Homemade mascara

I love mascara. It is my favorite cosmetic ever, and I would forsake all other cosmetics for it. The only problem I really have with it is that often it is quite thoroughly loaded with all kinds of weird chemicals. If you want to get one that is not chemical-saturated, it's definitely going to cost you. Well, being a broke student entangled in a complex love affair with mascara, I decided I needed to find a solution that doesn't involve drugstore mascara.

I am attempting to make my own mascara with the following ingredients:
- purified water
- avocado oil
- activated charcoal or cosmetic grade black iron oxide
- candelilla or beeswax
- vitamin E oil

This ingredient list is a composite I've created from a number of different recipes; no one recipe looked good to me, so I picked bits and pieces from multiple different recipes and essentially created my own. I don't know what proportions I should mix these in, but I figured I'd wing it until I get what looks to be a good consistency. I'm not sure if this is going to work, but it seems like it would: the oil providing the slip, the wax providing a bit of thickness, and the vitamin E oil serving as a mild preservative. We'll see though.

Disclaimer: I am not a professional cosmetic manufacturer, and to be quite honest I don't know much about making cosmetics at all, so if you choose to try this recipe, I am in no way, shape or form responsible for anything that might happen to you. Proceed at your own risk.

*photo by AndreaNicole

Oils by skin type

I posted a while back on using oil to cleanse your face, also known as the oil cleansing method. The most important factor in using the oil cleansing method successfully is to figure out what oils to use. There are different oils that are appropriate for different types of skin and even the proportions in which you mix those oils can make a difference, although determining proportions is usually by trial and error.

Here is a brief list of oils by skin type:

Oily - jojoba, grape seed
Dry - olive, sweet almond
Normal - olive, sweet almond, avocado
Acne prone or sensitive - jojoba, grape seed, sweet almond

It should also be noted that castor oil, which is commonly used as a carrier oil, can be drying, so if you have dry skin, you may want to avoid castor, or at the very least, mix it in lower proportion to a heavier, more moisturizing oil.

Additionally, if you'd like to add essential oils to your oil mixture, tea tree tends to be good for oily, or acne-prone skin, while lavender does well with dry skin.