When I first decided to make my own bath salts at  home it sounded like it would be an easy enough adventure.  There are myraids of bath salt recipes on the internet.  Most are quite simple.  I googled bath salt recipes and jotted down my essential ingredients.  Joyfully, I  set out to purchase all the ingredients I would need and lugged them back home, excited to begin.

Try as I might, however, my bath salts didn't look or feel quite like the descriptions said they should.  Many of the recipes I found were easy but had to be used right away.  I wanted to be able to store my bath salts and perhaps give some for gifts later on.  I wanted to be creative, colorful and fragrant!  And so my journey began!  I googled recipes, read articles and researched materials.  Experiment after experiment had me to the brink of pulling my hair out by it's roots.

While there was alot of information available on the internet, there wasn't alot of information about the DON'TS of making bath salts.  If you're looking for a bath salt you can use IMMEDIATELY, great, use the online recipes and have a blast.  If you're wanting something a little more serious, even better!  Take the time to research.  Better yet, invest in a book on bath salts and bath salt recipes and save yourself some frustration by relying on the trials and errors of bath salt making already learned by somebody else.

For example:

When making fizzing bath salts DON'T store them in airtight glass containers without doing your research first!  Improper storage and moisture content can cause glass containers to break which could cause injury to yourself or others.  Adding a silica gel packet to your salts may help prevent this mishap.

If you're serious about making fizzing bath salts there's one key ingredient you should always have on hand to prevent clumping of your salts.  This ingredient is inexpensive but an absolute MUST have. 

DON'T use fragrances oils or essential oils  that aren't intended for use on the skin.  Research fragrance or essential oils carefully before adding them to your salts.

Storing bath salts in ziplock bags or plastic is fine for the short term, however, plastic is porous and will draw alot of the fragrance from the salts.  Glass is best for storage, but again, must be used in the appropriate way.

I  read a post by another bath salt maker some time back about how they ran their salts through a blender to make them "finer".  DON'T blend your bath salts!  The friction from the blender heats the salts, the salts melt and before you know it you have something resembling quick setting concrete in your home appliance!  Unless this liquified form of bath salt it removed from the blender immediately it sets up quite solid and you have a ruined kitchen appliance.

Another big DON'T is heating fizzing bath salts in the microwave.  I had a brainstorm to get my fizzing bath bombs out of their molds by warming them up just a little bit.  The quickest way I could think of was in the microwave.  When I opened the door, my beautiful Fuzzy Navel Fizzing Bath Bombs had erupted into something that resembled an giant orange Mt. Shasta!  While the house smelled absolutely wonderful this probably wasn't the best idea I'd ever come up with.

I have a great many varieties of bath salts and I make them in bulk.  Trial and error became my greatest friends!

For just a day of fun and an evening of soothing baths, make the easily downloadable recipes of fizzing bath salts you find on the internet.  For more professional, long lasting salts, research, research, research!

Jeannie  Palmer, author, all rights reserved.