Although I haven’t posted much on the blog over the past few weeks, I have been busy as a bee in the garage getting some great projects finished for the house. One of them has been Emma’s much anticipated (maybe just by me) emerald green big girl bed. Yes, I wanted an emerald green bed for her way before emerald was the color of the year – much like I wanted to name a daughter Emma 25 years before it became one of the most popular names in America. I figure I’m just really ahead of my time, but it takes me so long to actually get anything accomplished that it’s pretty mainstream by the time it comes about.
But I digress.
The new big girl bed is a beauty I found for a song on Craigslist. It needed tons and tons of work, but it’s now finished and worth every second I put into it. I’ll go into more details on it later, but after I stripped, sanded and replaced some of the trim work, I painted it my with favorite primer and latex paint.
The problem is that my favorite primer is oil-based. And my gloves got covered in primer because my spray gun leaked. So I took off my gloves to fix the gun. And now you know where this is going. I had white primer covering the palms of my hands, and since it wasn’t water based, it wasn’t coming off with soap and water.
Enter one of my new favorite discoveries – essential oils. My friend Myra (of My Blessed Life fame) got me interested in them when we roomed together at the Haven Conference this summer (she gave me Peppermint oil for a headache – and it worked), and I’ve recently started using them for a whole host of things. I had used Lemon oil before when I had super glue on my finger (just rubbed it on and the glue came off), so I thought I’d try it for the paint.
I used a little scoop of Coconut oil (which you can buy at the grocery store these days – LOVE that stuff!) and put three drops of Young Living Lemon Oil on one hand. I rubbed my hands together like I was washing them until the oil mixture turned white from the primer. Then, I rinsed and washed my hands with soap and water. The oil-based primer was completely removed from my hands!
In the past, I would have used a whole series of chemicals to try to remove the paint – nail polish remover and mechanics hand scrub usually topped the list. I’d also have to scrub like the dickens for several days. How much do I love the discovery that I can get oil-based paint off my hands with an essential oil (Lemon) and a carrier oil (Coconut or Olive)? I love it like crazy.
If you are interested in learning more about essential oils and the awesome things that they do, visit my friend Myra to read all about her journey and experience with them. As I figure out more ways that they can help me in my DIY life, I’ll definitely let you know.
How do you get oil-based paint off of your hands? Any other natural techniques that you want to share?
Yay! What a great discovery. I am always covered in something paint related. If you happen to stumble on a solution for permanent marker from fabric, I would be all ears.
I have heard that hairspray works great for permanent marker on fabric! Have you tried that?
I feel like I’ve used something before that worked, but I can’t remember what it was! If I remember, I’ll let you know.
What a great tip! I know oils are really good at getting adhesives off too. I should make sure I have some around the house. My hands are so dry that I could probably use some just for that reason alone!
Yes! I’ve used it to get a stubborn sticker off of something before. I love having the oils around.
This is great advice to know! I always have paint on me it seems and its always a pain to clean off. Thanks for sharing!
Sure thing! I hope it helps sometime.
Thank you. I just primed a wall with oil based kilz and silly me stuck the paint brush under the faucet with soap and covered both my hands. The coconut oil/lemon essential oil was awesome. I just started stocking my essential oil cabinet and was thrilled to have what I needed to get this awful stuff off of my hands.
Agreed! I didn’t have the essential oil, but I used course salt to give my hands a little scrub and my skin felt extra smooth after. It still didn’t quite remove it all, so I bet I’m missing the alkaline properties from the lemon to really pull it out of the skin. Amazing!
I happened across these tips as I googled how to remove the oil paint that just spilled all over my hand. I didn’t even think about wearing gloves because I’m so used to water based paint. Thank you for saving me the trip to the store for acetone! I had coconut oil and table salt and it worked like a charm!
Hi! Awesome idea! Any chance I could use this to take oil-based paint off of some beautiful wood cabinets?