It’s the cold month of January, your new year resolution is fresh, so you’re extra motivated, you’ve pushed yourself to the limit at the gym, but now your muscles are sore and in pain.
The chill weather has made your skin dry like old sandpaper. The things you did for self-care feel like self-destruction now. Scary, right?
If your craving for relief is only increasing, and you’re wondering what it would take to soothe sore muscles, we have the best solution for you – DIY massage lotion bars.
These bars are made using cocoa butter and shea butter, providing significant relief from muscle soreness with the help of adzuki beans. In addition, these lotion bars provide a soothing warm minty sensation due to a combination of peppermint essential oil and cinnamon leaf used in making it.
This article will give you a tutorial on making a massage bar at home all by yourself.
Note: If you’re sensitive or allergic to any of the ingredients we suggest in our DIY massage bar recipe, you can substitute it with any other component.
For example, Shea butter can be swapped with Sal Butter. You can use mango butter instead of cocoa butter. Also, you can use ginger essential oil if you find the scent of cinnamon leaf oil irritating.
Contents
Key Ingredients Required to Make DIY Massage Bars
- Adzuki Beans – (Red beans at the back of a massage bar that enhance the massage experience)
- 3.5 oz. Shea Butter or Sal Butter
- 1 oz. Cocoa Butter or Mango Butter
- 55 drops of cinnamon leaf essential oil/ chili seed essential oil/ fresh ginger essential oil
- 40 drops of peppermint essential oil
- Glass bowl
- Measuring cup
- Stirring spoon or wooden stir stick
- Silicone Molds (Do not use cupcake pans)
- Tin storage container
Instructions
Step 1 – Put Adzuki Beans into the Silicone Mold
Try to keep the beans in one layer when adding them to the bottom of the silicone mold. Two layers make it difficult for the oil to bind, resulting in easy breakage. Use a digital scale to weigh out adzuki beans and other ingredients.
Step 2 – Add Cocoa Butter and Shea Butter into a Bowl or Cup
Add 1.5 cups of cocoa butter and 1/3 cup of shea butter into a heat-safe glass bowl or measuring cup. We will suggest the use of the double boiler method to melt the kinds of butter. This method involves putting the glass bowl over a pot of boiling water.
Microwaving is strictly prohibited as these oils are susceptible and may start a fire. The double boiler methods facilitate gradual and gentle melting of the oils.
Throughout the melting process, keep stirring the butter mixture periodically.
Step 3 – Remove the Butters from Heat
Heat the butter until melted, and then remove it. Let it cool down for a few minutes, but keep a check as it shouldn’t solidify again.
Once the oil mixture starts to look cloudy, measure the essential oils mentioned in the ingredients above (2 tbsp of jojoba oil, 40 drops, and 55 drops of Cinnamon leaf oil and Peppermint oil, respectively) using transfer pipettes. Add essential oils to the butter mixture.
Fun Fact: Cinnamon leaf oil is highly effective in calming dry skin, curing muscle aches and pain, useful in skin nourishment, slowing aging visibility, and making the skin look healthier. It also cures rashes, acne, and other skin problems.
On the other hand, peppermint essential oil also has numerous benefits. It helps to relieve back pain, cold, cough, and mental fatigue. It also boosts blood circulation, soothes muscle soreness, prevents cramps, and relieves itchy skin.
Step 4 – Slowly Pour the Butter Mixture Over Adzuki Beans
Gently pour the cloudy mix over the beans in a way that they do not move too much. You can use the wooden stick to slowly pour the mixture and set the beans. Fill the mold up to 70% of the container.
If this process gets too complicated for you, you can also use a Silicone Soap Mold. Then, all you have to do is sprinkle the adzuki beans on top of the mixture in the two mold cavities.
Step 5 – Freeze the Compounds
The next step involves waiting for the massage bar to solidify. Although it is not mandatory to solidify the bars by putting them in a fridge, freezing them indeed fastens the process.
You can also let it cool naturally. 1-2 hours of waiting time are sufficient if refrigerating.
Step 6 – Use Metal Tins
These massage bars with big round beads have a really low melting point, so we suggest that you store them in a cool, dry place.
A tin storage container is perfect for storing massage lotion bars. However, it would be best to keep the container in a temperature-controlled place away from heat or direct sunlight.
A Massage Lotion Bar’s Hardness
You should be aware of the hardness of different kinds of butter while making a massage bar at home. This is because every butter does not have the same type of density, thickness, or hardness.
Cocoa butter is generally very hard. So if you plan to make a massage bar just out of cocoa butter, then the result will be a very hard massage bar. This is why we add oils and shea butter along with cocoa butter to soften the end product.
However, if a softer butter is used in higher quantity, the DIY massage bar will come too weak, leading to easy disintegration. Ideally, you should create the bar in such a way that it stays hard when stored and melts easily when it comes in contact with skin.
The best way to learn is through trial and error. The more you make massage bars, the better you’ll understand the proportion and the kinds of butter to be used. We suggest getting creative and experimenting until you get your desired end product.
Now you can make multiple massage bars and rub them on your sore muscles to get instant relief.
