Does any of you have any ideas about how I can make my own face cream and shampoo? I'm realising more and more that ingredients in these products are very harmful and would like to learn how to make my own from natural plant materials and water if possible. I don't really want to resort to using stuffs that I'm not able to obtain in the UK since I'd like to be able to source them for myself from nature.

I read - may even have been on here - that a good alternative to shampoo is raw egg! One for short hair and two for long, plus an optional drop of olive oil for conditioner. You just whisk the egg/s as if you were making scrambled egg, and then knead into your hair just as you would shampoo.

I have to say though, on the one occasion I tried it, I was not overly impressed with the results... Still, maybe you need to stick with it for a while to see results.

I have also read that coconut oil is good for the face.

Oh yes! I saw a video or two a while back. One of them used eggs with alcohol and one more ingredient (i can't remember what it was now?) the other used bicarbonate of soda and, I think, it was lemon juice. Amazing

And of course there is the idea if you stop using any product on your hair at all, and just rinse it with water, it will eventually stop over-producing oils to protect itself, and soon you will have shiny, lustrous, healthy hair all the time, just using water!

What if you like to dye it though? Is there a natural blonde dye? OR shall I have to revert to my rather dull brindle brown and grey?

Legend has it that if you squeeze fresh lemons all over your hair and go out in the sun, it will go several shades lighter Even if you do dye it, though, I don't see why the water-rinse thing wouldn't work eventually. It would just be "back to square one" every time you re-dyed it.

Oh yes! lemons could be well worth trying!

As for face creams, you just want to keep it as clean and natural as possible. You should try cold-pressed organic shea butter, coconut oil and jojoba oil, mix them all together (will need heating gently in a double boiler no melt the 1st two) and pour into a glass airtight jar to cool. If you want to firm up skin as well, you can add MSM powder to help the body produce more elastin. ^_^

a dry shampoo would be amazing. i love that stuff. i actually found a recipe for that somewhere. i'll look for it and post it here.