Make your own beauty scrubs

EXFOLIATING is wonderful, especially if you’ve been sitting in traffic on the way to and from work, and then in a closed office with stale air circulating.

The benefits of a gentle scrub are that removing dead, dull skin cells give you an instant brightening factor, making your skin radiant and more youthful-looking.

Also, you reduce those very fine lines that come from the sun and pollution damage. If you’re prone to spots, this kind of cleaning will remove bacteria that cause breakouts.

Finally, it helps your moisturiser and skin toner to penetrate better.

However, exfoliating should not be a daily process because overdoing it can damage the skin.

Ideally, you should exfoliate very gently about twice a week.

A good place is in the shower. Wet your face thoroughly, dab the cream all over your face, rub very gently but be sure to get to those difficult spots like beside your nose and underneath your ears. Then wash off.

What you need is: Half a cup of ordinary white or brown sugar, a quarter of a cup of coconut oil and some fresh peppermint leaves (from the wet market or supermarket). Mix them together and leave overnight in the fridge. Then apply.

If you want, you can double the quantity and store in a glass jar in the fridge. It will keep up to a week and is ideal for two scrubs.

Tip: If you have hard skin on your elbows and your feet are rough, make a big batch and add a cup of fresh milled coconut. This will moisturise as you exfoliate.