harden a bit. I put the jar back in the double boiler, which is just a saucepan with water in it, and warm the entire concoction again. I use a chopstick to push the beeswax down into the other oils, so it isn’t just a disk of wax resting on top. Eventually it warms enough that it melts down and is evenly distributed.

Finally, after cooling a bit, it is time to add your essential oils, you only need a few drops of each flavor. You can also add other goodies to your salves, like infused herbs, but we started this project very last minute and just used the oils that sounded like they’d be the most beneficial in the moment.

We made a chest rub salve and ended up using it under his tiny nostrils.

We made a Frankincense salve, simply because it is my favorite. We added a hint of Lavender to this one as well.

We called the Lime/Tangerine salve “Happy Salve”.

When the salve hardens it is the consistency of a good quality lip balm. We use ours for dry skin spots, lip balm, cuts, scrapes, bruises, smelling good and sharing.