Thursday, December 6, 2012

wax on




These photos of my mum and her friend Lyn were taken in Brisbane in 1983, I think. Our families would take turns crossing the Nullabor to stay with each other over the summer holidays - 4 adults and 4 kids. They were good times. Mum and Lyn found the above recipe for home-made leg wax, somewhere, no recollection from whom it came, but many batches were made and there they would sit in the humidity of the upstairs kitchen slapping the sticky wax on each others legs and ripping out the hair with strips of old sheets, howling and giggling like teenagers. The wax worked a treat providing you didn't apply it too hot! And on returning to Perth, Mum and I spent afternoons stirring the sticky stuff, and waxing our legs and talking in the back yard. I felt like I had gained entry into the club of womanhood they had shared and that I was being handed down something almost sacred but most certainly Very Useful.  I've only just found the recipe in Lyn's writing, in a wad of old letters and I've stuck it my recipe book as it had been in one of Mum's for nearly 30 years. Am I game to give it another go? Perhaps, now that I'm on holiday and have time to sit and wax on, wax off. I tend to ignore leg hair for as long as possible but i may be inspired by nostalgia. I must add that none of us were harmed during the making and utilising of this concoction, however if you feel the urge to give it a whirl, do a little test patch to test the thickness of application and resist the urge to put it on your toast (it may look like golden syrup but it aint). From memory this recipe made enough to do four legs! It has probably been 30 years since I heard mention of glycerine.Does anyone use it these days? are there better sources than others? Is it made from baby seals?? Disregard this post entirely if so...

So there you are. Handed down from The Elders, an ancient grooming tradition, to share with your daughters and your daughters' daughters.....

1 comment:

  1. My god! I thought that was you in that photo of leg-hair free goddesses!!
    Thank you so very much for sharing such wisdom of the ancients. Very tempting to have a go, but probably more fun for a leg-hair-less chick's evening in!

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