Tea is one of the most popular beverages in the world. Many people prefer tea over other drinks because of its medicinal values and for centuries in China tea has been used in beauty care; therefore, many families in China regard drinking tea as a daily routine. Two thousand years ago, Chinese discovered tea’s amazing medicinal effects, including rinsing the month with tea water to help prevent tooth decay.
Rich in antioxidants and anti-aging and anti-inflammatory properties, tea is popular all over the world. However, 80% people throw after-brew leaves away without knowing their facial benefits. In fact, normal brewing can only release 70% of the beneficial substances in the tea leaves; therefore, it’s a huge a huge waste not taking advantage of them.
It’s common knowledge that tea helps control oil, soften and whiten skin. In fact, you can collect some leaves, and tie them in cloth bags. Later, throw them into your tub before you take a bath. We are not kidding! People do it with mud so it is ridiculous not to think that something, which is drank and already proven healthy won’t work in this regard. Different teas have different functions: green tea helps soften your skin and reduce acne; white tea can whiten skin tone; and black tea helps improve blood circulation.
We are living in a high-speed society, and people are suffering from stress from work and life, which leads to some annoying facial problems, such as the dark circles. The dark circles result from many reasons: not enough sleep, over use of eyes, or a diet deficient in Vitamin B12. Many people, especially girls, spend a lot of money on eye creams or eye concealers. Here is a cheaper and easier way to solve this problem.
Overnight tea bags are effective to reduce temporary dark circles because of staying up or over drinking water at bedtime. Before putting on facial masks or eye cream, warming your eyes up with tea bags for 10 minutes can improve your facial circulation and helps your skin to absorb the facial products better. Keep in mind, warm tea bags work better than the cold ones.
To many Asian girls, they hope to have brighter and brighter skin. However many whitening products are proved to have harmful substances. The after-brew leaves are rich in gallotannic acid helping keep the skin elasticity, decomposes melanin and whiten the tone. To oily skin, the leaves help kill bacteria and reduce or prevent pimples, and overall will bring about a healthy tone.
Since the leaves are still valuable, how can we use them? First, you can make some DIY facial masks. Squeeze the leaves with water until them become pasty. Then you can add in some glycerol or essential oil referring to a person’s needs. Mix them well and conserve them in the refrigerator. Then apply it to your skin like traditional masks. Different tea masks have different functions. Green tea masks can control oil and relieve pains because of sun burnt. Black tea mainly improves blood circulation and activates cell generation. Therefore, there is a saying – “green summer and black winter.” White tea becomes more popular because it helps whiten the skin and reduce wrinkles. Also, you can mix the paste with other cleansers too. Tea paste helps absorb oil and remove dead skin. Additionally, you can also make some polish masks by mixing the paste with brown sugar.
Aside for the beauty effects, after-brew leaves can be used to wash dishes to erase grease and polish pottery. Some people fill the dry after-brew leaves in the pillow, which helps improve sleeping quality. Also, the dry leaves can remove odors. Pack sunned leaves in gauze bags, and put them in the refrigerator, shoes, or closet. They can remove odors and prevent your clothes from moisture.