Fashion

How To Preserve Your Natural Beauty Products

It's likely you have something in your cabinet containing citric acid, especially if you're a fan of organic products. Citric acid is a natural preservative often used keep your goodies fresh without any chemicals. If you're looking to make your natural skincare products last longer, citric acid can preserve your products while preserving your youthful glow. Fortunately, this little known fact has limited the amount of times I run out of the shower naked to rummage through my fridge to find my body scrub or shaving cream.

In addition to keep your products fresh for use, citric acid brightens skin, shrinks pores, and can even treat mild acne, according to sources at Livestrong. Its ability to remove dead skin and speed up the growth of new cells makes are just a couple of reasons why you can find citric acid in many anti-aging beauty products. Citric acid occurs naturally in many fruits such as grapefruit, lemons, limes, and oranges, which is why they're great to put on your face (in small quantities). Of course, if you've ever made a decadent face mask filled with yummy fruits, you know your product has the shelf life of only about a week, which is definitely a bummer. Citric acid can prevent the fermentation of food which basically means it stops it becoming rancid. As someone who's no stranger to finding rancid beauty products in my fridge, this is excellent news.

If you're wondering how to incorporate citric acid in your DIY beauty game, here are some easy recipes that can keep your natural products fresh and long-lasting.

1. Preserve Your Favorite Homemade Cleanser

My fave cleanser has been stored in my fridge until recently and it's nothing short of annoying. Too many times have I forgotten to put my honey milk cleanser back only to find it's very close to rancid the next day. I added a teaspoon of citric acid to my cleanser and now I'm storing my perishable goodies in my medicine cabinet where it belongs.

2. Keep Your Lotions Lasting Longer

I usually don't have a problem with my lotions turning before I've finished using them, but I've found that the citric acid also adds a nice thickness to my favorite formula. My usual mix of mango, kokum, and shea butters with coconut oil only required a teaspoon of citric acid and the results couldn't be better.

3. Make Bath Bombs

I've recently gotten my father obsessed with bath bombs that are brightening and soothing on his skin. For these bath bombs I used granulated sugar, cornstarch, baking soda, and citric acid. I added clary sage, camphor, and grapefruit essential oils and spritzed with water until slightly damp. Use soap molds to make your bath bombs and leave overnight in a closet before using.

4. Create A Brightening Body Scrub

Speaking of brightening, adding citric acid to a body scrub is a great way to help slough away dead skin and turn dull skin vibrant. Blend sugar or salt with your favorite oils and voila! A sugar scrub that can last outside of your fridge.

5. Prevent Foot Odor

A popular way to remove foot odor is adding citric acid to a nice foot bath, some say you can even put the powder directly in your shoes, but after I tried this, I wasn't amused with the little grains between my toes. Instead, make a foot bath with your favorite oil, a dash of citric acid, a dash of arrowroot powder, and a few drops of lemon essential oil.

Image: Kristin Collins Jackson (6)