Making Baby Powder

Today, Olivia and I made a lovely batch of baby powder. We are preparing for the arrival of baby Gabriel sometime in May.

Why are we making our own baby powder? Of course you can buy baby powder at the dollar store and making it ourselves is not going to be any cheaper than that.

With Julius, we used corn starch for his tender little bum. The only problem with corn starch is that if a baby has a yeast rash or fungal infection – like thrush – corn starch can act as food for the yeast, and the rash can get worse.

Julius and I had a bad case of thrush that nearly disrupted our nursing relationship. The worst part about thrush is that it can be passed from baby’s mouth to mama’s nipples and back and forth, so it can be very difficult to treat, and it can be very, very painful for both mama and baby. It can also make for a very persistently red bum.

So I wanted to make a baby powder that would be natural, drying, soothing, and antifungal to help combat thrush. In the end, it wasn’t very expensive to make, either.

Here are the ingredients I used:

1 oz oatmeal
1 ounce calendula flowers
1 ounces kaolin clay
2 ounces arrowroot powder
5 drops lavender essential oil

Here is my lavender essential oil and one of the shakers I got at the thrift store.

I used my Magic Bullet to grind  yes it is an “as seen on TV” type of product. No, it is not as powerful as a Vitamix or a Blendtec. I don’t use it to do heavy labor, so I don’t need to spend $400 on it. I love it. It scrambles egg for me without making a mess (I’m very messy.) It chops herbs for me and is very easy to clean.  It turns Oatmeal into powder and makes milkshakes without me having to dissect and clean a huge blender. It’s not a be-all-end-all sort of product, it’s a cheap, flexible, if you break it you could buy another without crying about  it sort of product. I broke mine after two years and bought another – I was excited because now I had eight cups instead of four.

I poured the mix into two shaker containers that I bought at my local thrift store for 30 cents each. I had more than enough left over for another batch, and enough ingredients to last until Gabriel is out of diapers!

Olivia is showing off the final product.

I hope this post inspires you to make your own natural creations.

I used:
Purchased from Mountain Rose:

Kaolin Clay
Arrowroot Powder
Calendula Flowers, ground
Lavender Essential Oil

From Amazon:
Magic Bullet – but you old use many other methods to grind your flowers and oatmeal. Some people use a coffee grind or a blender – watch your thrift store again for these kinds of things, and you could keep one especially for use with your herbal creations.

Purchased Locally:
Oatmeal, ground finely (purchased at my supermarket)
Shakers – purchased at my thrift store and sterilized. I personally would also reuse a spice shaker, thoroughly cleaned and sterilized. – remember the greenest product is the one that you are saving from the landfill.

You can find out about the other wonderful uses of lavender here on my blog.