Happy Monday friends! We’re enjoying our last day in St. Louis today, and sis and I fly home this evening. I’m hoping to have some photos to share with you later this week.
Today I wanted to share with you my love of essential oils. About a month or two ago a few of my blogging friends (hi Kelli and Caroline!) started posting about using Essential Oils in their daily lives. I’d used lavender and tea tree before, but that’s about it. I honestly was of the mindset that essential oils were for hippies. I was pretty clueless when it came to them and really, I didn’t think I, or my family, “needed” them. I have friends who use them for health and wellness in their kids mostly, and we are a pretty healthy family, so why spend this money for things we don’t need? Whoa. I was so wrong.
Kelli and Caroline’s posts were so enlightening! I didn’t know there were essential oils that could help with pain relief. Or essential oils that I could use in cleaning products. I started doing a little research and asking a lot of questions and a few weeks ago I took the plunge and ordered my first kit of oils.
And I love them. Like really love them.
I posted this photo on Instagram a few weeks ago and instantly got a ton of questions about essential oils.
Everything from what are they, to what do you do with them and how can I get my hands on some. And a lot of you sung your praises of essential oils as well!
For those unfamiliar with essential oils, they come from distilling or cold pressing a plant’s seed, bark, stem, flowers, etc. usually for the healing properties. Essential oils are much more effective than dried herbs and give you more immediate results. You can apply them topically, diffuse them, inhale and digest them.
Essential oils have been around since Biblical times. There are hundreds of references to them in the Bible (y’all have heard of Frankincense before right?), and they were primarily used for healing purposes.
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| This is the Ancient Scripture line of Young Living Essential Oils |
There is a difference between oils that you get from companies like Young Living, and the drug store. Usually the oils you buy at the drug store are either not 100% pure, or they have been made with plants that have been exposed to pesticides and/or other chemicals.
Why did I decide to start using essential oils?
There are a few reasons in particular that I decided to take the plunge with the oils:
* I had used a few before with some success. Especially lavender; it has really helped Little A sleep when she’s been restless.
* I heard great things about some of the essential oils that help support the skeletal system. I really wanted to try and see if these oils would work for myself and my dad.
* I’m tired of putting junk in my body! I want to use natural methods to keep our family happy and healthy, not something manufactured in a lab.
* I’ll try anything once. I figure it couldn’t hurt to give them a shot and see if they would work for us.
Why did I choose Young Living?
There was one major deciding factor for me: They own their own farms. That 100% sold me on Young Living. That, and the fact that their control process is so strong that only 20% of what is produced is good enough to be bottled and sold. That is what I call quality control! You know with Young Living you’re getting the best of the best. doTerra is another really great brand of essential oils that I researched, but in the end Young Living had more of what I was looking for in a company.
What have I used the essential oils for so far?
More things than I’d expect in the 2 weeks I’ve had them!
* I made my dad a cream to support his skeletal system using coconut oil and 3 essential oils and he said it actually works! I was so excited to hear that! Honestly, that’s probably the biggest win for me with the oils.
*** If you’re interested, I used a 1/4 cup coconut oil, 10 drops of PanAway, 10 drops of Valor and 10 drops of Peppermint.
* I’ve diffused Thieves to keep our immunity boosted and used lavender to help us wind down from the day.
* Peppermint is a favorite to support a healthy and happy mind.
And that’s just in the few weeks I’ve had the oils. Love them! I brought Stress Away (hello, I’m traveling by myself with a 2 year old!), Peace & Calming, lavender and peppermint on our trip. I’m hoping the Peace & Calming and lavender will help Little A sleep well.
These are the oils I got with my first kit, along with Stress Away (an oil I know I’ll use a lot of, ha!), a diffuser and a few other great products.
If y’all are interested, I’ll continue to post every so often about how I use the oils, what I’ve found works, and just share as much information as I can about essential oils with you. I’ve already learned so much that I want to share! And this is coming from someone who just a few months ago was really skeptical about essential oils (ask Kelli, she will attest to my skepticism.) 🙂
Question of the day: Do you use essential oils? What is your favorite oil? If you don’t use them, what questions do you have?
If you do have any questions and would rather email me than leave a comment, feel free to anytime at addingatouchofgrace{at}gmail.com.
Have a great Monday!
Love love love this post, obviously 🙂 I’m so glad that you decided to give them a try! I love that your family is so healthy already and that they can be used for the times you’re not feeling well and even cleaning. I love that you’ve used them for so many different things already! Same as Caroline for me, using peppermint for headaches has been HUGE for me…and my allergies of course. By the way, I’ve recently been adding Copaiba to my Lavender, Lemon, Peppermint veggie capsule for allergies and it’s AMAZING. Copaiba is my new favorite!!
I use essential oils all the time! I use them for my homemade cleaning products, for pain relief (peppermint and headaches – yes please), and I even use them in my own mosquito spray.
They are awesome.
Welcome to the EO club!
xoxo
Oh Tiffany, you know I LOVE this post! So glad to hear that you are loving them. I love rubbing peppermint on my temples too 🙂 So awesome all the various ways you have used them already!! Thanks for the shout out!
I found your blog through Kelli and I love it already! I was the exact same way about essential oils at first too…skeptical. I’m so thankful that my research also led me to Young Living essential oils. I am continually amazed at the positive impact that they’ve made on my family. They’ve helped us with allergies (allergy bomb), bug bites, headaches, anxiety, sleeplessness, nausea, muscle soreness, blemishes, candida, sunburn, burns, and I could go on and on! I also agree with Kelli above about loving Copaiba. I won’t be without it now! Welcome to the world of essential oils! I look forward to your posts about them. 🙂
Aw thanks so much for your sweet words Jen! I am so glad I decided to take this step and introduce my family to essential oils. I think my hubby still has his moments of skepticism, but knowing that peppermint helped a headache he had recently, I think he’s changing his tune a bit. 🙂
I can’t wait to start using them more in our lives! Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by and comment!
xoxo
Yes! So when I buy my kit I can ask you questions. I’ve been so wanting to get my hands on some. We don’t use medicine at all anymore and I know that essential oils are great for just about everything that you mentioned and more. I know they are a bit dangerous in pregnancy so I’m going to take my time learning a lot about them before I start using them during this time. Worst comes to worst, I will try to have them for my labor since I know they are soothing and by then bringing on labor wouldn’t be an issue. 🙂
You can ask me questions any time Brittnei! If you need help getting a kit and want to go through Young Living let me know.
There are some oils that are safe during pregnancy, so I would say yes, do your research. I can send you some information if you like as well. Just let me know! 🙂
I am a huge fan of EO, although I haven’t gone very far with them yet. I bought a few from doTerra that I really loved, and used for my entire family. I found this post so useful though, because I think the reason I never went further into it was because it just felt overwhelming with all the oils that are out there. Glad to hear your experience with them!