Serena’s Enchanted Forest

For those of you who are new to the world of essential oils, I’ve decided to start a series of posts about essential oils, their benefit and uses. Beginning to use essential oils can be a somewhat overwhelming process, as there are so many to choose from, and so much information out there to try and sort through. I’m hoping this can make it a little bit easier to navigate the basics, and give you some recipes to try as you start on your journey.

Lesson 1: The importance of carrier oils

What are essential oils? Essentail oils are extremely concentrated plant extracts, which are harvested in a variety of ways depending on the plant. With the exception of lavender, most of these essential oils are so concentrated that they can do damage when directly applied to the skin. 

Let’s use peppermint as an example to help us get some perspective. One drop of pure peppermint oil would be the approximate equivalent of 25 – 75 cups of peppermint tea, depending on the potency of the tea. Yikes! That’s strong. You wouldn’t sit in a bathtub filled with 75 cups of peppermint tea, so you definitely don’t want to be putting the pure oil into your bath either.

The other thing to note is that essential oils aren’t exactly “oils” anyway. They have different properties. If you were to put some essential oil on paper it would evaporate, which won’t happen with true oils. 

This brings us to carrier oils. What is a carrier oil? Carrier oils are vegetable oils derived from the more fatty portion of a plant, such as the seeds, kernals or nuts. Some carrier oils include coconut oil, grapeseed oil, almond oil etc..

Using a carrier oil dilute’s the potency of the essential oil, ensuring that it doesn’t irritate your skin, and will will help to make sure the essential oil is absorbed rather than evaporated so that you can reap all the benefits. 

When making your own blend it is important to correctly calculate the percentage of carrier oil to essential oil. 

As a general rule you can follow the following:

 1% (for children, sensitive skin and facial skincare) or 2% (for healthy adults).

1% = 1 drop of essential oil per 5ml carrier oil. 2% = 2 drops essential oil per 5ml carrier oil.