Hand Sanitizer

I don't consider myself a germ freak, but I do like things to be very clean and organized and during the winter months I load the family up with soap and hand sanitizer whenever we go anywhere.

Last year I tried to make my own hand sanitizer because I get frustrated with how quickly my hands dry out with the store bought kind, plus I just like to try and make my own stuff.

DIY Hand Sanitizer.
You Will Need:
(1) 12 ounce bottle of 100% Pure Aloe Vera Gel {It must be clear and say 100% on the bottle!}
3/4 teaspoon of Tea Tree Oil
Witch Hazel

Directions:
In a glass bowl, mix Aloe Vera and Tea Tree Oil.  Then add witch hazel until you have the consistency you want your sanitizer to be

First of all, it was almost impossible to find 100% aloe vera gel.  Every store I went to had the blue kind with lidocaine in it.  I finally just ordered a bottle from Amazon. 

This particular recipe says it is alcohol free. I found other recipes that are very similar that say you can add alcohol if you want to.  I decided to put 2 Tablespoons of rubbing alcohol into my mixture.  Maybe it was a mental block, but how can it really kill off the germs without alcohol?

 I mixed everything together until I got a good gel

 Then put it into little travel size bottles. 

The verdict: Without setting up my own science lab with microscopes and petri dishes, there is no way to know if this stuff kills germs as effectively as the store bought kind but I can tell you four things about it:

It's sticky - if you have used aloe vera gel then you know what I mean.  It has a slight sticky texture until it dries and it takes longer to dry then the store bought kind.

My hands weren't as dry - they still dried out a but but it wasn't as bad as using the store bought kind

It's smelly - each of the ingredients has a strong distinct odor and when you combine them all into a bottle then look out, your sniffer will get an overload

We were healthier - It could be pure coincidence, but we used it during the whole cold/flu season last year and that was the healthiest our family has ever been.  We each got a couple minor colds but that was it.  Nothing major. 

I had planned on using it again this winter to see if we stayed healthier again, but my pregnant sniffer can't handle the smell this time around.