Eliminating VOCs in My Home with Essential Oils



 

As I've spent more time at home, I've had more time to make my house reflect my family.  This has included doing some home decorating with lots of DIY projects.  You can check out my other blog Decorating My Home On A Budget to see some of my projects!  As I started making my home start to feel more like "us", the engineer side started to take over, and I started thinking about the health of our home.  I started looking into ways to reduce the amounts of chemicals in our house, and specifically volatile organic compounds (VOCs).  A VOC is a chemical with a low boiling point, and has adverse health effects.  They can be found in many household items such as cleaning supplies, glue, and even within our furniture.  Working in a chemical plant for part of my career, we were always conscious about the presence of VOCs, taking courses about how to handle them and the proper safety gear to wear them when working with them.  Imagine my surprise when I learned that, according to the EPA, VOCs are 10 times more prevalent in our homes than they are outdoors!  For more information about VOCs and their negative health effects, please see VOCs: What they're all about.  VOCs.  I came across an article that talked about replacing my plugins that made my house smell oh so good, with essential oils.  I love the smell of a clean house, and use plugins to keep the house smelling nice (a challenge with a dog, cat, and two young boys).  So I looked into finding essential oils, and found a friend who sells young Life essential oils. I ordered the Young Living Lavender Essential Oil - 5 ml because I thought it would be the nicest scent.  I've also listed some other recommendations of other oils at the end of this post.

Young Living Lavender Oil I chose

  1.  First I removed he wick from the bulb.  I had a little trouble getting it loose, unlike the tutorial said.  But I was eventually able to get it free by jamming a knife between the glass and plastic part of the wick, and working them apart.    

 

 



 



    2.   Next I rinsed the glass bulb out with water a couple of times, and ran water over the wick.  I then filled the bulb about a quarter full with lavender oil (I wanted to use as little of the oil as possible), and the rest with water.

 

 

  3.  I inserted the wick back into the bulb (it took a little work, but eventually went back in), twisted it back onto the diffuser, and plugged it into my wall!

 

 

 

Now my house smells lavender clean, and I don't have to worry that I'm slowly poisoning my family! 

 

Lets talk financials on this project.  Essential oils are not cheap, especially good ones.  I bought the lavendar for $26 for a 5ml bottle. If I used the entire bottle for my diffuser, then that would have been expensive!  But since essential oils are extremely concentrated, a little goes a long way.  Combining the oil with water, I was able to fill two bulbs, and I still have about half of the bottle left.  So that would make 4 full bulbs for $26, the same price I was paying at the store.

 

Here are some other fragrances I will be trying soon: