Homemade Shaving Cream

I made the best homemade shaving cream a few weeks ago. It smells good and makes my legs feel so silky. However, it looks like a tub of fat…as my sister pointed out when she came over. (“Chelsey…why are you keeping a container of fat in your bathtub?” BECAUSE SOMETIMES I GET HUNGRY WHEN I SHOWER, JEEZ!)

It was pretty easy to make and I used “ingredients” that I already had lying around.

What you’ll need:

• 1/2 cup shampoo
• 1/2 cup body wash
• 1 cup conditioner
• 2 tbsps moisturizer
• 1 tbsp baby oil
• container

Step 01: Dump all the ingredients into your container. Yep.

The conditioner is obviously what causes this concoction to look like lard.

I love how much it looks like a lava lamp.

Step 02: You may be tempted to stir this…but it doesn’t work that well. Stirring doesn’t mix it enough and, as you can see, my shaving cream is near the top of the container. Stirring it made kind of a mess. So the easiest way to mix everything together is to just put the lid on and shake it.

I love this! It smells good and feels good. I should have put it in a squeeze bottle, so it would be easier to put on. But this works, too. It’s especially nice after I use my lemon scrub. (You get a closer shave if you exfoliate the dead skill cells surrounding your follicles first. Just try not to over shave after you do this, because shaving also exfoliates and you could damage your skin.)

Updated November 8, 2013: Now that I’ve been using this a while, I can really review it. I accidentally knocked it over while I was using it and spilled half of it. That said, it has lasted me seven months. If I hadn’t spilled it, I believe I could have gotten a year’s worth of shaves out of it. After I ran out, I switched back to store bought for a while, just as an experiment. Here are some things I noticed:

1. This shaving cream leaves my legs so much softer and more moisturized than any commercial shaving cream. That includes the ones that are marketed for their moisturizing capabilities. (I tried the one by EOS, which people claim is the best for moisture, and it was terrible. Not only did it NOT moisturize my skin, but it destroyed my razor blades and plugged up my drain.)
2. It gives me a closer shave. Even with dull razor blades (ever forget to buy new ones? I have), I get a much better shave with this cream than I do with store bought. I attribute this to the fact that this cream is very thin. Store bought shaving creams usually come in gel or mousse form and, either way, they’re quite thick. A couple of the store bought creams that I used didn’t even allow me access to my legs. The razor removed the cream, but barely even touched the hair…even though I tried to thin it out when I put it on. This cream doesn’t have that problem.
3. Getting a closer shave means I don’t have to shave as often. Which is just awesome. Shaving is a pain. I have dark hair, so I have to shave every other day, if not daily. That means I was previously shaving about every other day…depending on the cream (again, when I used EOS, I had to shave every day). Using this cream, I get an extra day or two of no-shaving. Nice!
4. My skin is healthier. When you shave, you not only remove the hair, you also remove dry skin (meaning you exfoliate every time you shave, whether you use a scrub first or not). Exfoliating too much is actually not good for your skin. It causes skin dryness and irritation (depending on your skin type, you should really only exfoliate once or twice a week, if that). Shaving/exfoliating less often mixed with extra moisturized legs (from the shaving cream and the moisturizer I put on afterwards) means  my legs aren’t dry and irritated anymore. Which is awesome, because they get really itchy when they’re dry, even in the summer. I haven’t had so much of that problem since I started using this. 🙂
5. It’s cheaper than store bought. Remember when I said this lasted seven months? Start keeping track of how often you buy shaving cream (and how much you spend). It’s probably more than you think (for me, it’s two cans a month). Now, keep in mind that I’m the only person in my household who uses this shaving cream. However, it will still last longer than store bought, even if multiple people are using it. Also, you don’t have to buy the expensive shampoos and stuff to make this (unless you have some kind of allergy and need to use special brands). Ingredients from the Dollar Tree work just fine. Also, I get about 3 container’s worth out of one bottle of product (and baby oil lasts forever). Worth it!
   
6. You can personalize the scent. This isn’t really important, but who doesn’t like to smell nice? Just buy whatever scent you want and mix them together. I really like Suave’s Mint & Rosemary. It smells nice and it makes my legs feel tingly.

Tip for getting your shaving cream to last longer: In the unedited post, I mentioned that I wished I had put this in a squeeze bottle. I no longer feel that way, because putting it in a squeeze bottle means I wind up using more of it than necessary. Instead, I leave it in the container pictured above (which works nicely anyway, because it separates and leaving it in the container makes it easy to just shake and mix again). I dip my razor in it, as needed (rinse it off well before re-dipping). Which means I only use what I need. Shaving cream isn’t necessary, it’s just a lubricant. It keeps you from cutting yourself too often (by helping the razor glide more easily) and it helps prevent your skin from drying out. So caking it on (like I tend to do when I use a bottle) is too much. Dipping it gives me the perfect amount.

I stand by what I said seven months ago. This is the best shaving cream I have ever used. If I can help it, I would like to never use store bought again.