Spring Sunburn

We went to the beach yesterday and it was beautiful. Although sunny, the wind was pretty strong and so we never felt hot. In fact, once out of the water everyone was pretty cold. My youngest took a break on the blanket while wrapped in a couple towels because he was so chilly. The older three were in the water the whole time. And, since it was so cool, I didn't even think about putting sunblock on everyone. The sunblock just sat in the car while we baked in the sun. It wasn't bad until we got home last night, and then we all had a hard time sleeping. And, of course, this morning we all looked like a bunch of lobsters.

I spent the morning looking up natural helps for sunburn and tried a few, none of which actually worked.

Vinegar-I found a lot of sites suggesting that vinegar, either straight or mixed with water, would take away the burn. I tried it on myself and it did not work at all.

Then there was the cucumber remedy--we all stood around rubbing and holding cucumber slices on our faces, which cooled the skin for a moment, but didn't really help once you removed it.

Then I tried a baking soda paste made with baking soda and water. I initially tried this on myself and at first it seemed to cool my burn so I put it on the kids too. Our faces, shoulders, backs, and arms were coated in a white pastey mask. We were supposed to leave it on until it dried then rinse it off, which we did, but the kids didn't enjoy the rinsing part since it tastes horrible if it gets into your mouth and stings a little if it gets into your eye. Well, afterward, the sunburn pain was still there and the redness didn't seem to fade in the least bit.

I know that the most important thing to do with a burn is to keep it cool so it doesn't continue to burn. And also, I've heard from firemen, never put any cream or oil on any burn since it blocks the heat from escaping as it coats your skin.

So far, I haven't found anything that would actually help draw the heat out so I am going with drinking a lot of water and spritzing with water to keep our skin cool for now. After it cools down we can apply moisturizers to keep it from drying out.

Regarding baking soda; I have used it succesfully as a toothpaste, mixing it with peroxide. And, although it really does taste pretty awful, it does an excellent job and my mouth feels very clean when done. I have also recently starting using it in place of shampoo along with apple cider vinegar as a rinse. This has been the best thing for my hair, not stripping it of all its natural oils, but gently cleansing it and leaving it very shiny and full of body.

I know there are a lot of great uses for baking soda and vinegar, but I think treating sunburn is not one of them.