What says I’m thinking of you more than a homemade gift?
This year make homemade goats milk soap gift baskets. Use HartNana’s Goat’s Milk Soap Recipe – so easy and so forgiving that even a novice can have terrific results. Of course HartNana will be there with you to help you out if you have problems or questions.
You can make goats milk soap gift baskets. Here is one gift basket I made a while back for the holiday and/or a baby shower gift. All you need to find is a basket, some “extra” goodies, some homemade soap, and a little creativity.
If you are wanting to give homemade soap as a Christmas gift now is the time to be making it. This recipe only needs about three weeks to cure.
We also have a super simple recipe for Goat’s Milk Lotion – Make it the same day you plan to ship it, as there is no lead time necessary (that’s a plus for last minute gifts right?)
Make Goats Milk Soap For Gifts – Putting It All Together
You can always make the lotion and put it in a cute container and don’t forget to use your imagination for wrapping your soap! Gift baskets are popular and easy to put together too.
All it takes is a basket, some cellophane wrap (you can get at the dollar store), some tissue paper, your soap, a container of lotion, and maybe a loofah sponge, a candle and a relaxing CD. Put it all in your basket after arranging the tissue paper, then wrap the whole thing in cellophane wrap and add a big bow.
Here is a video to give you an idea about how to put it all together.
There you go super simple, super personal and quite frankly – lots of fun!!
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Goat Milk Soap Gift Baskets For Extra Holiday Cash
The gift basket featured above I made for a craft fair. In fact I made a bunch of them. You can do it too! Find interesting baskets (or dig through your stores), add your homemade soap – because truly that is the gift – then add a few odds n ends. Coffee, wine, candles, chocolate, tea, cookies all make great additions. And don’t forget the huge bow.
Making any type of herbal oil is a simple process of infusing the herb into a good quality oil that will allow absorption into the skin. I prefer Almond and Coconut oils for making ointments, oils and lotions. You could add the Comfrey infused almond oil to this goat’s milk lotion recipe. You will get a super wonderfully healing lotion! Don’t use this everyday though, as there are chemicals in Comfrey that can cause liver problems if used long term even topically.
To make Comfrey oil you will need both almond oil and Comfrey leaves that are dried. I like to grow Comfrey as it requires so little effort. It also comes back from year to year without me having to do much.
Harvesting Comfrey Leaves
Each fall I harvest the Comfrey leaves and dry them on a clothes drying rack. Clothes drying racks are an awesome way to dry your herbs and greens.
(This is dill in the picture, I still had some wrapped up from last fall)
Gather the stems together in little bunches. Next rubber band them then use little pieces of wire like come with garbage bags or bread wrappers. I save mine in an old plastic bottle. Then thread the wire wrapper through the rubber band then attach the wire to the clothes rack. Sometimes I even put a bit of chicken wire between the racks so I can dry even more on one rack. This works well for drying peppers too.
Back to how to make comfrey oil. Take your Comfrey leaves crumble them up. Next rub them a bit to release their natural oils. Figure about 1/4 cup Comfrey leaves crumbled to one pint of almond oil. Heat the mixture up until it is warm and let it sit while warm for several hours.
Make Comfrey Oil With a Crock Pot
A good way to do this is in a crock pot on the low setting. Place a wet dish towel in the crock pot first. Then add your pints of almond oil/comfrey on top of the towel. Next fill the crock pot about half way up the jars then let it sit at low heat for about eight to twelve hours. I like to start mine in the evening and then they are ready in the morning.
Make Comfrey Oil in Your Oven
You can also make your Comfrey oil in your oven. Heat the oven up to 200 degrees then turn it off. Put your Comfrey oil in a roasting pan or a pot. If you’re only doing one jar, that has hot, but not boiling water in it, fill them about half way up the jar. Leave these in the oven for 8 to 12 hours replacing the water and reheating the oven once or twice during the process. This method doesn’t work so well at night as you need to do more with it. And, hey, who likes to wake up in the middle of the night to be “fiddling” with stuff?
I’m all about easy, fast and efficient in my world so the crock pot method works well for me.
After eight to twelve hours of infusing the Comfrey leaves you will need to strain them out of the oil. This is best accomplished by straining the oil/leaf mixture through cheese cloth. A neckerchief, or a piece of thin, clean cotton like muslin also work. Be sure to squeeze all of the oil out of the Comfrey leaves. Then label your Comfrey Oil. It is best stored in a cool dark place.
What are the Comfrey Leaf Benefits?
Comfrey leaves and roots have been used for centuries for heal bruises, bones and contusions. It is thought, by the medical community, that ingesting Comfrey leaves in the form of Comfrey tea can have detrimental affects on your liver. But using it in a topical application has been shown time and again to really work to speed up the healing process.
In 2016 I broke my ankle falling down the basement stairs. I used comfrey as a compress and was amazed at how quickly I healed. The bones was better in 3 weeks instead of 4!
Comfrey (Symphytum officinale) is sometimes used on the skin to treat wounds and reduce inflammation from sprains and broken bones. Comfrey roots and leaves contain allantoin, a substance that helps new skin cells grow, along with other substances that reduce inflammation and keep skin healthy. Comfrey ointments have been used to heal bruises as well as pulled muscles and ligaments, fractures, sprains, strains, and osteoarthritis.
Around here we like to either use Comfrey leaves crumbled, rubbed a bit and then put in a clean sock. Next we apply boiling water to the sock. You can dip it into a cup with boiling water in it. Then once the sock has cooled to warm (do not apply the boiling hot sock to your skin it will hurt and could burn you) apply the sock/Comfrey leaf poultice to your injured area. Use an ace bandage to hold it in place.
Comfrey the Natural Remedy for carpel tunnel
This works as a carpel tunnel natural remedy. It also works for tennis elbow, or runners knee, shin splints or even back pain.
Use this in addition to the Comfrey oil you should notice significant relief fairly quickly. A trick for applying essential oils. Put it on the soles of your feet at night with socks to protect your bedding. By morning you will find that the medicinal properties of what ever you put on your feet have traveled to where the ingredients were needed most!
The next time you have a cold, instead of applying the herbal ointment to your chest, put it on your feet. See if the results don’t blow you away by how well this works.
If you don’t want to make your own comfrey oil you can buy it here and if you’d like to grow Comfrey and make your own oil, check out these deals on Comfrey seeds. Comfrey grows like a weed – a very special weed indeed.
This Goat milk lotion recipe is so good for you because goat’s milk itself has healing properties! This is my own recipe that I love though some find it a tad bit oily until the coconut and almond oil soak into your skin.
Because as we all know, I’m not a patient or particularly detail oriented person, these ingredients go together smoothly. This is also a pretty thick lotion and could be used as a goat milk body butter recipe.
Goat Milk Lotion Recipe
2 oz bees wax/emulsifying wax (I have found that emulsifying wax works better than bees wax) 1/2 oz cocoa butter
1 1/2 oz palm kernel oil 8 oz coconut oil 8 tbs almond oil
1 cup goats milk
Add 1 1/2 cup distilled water
1 tbs Germaben II
Mix the first five ingredients in a glass bowl, micro wave or heat over the stove till melted, whisk in the water and goat’s milk until the whole emulsion cools. I like to mix this together over an ice bath with a whisk. Don’t forget to add the Germaben II once it has become lotion. Store in glass jar in fridge. If the lotion is too thick you can add more water to thin it out. I’ve also had success with re heating the lotion and mixing again to get it to stay emulsified, even adding more emulsifying wax if the lotion starts to separate.
One thing I always have to remind myself of when I first mix the oils and liquids together, is that the milk is not curdling, it is becoming lotion as it has kind of a strange look in the beginning. Keep mixing, it will turn to lotion.
Now for some alternatives to using this Goat Milk Lotion Recipe
So there you are, standing like Indiana Jones …
In a cave full of choices – I mean the grocery aisle – as you reach out for the lotion “made with natural ingredients” on the left. Sucking in your breath, you flip the label.
Water. So far, so good.
Sweet almond oil. You exhale cautiously.
MommyPotamus is funny and has a great video for making moisturizing lotion with just a handful of ingredients.
If these two recipes aren’t enough to satisfy your lotion making needs – here are 18 more easy homemade lotion recipes.
Let’s watch as this gal makes lotion on you tube.
Why The Ingredients in This Goat Milk Lotion Recipe Are Good For Your Skin
Raw goat’s milk does so many amazing things for your skin that you can discover over here on in this article about why use goats milk soap, What this article talks about in regards to goat milk in soaps is not just true for goats milk soaps, but for this goat milk lotion recipe too.
In addition to the goat milk, the almond oil is an excellent emollient and helps skin retain moisture. It makes your skin smooth and young looking and is a good oil for combating irritated skin.
Help prevent premature aging of your skin, it is a moisturizer and helps with various skin problems like eczema and psoriasis.
What Else Helps?
Cocoa butter – long touted for it’s ability to fade stretch marks (don’t most of us moms remember lathering it on our big bellies toward the end of pregnancy?), also has properties that remove free radicals in your skin. It penetrates deep into the skin so is extra moisturizing and also contains vitamin E which fades scars.
All in all this lotion should make you feel special not only because you made it yourself, but because it is good for you.
If you don’t have the ability to accumulate all of these skin loving ingredients, you can always just order your moisturizing lotion from HartNana.com
You can find all of the ingredients you need to create your own lotion here
What a great experience we had last night making goats milk lotion with the 4H gals here in town. Such a fun group of young girls who love and adore goats and making stuff out of goats milk.
We haven’t had any goat stuff going on at the Franklin Country Fair in many years (maybe never) because Cache Valley is primarily a Dairy Producing community. I used to wonder about the production of milk and cheese then I moved here. Wow, there are dairies every where!
When I first got my goats, Marsha and Fadra, I didn’t know that much about goats or anyone who actually had goats. I relied heavily on the internet to answer all of my questions, especially when it came time for the babies to be born. Man, I was a wreck. Not only had I not had that much experience with birth in general, well except for having my own five children, but I really didn’t know that much about goats!
I remember going out to the goat shed in the wee hours of the morning in March (a day or so before Easter that year), it was cool and damp out, but not incredible cold as it has been some years when goat birthing happened. Seeing the 3 babies, Faith, Grace and Billy; it was the most wonder gift I had ever experienced. Brings tears to my eyes just remembering that morning, it was magical. Fadra actually had 4 babies that night, one of them was born dead. That was my first experience with goats and birthing.
Fadra went on to have problems often giving birth, I think because she usually had 3 or 4 babies at a time. Over the years I have learned to deal with her quirky birthing process. She died last year. It was a pretty sad day for me.
We are going to go see spider goats in a couple weeks! Apparently the University has injected some goats with spider DNA so that they can spin silk from the goat milk. We will have more details once we investigate and will be sharing the whole experience with you! Until then enjoy your goat’s milk soap making experiences this summer while there is an abundance of goat’s milk to be had, everywhere, it seems to me.
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Several people have asked about testing Goat Milk Lotion to make sure that it is safe so I thought I’d address the requirements according to the FDA and give you all some options to ensure the safety of your products. At the end you will find a link to a home version of the goat milk lotion microbial test kit for your personal use.
The Federal Drug Administration considers a cosmetic by this definition:
“articles intended to be rubbed, poured, sprinkled, or sprayed on, introduced into, or otherwise applied to the human body…for cleansing, beautifying, promoting attractiveness, or altering the appearance” [FD&C Act, sec. 201(i)]. This applies to any product that is used as perfume, lipstick, fingernail polish, skin moisturizers, shampoo, permanent wave solution, hair color solution, tooth paste, deodorants and any other products used in the making of a cosmetic product.While the FDA does not provide testing they do require that you create your products safely and it is your responsibility to ensure that your product is safe for use. Any lab tests would be your responsibility.You are legally responsible for creating safe cosmetics and the only way to be certain that your lotions that you created from scratch meets these safety requirements is to have them challenge tested by a lab.
A lab challenge test is performed by a trained professional. The cosmetics are tested for adequacy of preservation against microbial contamination which could occur under the reasonably use by a consumer. The product does not have to be sterile, but they must not contain pathogens and the amount of non pathogenic material must be low.
Here are listings for several labs that will perform this test for you.
You can also purchase a microbial test kit if you are wanting to be more confident about the composition of your products.
This home use Microbial test kit will give you a good idea what the bacterial colonies, yeast colonies and fungal colonies are like in any of your goat milk lotion creations.
Bacteria colonies: 100, 1000, 10’000, 100’000, 1 million, and 10 millions – Microbial Test Kit Results
Microbial Test Kit Results: Fungi colonies: slight, moderate, and heavy
Yeast colonies:Microbial Test Kit Results: 100, 1000, 10’000, 100’000, and 1 million
Having had my goat milk tested by the local agriculture inspector, I have come to realize how crucial it is get your milk cold fast – even milking into sterile jars immersed in ice with salt sprinkled on it. (salt sprinkled on the ice). Bacteria grows fast, especially in warm conditions. Keep this in mind while you are creating your goat milk lotions, getting your lotion cold quickly after you have created it will keep the growth of bacterial, yeast and fungi down to a minimum. We covered the use of preservatives over in our article: Preservatives in Lotion and Why You Must Use Them
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