How is this healthy again?

There is a recipe currently going around Pinterest. I've seen it repinned at least 10 times now and every time I see it I think to myself: Is that really "healthy"? This is it. The pin says "When you need a healthy sweet: So good. Just five ingredients- coconut oil, cocoa powder, almond/peanut butter, honey, vanilla.

I'm trying to lose weight and I like chocolate so a healthy chocolate SOUNDS great. But when I read the recipe it didn't really sound all that healthy. In fact, it didn't sound healthy at all. Coconut oil (fat), cocoa powder (ok, I guess), almond butter (fat and a little protein), honey (sugar) and vanilla (flavor). So.... fat, sugar and flavor. Then I thought, well is it better for me than a Reese's Cup because I love a Reese's Cup for a treat sometimes. So I entered the recipe into my favorite recipe site (www.food.com) because they calculate the nutrition facts from the recipe. Here are the nutrition facts for this recipe.

Calories 210.5
  Calories from Fat 168  
Total Fat 18.7 g                  28%
  Saturated Fat 10.3 g          51%
Cholesterol 0.0 mg               0%
Sodium 29.3 mg                   1%
Total Carbohydrate 12.0 g   4%
Dietary Fiber 2.7 g              11%
Sugars 7.6 g                        30%
Protein 3.6 g                        

Compare that to the nutrition facts for a Reese's Cup.

Calories 80
  Calories from Fat 45
Total Fat 5.0g                             8%
 Saturated Fat 2.0g                  10%
 Trans Fat 0.2g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.8g
Monounsaturated Fat 2.0g
Cholesterol 5mg                        2%
Sodium 55mg                            2%
Total Carbohydrates 9.0g         3%
  Dietary Fiber 1.0g                   4%
  Sugars 8.0g
Protein 2.0g

So the healthy chocolate has 2.5X the calories and nearly 4X the fat (including 50% of the daily allowance of saturated fat) of the Reese's Cup? I'm not a dietitian or even really in to health and fitness but this one seems 100% bogus to me!

Skin Care: Anti-Aging Products

Wrinkles and aging skin are a fact of life. There are many things that contribute to aging skin:

1. Sun Damage: Like it or not, repeated exposure to UVA & UVB rays whether from the sun or a tanning bed dramatically speeds up the aging process of the skin. UVA rays penetrate more deeply than UVB rays. UVA is responsible for destruction of collagen and elastin and when they are destroyed, your skin gets saggy and wrinkled. UVB rays are primarily responsible for sunburns. Unless your sunscreen product say "Broad Spectrum coverage, it will only block UVB rays not UVA. Make sure you are blocking both.
2. Genetics: People with darker skin tones are less susceptible to wrinkles caused by sun damage.
3. Hormones: Women who have gone through menopause frequently begin to notice thinning and more saggy skin due to the hormonal changes. 
4. Getting Old: Gravity is a bitch. Every year you are on this earth gravity pulls down on your skin and stretches it more.
5. Muscle Movement: The muscles you use the most, be it smiling, frowning or squinting into the sun, wrinkle the fastest and the deepest. 

This is certainly not an exhaustive list but these are some of the major causes of aging. Now I'm going to tell you the bad news

There isn't a miracle vitamin, plant extract, or any other ingredient anywhere in the world that can change one wrinkle on your face. Stop looking for one ingredient that does it all, because that just leads to disappointment. There are thousands of anti-wrinkle products available around the world with claims that are either misleading or just plain false about what they can do for your skin.

So now that we have that out of the way- what can we do to care for aging skin?

1. Wear broad spectrum sunscreen every day before going in the daylight. EVERY day, not just in the summer, or on days you're at the amusement park, 365 days a year. Sun has been proved to be a huge contributing factor to aging and an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
2. Exfoliate! Removing the thickened outer layer of skin can increase collagen production and help your skin form a better structure. You don't have to exfoliate with a scrub (indeed many commercially available products have particles that are too large or too hard to do anything other that tear at your skin). You can also exfoliate with AHA (alpha hydroxy acids like glycolic acid or lactic acid) and BHA (beta-hydroxy acids like salicylic acid). As I discussed in my post about acne, any product using AHAs or BHAs to exfoliate your skin must have a pH between 3 and 4. Anything outside this range is either too irritating or simply won't work. 
3. Retin-A, Renova, Avita and Tazorac are prescription topical products to improve sun damaged or wrinkled skin. These products are cell-communicating ingredients. They can "talk" to your skin and tell it what to do. Niacinamide (Vitamin B3 or nicotinioic acid) is a great non prescription cell communicating ingredient. It increases the level of cerimide in the skin which helps regulate water loss and stimulates microcirculation in the dermis. Some other cell communicating ingredients to look for include: milk thistle, Filipendula glaberrima (Nakai root extract), retinyl palmitate, retinol, peptides, and phospholipids. Using cell communicating ingredients in skin care is in it's infancy. This area of research is sure to expand in the coming years. 
4. Maintain your skin's barrier. Think of the barrier as the mortar in between the bricks. Technically known as the extracellular matrix, the skin's barrier helps to keep your skin soft, smooth, moist and of course keep the bad stuff out. When the barrier is damaged, you get rough, dry and dehydrated looking skin. Maintaining the barrier can be done in several ways. Don't use water that is too hot or cold. Don't using products that contain irritating ingredients. Your skin should NEVER burn or tingle when using a skin care product. It doesn't mean it's working- it means it's irritating your skin. Avoid unprotected sun exposure (I know, I'm beating a dead horse here but it really is important). Some important skin-repairing ingredients to look for include ceramides, lecithin, glycerin, polysaccharides, hyaluronic acid, sodium hyaluronate, sodium PCA, amino acids, cholesterol, glycerol, phospholipids, glycosphingolipids, glycosaminoglycans, glycerides, and fatty acids.
5. Use antioxidants. This is a broad statement that covers a vast amount of ingredients. Antioxidants reduce inflammation, repair DNA damage, restore the skin's surface barrier, help defend against environmental stress, allow skin to build more collagen, and improve skin's ability to heal.

The price of the product means nothing. Good and bad skin care products come in all price ranges. Look at the ingredients. Compare it to the things that are needed to maintain healthy skin. Maintaining healthy skin is the only way to prevent and reduce the appearance of wrinkles. 

There is no one BEST ingredient. There are a lot of great ones but don't buy a product because of it's claims, buy it because it's a well formulated product that will make you look and feel great.

Skin Care: Acne Prone Skin

Acne care is a topic near and dear to my heart. As a teenager, I had relatively little acne. I started having more and more problems with acne as I got older. It was only recently that I realized my problems are entirely hormonal, a side effect of my PCOS and there is very little I can do to stop my skin from being oily and breaking out nearly every day. That doesn't stop me from trying to control my skin though. Since about 2008, I've tried just about every expensive and inexpensive option for acne control including ProActiv, Neutrogena Skin ID, hundreds of drugstore options and since starting with Bonne Bell, many iterations of my own creations with the "latest and greatest" from raw material suppliers. Through it all I have gained a lot of insight into what acne prone skin needs, and what it doesn't.

The most important thing to remember about acne prone skin is to avoid irritation. Irritation leads to more breakouts and slower healing. Unfortunately, many of the things that are commonly associated with skin care for acne prone skin are actually irritants and only make acne worse. One of the biggest is alcohol. You will see this in astringents, spot treatments, even face washes. Alcohol is way too drying for everyone's skin, even the most oily. Alcohol is actually counterproductive to oily skin because it over dries the skin and actually increases oil production. It's truly a relic from when it was thought that the best way to get rid of a zit was to dry it out as quickly as possible. Alcohol has no place in skin care products.

Other irritants commonly used in acne products are menthol/ peppermint extracts because they give a cooling sensation that many people believe means it's "working". There are many other fragrant botanicals that are irritants to skin as well. Witch hazel, eucalyptus, fennel, cinnamon, citruses and cloves are all too irritating for most skin types.

It's important to not over cleanse your face when you are trying to control acne. Wash your face twice a day (unless you are formulating a new skin care line and you are your own test subject, then wash your face 10 times a day and have your worst breakout in years). Wash your face with lukewarm water, not hot. Hot water is irritating to your skin and over time can lead to burst capillaries and splotchy redness on your face.

So now that I've covered all the things you SHOULDN'T use on your acne prone skin, what should you use? Basically for a face wash you want something gentle and mild that cleans off excess dirt, oil and makeup and doesn't irritate your skin. You will commonly find face washes with salicylic acid but really, salicylic acid in a face wash is a waste. Salicylic acid is a chemical exfoliant. It is known as a beta hydoxy acid or BHA. It works by sloughing off dead skin cells and clearing out dirt from your pores. However it only works if it stays on your skin. A face wash is on your skin for maybe a minute, tops. That is not nearly enough time for salicylic acid to do anything. So save that for later. Clean & Clear Foaming Facial Cleanser, Sensitive Skin is a gentle foaming face wash without irritating ingredients.

Now it's time for your BHA. Salicylic acid can only function as an exfoliant in the very narrow pH range of 3-4. If the product is outside of that range, it really won't be helpful at all. Unfortunately, unless you walk around with your pocket pH meter you have no idea if the chemist who formulated that product knew that or cared enough to bother to specify a pH for the product. Neutrogena Oil-Free Stress Control Acne treatment  is a well formulated product, in the correct pH range, with a good level of salicylic acid- 2%. Use your BHA product over your whole face, not just on your current zits. Like I said, salicylic acid exfoliates and clears dirt and oil out of your pores- thus preventing future breakouts when used over your whole face.

Basically that's all that you need to do to control most cases of acne. If your acne doesn't show signs of improvement with this type of treatment, talk to your doctor. It could be caused by hormones, in which case birth control pills have been shown to be very effective for controlling acne. Doctors can also prescribe antibiotics or topical steroids which are also effective at controlling more severe cases of acne.

Skin Care Myths: Propylene Glycol

Every one has something that just gets under their skin. For me, it's spreading myths and misinformation about harmless chemicals. Over the past couple of months I have been working on an all natural skin care line for my company. All natural cosmetics are not at all important to me, I'm much more concerned about making skin care products that don't contain irritating ingredients, have ingredients with proven research for their benefits and are well formulated products. However, natural is the buzz word, and I've got to earn my paycheck.

Ecocert guidelines prohibit the use of glycols because they are derived from petroleum. Well Bossman talked to a supplier who had an Ecocert approved Propylene Glycol and he ordered a sample of it. I should mention Bossman is not a chemist, he's a meteorologist  He started in QC, moved to R&D then to manager. His chemistry knowledge is fairly limited. So he handed me the literature for the Ecocert Propylene Glycol and I looked it over and found that the INCI was propanediol. Propylene Glycol exists as two stereoisomers.

1,2-propanediol:

1,3-propanediol:

The difference between the molecule is which carbon the second -OH group is bonded to. Standard propylene glycol is a raecemic mixture (equal parts) of the two isomers. The Ecocert propanediol is stereospecific to the 1,3-propanediol. Bossman and I got in to a big disagreement about this because he would not accept that the propanediol was not (for all intents and purposes) the same as the propylene glycol that we use every day. There are minor differences but they serve the same purpose and have essentially the same properties, especially for our products. So I did some research on exactly why customers felt we needed to avoid propylene glycol in cosmetics. I was truly surprised at what I found people saying about poor little propylene glycol.

This site claims the propylene glycol is  linked to cancer, developmental/ reproductive issues, allergies/ immunotoxicity, neurotoxicity and endocrine disruption. It has been found to provoke skin irritation and sensitization in humans as low as 2% concentration, while the industry review panel recommends cosmetics can contain up to 50% of the substance. It goes further and claims that it alters the structure of the skin by allowing chemicals to penetrate deep beneath it while increasing their ability to reach the blood stream. Even the EWG (which I should mention, I hate, because they are fear mongers) isn't that extreme. They only list propylene glycol as a 3 (moderate hazard) and claim that it is a skin sensitizer. Honestly it's just absurd. 

Propylene glycol is a humectant, which means it draws water to your skin, acting as a moisturizer. It also improves freeze/ thaw stability of finished products by preventing them from freezing as hard. It is classified by the FDA as GRAS (generally recognized as safe) for all food applications. Unlike it's cousin, ethylene glycol, propylene glycol is easily metabolized by the liver and it does not accumulate in the body over time. The acute oral toxicity of propylene glycol is very low, ingestion of large quantities in a very short period of time are required to achieve a toxic concentration in the blood. I could not imagine a situation in which a cosmetic formula would use 50% propylene glycol as the first website mentioned, it's usually used at around 2-3% in a finished lotion formula. Prolonged contact with propylene glycol is essentially non-irritating to the skin. Undiluted propylene glycol is minimally irritating to the eye, and can produce slight transient conjunctivitis (the eye recovers after the exposure is removed). Exposure to mists may cause eye irritation, as well as upper respiratory tract irritation. Inhalation of the propylene glycol vapors appears to present no significant hazard in ordinary applications. Both experimental and anecdotal evidence to date indicate propylene glycol to be completely non-carcinogenic. In a very interesting study, some rats were fed propylene glycol at amounts equal to 5% of all of their food intake every day for two years, which is a pretty huge volume over a large portion of their lifetime. There were no observable effects on their health or behavior. 

There is simply an overwhelming amount of evidence that indicates that propylene glycol is a perfectly safe ingredient for all food and cosmetic applications. The Agency for Toxic Substances and Diseases Registry issued this statement regarding propylene glycol. Unless you are one of the very few people with an allergy to propylene glycol, it's just not something to be concerned about. 

Skin Care Myths: Never Pop a Zit

I'm sure you've heard it before- never pop a pimple. Well I'm about to burst that little bubble. It's ok to pop a pimple if you do it correctly. If you do it incorrectly you risk scabs, increased healing time and permanent scars. However, done correctly, popping a pimple reduces inflammation, healing time and gets rid of the ugly white bump that is so hard to cover up. When you get a facial at a spa, the aesthetician will do extractions on clogged pores, which is what you want to do.

Before you start, make sure you are dealing with the correct type of blemish. Deep cystic acne cannot be popped safely without scarring. This method will work well on blackheads or white heads that are raised and inflamed. It's also easier to do when the zit is on a hard part of your face like the jawline, chin, forehead or nose area. It's more difficult to do correctly in the fleshy parts like your cheeks.

Here's how to correctly pop a pimple.
1) Buy a comedone extractor. This is what they look like:

 The loop end is what you are going to use to gently remove the pus from the clogged pore. You can use the needle end to gently pierce the top of the zit to make it easier to remove.

2) Wash and dry your face. It can be helpful to gently scrub with a wash cloth to remove dead skin cells on the surface. Don't use hot water- no need to inflame the pimple more than it already is.

3) Center the loop over the head of the pimple, press down gently and slide the loop over the pimple. Repeat if necessary but don't press down harder. You can also try piercing the top of the pimple with the needle and then try sliding the extractor over the pimple again. This should remove the pus.

Make sure to clean the extractor after each use (a quick wipe with rubbing alcohol should suffice). You don't want to spread the bacteria to a new place the next time you use it.

After you have extracted the zit, DO NOT pick at it. The point is to remove the pus and make the zit easier to cover up, not to create a scab. Scabs leave scars. Do not squeeze pimples with your fingers, this is what leads to damage in the lower layers of skin and leaves scars. It is also helpful at this point to apply your 2%  salicylic acid treatment gel to the treatment spot.

So there you have it. You can pop a pimple safely, just don't overdo it and don't pick at it afterwards. Good luck!

Skin Care Myths: Mineral Oil

Mineral Oil gets a bad rap. People claim that mineral oil is terrible for your skin, it coats it like plastic wrap, doesn't allow it to breathe, gives you cancer and worst of all it comes from petroleum. First of all, yes, it comes from petroleum but why is that so bad? Petroleum comes from the earth, that's pretty natural if you ask me. We get a hell of a lot of stuff from petroleum and most of it makes our lives better. Pure cosmetic grade mineral oil has no relationship to cancer. Mineral oil actually scores a 0 (out of 5) on the comedogenicity scale meaning it DOES NOT clog pores. It also scores a 0 (out of 5) on the irritancy scale. Compare this to a "natural" oil like coconut oil which scores a 4 for comedogenicity and a 1 for irritation. I'd much rather have a product made from mineral oil than from coconut oil. Mineral oil is an occlusive ingredient, meaning that it prevents trans epidermal water loss (TEWL in the biz). So basically, if you are preventing TEWL, you are moisturizing because you are keeping the moisture in your skin where it belongs. Mineral oil is cheap and it has an amazingly long shelf life compared to most other oils. It's a great solvent for removing makeup and it is a great emollient.

Probably the worst thing I can say about mineral oil in its pure form is that it feels greasy. However in a well formulated product, the greasiness will be mitigated by the other ingredients in the formula.

Skin Care Myths: If it's tingling, it's working

Last night, my husband spouted off one of the most common myths about skin care products. If a product is tingling or cooling, it means it's working. This truly couldn't be farther from the truth. Tingling/ cooling effects in washes, creams, balms etc come from menthol. Tingling is just your skin's response to irritation. Peppermint oil/ extract/ Menthol has antimicrobial properties but unfortunately is a known skin counter irritant. Counter-irritants are used to induce local inflammation for the purpose of relieving inflammation in deeper or adjacent tissues. In other words, they substitute one kind of inflammation for another, which is never good for skin. Irritation or inflammation, no matter what causes it or how it happens, impairs the skin’s immune and healing response. Although your skin may not show it or doesn't react in an irritated fashion, if you apply irritants to your skin the damage is still taking place and is ongoing, so it adds up over time. There is no good reason to put peppermint/ menthol in a skin care product. It's not helpful and it's damaging to your skin.

Homeopathy

"There's a sucker born every minute." - David Hannum

I'll admit it- I was one of those suckers.  This past winter, Makayla had a cold and cough. There was no reason to go to the doctor in my opinion, but she said her throat hurt when she coughed so I went to the drug store and looked for some cough medicine. Unfortunately everything there was for children over the age of 4-6 (she's 3). Everything except so called homeopathic remedies. I bought Hyland's Cough Syrup 4 Kids and gave it to her. She said it tasted good but she coughed for the rest of the day. I noticed no improvement in her symptoms until two days later when she gradually started getting better. Makayla does not get sick very often, in fact she's never been to the doctor for a sick visit. She gets two or three colds a year that clear up fairly quickly so I hardly ever have cause to think about medication for her.

Today I was perusing Science Based Medicine because I'm kind of obsessed with it at the moment and I love finding out about things I didn't know. So today I picked homeopathy to look into. I read it and said "Wow, I'm an idiot" because honestly I was completely ignorant of what homeopathy really is.

Homeopathy is the practice of treating "like with like". Basically the "premise" behind it is that you can cure illness by treating it with extremely dilute concentrations of what made you sick. For example, treating lead poisoning with an extremely dilute concentration of lead.  After I read that I knew that this whole thing was nothing but shenanigans. THEN I read HOW dilute. This is the process for creating a 6X HPUS homeopathic dilution:

1. Fill a 100mL container with the mother tincture
2. Dump it out
3. Fill the container with water
4. Shake it
5. Dump it out
6. Repeat 2 more times

The dilution of the "potentized" liquid will be 10^(-6) or  0.000001:1. Seriously, that is absurdly small. The irony of that is that this is a relatively strong dilution in the world of homeopathy. One of the most common nostrums is that of oscillococcinum. First off- oscillococcus don't exist. In the 1919 flu epidemic a physician who did not understand that artifacts on the slide, probably bubbles, move randomly due to Brownian motion.  Looking at the tissues of flu patients with a microscope, he  found what he thought was not only the cause of influenza, small cocci (round balls) that oscillated under the microscope.  He found these wiggling bubbles in all the tissues of all the ill people he examined and thought he discovered the true cause of all disease. He is the only person, before or since, to see these oscillating cocci. So to make oscillococcinum take the heart and liver of a duck and stick it in a bottle with pancreas goo and sugar. Wait for 40 days until it autolyzes into a goo. Then dump it out. Refill with water. Shake it. Repeat 200 times. 200 TIMES! The final dilution of this solution would be 10^(-400). That is a decimal point, 399 zeros and a 1. To put that in perspective there are about 10^80 molecules in the entire universe. So to find one molecule of duck goo in this solution you need to have 4 more universes to look in. This will cure the flu.

So let's look at a popular homeopathic remedy that I see advertised in my parenting magazines frequently. Hyland's Teething Tablets

The ingredients used in this product are:

• Calcarea Phosphorica 6X HPUS: teething, dentition
• Chamomilla 6X HPUS: irritability
• Coffea Cruda 6X HPUS: sleeplessness
• Belladonna 12X HPUS: redness and inflammation

in a base of Lactose (or sugar)

Calcarea Phosphorica is calcium phosphate
Chamomilla is chamomile
Coffea Cruda is unroasted coffee beans
Belladonna is Death Cherries or Deadly Nightshade

I'm going to go ahead and point out that obviously there are none of these in the actual product. But Belladonna is Deadly Nightshade- a POISONOUS plant. Eat it and you die. In a product for babies. Makes perfect sense. So basically these are sugar pills or placebos. So the only effect you could possibly get from them would be a placebo effect in which you have convinced yourself that it is working so it is.

What really pisses me off about these products is that they are sold as medicine, right next to the real medicine when they are anything but.

So to sum up- homeopathy is complete bullshit. The more you know...

Top 5 Most Misleading Cosmetic Claims- Part 5

Understanding "Helps" Claims

There are two categories recognized for cosmetics; cosmetics and drugs.

• Cosmetics- products intended to be applied to the human body for cleansing, beautifying, promoting attractiveness or altering the appearance.   
• Drugs- products intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment or prevention of disease in man. 

 A drug product is subject to registration, testing, labeling and packaging requirements that a cosmetic product is not. Since by definition a drug product is intended to treat something the claims that can be made on a drug product are substantially different than a cosmetic product. A drug product has an active ingredient that is recognized as a treatment for a disease or condition by FDA. For example, acne treatments. Here are the claims for Neutrogena Rapid Clear Acne Defense Face Lotion:

Contains maximum-strength acne-fighting medicine with botanical extracts to fight existing acne, help prevent future breakouts and leave skin feeling soft. This lightweight, daily lotion fights the multiple symptoms of acne. A powerful formula contains soothing natural botanicals to help prevent irritation, peeling or dryness. Powerful Salicylic Acid fights acne fast, penetrating deep into pores to unblock dirt and oil while sweeping away dead surface cells that can cause future breakouts.

The monograph for the active ingredient- salicylic acid- defines what you can say about the product. Salicylic acid is recognized as a treatment for acne and it functions by exfoliating the skin of dead skin cells which can block pores and cause acne. Botanical ingredients are not recognized as a treatment so any claim related to them must include the word helps.

Of course cosmetics companies want you to believe that a cosmetic (not drug) product is going to do something for you otherwise why would you buy it? So they couch their claims with words like "helps" and "reduces the appearance" and this is where it gets misleading. Here are the claims for Estee Lauder Time Zone Line and Wrinkle Reducing Creme:

Now you can take more than 10 years off the look of your skin in just 4 weeks and dramatically reduce the look of wrinkles. We can prove it. In fact, this anti-wrinkle moisturizer is so powerful, every single woman tested showed a reduction in the look of wrinkles.

That sounds great, right? If you read carefully, they only claim a reduction in the "look" of wrinkles not and actual measurable reduction in the number or depth/ length of wrinkles.

In 2005, Strivectin introduced their "better than BOTOX" stretch mark and wrinkle creams. These were cosmetic products but they were literally COVERED in claims. They claimed things like:

•  Decreased the actual length of striae (stretch marks)
•  Decreased the depth of indented surfaces
•  Actually reduce the size of saddle bag thighs
•  One problem area at a time, until you've literally melted the fat and molded your body into a more pleasing shape

And so on. It was ridiculous. No drug does the things that they claimed let alone a cosmetic. But it sold their product. Then the customers did not get the results that they claimed and they were understandable mad because these were not cheap lotions. FDA sent them a warning letter http://www.fda.gov/ICECI/EnforcementActions/WarningLetters/2005/ucm075254.htm and forced them to withdraw all of the false claims from the market. StriVectin reformulated (or repackaged I don't know for sure) but their claims are much more subdued now because they are just selling lotion and no mater what the package says- there are no miracle lotions.

Read the packaging carefully and critically. Don't be a sucker for a pretty package that says great things.  

Top 5 Most Misleading Cosmetic Claims- Part 4

HYPOALLERGENIC COSMETICS

When you see a product labeled as "hypoallergenic" you would think that this means that the product is less likely to cause allergic reactions than similar products without this designation. Unfortunately, you would be wrong. According to FDA there are no federal standards or regulations that apply to the term "hypoallergenic". The decision to use the term lies solely with the manufacturer and may be used without any proof that the product causes fewer allergic reactions than others.

Decades ago, a lot of harsh ingredients were used in cosmetics. Today, what can and can't be used in cosmetics is highly regulated so the ingredients available to a cosmetics company are limited and all the same. When using the term "hypoallergenic" became popular in 1975, FDA tried to regulate the use of the term, stating that a cosmetic product could be labeled "hypoallergenic" only if scientific studies on human subjects showed that it caused a significantly lower rate of adverse skin reactions than similar products not making such claims. However, this regulation was struck down by US courts and manufacturers were free to say "I DO WHAT I WANT!"

At my company, we do RIPT (Repeat Insult Patch Testing) on every product that we sell for our own peace of mind (and to protect the company from law suits). An outside testing company gets a collection of volunteers who have the product applied to their skin for a predetermined amount of time and then evaluated for skin reactions. Our products have never shown any adverse reactions but we still do not label our products hypoallergenic.

The bottom line here is that labeling a product hypoallergenic means nothing and the company is not obligated to perform any testing in order to use this label.

Top 5 Most Misleading Cosmetic Claims- Part 3

Cosmetics companies want you to believe that they have the answer to fine lines, wrinkles, sagging skin and stretch marks. Just put this cream on and the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles will be visibly reduced! Technically- that statement is true. If you moisturize your skin, the fine lines and wrinkles will plump up and they will appear to fill in. This does not mean that you will have any real reduction in wrinkles. It just means that if you use this product (and continue to use it) your wrinkles will look better.

Sadly, most consumers expect that a wrinkle cream will make their wrinkles fade away and disappear. Unfortunately there is no lotion, serum, cream, or oil that can reverse the effects of age and gravity on our bodies. The only thing that can do this is plastic surgery. A cream that says it will "help" tighten and tone your sagging skin may have and ingredient in it that tingles or feels tight so that you know its "working". Wrinkle serums frequently contain plumpers like pepper extracts which are really just irritant to your skin. They cause inflammation and swelling, or plumping. There is nothing that can penetrate the skin layers all the way down to the snapped elastin fibers and make them grow back together to heal your stretch marks. (I sure wish there were!!) The best any cream can do for you is have skin lightening ingredients to help the redness fade away- which time will eventually do by itself.

Women spend a lot of money on products that claim to be "Better than Botox!" but you should really just save that money for the real thing.

Top 5 Most Misleading Cosmetic Claims- Part 2

CHEMICAL IS NOT A DIRTY WORD!

Which brings us to Number 2 on my list of misleading cosmetic claims: Chemical-free.
First let me reiterate what I have said many times: everything in this world is a chemical, even you, even water. We are all just complicated combinations of chemicals. So that said- no cosmetics are chemical free. When you see this claim you should immediately dismiss the product- it's an outright lie.

Along the same lines as "chemical-free" products, products that have a "Free From:" and a long list of supposedly "bad" chemicals are almost as bad. A good example of a company that does this is Origins. www.origins.com Their "purity" statement says "Our products are formulated without parabens, phthalates, propylene glycol, mineral oil, PABA, petrolatum, paraffin, DEA and animal ingredients. Why is it so important to know all of the things that the are NOT putting in their products instead of telling you what they DO put in their products?
1) Ginger Extract- data shows taking ginger orally has anti-oxidant and anti-carcinogenic benefits. Applied topically- it's a major skin irritant.
2) Lemon (and all citrus) oils- classified as irritants and potentially phototoxic (cell death with light exposure)
3) Mint- irritant
I could go on and on with the number of irritating essential oils included in the Origins line. Their tagline is using all natural plant oils but not all plant oils are good for your skin! Many are downright bad for it! Besides all of this, after a lot of digging I found an ingredient statement for their Have A Nice Day Supercharged Moisture Sunscreen SPF15 and found that they did indeed use parabens! There is nothing wrong with parabens (they are a much vilified ingredient as I explained in a previous post) but Origins made a specific statement that they DO NOT use them.

I've also seen products that have a "free from" section a mile long with ingredients that would never be included in that type of product. For example, a facial moisturizer claiming to be free from Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS). What formulator in their right mind would put a detergent in a lotion?!

I think it is far more important to be aware of what is IN your products than what is not. I can make a preservative free product too. In another month you'll get the added ingredients of bacteria and mold! Enjoy smearing that on your face!

Top 5 Most Misleading Cosmetic Claims- Part 1

Let's talk about "All Natural" products.

First of all, there is no specific definition of what is required to label a product as "all natural". Any company can use this term on any product. It's a marketing tool- plain and simple. The company wants you to believe that this product is some how better for you that it's "non-natural" counterpart. It's not true.

Here is a good example of an "All Natural" product from Burt's Bees. This is the INCI ingredient statement from their Natural Acne Solutions Daily Moisturizing Lotion:

Active Ingredients: Salicylic Acid (1.0%), Other: Water, Helianthus Annuus Seed Oil (Sunflower), Glycerin, Stearic Acid, Sucrose Distearate, Salix Nigra Bark Extract (Willow), Sucrose Stearate, Cymbopogon Schoenanthus Extract (Lemongrass), Hamamelis Virginiana Water (Witch Hazel), Humulus Lupulus Extract (Hops), Equisetum Hiemale Leaf Extract (Horsetail), Hydrastis Canadensis Extract (Golden Seal), Epilobium Fleischeri Extract (Gravel Willow), Lecithin, Chrondrus Crispus Extract (Carrageenan), Fragrance, Glucose, Xanthan Gum, Sodium Borate, Sodium Chloride, Glucose Oxidase, Lactoperoxidase

Burt's Bee's will tell you that this is an all natural product because their salicylic acid is derived from white willow bark extract. Salicylic acid is salicylic acid- where it was "derived" from makes no difference. What about all of the other ingredients in this product? The product claims to be 100% Natural but I don't know how glycerin, fragrance, or stearic acid can be considered natural. While there is nothing harmful in this product, as an acne sufferer for my whole adult life, this would not be a product I would use to treat my face. It's main ingredient is Sunflower Oil. For oily skin? Why would I want to add more oil to my oil plagued skin? It also leaves a tacky, waxy feeling on the skin (due to the choice of emulsifiers). Finally the product is well above the pH range for the salicylic acid to function as an exfoillient. These are things that make my skin break out more.

By contrast here is the INCI Paula's Choice Skin Perfecting 2% BHA lotion:

Water, Methylpropanediol, Butylene Glycol, Polysorbate 20 , Salicylic Acid , Phytosphingosine , Hydroxyethylcellulose , Vitis Vinifera (Grape) Seed Extract , Camellia Sinensis (Green Tea) Flower/Leaf/Stem Extract Epilobium, Angustifolium (Willow Herb) Flower/Leaf/Stem Extract,  Bisabolol , Sodium Hydroxide , Tetrasodium EDTA

Paula's Choice does not claim that this product is all natural. It contains the same active ingredient, four naturally derived anti-irritants, two glycol solvents that aid penetration of the actives, a pH adjuster, an emulsifier, a plant derived thickener and preservative and a chelating agent. Nothing in here is bad for you in any way. This lotion is lightweight and absorbs quickly. It's formulated in the correct pH range for the salicylic acid to function as an exfoillient.

I have no aim to villainize Burt's Bee's or promote Paula's Choice. My mission here was to point out that an "all natural" claim:
1) Means nothing as there are no regulations on labeling something "all natural"
2) Natural does not mean good for your skin. Arsenic is natural. Lead is natural. Both of these were used in the Middle Ages and poisoned and killed many women.

Again I would like to point out that there are ZERO "chemical-free" products as EVERYTHING is a chemical, even water. Cosmetics and personal care companies are not looking to poison their customers. If we killed everyone who would buy our products?

Water Wipes- perhaps mold wipes would be a more appropriate name

Last night, I was harvesting my crops on FarmVille like always and I look to the right and there is this ad from WaterWipes USA. Basically their ad says 100% Chemical Free! As a chemist I was instantly annoyed.

The product is a baby wipe moistened with 99.9% water and 0.1% grapefruit seed extract. This is the link to their facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/WaterWipesUSA and their company website: http://www.dermah2o.com/ I was in a bit of a snarky mood so I went to their Facebook page and left a comment. "Dihydrogen Monoxide is still a chemical." These kind of claims always make me mad. EVERYTHING on this earth is made from chemicals. NOTHING is "chemical-free". Companies that make these claims are pandering to the ignorant and scientifically illiterate people who suffer from chemo-phobia.

Obviously I am a cosmetic/ personal care chemist, but I am also a mom. I had a natural, unmedicated birth but I would never even think of not having my child vaccinated. I breastfed but when I went back to work, Sarah gave her pumped milk in bottles made with BPA. I grow my own vegetables and can them myself too- but I use fertilizer and pesticides in my garden and on my fruit trees. Basically what I'm saying is this- look at the data, evaluate the source of the data and then determine whether you need to avoid chemical X or Y.

The biggest hype about this product is the worst of all- the fact that it is preservative free. The 0.1% GSE is SUPPOSED to be there as a preservative but as I have learned through research for work- GRAPEFRUIT SEED EXTRACT IS NOT A PRESERVATIVE!!! If you don't believe me look for yourself:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10399191
http://www.naturalingredient.org/Articles/Report0520.pdf

I'll summarize it here. There are no regulations for how GSE is manufactured. Most GSE has has been preserved by another preservative (i.e. parabens, benzethonium chloride, etc). When tested, the GSE samples in which no preservative can be detected show no anti microbial activity. In other words, if you leave a pack of these wipes open, and some mold spores float into the package, you will have created the perfect petri dish to grow that mold because there is NOTHING in here to prevent it. Since this product is for cleaning babies butts- a place where bacteria is plentiful- imagine if you were wiping up a big mess and some got on your fingers and you reached for another wipe. Now you have inoculated your package of wipes with fecal coloform bacteria- or E.Coli- where it will grow and multiply unchecked. Preservatives keep products from going rancid, and growing mold and bacteria. There is no data linking parabens to breast cancer or any other type of cancer. Check out the American Cancer Societies position on parabens: http://www.cancer.org/Cancer/CancerCauses/OtherCarcinogens/AtHome/antiperspirants-and-breast-cancer-risk basically, they say that there is really no connection between the two and that the study "linking" them was a poorly designed study.

If all of this isn't enough to convince you that this product is a terrible idea, the price for a pack of wipes is $4.99. $4.99 for a package of washcloths moistened with water. If you have a sensitive skinned baby, wet a washcloth in the sink and wipe your baby's butt with it. At least you can wash it out when you are done. There a lot of reasonable options for disposable baby wipes for babies with sensitive skin.
Pampers Sensitive Skin wipes do not have any alcohol, fragrance or dyes (the main contributors to skin sensitivity) but they are still well preserved.
Huggies Natural Care- fragrance free (all the same reasons as above)
BabyGanics Thick n Klean wipes a more expensive option but it does have an effective preservative, plus they claim a biodegradable status and have no parabens if you are still worried about that
Walgreens Comfort-Smooth Baby wipes with Aloe (unscented) almost the same product as BabyGanics except they make no claim about the biodegradability and they are half the price.

There are literally hundreds of valid options for gentle, disposable wipes that are also well preserved. I don't know about you but I would rather wipe my babys' butt with a well preserved wipe than mold. Hell, I would rather wipe her butt with just about anything besides these terrible wipes!

So, you want to make a sugar scrub.

Sugar or salt scrubs are one of the simplest things you can make for your skin. If you have dry skin, they are great for moisturizing. In my opinion, sugar and salt scrubs are too harsh for the skin on your face but can be wonderful for rough areas like your hands, feet, knees and elbows or to exfoliate your legs prior to shaving.

Making a sugar scrub is something you can easily do at home with ingredients from the kitchen. Really you only NEED two things- an oil and a sugar. Pour some oil in a bowl and add enough sugar until it gets to the consistency you like in a scrub.

Now, there are a lot of ways you can fuck this up and a lot of ways you can make it fancy. Here are some guidelines of stuff NOT to do when making your own sugar scrub.

1) Don't add anything that contains water or is water soluble. This includes any type of juice or extract (unless extracted in oil, unlikely to find in your house).
2) Don't add a bunch of sugar to hand soap and expect it to stay a scrub- the main ingredient in liquid soap is water!

The reasoning behind items 1 and 2 is that sugar and salt dissolve in water! It may start out a scrub but over time, the sugar or salt crystals WILL dissolve and you will be left with a very sugary or salty liquid! There is NO getting around this. A scrub with a water soluble scrubber (like salt or sugar) HAS to be anhydrous!

3) Don't add citrus oils or other irritating essential oils. The whole premise behind the anhydrous (without water) scrub is that you scrub loose any dead skin, etc and leave behind a nice moisturizing layer of oil. Citrus oils are phototoxic, meaning that when they are exposed to sunlight they kill your cells (resulting in a bleaching effect, which is why so many skin lightening products have citrus oils in them) but it's not healthy for your skin. So unless you're exfoliating your lady garden (or other areas that never see the light of day) leave the citrus oils out!

OK, now that I've covered what not to do, here's a few tips on what TO do!

1) Pick an oil that you love. There are literally hundreds of choices here. Some are substantially more expensive than others or significantly harder to get but if you have heard of it, it's out there. Some that are commonly available in grocery stores are: canola, corn, peanut, avocado, coconut, grapeseed, sunflower, olive and sesame. Personally, I like a lightweight oil so my choice would probably be grapeseed. If you have really dry skin you should pick something a little heavier like avocado, sunflower, olive, corn, canola or sesame (peanut if you don't have allergies). The only one that I would personally never use is coconut. Coconut oil is comedogenic, meaning it clogs pores and makes acne worse. I have acne issues, not just on my face but occasionally on my chest and body too- so I avoid coconut oil at all costs. If you don't have issues with acne go ahead and give it a try- it smells great!

2) Once you've picked your main carrier oil, consider purchasing a small amount of a more exotic oil or an oil soluble extract. Again the possibilities here are endless and the interweb is your friend.

Finally, if you want to get a little bit fancy, try making an emulsified scrub. All you need to make a sugar scrub into an emulsified sugar scrub is.... an emulsifier! :) Emulsifying wax (E-wax) is readily available from multiple suppliers on the internet. Emulsified scrubs are still anhydrous but when you are scrubbing your wet body part with it, it forms a microemulsion on your skin and feels like a lotion when you rinse it off. They are also easier to rinse off, don't feel as oily and don't leave a super slick, hazardous tub behind!
The recipe for an emulsified sugar scrub goes something like this:
10g E-Wax
90g oil of choice
Melt E-Wax in to oil in a double boiler
To this add as much sugar as necessary to create the desired level of scrubbiness (probably at least 100g)!

Also, since I've harped on this on my blog before, you actually do not NEED a preservative in this formula. Microorganisms need water and this doesn't have any. That said, dipping wet hands into a tub of sugar scrub CAN introduce bacteria and the water necessary, so a preservative wouldn't hurt. If you don't want to use a preservative, don't make a lot and store it in the fridge just in case. All oils do go rancid after a time, some faster than others. Keep this in mind when choosing your oils and if your scrub starts to smell funny- THROW IT OUT!

A well made sugar scrub is a quick and easy gift idea for any lucky person in your life. Just spoon it into an appropriate container and finish it off appropriately!

The REAL Facts about Sunscreens

There is a lot of nonsense out there about how sunscreen ingredients cause cancer. ALL OF THEM. This is simply not true. Here are some things I know for sure:

1) UVA rays cause cancer.
2) UVA rays cause premature aging of the skin including wrinkles and sagging by destroying the elastin and collagen in your skin.
3) UVB rays cause painful and serious burning of the skin.
4) A base tan does not protect your skin from UVA or UVB rays
5) Tanning in a tanning bed is as bad or worse than tanning in the sun.

Fortunately, we have these wonderful products that can prevent all of these from happening. They're called sunscreens. There are two types of sunscreen ingredients; chemical blockers and physical blockers. Now before you start raging about putting CHEMICALS on your skin, please refer to my post on why chemical free anything is a lie. Ok, so now that we have that out of the way- chemical sunscreens work by absorbing UVB and in some cases UVA rays. Physical sunscreens work by forming a physical shield that blocks both UVA and UVB rays. A good sunscreen will provide both UVA and UVB protection and it will say "Broad Spectrum" on the package. Sunscreens that claim an SPF value must be validated to perform to the stated level and are sold as a drug product. SPF (Sun Protection Factor) means that for an SPF 15 product you will be protected for 15X the amount of time you would burn in with no protection. So if you would burn in 10 minutes without sunscreen, you should reapply an SPF 15 product every 150 minutes. The problem with high SPF products is that, yes, an SPF 70 product will block the sun for 700 minutes (using our previous example) but ONLY if the product remains in a continuous film on the skin that long. Which, if you're working in the garden on a sunny day and sweating, chances are slim to none that your SPF 70 product will still be an effective coating after 11 hours in the sun. In my opinion, you're better off with an SPF 30 product applied more often.

So let's review all the different ingredients that could be in your sunscreen so you can make a wise and informed decision about which sunscreen to purchase. Some ingredients can have two names, one for when used in drug products (or products claiming SPF) and another for when they are included in the formula but no specific SPF is claimed.

UVB Blockers (also have some protection against UVA but are mainly for UVB)
1) Octinoxate (AKA Ethylhexyl Methoxycinnamate) A very common chemical blocker. A recent study concluded that octinoxate  and other chemical sunscreens do not penetrate the skin in sufficient concentration to cause any significant toxicity to the underlying human keratinocytes. It does have some effect as an endocrine disrupter in rats. While I would not actively avoid this ingredient based on this, I do think there are better choices.

2) Octocylene - this is an excellent option for blocking UVB rays. A small number of people do have a sensitivity to this ingredient. If you happen to be one of those who has a reaction (contact dermatitis) when using this ingredient, avoid it. Otherwise this would be my top choice for UVB.

3) Oxybenzone (AKA Benzophenone-3) As with octinoxate, oxybenzone was studied to see if it penetrated this skin in this study. It does not. Therefore, the myth that these chemicals are causing increased cases of melanoma is false. The FDA and governing agencies in Canada and the EU have approved the use of oxybenzone as a safe and effective sunscreen ingredient. The safety of oxybenzone has also been reviewed and confirmed by the Cosmetic Ingredient Review expert panel.

4) Padimate O Some preliminary studies indicated that padimate O was a phototoxic ingredient, meaning it caused cell damage or death with UV exposure (something that would be undesirable in an ingredient designed to protect you from the sun) however, multiple in vivo studies conducted in hairless mice following topical application of padimate O have demonstrated no carcinogenic effects and that padimate O reduces the number of and delays the appearance of UV-induced skin tumors.

UVA Blockers (also block some UVB)
1) Avobenzone (AKA Butyl Methoxydibenzoylmethane) absorbs all of the wavelengths of the UVA spectrum. It also degrades significantly in light, which is one of the reasons sunscreens need to be reapplied. It can be significantly stabilized by using it in combination with octocrylene or another photostabilizer. Avobenzone can also react with minerals like iron to form colored complexes that can stain.

2) Titanium Dioxide is a physical sunscreen. Most sunscreens that use titanium dioxide use nano-sized titanium dioxide because it scatters visible light less (meaning it doesn't look white, it looks clear) but it still provides UVA protection. There has been controversy over the nano-sized titanium dioxide products because as with the chemical sunscreens people are afraid that they are being absorbed by the skin and in to the blood stream where they are wreaking all kinds of havoc. As with the chemical sunscreens however, studies have show that this is not true. Titanium Dioxide is not absorbed at any significant level by the skin. As with nearly all ingredients, some people can be allergic to titanium dioxide.

3) Zinc Oxide also a physical sunscreen. It's thick, pasty and white unless nano-sized zinc oxide particles are used. Refer to the titanium dioxide discussion above.

Now for the specific points of the "controversy":
1) The absence of UVA filters combined with a longer exposure time of the sunscreen user causes more melanoma than a non sunscreen user.

• This one is easy- use a broad spectrum sunscreen. UVA rays are mostly responsible for the DNA damage that causes skin cancer. Make sure your sunscreen protects against both UVA and UVB. Recent changes to how sunscreen products are labeled ensure that only products that protect against UVA and UVB rays are labeled "Broad Spectrum" 

2)  By reducing the exposure of the skin to UVB radiation, sunscreen suppresses the skin's production of the natural photoprotectant, melanin, and the lack of melanin leads to an increased risk of melanoma. 

• This has been disproved multiple times. Getting a base tan (increasing the melanin in the skin) offers an increase in SPF of 4 or less. The larger issue is that any darkening of the skin indicates UV damage to the skin. So you're not helping yourself, you're hurting yourself.

3) Melanoma is caused by free radical generation by sunscreen chemicals that have penetrated into the skin. 

• As I have cited in this post, multiple studies have disproved the notion that any of these chemicals are absorbed in any significant amount deep enough to cause damage to the keratinocytes. 

4) Melanoma is caused by the pathogenic cytotoxicity and carcinogenicity of micronized titanium or zinc oxide nanoparticles. 

• Again, as I have cited in this post, multiple studies have confirmed that nano and micro sized titanium dioxide and zinc oxide do not penetrate into the skin in any significant amount to cause any health effects. 

5) Malignant melanoma has been found more frequently in sunscreen users compared to non-users in some studies. Other studies found fair skinned people used more sunscreen and had more skin cancer, but did not address cause and effect.

• This is a case of confusing correlation with causation. Several metanalyses have failed to demonstrate any causative relationship between sunscreen use and cancer rates. 

There can be only one conclusion in my mind. The sun causes cancer, sunscreen doesn't. Use sunscreen!

No, you can't make lotion from beeswax, olive oil and water.

I love Pinterest- I really do. I love to find things that I didn't know I needed and inspiration for things I want to do around the house and yard. I also love to get patterns for sewing, crochet and knitting. There are many great things pinned on pinterest. Recipes for making your own lotion from stuff in your kitchen are not among them. I have seen so many bad recipes. I would love to review them all but my sensitive skin would literally be on fire with some of the stuff I've seen. So in honor of my newest favorite blog, Pintester and her Pintester Movement, I'm writing a review of a homemade lotion using just three ingredients.

Making cosmetics (lotions, soaps, shampoos, face masks, etc.) is about more than mashing an avocado and an egg together and smearing it on your face. You can't make a wonderful lotion out of Crisco and water. And you cannot defy the laws of chemistry and physics just because you really want beeswax to be an emulsifier. I found this recipe on pinterest a few weeks ago. I knew from looking at the recipe that it would not work because I am a chemist and I do this all day. Beeswax is a wax- it has no emulsification properties. Emulsion is the act of bringing two disparate parts together in a stable way, in the case of lotions, oil and water. The emulsifier must have hydrophilic and lipophilic parts in order to create a stable mix. Most lotions made by homecrafters will use something called "ewax" or emulsifying wax because it is easy to use. Commercial lotions use the HLB system to create a blend of high HLB and low HLB values that will emulsify all of the various components of the oil phase. The HLB system is not an easy thing to learn in my opinion but once you know it, you can do it in your sleep. So anyway- even though I knew this wouldn't work I decided to make it in the lab anyway for demonstration purposes.

First- the recipe- converted to grams because it's a much more accurate way to measure things. Side note- weighing ingredients in baking results in much better baked goods as well.

My ingredients, I used distilled water, beeswax and olive oil.

I weighed the water into a beaker large enough for the full formula and put it on my stand mixer with my high shear dispersing blade. Also, it is important to note that the original blogger did not say to heat the water, so I did not. Normally, when creating an emulsion- you heat both parts (oil and water phase) to the same temperature (70C) and hold them there to kill any microorganisms present in the water. To create a stable emulsion, the phases must be the same temperature when they are combined.

I weighed the olive oil into another beaker, added the beeswax and let it melt in my steam table.

The recipe says to let the oil phase cool for two minutes- using a thermometer to measure the temp would have been much more valuable but whatever- two minutes it is.

Now we turn on the agitation and add the oil phase to the water phase.

This is not at all what an emulsified lotion looks like. An emulsified lotion is a smooth, white liquid. This is water, a lumpy, curdly layer of wax and oil floating on top. The recipe says that at this point you should spoon it into jars and give it to all your friends because it's amazing! Would you like some?

I went a little farther and turned my dispersing blade up as high as it would go and forced the wax into the blades. Basically after about 10 minutes I has a sort of whipped wax that if you squeezed, water would come out.

I put some on my hands and the wax coated my skin and the water beaded up on top. Exactly as I predicted- the "lotion" was not at all emulsified. This doesn't even cover the inherent problems with a recipe that uses unheated tap water and no preservative. This lotion would spoil and grow beasties in a matter of days. The original poster says that you can store it in the fridge- because there is nothing I like better than smearing ice cold wax on my skin.

I left it sitting over the weekend and this morning it was clearly in two layers again. I poured out the water for you to see.

Buy some lotion at the store or at the very least learn about how to make safe cosmetic products at home. There are things you can make at home that are safe and awesome, check out one of my other posts- So You Want To Make a Sugar Scrub? for ideas. Save your Crisco and olive oil for baking.