The reason this subject is so mysterious is that distilling essential oil is probably one of the most frustrating, fruitless activities a person can pursue. I have been distilling oil in my home for a while now and luckily I am not relying on the oil I make to help me make a living. Yo truly need to actually grow fields/ trees/ huge bushes of the plant you're trying to distill in order to get a reasonable amount of oil. That said, if you are passionate (and/ or obsessed)with essential oils and aromatherapy, it will be totally worth the frustration. I tried for years to be craftly and cheap and to make a still myself, using all the old moonshiner methods. Nothing worked. I was being foiled at very turn! So, I stopped being such a scrooge and I saved up the money and bought me a real essential oil still which has proven to be much better quality than the ones I was making myself. Who knew? So let's say you have a still- either bought or of your own devising-and you have found a source for loads upon loads of plant material to make this oil distilling thing worth your while, there is another problem that you have- your oil doesn't smell like the oil you bought from the store. Why is this? My lavender oil just smells like burnt, wet plant matter! What's the deal? I think part of it is that the oil needs to sit uncovered for a while, just to air it out. That seems to help quite a bit. Also, I was fortunate enough to have a chance to make essential oil of lemon rind in an actual chemistry lab. For those who don't know,citrus zest probably produces the most oil of anything on the planet. It's the most rewarding distillation I've ever had. So int this lab we distilled the zest just like I would have done at home and came away with the same amount of oil. But then we did this extra step where they stuck the oil flask on this weird looking science fiction-y machine that spun the flask around for a couple of minutes very fast. I was told that it would evaporate all the extra water out of the oil, making it pure. WHAT??? I thought it WAS pure after the distillation- that's what distilation is supposed to do, right? Well not quite. So I got my oil back and low and behold, there was about 1/2 as much oil in there as there had been before the spinning. It smelled like lemons. Wow. I wish I had a weirdo-science spinner of my own. I don't have a spinner. So, I think all we simple people can do is, a few times a day for several days, put a lid on the oil, give it a good shake and then leave it opened to the air. This will give the little remaining water a chance to come to the surface and possibly evaporate. ANYWAYS, back to something most people will care about- heartmagic.com/essentialdistiller is where to go to find the still I bought. I have the glass one which is the cheapest ($400)but there are also copper ones and I think they even have a pelican for over a grand. Someday... Thanks for reading!

I just noted that I wrote I wasnt putting a essential oil recipe in there for cleaning wooden floors, but there is one in there. Note though, that I havent ever used that recipe as I dont have wood floors, so I cant 100% say it wont take the shine off. If you want to try it, just do a test spot in a hidden area. Also, I dont know if I can give people my e-mail address if they want a printable version of this? Or my environmental group on myspace? Can I? Will someone please tell me so that I can put this info down if someone wants me to send them out a printable copy? Oh, and sorry it took me so long to get this up online sylviatexas! Thanks, sammie

We use 8%, which seems pretty great with Fragrance oils. Now, with essential oils, If you got to something like 30%, you will be both dilluting the wax (so it wont burn well) and also spending a boatload on the oils. The tricky thing is, essential oils vary so much for their own throw, so 8% of one might be great and 8% of another might not do anything. Its all about experimentation, we are trying new things all the time. Connect with your inner mad scientist!!

It depends on what is ON the floor. If you have WAXED hardwood floors then MORE WAX is needed. Anything else and you need a something else. Most finishes from the last 40+ years are polyurethane finishes. These are NOT to receive ANYTHING other than 'cleaning'. If the floor is showing raw wood then it is time to do a full sand and refinish. Never, ever put down wax or polish or oil on a polyurethaned floor. EVER. At this point, we don't know what you have on your floors. You will need to load a photo or two. Can you load photos? They need to be in jpg format and it takes ++time for them to load. You need to leave the page alone until your photos have finished loading (can be 5-10 minutes).