Homemade All Natural Lip Balm

Here it is, the post you've all been waiting for (even though you didn't realize it). The almost fully illustrated guide to making your own lip balm for WAAAYYY LESS than $2.50 a tube or whatever the going rate is.

Start by eating some canned goods. Seriously. Just a small can--like a veggie can--we ate green beans, but you can have whatever you want. A soup can would work fine also, although the ones with the pop off tops might be a bit more difficult to shape. After you've emptied your can, wash it out and bend the edge of it into a spout like this:Now gather the rest of your supplies. The recipe I use is fairly versatile, so you can choose and alternate ingredients. Here's the recipe:

20% Beeswax
25% Solid at room temperature oil (Coconut Oil, Palm Oil, Shea Butter, Lanolin, etc.)
15% Brittle at room temperature oil (Cocoa Butter, Palm Kernel Oil, etc.)
40% Liquid at room temperature (Sweet Almond Oil, Olive Oil, Avocado Oil, etc.)
Essential oil of your choice

You'll also need a scale, a small pot with water, and containers for your lip balm. I have a postal scale, but you can use whatever scale you have that will measure small weights. And for the containers, Google "lip balm tubes" and you'll find places that sell them. They are like chap stick tubes. I purchased mine some time ago and can't remember where I got them, but they had a great deal on a gross of them (yep 144) so I bought that and let me tell you, it takes a while to use 144 lip balm tubes! You can also find little pots if you prefer that type of application.


All the measurements are by weight, you can do any amount and measure in any weight increment (ounces, grams, pounds, etc.)


Today, I'm making about 2 oz. of lip balm and putting it in tubes. The tubes hold approx. 0.15 oz each.

So after you eat your veggies and get your ingredients and supplies together, it's time to begin. Put a bit of water in the pan and put it on the stove to heat up.You can measure the ingredients separately and add them to your can, or you can just measure them into your can. If I have helpers, I put a paper cup on the scale and have them measure out the right amount of each ingredient separately, then add them all together, but today, I'm just measuring right into the can. So I put my can on the scale and zeroed the weight so it will only be weighing the ingredients.Next I added the beeswax. You can also get beeswax online, or maybe your health food store has it. I got mine from my mom who bought a big ol chunk of it and had plenty of excess to share with her daughter. Beeswax is extremely hard, so you may end up with shavings instead of a slice and that's okay because it melts faster if it's in little pieces. I wanted 0.4 oz of beeswax for my recipe and put in 0.5 oz because I like my lip balm just a little more solid :)
It really doesn't matter in what order you add your ingredients, so I'm just going in the order I happened to add them. Next, add the solid at room temperature oil--I used Coconut Oil. It's just what I had. All these oils can be found at your local natural foods store type place, and some even at your standard grocer.I added 0.5 oz. + Okay, the scale says the total now is 1.1 oz., so maybe I added 0.6 oz.Next add the brittle at room temperature oil--I used Cocoa Butter. It smells yummy--kind of like chocolate--mmmmmm.
Would have been 0.3 if I did my recipe just right, but again, I added a little over. (My scale has an auto reset after a certain time--that's why it shows 0.4 oz instead of the total weight which would have been 1.5 oz at this point).Next add your liquid at room temperature oil--I used olive oil.Now I was trying to make it a little stiffer than this recipe had made in the past, so I went a little light on the olive oil and probably only put in 0.7 oz instead of 0.8. You see, the recipe is not set in stone.Add your favorite essential oil. I used peppermint. About 10 drops per ounce of lip balm, so I added about 20 drops.At this point you could also add a bit of vitamin E, which I couldn't find at the time I made this, so I left it out. When I do add it, I just poke the end of one or two of the vitamin E capsules with a pin and squeeze the oil into the can.

Now, put your can into the pot of water and let it heat up and melt all the oils. You can stir it if you want to help it melt--I usually do. I kind of like things to happen NOW if at all possible.

While the oils are melting, get your lip balm containers ready. I like to put mine on a paper towel--I know how good I am at pouring and I'll probably over fill one or two tubes and have lip balm all over the counter . . . When the stuff in the can is all melted, take the can out of the pot. It will be hot--use an oven mitt.The can cools off pretty quick, so then you can just grab it at the top and pour the liquid into the tubes.
I filled these to the top, but if you fill them a little less, you can come back and top it off before it hardens and get a flatter top.

As the lip balm hardens, it kind of sinks in the middle. If you want it all pretty and smooth on top, you'll need to top it off. It's best to do that by not filling it quite all the way the first time and then topping when it's not quite all cooled off. Your lip balm will also start to harden in the can as you're pouring. If it gets too hard, just put the can back in the pot of water and melt it again.

Once it is all cooled off, put your lids on your tubes and voila! Fancy schmancy lip balm! If you're real fancy, you can work up some kind of label for your tubes. I just don't bother with that, but if you made more than one variety at a time, you might want to label them somehow so you'd know what you were about to put on your lips . . .

Yea! Happy Lips! :)