Welcome to the home of SwiftCraftyMonkey Formulating Inc.! Join Susan as she obsesses about cosmetic chemistry and other things (some possibly related to monkeys)! Here you’ll find over 5,000 posts and formulas written over the past 16 years for everything from lotions, creams, and body butters to hair care products to fancy facial products filled with actives and cosmeceuticals! Enjoy the site without distractions – no ads, pop ups, sponsored posts, affiliate links, “one weird tricks” – all supported by readers like you.
Our facial skin type is not always the same as our body skin type. I have oily-sensitive (rosacea)-non-pigmented-wrinkled skin on my face, but my body skin is fairly normal (except my back), fairly resistant, non-pigmented with some signs of aging. Take a look at the skin types again to see if your facial skin type...
I do love body wash, and I know I’ve already tweaked this recipe a thousand times, but let’s take a look at including white willow bark extract in our body wash! Why would we want to use it here? It works well for oily skin, acne prone skin, and aging skin to reveal new and...
Chrysanthemum extract (also known as feverfew, INCI: Chrysanthemum parthenium flower extract) is considered to be a good anti-inflammatory, astringent, analgesic, and anti-septic (anti-fungal and anti-microbial). It contains tannins, sesquiterpenoids, flavonoids, and more! Camphor contains tannins, specifically gallic acid, which act as good anti-oxidants and wound and burn healers. It contains luteolin (which you might remember...
Is there any value in combining anti-oxidants in our creations? If we have a good anti-oxidant like Vitamin E, is there any point in including rosemary oleoresin (ROE) or other anti-oxidants?Yes. Rancidity happens in different ways (for the full post, click here). Anti-oxidants fight that rancidity in different ways – one might kill microbes that...
BATH BOMBSClick here for the handout from today’s class!These are super easy if you follow the instructions properly. Bath bombs are made with citric acid and baking soda. When you add them to the bath, they fizz up when they touch the water. (It’s like the volcanoes we made for school as kids with vinegar...