It’s cold and windy outside.  Are you taking care to pretect against dry skin and face wrinkles?

Whether yes or no, you may want to try some homemade facials and masks. Home-made facials and masks are safer than commercial brands because they contain no chemicals and toxic ingredients.

I would like to share with you these easy to make homemade facial and mask beauty remedies (facial meditations*) to heal, soften, rejuvenate, nourish and moisturize your dry winter skin. Every facial will help you relax, which is very important if you want to stay healthy during cold and flu season.

Six Homemade Beauty Remedies and Recipes for Dry Skin

Cottage Cheese Facial Beauty Remedy

Ingredients:

• 1 tsp. cottage cheese
• 1/tsp. raw organic honey
• 1 tsp. olive oil

Directions:

Mix all the ingredients and apply to your face and neck for 10-15 minutes; relax and enjoy the moment – you deserve it.  Rinse with lukewarm water. Don’t forget to eat the leftovers.

Avocado Facial Beauty Recipe

Ingredients:

• 1 Tbsp avocado, mashed with a fork
• 1 tsp raw organic honey

Directions:

Mix all the ingredients and apply to your face and neck for 10 -15 min.; relax and enjoy the moment – you deserve it. Rinse with lukewarm water. Don’t forget to eat the leftovers.

Variations:

• Avocado plus plain yogurt or kefir
• Avocado plus olive oil

Persimmon Facial Beauty Remedy

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp mashed persimmon
• ½ tsp raw organic honey

Directions:

Mix all the ingredients and apply to your face and neck for 10-15 minutes; relax and enjoy the moment – you deserve it; rinse with lukewarm water. Don’t forget to eat the leftovers.

Banana Facial Beauty Recipe

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp mashed banana
• 1 tsp sour cream

Directions:

Mix all the ingredients and apply to your face and neck for 10-15 minutes; relax and enjoy the moment – you deserve it; rinse with lukewarm water. Don’t forget to eat the leftovers.

Oatmeal Facial Beauty Recipe

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp oatmeal cooked with some water

Directions:

Apply it slightly warm to your face and neck for 10-15 minutes; relax and enjoy the moment – you deserve it; rinse with lukewarm water.

Pumpkin Facial Beauty Recipe

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp canned or cooked pumpkin (mashed)
• 1 tsp olive oil

Mix all the ingredients, apply to your face and neck for 10-15 minutes; relax and enjoy the moment – you deserve it; rinse with lukewarm water.

No time to make a facial? Don’t worry! Apply one of these ingredients by itself:

• Avocado
• Cottage cheese
• Olive Oil
• Coconut Oil
• Honey
• Yogurt / Kefir
• Sour Cream

* I call the time we have to enjoy our home-made masks  – facial meditation. There are a lot of variations of basic meditation. One of them suggests sitting or lying down doing nothing, but being aware of our breathing. Just sit or lie still with your mask on inhaling slowly through your nose, then exhaling through your mouth. Enjoy taking care of yourself, enjoy your facial meditation time.

Click to listen to author Julie Gabriel on Holistic Beauty Remedies for Your Face and Hair.

Click to listen to Naturopath Pamela Reilly on How to Take Care of Your Dry Winter Skin.

Breathe, smile and be happy.

© Irina Wardas, HHC

Women’s Holistic Health Coach and Counselor

No matter how busy we are, we should never forget to take care of ourselves – mind, body and spirit.

One little thing you can do for yourself is to indulge yourself in a mini spa day.

This beauty remedies tip will help you relax to feel and look fabulous.

Are you ready for a homemade beauty remedy recipe that will make you feel and look fabulous?

Relax, Rejuvenate and Detox with an Essential Oils Healing Bath

By taking a relaxing healing oil bath you may be able to reduce your stress level, lower your blood pressure, heal a headache, balance your hormones, address your sleep needs to sleep better, achieve a natural weight loss, detox cleanse, and feel sexy.

According to Ayurveda, the perfect bath should stimulate all the five senses, provide relaxation and a feeling of emotional fullness. After your full body massage, you should let your skin absorb the oil for at least 15 minutes before you get into the tub. During this time, you assemble everything you will need for a full sensory experience.

Taste: It’s important to remain hydrated while you are cleansing and detoxifying your body. For a soothing drink, try herbal teas. Nettle Tea is specially designed to calm the mind. For an energizing beverage, you can add a few teaspoons of Cocoa. Ayurveda does not recommend drinking coffee and alcohol because they stimulate the body instead of soothing it.

Sight: For a peaceful atmosphere, light a few candles and turn off the lights. Make sure you place the candles in a secure place, where you can’t knock them off while bathing.

Sound: To help you focus on your spa experience, turn off your phone and mute the answering machine. Put on your favorite soothing, low-volume music. You can also listen to a CD with pacifying melodies of nature, which will help revitalize your body, mind and spirit. If you have a portable CD player, you can place it in the bathroom but away from the bath tub for safety reasons.

Smell: Now you are ready to fill your tub with warm water. Do not bathe in hot water because it dries your skin and depletes your energy. Make sure to use a filter if the tap water is heavily chlorinated. Soften and scent your bathwater with essential oils, which come in different aromatherapy combinations such as relaxing, rejuvenating or energizing. You can also try the Epsom salts to relax your muscles.  Natural aromas will uplift your spirit. If you are planning to soak for a while, you can use bath pillows to cushion your head and neck.

Touch: Use natural sponges or scrubs such as loofah, to soften rough elbows and knees, and pumice stone to scrub calluses on your feet. Instead of petroleum-based soaps, use vegetable soaps to cleanse your skin. (adopted form Maharishi Ayurveda -www.mapi.com)

Click to listen to our discussion with Mary- Beth Janssen, Health and Beauty Expert on Pleasure Healing and Self Nurturing Tips for Busy Women.

P.S. You can also take a lavender bath with lavender essential oils, aromatherapy lavender, a tea bath, or healing oils as a beauty remedies stress reducer to detox cleanse and to feel sexy.

Breathe, smile and be happy.

© Irina Wardas, HHC

Women’s Holistic Health and Nutrition Counselor and Coach

To look fabulous in Summer, we need to eat more lycopene rich foods, such as cooked tomatoes, apricots, pink grapefruit, papaya, water melon in order to protect our skin from sun damage.

New studies show that lycopene in our diet can help our skin block UV rays and that there is a connection between lycopene and skin cancer.  Because our body doesn’t produce this antioxidant,  we should incorporate more lycopene rich foods in our diet, to protect ourselves from skin cancer.

Try these three healthy simple and easy summer recipes to keep your skin sun damage free.

1. Grapefruit and Walnuts Salad Easy Summer Recipe

Ingredients:

• 2 medium grapefruits
• 1 avocado
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• juice of ½ lemon
• 1/2 cup Immunity Boosting Turmeric Dressing

Directions:

Peel grapefruits and section. Peel avocado and remove pit, cut into chunks. Place avocado and grapefruit into the bowl and gently toss. Drizzle lemon’s juice. Add nuts and drizzle with Turmeric dressing.

2. Spaghetti Sauce Easy Summer Recipe

Ingredients:

• 2 medium onions chopped
• 2 Portobello (or 1 cup shitake) mushrooms sliced
• 4 tomatoes chopped or 2 tbsp tomato paste (for paste you need 1/3 cup water)
• 2 clove garlic minced
• 2-3 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tbsp parsley, chopped
• salt and fresh grounded pepper to taste
• 8 ounces spaghetti or angel hair pasta

Directions:

Sautee onions in olive oil for 10 min., add mushrooms and cook for 5-7 minutes. Add tomatoes (if you use tomato paste, add some water), parsley, salt and pepper.

Drain pasta. Toss with tomato sauce and serve.

3. Papaya Fruit Salad Easy Summer Recipe

This recipe is from one of my favorite books Eating for Beauty by David Wolfe:

Eating this fruit salad is a great way to begin the morning. The cinnamon contains the mineral chromium, a great blood sugar balancer, this fruit salad is loaded with enzymes to help stimulate elimination in the morning.

Ingredients:

• 1papaya
• ½ avocado
• 6 fresh figs
• 2 nectarines
• ½ tbsp Cinnamon
• 1 lemon juice
• 1 tbsp raw honey

Directions:

Chop all ingredients, mix and serve.

Bon Appetit!

Breathe, smile and be happy.

© Irina Wardas, HHC

Women’s Holistic Coach and Counselor

Do you have a favorite natural skincare routine that you use to keep your skin glowing?

I recently interviewed  Julie Raines, an Esthetician and Facial Therapist, about beauty remedies for aging skin on my women’s holistic health talk radio “Feel and Look Fabulous with Irina.” If you would like to learn how and why natural regular skin care routine can benefit your skin aging.

One of the natural beauty remedies / anti-aging tips I talked about with Julie Raines follows.

Simple Cucumber and Yogurt Cleanser Anti-Aging Beauty Remedy and Recipe

• 1 Pot of Organic Natural Yogurt (try Greek if you want a creamer blend)
• ½ Cucumber mashed in blender

Mix yogurt and cucumber in a bowl until well blended.

Damp skin with warm water and use a generous amount of the yogurt /cucumber mix and emulsify in your hands and massage using upwards strokes from the top of the bust to the top of your head. Massage until a sticky consistency then remove with a damp face cloth. Splash your face with plenty of water and pat dry.

This is wonderful to get pre teens in to a gentle skin care routine & they can experiment with additions of honey or oatmeal about 1 teaspoon of each. This is also fabulous on maturing skin as it will calm redness and the cucumber will freshen and stimulate. You can use slices of cucumber on the eyes and even use it as a quick toner for the skin in an emergency.

 Click to listen to our interview with Julie Raines Esthetician and founder of Charlie Locks Skin care  for more tips on natural anti-aging skin care.

© Irina Wardas, HHC

Women’s Holistic Health Coach and Counselor

It’s alway a perfect time to eat lots of fruits and vegetables.

With fruits and vegetables you can always make a delicious detox breakfast, green smoothies recipes for weight loss, or anti-aging soups to feel fantastic.

Use the green juice recipe below to help you look and feel younger and healthier.

Cucumber is rich in silica to keep our skin wrinkle free.Cucumber also contains the digestive enzyme (erepsin) to help digest = break down protein and cleanse the intestines, and a detox vegetable for cleansing our kidneys.

Apple is one the high fiber foods for constipation, easy natural weight loss and detox. The pectin in apples cleanses intestines and removes toxic metals and residues of radiation. Apple is rich in vitamins A, E and C and pectin, which are very beneficial for our skin. It is always a great idea to use apple facials to rejuvenate and nourish our skin.

Cilantro is a detoxing and cleansing herb. It helps in the chelation of heavy metals such as mercury and lead.

Tasty Cucumber and Apple Green Smoothie Simple Detox Recipe and Natural Beauty Remedy

• 2 organic apples
• 1 medium cucumbers
• 1 cup fresh cilantro
• 1 organic celery stock ( if you like it)

Juice all ingredients and serve immediately.

Cucumber Homemade Anti-aging Beauty Facial Mask

Place cucumber slices on your eyes for 10 – 15 minutes to reduce swelling and puffiness. This easy to make homemade anti-aging beauty recipe and remedy will help you look refreshed and a couple of years younger.

P.S. Don’t forget to also try a Green Apple Water Recipe to reduce face wrinkles and fine lines.

Bon Appetit!

Click to listen to our discussion with Author Mindy Green on Homemade Skincare Treatments and Beauty Secrets.

Breathe, smile and be happy.

©Irina Wardas, HHC

 Women’s Holistic Health, Nutrition and Relationship Coach and Counselor