How To Pamper Yourself at Home with a Magical Spa Night

Why do you need to pamper yourself at home? To keep your sanity! As the global COVID pandemic refuses to abate, many of us are asked to stay at home, hunker down, and social distance. Lack of contact with fellow co-workers, friends, and family members can lead to feelings of loneliness, frustration, and unhappiness.

Add to it potential financial difficulties, anxiety about the future, and the lack of knowledge when the situation will change for the better, and the potential for mounting stress and depression looms large.

While there are many good ways to combat these emotions, today I am focusing on only one: giving yourself a gift of a DIY spa night. Pampering yourself as part of a self-love routine is always a good idea, but in the current situation when we all are more homebound, it might be even more called for and yield better results.

So, do it for yourself, for your beauty and your sanity, and when this all is over, and it will, you can invite friends over and have a girlfriends spa party! 

Don’t Feel Guilty about Pampering Yourself

Surely, you’ve heard the term self-love before. We often forget it but loving oneself is the very foundation for all good relationships with others. Self-love is the very important first step on a journey to being able to truly love others and to receive their love for ourselves. If you won’t love yourself, it will be difficult to be completely selfless in a relationship with anyone.

Part of loving oneself is taking care of one’s health and sense of wellbeing. This leads us to self-care: taking care of our needs without the fear of being perceived as egotistical or selfish.

It’s been proven that good self-care is a great preventative measure for a number of problems: it can prevent or reduce most health issues, including mental and emotional distress. Pampering yourself from time to time can do wonders for your self-esteem and your stress levels. And, in the process, it will make you feel and be more radiant, vibrant, and healthy-looking.

So, what do you have to lose? Really nothing! I used to visit Korean spas here in Los Angeles, and marvel at how relaxed and rejuvenated I felt after a few hours of chilling in the pools, saunas, and steam rooms. Of course, this kind of experience cannot be replicated at home, but we can still do something to feel and look better.

How to Pamper Yourself with a DIY Spa Night

It turns out you don’t need much for a stay-at-home pampering night. Many of the things can be found in the kitchen, others you might already have in your beauty arsenal.

Prepare a Hair Mask

Depending on what you want to address, here are some possibilities: just mix the ingredients into a paste consistency.

For Dry and Brittle Hair:

• 2 TBS Yogurt + 1 TBS Apple Cider Vinegar + 1 TBS Lemon Juice.
• 1 Avocado + 1 TBS Honey + 1 TBS Olive or Coconut Oil.
• 1 Avocado + 1 TBS Honey + 1 tsp Lemon Juice + 1 tsp Olive Oil + 6 drops Ylang Ylang Essential Oil.

To Stimulate Hair Growth and Volume:

• 1 TBS Coconut Oil + 1 TBS Jojoba Oil + 6 drops Peppermint Essential Oil.
• 2 TBS Ayurvedic herbs (Amla, Neem, or Henna) + 1 TBS Yogurt + 1 TBS Castor Oil
• 2 TBS Coconut Oil + 1 TBS Castor Oil + 6 drops Rosemary Essential Oil

For Oily and Flat Hair:

• 1-2 Egg white + 1 tsp Lemon Juice + 6 drops Peppermint Essential Oil
• 1 TBS Apple Cider Vinegar + 1 TBS Honey + 1 TBS Castor Oil
• 3 TBS Aloe Vera Juice + 1 TBS Lemon Juice

Prepare a Face Scrub

Here too, the possibilities are almost endless and easily found in your kitchen:

• My fav: 1 TBS Brown Sugar + 1 TBS Sake (read about the benefits of this miracle scrub)
• 1 TBS Almond Meal + 1 TBS Raw Honey
• 1 TBS Ground Oatmeal + 2 TBS Milk
• 1 TBS Ground Coffee + 1 TBS Cocoa Powder + 3 Crushed Strawberries

Once you remember what each ingredient is capable of doing for the skin, it’s so much fun to experiment with all these kitchen staples to bring more beauty to your face and neck.

Prepare a Face Mask

Depending on your skin’s needs, you can choose to alternate between different masks or, if time is not an issue, apply two or more to give your skin even more love. See this post for many more ideas.

• Exfoliating Enzyme Mask: 1 TBS Pumpkin flesh + 1 TBS Papaya flesh + ½ tsp cinnamon
• Pore-Tightening Mask: 1 Egg White (beat stiff) + 1 tsp Lemon Juice
• Antibacterial and Moisturizing Mask: 1 TBS Raw Honey + 1 tsp Aloe Vera Gel
• Deep-cleansing Turmeric Clay Mask, which has amazing benefits for all skin types, but especially for acne-prone skin.

Prepare a Hand and Body Scrub

I like to alternate between sugar and salt scrubs. They both have different uses and depending on what you are trying to achieve, you might choose between one and the other. Sugar scrubs have smaller granules than salt and work best for sensitive skin. A sugar scrub will still exfoliate but with less abrasion.

Preparing a scrub can be as easy as mixing ½ cup of salt or sugar with ½ cup of oil of choice (olive, almond, grapeseed, avocado, or coconut all work well). You can add other ingredients like essential oils and/or other granules like cinnamon, poppy seeds, or ground oatmeal if you wish. Here is an example of a sugar scrub I like to use. Another option is to add spent coffee grounds to my body scrubs as the caffeine has amazing anti-cellulite properties.

Preparing a scrub can be as easy as mixing ½ cup of salt or sugar with ½ cup of oil of choice (olive, almond, grapeseed, avocado, or coconut all work well). You can add other ingredients like essential oils and/or other granules like cinnamon, poppy seeds, or ground oatmeal if you wish. I like to add spent coffee grounds to my body scrubs as the caffeine has amazing anti-cellulite properties.

Prepare some dried herbs and flower petals, if using, to make face steam. Place 2-3 TBS of the mix in a large bowl and boil some water in a kettle.

Don’t Forget to Set the Mood

Alert your family or whomever you share your home and ask for an hour or more of time to yourself. And don’t feel guilty about it! It’s your time to self-love and you deserve every minute of it! Your family will also be happier when you are happier and more relaxed.

I like to prepare my bathroom and bedroom with some candles or a salt lamp, soft music, and a diffuser. Nothing is more relaxing than a wonderful aroma of your favorite essential oil blend, the sound of your favorite soothing tunes, and soft light. Put on a comfy robe and let the pampering begin.

Here is how I pamper myself from time to time

Here are some steps of how to pamper yourself during an at-home spa night.

• Put a hair mask on dry hair, comb through, and cover it with a plastic cap and a warm towel. I keep it covered for at least 20 minutes while getting my herbal steam going.
• Double wash your face. First, cleanse with oil (read about the oil cleansing method and its benefits for skin health), and then take off the rest of the grime with a gentle face wash or a toner.
• Pour boiling water onto the herbs in the prepared bowl, lean with your cleansed face right above it, and cover your head and the bowl with a large kitchen towel so that the steam doesn’t escape. Inhale the goodness of the herbs for about ten minutes until it cools down.
• Draw a bath with Epsom Salts, Essential Oils of your choice (I love Lavender mixed with Sweet Basil or Orange, so relaxing!), rose petals, or other herbs.
• After the 20 minutes+ with the hair mask are over, hop in the shower with your prepared body scrub. Wash the hair mask off, shampoo and condition your hair, apply Apple Cider Vinegar rinse (it’s great for shine! Just mix a few TBS of ACV in 2 cups of water, and pour it over your hair as the last rinse).
• Scrub your body and hands while in the shower with the prepared scrub. Rinse off and hop into the tub. (If you don’t have a tub or don’t like taking baths, you can also apply the face scrub while in the shower.) You can now scrub your face and/or apply the prepared face mask. Other than that, just relax for some time. You can put some cucumber slices or cotton rounds soaked in green tea on your eyes for a soothing eye-lid treatment. Enjoy the peace and quiet. It’s so good for your health!
• After the bath gently towel-dry and apply body oil all over. Alternately, you can apply body lotion or lotion bar to seal in the moisture after the hot bath. This is a perfect time to give yourself a self-massage, always going from the feet and hands up toward the middle of the body. Or, ask a significant other to give you one. Either way, you deserve every single moment of it!
• If you didn’t apply a face mask in the tub, now would be a good time to do it. You are in your comfy robe, your body is scrubbed, oiled, and massaged, you can now lie down with a mask on your face, the diffuser going, and nothing to disturb your relaxing me-time.
• After 10-15 minutes, rinse the mask off with lukewarm water, tone (if using), and moisturize with a serum or light face oil. You can use jade or rose quartz roller or a Gua Sha which will help with depuffing and promote skin elasticity.
• Don’t forget to pamper your feet and hands. Here as well, self-massage with a good foot balm and hand lotion or cream will yield pleasant results for the appearance of your skin and for your emotional well-being. Sip a glass of wine or herbal tea, whatever you desire at the moment. Enjoy and repeat often.

There you have it. That’s my idea of a perfect, yet no-frills and practically no expense, spa night at home. After all that pampering, you’ll be ready to dose off in a jiffy. It works for me 100 % of the time! Good night!