Skin care essentials - Tone.

To achieve naturally glowing complexion it is crucial to follow four important steps: cleanse (surface cleanse - every day and deep cleanse - once a week), exfoliate (once a week), tone (as much as your heart desires), and moisturize (from one to two and even three times per day depending on you skin type). I have talked about cleansing here and exfoliation here.

Now it is time to shed some light on the most neglected step in facial care regiment - tone. Use of toners is a connecting link between process of cleansing and moisturizing that helps to achieve ultimate goal - beautiful and radiant skin. Toners help to restore pH level of you skin, enhance your skin tone, tighten pores, remove leftover soap or oil residue, and prepare your skin for final step - moisturizing. How it works: pure water has a neutral pH, which is close to 7.0, when natural pH of our skin is slightly acidic and varies between 5.0 and 6.0. Hence, washing your face even with plain warm water, guarantees to throw off your pH balance, and cause all kinds of discomforts. After applying pH balanced botanical toners you will not only return your skin to its natural state but you will also get more out of your moisturizer! Why? In order for the moisturizer to deliver all of its benefits, your skin has to be prepared to properly absorb them. By removing the leftover residue from a cleanser you are allowing your skin to take-in all of the natural goodness of your moisturizer. Additional botanical ingredients will provide extra shot of natural vitamins and antioxidants that are irreplaceable components in any healthy cell function.
Marmalade Hills Facial Fusions have been especially formulated to be gentle on delicate facial tissue and with pH balance of about 5.0 to help restore natural pH balance of your skin. Base ingredients of our toners: gentle and nourishing botanical distillates, distilled water, natural astringent - witch hazel and healing aloe juice.
Botanical distillates are usually obtained by steam distillation from aromatic plants. During such distillation essential oils will float on top of the surface, leaving behind the watery distillate. Botanical distillates contain diluted essential oils and many of their therapeutic qualities, making them especially skin friendly. Another important ingredient that is used in every Marmalade Hills toner is Green Tea Extract. We love using Green Tee Extract in our formulations as it naturally contains the chemical ECGC - an antioxidant proven 200 times more powerful than Vitamin E. Antioxidants are extremely important in any anti-aging and healthy skin care, as they are capable of inhibiting oxidation of other molecules. Oxidation produces free radicals - micro elements that contribute to cell destruction and therefore aging of the skin, as well as abnormal mutations, therefore creating favorable environment for deceases to form and overtake our bodies.
After the water/witch hazel/aloe/green tea base is created we customize our toners according to skin types, by adding different plant distillates and infusing them with extensive variety of botanical extracts of Rosemary, Lavender, Rose, Nettle and Ginko biloba extract, just to name a few. In the end we create 100% natural, gentle, nourishing and soothing botanical toners that work in unison with your body and help to maintain not only healthy glow on the surface but also in deepest layers of your skin!

Hope you find this post useful. Take care of your skin and it will thank you!

Till next time,
Liana.

Featured Product - Body Oils

Would you like to unlock a secret to supple and lustrous skin? Marmalade Hills 100% Natural Body Oils have one of a kind formula that consists of not one but multiple precious and luxurious natural oils which in combination with one another deliver ultimate, long lasting results. It would be fare to compare Marmalade Hills body oils to a power bar for your skin. They are packed with naturally occurring vitamins, antioxidants and various nutrients. Our body oils are absolutely irreplaceable when it comes to long lasting moisture, sun damage repair and supplying your body with needed nutrients to fight off free-radicals and reverse aging effects.

About the ingredients:
~According to University of Maryland Medical Center, grapes have been heralded for their medicinal and nutritional value for thousands of years. Egyptians ate grapes at least 6,000 years ago, and several ancient Greek philosophers praised the healing power of grapes - usually in the form of wine. European folk healers made an ointment from the sap of grapevines to treat skin and eye diseases. Grape leaves were used to stop bleeding, inflammation and pain. But grapes - or the chemicals within them, especially oligomeric proanthocyanidin complexes (OPCs) -- have been touted as powerful antioxidants. In addition to being extremely nutritious, Grape Seed Oil plays an important role in massage therapy practices due to its light, non greasy and highly absorbent texture.
~Jojoba Oil is a wonderful, light golden color, luxurious oil that is actually a plant liquid wax ester. Why should you care? Because out of all compounds in nature, this wax ester is the most similar to human skin oil (sebum). As we mature beyond early adulthood, our skin produces less and less lipids, resulting in wrinkles and more fragile drier skin. Jojoba's rapid absorption just deep enough into the skin's surface layer (stratum corneum) provides all-day moisturization that leaves the skin feeling soft and smooth. Another great benefit of Jojoba Oil is that it is a superb massage oil that has outstanding spreadability and absorbs quickly. Jojoba and the skin's sebum are completely miscible. They form a non-greasy, non-tacky layer with exceptional transepidermal water control.
~For centuries, Asian women have attributed their gorgeous glow to the cleansing power of rice. Rice Bran Oil is extracted from the bran or outer coat of the brown rice grain removed during the milling process. It is rich in essential fatty acids, phytosterols and has high level of the antioxidants gamma-oryzanol and tocotrienols (vitamin E). Gamma-oryzanol compound is a component that can impede the progress of melanin pigmentation by restoring the erythema activity of the tyrosinase enzyme as it intercepts the UV rays at the skin’s surface, hindering UV ray transmission. Another wonderful and naturally nutritious, light weight oil that will give you a perfect slip during application.
~Rose Hip Oil - I can never say enough about this oil. It is my absolute favorite oil to use and let me tell you why. This oil is truly a miracle oil as it is extremely rich with essential fatty acids (omega-6 and omega-3). They help nourish skin and keep it plump and youthful, helping to reduce wrinkles, tone and smooth roughness. Essential fatty acids are called "essential" because our body is not able to produce them, they must be obtained through the diet or through supplementation. Rose Hip Oil is recommended for scarred tissue and this makes our oils a perfect solution for damaged skin.
~Vitamin E is considered an antioxidant superstar. Vitamin E is a lipid-soluble vitamin (meaning it likes oil better than water) that is essential for the healthy skin. But don’t just take my word for it, check out what Journal of Molecular Medicine (January 1995, pages 7–17) says about Vitamin E: “More than other tissues, the skin is exposed to numerous environmental chemical and physical agents such as ultraviolet light causing oxidative stress [free-radical damage]. In the skin this results in several short- and long-term adverse effects such as erythema [redness], edema [swelling], skin thickening, wrinkling, and an increased incidence of skin cancer…. Vitamin E is the major naturally occurring lipid-soluble … antioxidant protecting skin from the adverse effects of oxidative stress including photoaging [sun damage]. Many studies document that vitamin E occupies a central position as a highly efficient antioxidant, thereby providing possibilities to decrease the frequency and severity of pathological events in the skin.” ***Please note that Vitamin E has eight different forms, of which some are known for being excellent antioxidants when applied topically to skin, particularly alpha tocopherol and the tocotrienols. All Marmalade Hills products are made with Alpha Tachoperol, not Tachoperyl Acetate which is less beneficial for your skin.
~And the last but not least ingredients are the different Essential Oil combinations that posses aroma-therapeutic qualities like no other natural ingredients. Essential Oils are highly concentrated distilled plant essences. They are very aromatic, and have a wide variety of applications. They are sometimes used medicinally for treating specific ailments. In addition to treating physical conditions, these oils can effect us mentally and emotionally as well. They can clear your mind, uplift your spirit and calm down your fears. As Phyllis Balch points out in Prescription for Herbal Healing, "The inhalation of certain essential oils has been associated with the release of brain chemicals that stimulate various emotions. For example, lavender oil has the ability to evoke and increase the release of serotonin, thus producing a calming effect on the body."




As you can see, our Body Oils are formulated with first class ingredients that even some facial creams can envy! They are a perfect all-natural alternative for easily evaporating, water base body lotions and creams. We recommend using them after shower or bath on damp skin. I find body oils especially useful as an aftershave moisturizer. They are absolutely safe for babies and adults. If you need silky smooth, moisture rich and healthy looking skin you have no better place to go but to our store.

Till next time friends and hope you learned something new today,
Liana.