DIY Poo - Pourri Spray

Have you heard about this poo-pourri spray? It's really quite amazing and has been around for quite a long time. I personally never bought itbecause I thought, "is it really worth the money for some fancy essential oil spray?"

Well, there are three things you need to know about these sprays:

1 - They really work like miracles. No joke. You spray it before you go (and that is the trick, you have to know how to use it, its not an air freshener) and NO ONE will know.

2 - I do not know what the ingredients are in the commercial  ones you can buy, but I do understand the principle behind them and how they do their magic.

3 - Knowing how they work, I was able to make my own and you can too. Its so easy and a fraction of the cost of buying the fancy ones. Lets make some!

How It Works: It creates a barrier (a layer of scented oils) on top of the water in the toilet. The barrier itself smells great (you mix up your favorite essential oils or just use your favorite already blended ones) and once something (eh, hem) passes through the barrier, it seals back up and no smells can get through it. Genius, right?

How I made mine: So you can't just put essential oils in a spray bottle and use them straight. For one, that's like flushing money down the toilet (literally) and two, not all essential oils are very thick, and some are probably too thick. So the second ingredient needs to be water.

Then we need something to thicken it a little, but more so to give it a spreadable consistency once it lands on top of the water. So I used glycerin. Glycerin is in a lot of products in order to give them consistency, glide, or thickening. You could use pure glycerin (its in the face product section) or vegetable glycerin (a more natural choice derived purely from, you guessed it, vegetables.)

I took a small glass spray bottle I had saved from a facial toner. I think it was about 2 - 2.5 ounce capacity. I put in a teaspoon of glycerin, then a total of about 20-25 drops of essential oils. I blended some of my favorites like citrus bliss blend, clary sage and grapefruit, but you can use any you would like. Then I topped the bottle off with water and shook it up like crazy. I would recommend using distilled water to keep the oils and everything from getting gross.

We gave this stuff a couple tests and everyone was happy to report "it works, it really really works!"

So go forth and make your own! You'll probably need some directions to put with it if you are hoping anyone else will use it. The sticker I put on mine says "If you gotta go, spray this first and no one will know!"

Please give it a try and let me know what you think.