This post may contain affiliate links, please see the privacy policy for details.
Although you can find shower steamers with essential oil in the store, it’s much more fun to make your own. Once you try this DIY citrus shower steamers recipe you are going to want to experiment more with essential oils and create homemade shower steamers as gifts! These homemade shower bombs use natural ingredients like baking soda, citric acid, and Epsom salt, along with your favorite essential oils. When making your own you can use high quality essential oils for a truly luxurious shower experience and combine different oils to customize the steamers!
With just 3 natural ingredients along with essential oils, you can make your own DIY citrus shower steamers. They turn a boring shower into a fun and fragrant one!
If you love making your own bath and shower products, using natural ingredients, then you might also like to try making lavender orange bath salts. Other fun craft projects to consider include DIY beeswax wraps, orange sugar scrub or pom pom bookmarks. And these DIY birdseed ornaments are also worth making!
Why You’ll Love These
Natural ingredients: This shower steamer recipe is made with natural ingredients only, none of the chemicals or unknown ingredients that are in many commercially made ones.
Make your own oil combos: Another issue with store-bought shower steamers is the limitation on scents. You can usually find lavender as well as citrus steamers, but the choice is limited and you can’t combine several essential oils in one steamer.
Cost effective: It’s cheaper to make your own DIY shower steamers, even if using premium essential oil, than it is to buy readymade ones!
Shower Steamer Supplies
A complete list of ingredients and amounts can be found in the instructions card below
Baking soda and citric acid: The basis of each shower steamer. These components in the citric acid react with water to fizz and melt and release their fragrances.
Essential oil: Shower bombs have a lot more essential oil content that bath bombs, since the mixture doesn’t come into contact with the skin. You can use premium essential oil mixes or basic ones, depending on your budget.
Water: A little water goes into the shower steamer mixture to help hold it together. Without the water, it would be too powdery to set into a shape.
Silicon mold: This sets your shower steamers into your desired shapes.
How to Make Shower Steamers
For more detailed instructions with weights and measurements, jump to the printable recipe card
Combine the main ingredients: Mix the baking soda and Epsom salt (here) together with a whisk, and then add the citric acid (here).
Add water: Add a little water to the baking soda and Epsom salt mixture, and mix. Then repeat, until the shower steamer mixture is similar to wet sand in consistency.
Add essential oil: Add your favorite essential oil(s) to the mixture and blend in. I used orange (here), lemon (here) and lime (here).
Shape the shower steamers: Now spoon the mixture into silicon molds (here and here). I love the orange shaped mold.
Let them dry: Leave them for about 48 hours to fully dry before popping them out of the mold.
Substitutions and Variations
Use any oils you want: Perhaps you want to make relaxing shower steamers with lavender essential oil, or maybe you want to use eucalyptus essential oil for a decongestant one. Have fun trying different blends with your shower melts! I love this set of essential oils.
Add some color: When learning how to make a shower steamer, you might want to start off with a basic shower steamer with the main ingredients and a few drops of oil. But as you experiment you might like to try adding color. The best way to do this is to use natural food coloring. It won’t come into contact with your skin and should just rinse down the drain with the shower water.
How to Use Shower Steamers
Put a shower steamer, or shower bomb, on the shower floor. It’s best to put it away from stream of water so it doesn’t melt away too fast.
The hot steam and water droplets will make it bubble up and dissolve gradually during your shower, and it will release the essential oil scents.
How to Store DIY Citrus Shower Steamers
Store: As shower steamers react with water, it’s very important to keep them dry! You could wrap each one in some plastic wrap or else keep them in an airtight glass container. Either way, keep them away from moisture.
Top Tips
Adjust the essential oil amounts: If you want your shower steamer mixture to offer a delicate scent, just add a few essential oil drops. If you prefer a strong-smelling steamer, go ahead and add lots!
Make them flat: Although you could make your shower bombs any shape you like, depending on the shape of your silicon mold, flat and round or oval is best, the reason being they have more surface area this way and will react with the shower water faster to get those lovely aromas into the air.
Homemade Shower Steamers Recipe FAQs
No, these are two different items. Shower steamers have a higher essential oil concentration, as they aren’t intended to come into direct contact with the skin. Shower steamers are also known as shower fizzies, shower bombs, shower melts, shower tablets, and shower discs.
You don’t need to fill the tub with water (and pay a higher water bill) to use shower steamers, unlike with bath bombs. There’s no tub to clean afterwards either. Shower steamers can create an aromatherapeutic experience and you can mix and match any essential oils for your desired result (for example, relaxing, calming, invigorating, energizing, decongesting in, and so on).
If you’re making shower steamers, you might wonder how they’d work if you only have a bathtub with shower attachment. Is a shower steamer DIY bomb still going to work? The short answer is yes, you will simply place it somewhere in the tub instead of in the shower tray.
If you put it somewhere it gets water running directly on to it, it won’t last more than a few minutes. This is why it’s best to keep it out of the direct flow of the water. This way, it should last for several showers, so long as you keep it dry in between.
Orange Shower Steamer Recipe
Prevent your screen from going dark
Whisk together the baking soda, epsom salt, and citric acid together in a large bowl.
Add water one teaspoon at a time until the mix turns into the consistency of wet sand. It took me 2½ tablespoons. (If you squeeze some in your hand it should hold its shape).
Add your essential oil blend to the mixture.
Whisk to combine.
Spoon the mixture into a silicone mold and press it firmly with the back of the spoon to fill the design on the mold.
Continue to spoon in the mixture until the mold is full.
Let the shower steamers dry for about 48 hours before removing them from the mold.
You can speed up the drying process by omitting the essential oils and baking the shower steamers (in the mold) for 15 minutes in a warm oven. Add essential oils once they’re cooled and unmolded.
Homemade shower steamers are a fun project and you can create DIY shower steamers easily. Make some for yourself and more as thoughtful gifts. These shower melts are always popular with anyone who showers, which is just about everyone! You can have fun coming up with different mixes and combining different essential oils for your own customized blends.
You Might Also Like
- Looking for gift inspiration? How about making a DIY BBQ rub (trust me, this is a great gift!)
- Boozy hot chocolate gift sets are another easy gift idea if you want to give something thoughtful.
- Chocolate popcorn is also a lovely gift.
- And if you just want to craft something without necessarily making a gift, a succulent centerpiece will jazz up your dinner table. Go ahead and theme it, perhaps adding pumpkins for the fall or chocolate eggs for Easter!
Bella Bucchiotti
Bella Bucchiotti is a Canadian-based syndicated food, travel, and lifestyle writer, photographer, and creator at xoxoBella. She founded xoxoBella in 2015, where she shares her love for food, dogs, sustainability, fitness, crafts, outdoor adventures, travel, and philanthropy to encourage others to run the extra mile, try new recipes, visit unfamiliar places, and stand for a cause. Bella creates stress-free and family-friendly recipes for weeknight dinners and festive feasts.
