Four Essential Oil Diffuser Blends for Relaxation

Posted on by Astrid

Like I’ve mentioned a couple of times over the past week, I’ve been loving my new essential oils. I got three new-to-me oils, even though I already had a stash of about thirty different oils. One of the reasons for this is the fact that, when I started out experimenting with essential oils several years ago, I just bought oils at random without paying attention to which blended well together. In case you didn’t know, blending essential oils is better than using single oils. For this reason, you almost by default need more than one oil. But I was completely clueless and just threw oils together that I had no idea about whether their smells or effects would complement each other or would lead to something that flat out stank. And since I had no idea what to expect, my nose wasn’t telling me either.

All this to say, you don’t need thirty or more essential oils to enjoy aromatherapy. I for one love creating a new blend everyday and, since I buy my oils online, I haven’t been able to smell them before purchasing them. If you are in a position to smell different oils before purchasing them, by all means do. After all, even though blends are better than single oils, if an oil has a horrible smell on its own, you may not like it in synergy either. Thankfully, all my new-to-me oils smell pretty good.

Like I said above, I like to try a new essential oil blend everyday. Like I said when doing my #AtoZChallenge on aromatherapy, essential oils can do different things. For example, some can be uplifting and some can be relaxing. Today, I’m sharing four different essential oil blends for relaxation.

For each blend, I will assume you have a medium-size (about 300ml) ultrasonic diffuser. For this reason, the total number of drops of essential oil you’ll want to use, is about 10 on average. You can adjust the number to your liking or your diffuser size.

Blend 1

First up is a blend of lavender or lavandin, cedarwood, sweet orange and ylang ylang. Like I said when discussing lavender and lavandin last April, lavandin is milder and cheaper than lavender. In this recipe, I used lavandin. You can substitute the sweet orange for wild orange if you have this, but I’ve never tried that. I really like this combination of oils and have it in my diffuser as I write this post.


  • 4 drops lavandin

  • 2 drops sweet orange

  • 2 drops cedarwood

  • 1 drop ylang ylang

Blend 2

This blend combines equal amounts of bergamot, patchouli and ylang ylang. I got a little bored of this blend after using it a little too often. However, it is simple to memorize, which may be one reason I used it so regularly.


  • 3 drops bergamot

  • 3 drops ylang ylang

  • 3 drops patchouli

Blend 3

This blend contains lavender (or lavandin, I’ve tried both), patchouli and geranium. Geranium is one of those oils whose smell I don’t personally appreciate that much, so I like to use only one drop of it in my blends.


  • 4 drops lavender

  • 4 drops patchouli

  • 1 drop geranium

Blend 4

Finally, I want to mention a blend that contains one of my absolute favorite essential oils: clary sage. I was really saddened that I didn’t find a reason to discuss this oil in my #AtoZChallenge last April, although I think I mentioned it when discussing uplifting essential oils. This blend has both mood-boosting and relaxing properties.


  • 1 drop lemongrass

  • 5 drops lavender

  • 4 drops clary sage

I hope some of these essential oil blends will inspire you.

loopyloulaura

Also linking up with the Hearth and Soul Link Party

Orange and Other Citrus Essential Oils #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hello and welcome to my letter O post in the #AtoZChallenge. I have been looking forward to sharing this post ever since I found out that the letter O in the #AtoZChallenge alphabet scavenger hunt is for orange. Yes, I’m writing about orange essential oil. Oh, and all the other great citrus essential oils too.

When referring to orange oil, many people mean sweet orange essential oil. Wild orange essential oil is also often used in aromatherapy. I for one don’t own that oil, so I always substitute it with sweet orange.

Unlike most other essential oils, sweet orange and most other citrus oils are not extracted using steam distillation. Rather, they are extracted by cold pressing the rinds (peel) of the fruit. There are distilled varieties of citrus essential oils, but they are much harder to come by. I, for one, have searched a lot of places to find steam distilled lime and lemon essential oils, but haven’t been able to find them here in the Netherlands.

Sweet orange oil is one of the more skin-safe oils out of the citrus group. It is most likely not phototoxic. However, most other citrus essential oils, such as lime, lemon and also bitter orange, are phototoxic.

Another citrus essential oil I love is bergamot. This aroma and flavor may be well-known to those who drink Earl Grey tea, as bergamot oil is used to flavor this type of tea. Bergamot’s scent is citrusy like orange, but somewhat more floral with bitter undertones too. Be very careful when using bergamot essential oil on the skin, as it is highly phototoxic due to it containing bergaptene. When using bergamot essential oil on the skin, be sure to choose the furocoumarin-free (FCF) variant, which has the bergaptene removed. Still, even FCF bergamot essential oil can be irritating to the skin as well as photosensitizing.

Citrus essential oils blend well with many different essential oils, including lavender, eucalyptus, etc. I also love the combination of several different citrus essential oils in a diffuser blend. For example, here’s a recipe for my keylime pie diffuser blend:


  • 2 drops sweet orange

  • 7 drops lime

  • 1 drop lemon


I also like to blend citrus essential oils with spicy essential oils such as cinnamon and clove bud. However, just about anything goes!