Journey to the land of Frugality: Homemade Deodorant

Journey to the Land of Frugality

So in my last post I spoke about being "frugal" in an attempt to cut down on my excessive spending. I've done some research and over the next couple of days I'm going to try out different things and give you guys a daily update. In other words, consider me your frugal guinea pig!  In addition to updates, I will also show you how to make all of these house hold products and toiletries with step by step instructions and photos.  

I decided to start with the most disturbing frugal method: Homemade Deodorant.  

As a female (correction, as a human being) its completely unacceptable to walk around smelling like you bathed in old hot dog water. I have a fear of stinking. Stinking leads to loss of friends, lowered self-esteem and possibly, job terminations (I had a co-worker fired for body odor. There was a clause in our contract that said "We must come dressed appropriately for work" and foul odor falls under not being "dressed" appropriately). With that being said, I work 5, sometimes 6 days a week. I can't afford to lose shifts or be sent home due to body odor. With hesitation, I attempted the homemade deodorant "challenge."

Here's what you will need:

1/2 cup baking soda

1/2 cup cornstarch

6 tbsp. coconut oil

1/2 cup shea butter (optional - I didn't use it)

Essential oils (optional - I used Sweet Almond Oil. It smells delicious!)

Take all of the ingredients, except the essential oils, and mix them together in a small jar. Be sure that the baking soda and corn starch is blended in really well as they tend to settle to the bottom of the jar. Once that's done, add in 4 - 5 drops of the essential oil. You can add more if you like, but be careful not to make it too oily.

Here's what mine looked like when it was all blended together:

From here you can do one of two things: 1) Put it in the freezer as is and wait for it to get hard. Then use it like the old school deodorant Tussy 

OR

2) Take an old deodorant stick and fill it with the homemade deodorant. I'm so use to the roll on deodorant feeling that I decided to fill my old Dove deodorant stick with my new "Coco-Almond Deodorant" - Nice name right??

Fill the old stick then freeze it. Woala! You done!

Since my landlord likes my building to feel like it's next to the sun, I tested my Coco-Almond deodorant over night. With the heat blazing and no windows open I was bound to sweat in my sleep. 

Next Morning (9 hours later):

I'm completely dry and more importantly "I don't stink!!!!" There's a slight hint of the Coco-Almond smell on my pits (which, might I add, still smells delicious). It showered off without a problem and my pits felt nice and smooth (baby bottom pits!). So far I'm impressed. Today (January 15, 2014) I'm going to try out Coco-Almond at work. Let's see how the homemade stuff holds up in comparison to my usual Dove deodorant. I will be checking for odor (of course), stains (I'm purposely wearing a black shirt), sweating and how often (if any) I reapply.

Check back soon for an update!