By Rohit Chopra
There are a lot of benefits to aromatherapy. Perhaps you want to help heal minor problems. Perhaps you want a sensual massage. Perhaps you need to calm down or wake up. Or perhaps you want to smell something pleasing.
Whatever your reason, you will soon discover that your nose has its own likes and dislikes. What essential oil recipes work for one person might not work for you, much in the same way jazz music is both loved and hated. You have to spend some time learning what scents you like and what you don’t. This way you can make your own essential oil recipes that best benefit you.
Notes of Scent
Creating your own essential oil recipes can be a lot of fun for many people, like playing or listening to music. With your first essential oil recipes, stick with just three oils until you get the hang of it. Otherwise, they will clash. Also, considering the price of some essential oils, it will be a lot cheaper.
There are three kinds of oils that you need in your mix to make it the most effective. These types of essential oils are called notes. You need a top note, and a middle note, and a base note. You can also make some good essential oil recipes with one top note and two middles.
Experiment and see what works best for you. Note what scents bring about what kind of feelings brought up in you. Its safer to blend essential oils with a carrier oil like olive or jojoba than just to use the pure essential oils if you mean to put the oil on your body. Its also a lot less expensive! When burning oils for their scent alone, it is best to use the pure essential oils.
Top Notes
Top notes are like the lead vocals of an essential oil recipe. They are usually the first thing you notice. They also don’t last too long, letting the other notes take over. Many fruity and floral scents fall into this category.
Common top note essential oils are lemon, bergamot, eucalyptus and orange.
Middle Notes
Middle notes are like the guitars in a band. They are more subtle than top notes and tend to last a lot longer. Spicy, floral and herbal kind of essential oils tend to fall into this category. Some are listed as middle notes OR base notes, depending on what aromatherapy book you read. Smell them and determine for yourself how long the scent lasts in your essential oil recipes.
Common middle note oils are lavender, geranium, patchouli, rose and rosemary.
Base Notes
Base note scents are the percussion and rhythm of the scent band. They provide the beat that the rest of the band has to follow. The base note oils linger the longest in you essential oil recipes. Many spicy and woody scents fall into this category.
Common base note oils are sandalwood, cypress, frankincense and myrrh. Some also list patchouli and even rose in this category.
About the Author:
Rohit Chopra has written several useful articles on topics like Essential Oil, Aromatherapy Essential Oil, Lavender Essential Oil,
Pure Essential Oil, etc. Get more useful information on Essential Oil at http://www.rawbeautycare.com
Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/health-articles/making-beautiful-music-for-your-nose-with-essential-oil-recipes-367358.html
Very informative but I’m not sure which note to add first, second and last, also do i mix essentials first and then add mixute to base oil or do i add notes (in which order) to base oil?
thank u
Mix the essential oils first. Ideally start with the base note essential oil, because it helps keep the middle and top notes of the scent from fading too fast.
You want to get the scent right before you start mixing with lotions, almond oil, or other carriers. For one thing, it takes too long to mix each EO separately.
Essential oils are easy to mix with each other. Then you can adjust the scent if needed. But it takes much longer to thoroughly blend them with lotions, bath salts, or whatever.
Once the EO mixture smells the way you want it to, you have an EO blend that you can use for many purposes. You can float a few drops on a teaspoon of water in a diffuser, for example.
Or you can add some to a lotion for skin care or to a carrier oil for massage. You can add some of the EO blend to alcohol to make a cologne or to water to make a body spritzer.
Or you can blend some of the EO mixture with epsom salts to make bath salts or with vegetable oil or lanolin to make bath oil.
The possibilities are almost endless, but you start by mixing the essential oils to get the scent just right. Then you can blend the appropriate amount of the mixture with whatever carrier you choose.