Easy Homemade Rug or Repurposing

Browsing second hand and donation stores is a favorite pastime of mine. It's even better when I score.

At Goodwill, I found two tapestry-like pillow shams for 59 cents each that I converted into bathroom rugs. Although they were pretty thick and cushy already, I wanted them to be thicker so I cut an old towel in half and inserted a half into a pocket at one end of each sham. If I had wanted them even thicker I would have inserted a whole towel in the pockets by laying it flat and inserting one end in each pocket.

Next, I folded the shams in half (along the long edge not the narrow edge) and whip stitched the edges together with matching embroidery floss pulling the floss though the gold cords that adorn the shams' edges. The sham rugs add a classy touch and look much better than a folded towel on the floor. What's even better? They were inexpensive!

Psoriasis Control

My husband has psoriasis on his hands, legs, elbows and buttocks. From what I understand he has had it for much of his adult life. The creams he has been prescribed were of minimum effectiveness resulting in - at best - a slight recovering of the scaling skin but did not remove the redness.

I did some research on natural remedies and skin moisturizing and found glycerine to be a major factor for both. It is an organic compound used for:

Topical pure or nearly pure glycerol is an effective treatment for psoriasis, burns, bites, cuts, rashes, bedsores, and calluses. It can be used orally to eliminate halitosis, as it is a contact bacterial desiccant. The same property makes it very helpful with periodontal disease; it penetrates biofilm quickly and eliminates bacterial colonies. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glycerol)

 Doing further research, I discovered common kitchen vegetable oil to be a component for homemade creams and lip balms.

With this knowledge in hand, I prepared a (coffee) scrub and lotion for John to use. The scrub is a simple combination of 3/4 vegetable oil, coffee grounds and 1/4 glycerine. The lotion is made up of 3/4 vegetable oil and 1/4 glycerine.

It's too bad I don't have before and after pictures. It is incredible what the combination of liquids have done for John's psoriasis. After approximately three months, the patches of psoriasis are no longer scaly, and the red patches on his hands have faded to nearly normal skin color. Further, he no longer uses the prescribed cream on his hands. He uses only the homemade lotion.

While the glycerine is rather expensive if purchased from the hobby store, it does last quite a long time. I highly recommend adding glycerine to the lotions you have on hand or making homemade lotion with vegetable oil and glycerine if you have psoriasis or cracked, dry skin. You will see a remarkable difference in a few weeks.