Shark Week + Essential Oils: Yes, Please!

At the close of Shark Week 2018, we thought that Suzanne Rodolfich's Shark Week-themed posts were too good not to share on our blog! Enjoy:) 

Shark Skin? No, Thanks! Best Essential Oils for Skin Care 

Essential Oils are a great, natural way to take care of your skin! 

Essential Oils are a great, natural way to take care of your skin! 

Did you know that shark skin actually looks and feels like little interlocking teeth? Um, no thank you!

Young Living offers SO many options for your skin! Here are a just a few top skin oils:

Top Essential Oils for Skin

  • Frankincense—helps create youthful appearance 
  • Tea Tree—cleanses skin
  • Geranium—helps provide healthy, clear, glowing skin
  • Cypress—smooths skin
  • Copiaba—reduces redness
  • Sandalwood—soothes, tightens, cleanses
  • Blue Tansy—soothes, reduces redness, provides antioxidant
  • Kunzea—provides antioxidant benefits (check out the pics of how the Kunzea plant affects a barbed wire fence)

DIY Skin Care Recipes

My Toner Recipe

  • Witch Hazel  
  • Equal parts Frankincense (glow), Lavender (soothe), Lemon, (brighten), Copiaba

My Skin Cream Recipe

I originally created this as a diaper cream, but now I use it for all sorts of skin issues.

  • Coconut oil
  • Shea butter
  • Equal parts Frankincense, Tea Tree, and Lavender

My Facial Serum Recipe

  • 3 drops Frankincense
  • 2 drops Myrrh,
  • 1 drop Rose

Lots of options, right? I love that we can take care of our skin with non-toxic products that meet our skin’s unique needs!

Do you sleep like a shark? Best Oils for Sleep Support

So many sleep support oils, which are your favorites? 

So many sleep support oils, which are your favorites? 

So apparently there’s lots of controversy about how and if and when sharks sleep:

  • They seem to be very active at night
  • Most species have to remain in motion, so for years scientists thought sharks didn’t sleep
  • However, now scientists think they enter periods of rest where they slow down, but their eyes are open, and it’s not a true deep sleep

Did I describe any of you with those facts? Maybe your kids?

I think many of us seek out essential oils because we need sleep support—that was my reason 5 years ago!

But just like there are lots of things we don’t know about sharks’ sleeping habits, there are so many variables with our own sleeping habits that finding an Essential Oils combo for sleep support can be trial and error.

Best Oils for Sleep Support

  • Lavender: Most people start with Lavender—this doesn’t work for me or Jonna 
  • Frankincense: this is a fav in our house and a Lavender + Frankincense combo can be powerful
  • Stress Away
  • Peace and Calming

If you really want to sleep like the dead, then consider these heavy hitters:

  • Valor
  • Valerian
  • Rutavala
  • DreamCatcher

And then there are a few that kids especially find calming:

  • Gentle Baby
  • Roman Chamomile 
  • SleepyIze

And finally, you may want to consider WHY you aren’t sleeping: Are you worried? Is your child needing a little extra security? Sometimes if we can support our emotions, we can sleep better.

Suzanne's Picks

So—what do WE use for sleep support in our house?

The Kids

  • Jonna (6)—Frankincense, Valor, or Palo Santo
  • Zanna (5)—Frankincense,  Valor, or Palo Santo
  • Mila (3)—Palo Santo and White Angelica
  • Vin (1)—Lavender or Peace and Calming

The Adults

  • Me—Valor or Rutavala (the kids would use the Rutavala, too, but that’s liquid gold and I’m a little stingy with it )
  • The hubs—whatever I’m diffusing 

And despite this lengthy post, there are still more options—I feel like I am leaving so many good ones out!

Maybe you can help me out—what are your family’s favorite oils for sleep support?

Skip the Blue Shark Blues: Essential Oils for Mood Support

No need to feel like the Blue Shark! Try out these tried and true mood boosting oils. 

No need to feel like the Blue Shark! Try out these tried and true mood boosting oils. 

This is the blue shark—according to my friends Google and Wikipedia, they are sort of sluggish and lethargic in their movements. 

Top Oils for Mood Boosting


If you’re feeling the same way, maybe a little down, a little blue, here are some oily tips to try:

  • A drop of Frankincense Vitality daily under the tongue (this is a my go-to mood lifter)
  • Frankincense + Lemon in the diffuser
  •  A few drops of Joy in your hands and inhale
  • Ylang Ylang + Orange in the diffuser
  • Super B an energy and mood lifter all in one—do you know how much our body NEEDS B vitamins? They are vital! I made this a part of my daily routine after I had Vin.
  • NingXia Red—daily, daily, daily! In addition to about a hundred other things, it supports healthy energy levels and regulates blood sugar (anybody else get HANGRY?)

Raise your hand if you had fun with Essential Oil SHARK WEEK! Share any skin, sleep or mood support tips below. Bonus points for Shark-themed ideas:) 

Essential Oils History 101

From Queen Cleopatra’s personal spa to our nightly routines, essential oils have been...well...essential in people’s lives for thousands of years. So today, we decided to take a look back. Way back, to the beginning of essential oils’ rich history.

We love how the oils we use on a daily basis have been used by people from nearly every major ancient culture. They must have been on to something, huh? Consider this your Essential Oils History 101 crash course. Buckle up, we have human history to cover.  

Oil Like an Egyptian

Queen Cleopatra used plant-based oils and pastes in her famous beauty spa. 

Queen Cleopatra used plant-based oils and pastes in her famous beauty spa. 

Recorded essential oil history starts with the Egyptians. As a world power for almost 30 centuries, their love of oils was diffused around the world to cultures like the Jews, Greeks and Romans. Want to oil like an Egyptian? Here are a few ways they used oils and plant-based products in their culture.

  • Beauty: Famous for her radiant skin, Queen Cleopatra opened the world’s first spa. She extensively used...you guessed it...essential oils.
  • Burial: The items that Egyptians chose to bury with their Pharaohs gives us insight into what they treasured. It’s no surprise that King Tut was buried with 350 liters of essential oils!
  • Worship: The oils were considered sacred and at height of Egyptian power only priests were allowed to use them. In fact, each deity had a dedicated oil.
  • Power: Pharaohs also had blends developed for every aspect of their rule, from love and war to mediation.  

The Wild East

"The Yellow Emperor's Book of Internal Medicine" is still used by eastern medicine practitioners today! 

"The Yellow Emperor's Book of Internal Medicine" is still used by eastern medicine practitioners today! 

Essential oils were also valued in eastern cultures like China, India and Persia.

  • China: Essential oils were first recorded in the east between 2697-2597 BC, during the legendary Yellow Emperor’s reign. His book “The Yellow Emperor’s Book of Internal Medicine” covers essential oil use and is still a classic resource of modern eastern medicine practitioners.
  • India: Ayurvedic medicine has a 3000 year history with essential oils for health and spiritual purposes. The literature contains over 700 substances including some of our favorites: Cinnamon, Ginger, Myrrh and Sandalwood.
  • Persia: A prolific researcher on plants and their effect on humans, Avicenne was the first person to record his distillation methods in 980 BC. They are still in use today!

Fit for a King

We wrote about the oils that were fit for a king this Christmas, check it out!

We wrote about the oils that were fit for a king this Christmas, check it out!

Take a look at which oils were presented to Jesus at his birth.

Dark Times

What does Thieves Essential Oil Blend have to do with the Black Plague? Check out one of our top posts to find out! 

What does Thieves Essential Oil Blend have to do with the Black Plague? Check out one of our top posts to find out! 

The Dark Ages were a dark time for humanity and essential oils. Holistic healing and baths (yes, really) were prohibited by the church. However some essential oil tradition continued as people leaned on aromatic blends to counterbalance the church’s anti-bathing stance. As a bonus, this practice actually supported the user's immune system.

The Dark Ages and Bubonic Plague also brought us Thieves blend! Read how the Black Plague set the stage for one of our most beloved oil blends.

French Connection

The French, including chemist Rene Gattefosse, developed many of our modern Essential Oil techniques. 

The French, including chemist Rene Gattefosse, developed many of our modern Essential Oil techniques. 

Modern Essential Oils study started in France. French chemist Rene Gattefosse coined the term “aromatherapy” in 1937 after observing lavender’s skin-boosting results. Other essential oil experts followed: Dr. Jean Valet who used Essential Oils to help injured WWII soldiers and Marguerite Maury who pioneered The Raindrop massage technique. Thanks to Robert Tisserand, much of France’s aromatherapy knowledge has been translated to English for us to learn from today.  


Start Your History Today!

If you’re ready to start your own personal history with Essential Oils, contact us today! We’d love to team with you as you journey toward wellness, purpose and abundance.