Common Household Items for Skin Care

Give expensive skin-care products a pass and give your budget a break with a few common, skin-nurturing ingredients found on your kitchen shelf or in your refrigerator. Your skin will reap the benefits of skin-care treatments made of high-quality, fresh ingredients free of chemicals, fragrance and other harmful additives.

Fruit
Fresh fruits are skin-friendly and can be used in a variety of beneficial skin-care treatments. Mash an avocado with a small amount of honey and a few drops of vinegar for a hydrating facial for dry skin. Mix lemon juice with rolled oats for an oily skin facial cleanser, or with yogurt for a soothing cleanser for sensitive skin. Mash a ripe banana with honey for an easy facial. Cleanse your face with juice from fresh strawberries or kiwi.

Vegetables
Vegetables are on the top of the list when it comes to healthy ingredients. Toss a cucumber in your blender, and puree the cucumber with a few drops of honey for a soothing toner for combination skin. Tomato juice makes a refreshing toner for oily skin, or add a few drops of honey to the tomato juice for a soothing facial.

Dairy Products
Dairy products such as cream, milk or yogurt are full of healthy fats that act as natural moisturizers. Cleanse your face with a paste made from cream, ground oats and a few drops of green tea, or a combination of oats and yogurt. Wash your face with a mixture of whole milk and warm honey, or add milk and honey to a warm bath. Use full-fat milk or yogurt.

Olive Oil
Olive oil is rich in antioxidants and vitamin E that will keep the skin smooth and supple. A few drops of olive oil on a cotton ball will smooth away makeup. Massage a drop of olive oil into the tender skin around your eyes. Olive oil massaged into your cuticles will moisturize your cuticles and add natural shine to your nails. Massage olive oil into dry, callused feet, or pour olive oil into a warm bath for an all-over moisturizer. Smooth olive oil onto dry, cracked lips. Use high-quality, extra virgin olive oil.

Sugar
Sugar has surprising moisturizing qualities that make it a useful ingredient in a number of skin-care treatments. Combined with a small amount of olive oil, sugar makes an effective scrub for dry hands or rough, calloused feet. A small amount of brown or white sugar stirred into a teaspoon of honey will exfoliate and moisturize dry lips.

Use Banana Peel For Skin Care

Bananas rightfully earn the title of “super food” with numerous beneficial properties -- think copious nutrients, antioxidants and healthy natural sugars. For do-it-yourself skin-care gurus, however, the power lies in the peel. You can use this fruit's characteristic peel for various at-home skin remedies, each of which targets a particular skin issue, ranging from acne to dry skin.

Rub Out Acne
Some acne sufferers have experienced positive results simply by rubbing banana peels on affected areas. For this technique, cut a ripe banana into pieces and remove the peel, once again cutting the peel into manageable pieces about the size of the average acne pad. Rub the inside of the peel onto the affected area -- use only one peel section for each spot, such as your forehead or chin -- until the peel browns. Repeat the process about three or four times daily. This method's potential effectiveness is likely owed to the banana's vitamin-C content; vitamin C serves as an antioxidant that, according to dermatology professor Whitney Bowe, can help relieve the oxidative stress responsible for causing skin inflammation.

Ease Puffy Eyes
To tighten up under-eye bags, run a spoon through the inside of a banana peel to collect the white internal fibers. Combine the peel's fibers with aloe vera gel until the two ingredients form a paste, then apply the paste around your eyes. Lie down for about 10 to 15 minutes with your feet raised before rinsing the paste away with cold water. While the aloe vera moisturizes, the banana's potassium content can help counteract the excess salt that causes fluid retention and under-eye bags.

Scrub for Success
While many banana skin-care recipes call for the creamy flesh of the banana, exfoliating, skin-tightening scrubs can actually benefit from leaving the peel on -- a practice which adds a chunkier texture to the mixture. To create a banana scrub, slice a ripe banana -- leaving the peel but not the stems -- and mash it into a chunky paste with a few tablespoons of granulated sugar and a dash of vanilla extract or the essential oil of your choice. Massage the scrub into your skin -- it works just as well on the face as it does the arms and legs -- and rinse it clean with warm water.

Peel Back the Layers
If you're looking for DIY skin-care techniques, don't neglect the fruit within the banana peel. For a moisturizing mask, mash a medium-ripe banana into a paste and apply it your freshly washed face; allow it to rest for about 10 or 20 minutes before rinsing with cold water. You can also add a few tablespoons of honey and plain, natural yogurt to this mask to heighten its antibacterial, skin-tone evening and moisturizing properties.

How to Make an Easy Three-Step Oatmeal Facial Mask

Whether acne irritation or environmental stress is the culprit, your skin could likely use a pick-me-up. An oatmeal facial mask is an inexpensive way to pamper your skin at home. Oatmeal has soothing ingredients that will relieve irritated and itchy skin on your face, and leave you with smooth skin. To reap the benefits of oatmeal, do an oatmeal facial mask three times a week.

Step 1

Grind 4 tbsp. of rolled oats to enhance the texture of the resulting mask. Pour the rolled oats into your blender or food processor, and grind the oats until they form a course powder. Pour the ground oats into the small bowl.

Step 2

Measure 1 tbsp. of honey and pour over the oat powder in the small bowl. Mix the honey and oats thoroughly until they form a uniform mixture. Honey will improve the texture of the mask and acts as a humectant to help moisturize your skin; it also has antibacterial properties to help treat acne.

Step 3

Crack an egg without breaking the yolk. Pour out and discard the egg white, and pour the yolk into the small bowl with the honey and oatmeal mixture. Use the spoon to break the yolk and mix with the honey and oats to form a paste. Egg yolks are rich in vitamin D, which is an antioxidant that delays the aging process.

Step 4

Apply the mixture to your face and allow it to set for 15 minutes, then rinse it off thoroughly with warm water. Pat your face dry with a towel.

Tips

If you have oily skin, include a splash of lemon juice to help clean away excess oil.

Things You'll Need

Blender

4 tbsp. rolled oats

Small bowl

1 tbsp. honey

1 egg

Spoon