99% of American women voluntarily get rid of their hair. 

It’s one of the most unpleasant and expensive forms of beautifying but there is a DIY way to do it affordably. 

If you’re suffering from PCOS and have excess hair on your face and neck, this could be perfect for you. It’s also great for hair removal all over your body and it can cost less than $5. (Also getting your hormones back on track with S'moo can reduce your body hair growth - stopping it before it begins). 

All it takes, is sugar, lemon and a candy thermometer and a mason jar. 

You might have heard of it before? It’s called Sugaring. The kicker is you can pay a pretty penny to have it done for you, or you can do it yourself, including making the product all for under $5 dollars. Sure it takes a little extra work and you have to try it a few times before you get super good at it but in the end, it will be worth it. 

My husband and I have been doing this for about five years. My husband actually sugars his own neck hair so that he has a nice clean beard line, while I sugar my upper lip, arms, and legs. How did we get started? My mom actually paid a pretty penny to get me a gift card to a sugaring place (even though I told her not to). After the gift card was gone, I didn’t want to spend the money and when I looked up buying sugar paste, it was $20 for a small amount that I knew we could make ourselves. 

It didn’t work at first and the secret ingredient to make it work as a candy thermometer! Once we got a candy thermometer, we were on a roll! We’ve saved thousands of dollars and the best part is sugaring is easy on your skin. My husband started sugaring his neck because shaving it was causing hundreds of ingrown hairs that were extremely painful. With sugaring, his hair grows back the same each time without any unwanted ingrown hairs. 

Sugaring was considered an ancient Egyptian art, a hairless body was extremely popular. Their method involved sugar, water, and lemon, the paste was applied in the direction of the hair growth, covered with a piece of muslin cloth and pulled off when cooled. 

This sugaring method we use, doesn’t need water or muslin cloth. Here is the secret. 

2 cups sugar

1/4 cup lemon juice 

1. Place the sugar and Lemon juice in a medium sauce pan. 
2. Start with medium to high heat 
3. Constantly stir this mixture and watch your candy thermometer 
4. Once your candy thermometer hits 260 degrees remove from heat. 

Let this cool and warm up a mason jar. You can warm up a mason jar by adding water to it and placing it in the microwave for two minutes. Remove carefully, pour out the water and dry well before pouring your warm sugar paste into the jar. 

You’re done. You have sugar paste. We don’t recommend using this right away, as it will be too hot. When you are ready to use it, place your jar without the lid into the microwave for 30 seconds to warm it up enough for you to spoon some of the sugar paste into a bowl. The amount needed will depend on what you’re sugaring. An upper lip will only need a tablespoon or two, a leg might need about a 1/4 cup. You’ll be able to get more if needed and you can reuse your sugar paste as you go. Warm up your sugar paste which is now in a bowl, for ten second intervals. Until the sugar paste is about the consistency of molasses (this is part of the learning curve as if the paste is too cold, it will not work as well and if it’s too hot it will be very unpleasant on your skin).  

Your Ready To Sugar:

Make sure your skin is clean (free of lotions) and it sometimes helps to add some corn starch or baby powder to your skin and rub it in, just a fine layer of dust to help the hair separate from your skin. 

When you apply the paste apply it against the hair grain with your fingers (I usually try to use only one or two fingers), work it into the hair. Then you can work up an edge of the sugar paste and pull it in the direction of your hair growth. Then repeat! We reheat our sugar paste every time it isn’t spreading on super well. If you have a lot of hair like we do, the harder the paste, the more painful it is to spread, so just put it in the microwave for another 10 seconds (be careful, it holds its heat well) and after a min, start again. 

Though this video has a slightly different recipe and doesn’t use a candy thermometer (which I’m not kidding, is a life saver) it does show you the general idea so check it out if you need a visual https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SdBEMvqovs  

* Caution * please be very careful. Sugar paste holds heat and can badly burn you.