Everything has its season. It applies to vegetables, relationships, sports, and even essential oils! If you’re a devotee of essential oils and your roster of favored blends is mostly fresh and clean spring sets or warm and citrusy summer blends, you might find your diffuser getting a little less love as the cold weather rolls in and day turns to night much closer to lunchtime than any of us would like.
While we love essential oil blends, especially when we can diffuse them into our living space, all of the time, we definitely find that we’re less impressed with floral scents and sharp citrus in the winter months.
The essential oil blend you put together and diffuse into your space can really set the tone for your day and have an impact on your sense of well-being. While you obviously don’t have to give up everything you love about the warmer months, there’s something to be said for a change in mood to accommodate the seasons.
After all, we change our decor! And there’s something about twinkling lights, candles, rich tones, and just overall coziness that helps you to embrace the change in the season rather than resent every frosty morning.
If you need to brush up on your winter essential oil blends as we get closer to the holidays, here are some great options for essential oil blends to help you move into the colder seasons with grace and enthusiasm.
1. Something Festive
No matter what you celebrate, the winter months are prime holiday time. So why not design your essential oil blend to match!? If you’ve already gotten your holiday decorations out and are just looking for the perfect scent to get you in that holiday mood and sweep you away on a cloud of festive bliss, look no further.
For this blend, you’re going to want to mix essential oils like pine, juniper, fir, or cypress. This evokes the warming, woodsy scent of Christmas trees—or simply the types of trees that retain their greenery throughout the winter if Christmas isn’t your jam. Add to that some warming cinnamon, the zing of orange or lemon, and a sharp hint of ginger essential oil, and we guarantee you’ll be ready to deck the halls in no time.
2. Something Bright Yet Seasonal
If you’re not quite ready to let go of summer but still want to feel seasonally appropriate, a mixture of orange, eucalyptus, and peppermint is one of the best winter essential oil blends for you. Eucalyptus and peppermint are great for making you feel clean and fresh while still feeling appropriate for the holiday season (and if you’re really sick over the shift to cold weather, peppermint oil is good for nausea, too.)
Orange essential oils are also thought to help increase feelings of comfort and relaxation, so you can get those cozy vibes without needing to totally give up on sunny citrus in the months when the sun is scarce.
3. Something With Woodsy Vibes
If you’re more of an outdoorsy soul and your favorite thing about winter is views of snow-capped mountains and trees dusted in glorious white, this is the blend for you. You’ll want to start with black or pink pepper essential oil for a layer of spiciness to keep things lively as you go on to add a couple of drops of pine oil and a few drops of grapefruit essential oil.
The result is something spicy and sweet, yet earthy. It’s like going on a long winter hike with some of your favorite friends. In a word: perfect. If your version of a winter wonderland is getting lost in the woods during a snowstorm, this is the perfect blend to help you feel at home.
4. Something Cozy AF
Nothing hits the spot as far as childhood nostalgia goes like the smell of freshly baked cookies. If holiday cookies are one of the bright spots of the season for you, this is your blend. Start with some familiar cookie ingredients like clove and allspice essential oil, and a drop or two of cassia essential oil.
Cassia is in the same botanical family as cinnamon, so if you prefer the latter, feel free to substitute. Cassia is thought to help improve symptoms of depression, so if you have a hard time with the winter blues—or Seasonal Affective Disorder—this might be a good blend to keep you cozy while lifting your mood.
Finish off this blend with some ginger essential oil, to add some balance and complexity. Your home will smell like a gingerbread house in no time, and we can’t think of anything better.
5. Something To Ease Your Winter Cold
If your biggest concern in the winter isn’t setting the mood but fighting the symptoms of a persistent cold, we feel you. As the temperatures drop and people start spending more time inside, our chances of catching a cold go up.
Add to that an (ahem) reluctance to go for a morning run when there’s frost on the ground and tendency to overindulge on both food and drink as we slide into the holidays, and you’ve created the perfect recipe for a weakened immune system and opened the door for a pesky winter cold.
If you want your winter essential oil blends to help clear up your stuffy nose and help you to breathe easier, a mixture of eucalyptus and peppermint essential oils are the way to go. Our Breathe Easy Pure essential oil is an excellent pre-mixed blend, ready for your diffuser if that cold has you feeling like a one-step process is all you can handle. Peppermint and eucalyptus are great for cleaning up sinuses so that you can breathe easier and enjoy the holidays properly.
6. Something To Stop Your Winter Cold From Coming Back
But what if you’ve already tackled your seasonal sickness? You might be wondering if there are health benefits from winter essential oil blends that can keep your symptoms from coming back. Our Immunity Boost Pure essential oil is a great way to give your immune system a boost and help it to fight away any new germy invaders that might try to bring you down this winter.
It’s a potent mix of eucalyptus and lemon that is like a ginger shot for your mind and mood—we especially love this blend in the morning when we can all use a bit of a pick-me-up.
7. Something To Complement the First Snow
While some of us dread snowfall, some of us spend every day leading up to the holidays checking the weather forecast to see if it’s going to be a white Christmas. If you can’t wait for that first blanket of freshly fallen snow to coat your hometown, an essential oil blend to complement that bright yet cozy feeling you get when you watch the first snowflakes of the year fall past your window.
Adding a drop of clove essential oil to a few drops of snuggly cardamom and a few drops of white fir essential oil will round out this seasonal superhero nicely. If you don’t have white fir on hand, any evergreen essential oil we do. We do prefer white fir for this mix, though, because it gives major Christmas tree vibes, and who doesn’t want that? It’s especially clutch if you get a fake tree and miss the smell of the real deal.
8. Something Divine
If your holiday season is particularly religiously inclined or you just like a niche reference, we’d like to point you toward an essential oil blend that picks up on some little-remembered bits of Christmas lore. Picture a nativity scene—and if this isn’t part of your holiday practice, a quick Google will do. You know the three wise men, right, giving the baby in the manger their gifts?
Those gifts were myrrh, frankincense, and gold. While gold essential oil isn’t something we’ve discovered just yet (we’ll keep you posted), you can do a sweet yet grounded twist on this tale with essential oils. Just mix equal parts myrrh essential oil, frankincense essential oil, and a little bit of orange essential oil to round out the scent profile and stand-in for gold while we look for a 24-karat alternative.
In Conclusion
Winter essential oil blends are a key part of our routine in transitioning between the seasons. When the temperatures start to drop and we have to unpack all of our winter layers from the backs of our closets, we know it’s time to find a way to make that transition a little easier. And if you love winter, cold weather, or are just obsessed with the holidays, a wintry essential oil blend can help you get in the mood to appreciate the change in the seasons and all the glad tidings they bring.
Sources:
Seasonal Affective Disorder | National Institute of Mental Health