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It is a warm summer evening, the work is done, and you would like nothing better than to sit out on your porch in the cool of the day. But you cannot, for the mosquitoes are out, whining about your ears and biting your arms till you give up and go inside. So you reach for the can of chemical spray — the harsh-smelling stuff you do not much like to coat your skin and your children's skin in. But there is a better way, an old homemade way: a spray you mix yourself from a few cheap things that keeps the mosquitoes off and, best of all, smells absolutely wonderful — like cinnamon and vanilla, like a kitchen at baking time. In this video I will show you how to make it.
I am Elias, and I keep up this Lancaster County place the way my people always have. Out here close to the damp low ground, the mosquitoes can be a torment of a summer evening, and my grandmother kept a little crock of sweet-smelling mixture she would dab on us children before we went out. That is the spirit of what I am giving you today — and I will be honest with you about what it can and cannot do, as I always am.
The hones
https://eliasyoder.com
It is a warm summer evening, the work is done, and you would like nothing better than to sit out on your porch in the cool of the day. But you cannot, for the mosquitoes are out, whining about your ears and biting your arms till you give up and go inside. So you reach for the can of chemical spray — the harsh-smelling stuff you do not much like to coat your skin and your children's skin in. But there is a better way, an old homemade way: a spray you mix yourself from a few cheap things that keeps the mosquitoes off and, best of all, smells absolutely wonderful — like cinnamon and vanilla, like a kitchen at baking time. In this video I will show you how to make it.
I am Elias, and I keep up this Lancaster County place the way my people always have. Out here close to the damp low ground, the mosquitoes can be a torment of a summer evening, and my grandmother kept a little crock of sweet-smelling mixture she would dab on us children before we went out. That is the spirit of what I am giving you today — and I will be honest with you about what it can and cannot do, as I always am.
The hones
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00:00It is a warm summer evening, the work is done, and you would like nothing better than to sit
00:05out on your porch in the cool of the day. But you cannot, for the mosquitoes are out,
00:10whining about your ears and biting your arms and the back of your neck till you give up and go
00:16inside. So you reach for the can of chemical spray, the harsh smelling stuff you do not much like
00:23to coat your skin and your children's skin in. But there is a better way, an old homemade way,
00:30a spray you mix yourself from a few cheap things that keeps the mosquitoes off and, best of all,
00:37smells absolutely wonderful, like cinnamon and vanilla, like a kitchen at baking time rather
00:44than a chemical works. Today I am going to show you how to make it. I am Elias, and I
00:50keep up this
00:50Lancaster County place with my own hands, the way my people always have, and out here close to the
00:57fields and the damp, low ground, the mosquitoes can be a torment of a summer evening. The old people
01:04had no can of chemical spray to reach for, so they kept the biting bugs off with what they had,
01:10with certain smells and plants and smokes and a bit of knowing, and this homemade spray is in that same
01:17spirit, cheap, pleasant, and made from things you likely have in the house. But I will be honest with
01:24you about what it can and cannot do, as I always am, for I will not oversell you.
01:31I remember the summer evenings of my boyhood on my grandparents' porch, the whole family out there
01:37in the cool after a long, hot day of work, the grown folks talking low and us children catching
01:44fireflies in the dooryard. And the mosquitoes, well, they were there too, for we lived near the creek
01:51bottom. But my grandmother had her ways. She kept a little crock of a sweet-smelling mixture she would
01:58dab on us children before we went out, and a few pots of strong-smelling herbs grew right up by
02:04the
02:04porch steps, and there was always the good screen on the porch besides. I did not think of it as
02:11anything clever then. It was just what she did, the smell of her porch of a summer evening, sweet and
02:17herby. It was only grown that I understood she was keeping the bugs off us the old cheap way,
02:24the way her mother had taught her, with sweet kitchen things and growing plants instead of a can of
02:30chemical. That is the spirit of what I am giving you today. Quick word before I go further. The old
02:37methods my family uses, there is more of it than fits in any one video. I gathered the whole of
02:44it into
02:44a book at EliasYoder.com. The book is the long version. If you want it, it is there. I will
02:52not mention it
02:52again. Now let me be straight with you right at the start about what this spray is and is not
02:58before I
02:59give you a single thing, because I will not promise you what no homemade spray can do. This spray keeps
03:06the mosquitoes off you well, and it smells far better than any chemical can, and it costs you pennies.
03:13But it is not a wall of armor, and it does not last forever on your skin. It wears off
03:20after a while
03:20with your sweat and the evening, and you must put it on again. And I will say this plainly, for
03:26it
03:27matters. In the places where the mosquito carries real sickness, real disease, this homemade mix is
03:34not the thing to trust your life to, and you should use the strong proven protection there and not gamble
03:40on a folk recipe. But for the ordinary backyard, the porch of an evening, the garden at dusk, keeping the
03:48whining biters off your arms while you sit and work, it serves beautifully, and it serves sweet-smelling
03:55and cheap and natural. So that is the honest measure of it, and I would rather tell you true
04:01and have you trust me than promise you a miracle and lose you the first time a mosquito finds your
04:06ankle. A good homemade repellent that keeps most of them off and smells like a baking kitchen and
04:13costs you pennies is a fine and useful thing, worth making and worth using, and I will not let an
04:21overblown promise rob you of it by setting you up to be disappointed. Take it for what it honestly is,
04:27a sweet, cheap helper for the ordinary evening, and it will serve you well for years.
04:34Now here is how you make it. You need but three things, and a fourth that is only water.
04:40The first is pure cinnamon oil, and this is the heart of it, for the mosquitoes cannot abide the
04:46smell of cinnamon. But mind me close here, for cinnamon oil is powerful and can irritate the
04:53skin, so you use only a little, a single teaspoon, not a tablespoon, a teaspoon, for a little does the
05:00work, and too much will redden and sting your skin. The second thing is pure vanilla extract,
05:06a full tablespoon of that, for vanilla too has a way of keeping the insects off, and the two together,
05:13the cinnamon and the vanilla, work better than either alone, and smell like heaven besides.
05:19Use the real vanilla extract for this if you can, the true stuff, not the cheap artificial flavoring,
05:26for the real extract carries more of what the bugs dislike, and smells the truer for it,
05:31though I will own the real vanilla costs dear, so the artificial will do at a pinch. A tablespoon
05:38is plenty, enough to scent the whole bottle and do its work alongside the cinnamon. And the third thing
05:45is a carrier to hold it and help it keep, and for that I use witch hazel, that old gentle
05:50thing from
05:51the drugstore, a few tablespoons of it. Some folks use a high proof grain alcohol instead, which helps the
05:58spray keep longer on the shelf, and that works too, but the witch hazel is the gentler and plainer choice,
06:05and serves fine. The reason you want one or the other is that the cinnamon oil, being an oil, will
06:11not mix
06:12into plain water on its own, it only beads up and floats, but the witch hazel, or the spirits, help
06:18carry
06:19the oil into the water and hold it there better, and help the whole mix dry on the skin without
06:24staying
06:25greasy. So it is not just for keeping, it is to marry the oil and the water in the first
06:30place. A small
06:32thing, but it is why you do not just shake cinnamon oil into water and call it done. And then
06:38last,
06:38you fill the bottle the rest of the way with pure water, about a cup and a half, and here
06:43use clean,
06:44pure water, distilled or your good well water, not the city tap water with its chlorine and such,
06:50for the pure water keeps the mix cleaner and truer. Now you may wonder why a mosquito should mind the
06:57smell of cinnamon and vanilla so, when to us they smell of nothing but a good kitchen. It is that
07:03a
07:03mosquito finds you mostly by smell, by the scent of your skin and your breath on the air, and a
07:08strong,
07:09sweet smell like the cinnamon confuses and masks that scent, so the bug cannot home in on you the way
07:15it
07:15would. You have hidden your own smell behind the cinnamon, in a manner of speaking, and thrown the
07:20bug off your trail. And the cinnamon itself the mosquito plainly dislikes and keeps away from. So
07:27between the masking and the dislike, the bug leaves you be. That is the plain sense of why it works,
07:33no mystery to it. The making could not be simpler. You put your teaspoon of cinnamon oil into a common
07:39spray bottle, your tablespoon of vanilla, your few spoons of witch hazel, and then fill it up with the
07:45pure water, cap it, and shake it well. And that is the whole of it. The smell that rises out
07:51of that
07:51bottle, I tell you, is a wonder, warm and sweet, cinnamon and vanilla, and you will hardly believe a
07:58thing that smells so good is keeping the mosquitoes off you. But it is. You can mix it right in
08:04the spray
08:04bottle as I do, adding each thing in turn and the water last. Or mix it in a bowl first
08:10if you like,
08:11and pour it in. It makes no difference. And the amounts are not so exact that you need fret over
08:16them. A teaspoon of the cinnamon oil is the one thing to hold too firmly, for the reasons of the
08:22skin I gave you. But the vanilla and the witch hazel and the water, you can judge by eye well
08:27enough
08:27once you have made it a time or two. It is a forgiving recipe, plain and simple, the kind of
08:33body can mix up of
08:34an evening without any fuss. Now the safety on this and you heat it, for I will not have anyone
08:39hurt.
08:40The cinnamon oil is the thing to mind. Before ever you spray it all over yourself, you test it,
08:46for some folks are sensitive to cinnamon. Spray a little on the inside of your wrist and leave it a
08:52day, and if your skin reddens or itches or stings, then you have a sensitivity to it and must not
08:58coat
08:58yourself in it. If you already know cinnamon troubles you, do not use this at all. And once you know
09:05it
09:05is safe for you, still you never spray it on your face, never, for if the cinnamon gets in your
09:11eyes,
09:12you will dearly regret it. It stings something fierce. To protect your face and neck, you spray
09:19it on your hands and then rub it on, on the back of your neck, your ears, your forehead, never
09:25spraying
09:25near the eyes. And do not breathe the spray in. Turn your face away as you spray your arms. Used
09:32with
09:33that plain care, it is a safe and gentle thing. Far gentler than the harsh chemical sprays, but
09:39cinnamon is strong and wants respecting. And here is a gentle way to use it for those whose skin is
09:45a
09:46little sensitive, but not truly allergic. Rather than spray it on your skin at all, you can spray it on
09:52your clothes before you put them on, your sleeves and your collar, and let the sweet smell hang about
09:58you that way, keeping the bugs off without ever touching your skin. That is a kindness to tender
10:04skin, and it works near as well, for it is the smell about you that turns the mosquito. Spray the
10:11hat brim,
10:12the cuffs, the collar, and go out wrapped in the scent of cinnamon and vanilla with nothing on your skin
10:18at all. A couple more practical notes to make it serve you well. Each time before you use it,
10:25shake the bottle good. Turn it upside down and back several times, for the oil and the water will
10:31separate and settle as it sits between uses, and you want them well mixed when you spray,
10:37or it will not work right and you will waste it. And as for keeping it, this is a fresh
10:42natural thing
10:43with no preservatives in it, so it does not keep forever. Store it somewhere cool. The top shelf of
10:50your icebox is best, and kept cool, it will last you a couple of months, maybe the summer. Kept somewhere
10:57hot, in a shed or a hot greenhouse or a car, it will go off far quicker. So keep it
11:03cool, and label the
11:05bottle plainly so nobody mistakes that sweet-smelling stuff for something to put on their food, for it
11:11surely is not. That is a real caution, mind, for it smells so much of vanilla and cinnamon that a
11:18child
11:18or an unknowing body might take it for a flavoring and put it on their food or in a drink,
11:24so mark the
11:25bottle clear and keep it apart from the kitchen things. And because it does not keep so very long,
11:31do not mix up a great vat of it at once. Mix a bottle at a time as you need
11:36it through the summer,
11:36fresh, and you will always have it at its best. It takes but a minute to mix, so there is
11:42no sense
11:43making more than you will use before it turns. And remember to put it on again after a while,
11:49for as I said it wears off, it is no permanent armor. A fresh coat every so often through the
11:54evening keeps the biters off, especially after you have worked up a sweat or wiped your arms,
11:59for that takes it off sooner. Now since I have mentioned that the old people kept the bugs off
12:05long before there was any spray to mix, let me give you a little of that older wisdom too,
12:10for the spray is only one tool. The first and best old way is simply to deny the mosquito its
12:17breeding
12:17ground, for the mosquito breeds in still standing water, and a yard with standing water is a yard that
12:24breeds its own torment. So you walk your place and dump out every bit of standing water you find,
12:30the old bucket, the wheelbarrow left out, the clogged gutter, the saucer under a flower pot,
12:36the low spot that holds a puddle, the rain barrel left open. Tip them out, turn them over, screen the
12:43rain barrel, keep no still water sitting about, and you will breed far fewer mosquitoes to begin with.
12:49That one bit of plain housekeeping does more than any spray, for it stops the bugs before they ever
12:56hatch. Understand how the mosquito comes to be, and you will see why this matters so. The mosquito lays
13:05her eggs in still water, and the young hatch and grow there in the water before ever they take wing
13:11to come bite you. It takes only a little water, and only about a week of it sitting still, for
13:18a fresh
13:18crop of biters to hatch. So every bit of standing water about your place is a little nursery breeding
13:26the very mosquitoes that will torment you. And the worst of it is, most folks breed their own without
13:32knowing it, in the forgotten bucket, the old tire, the clogged gutter, the birdbath left to sit, the tarp
13:40that holds a pool, the low rut in the lane. Walk your whole place after a rain, and hunt out
13:48every
13:48such spot, and tip it, drain it, turn it over, or screen it. Change the water in the birdbath every
13:56few days, so nothing has time to hatch. Keep your gutters running clear. A yard with no standing water
14:04breeds few mosquitoes, and that does you more good than all the spray in the world, for the bug never
14:11born, never bites. The old people also knew that smoke keeps the biting bugs off, and a little smudge
14:20fire of an evening, or smoke from the right things smoldered, would clear a sitting porch of mosquitoes.
14:26And they knew certain plants the bugs dislike, the strong-smelling herbs, and would plant them about
14:33the porch and the sitting places, or crush a leaf and rub it on. The strong-scented growing things,
14:40the ones whose leaves give off a sharp smell when you bruise them, are the ones that help, planted
14:47thick where you sit, so their smell hangs in the air. And a handful of leaves, crushed and rubbed on
14:53your hands and arms, lends you their scent directly. There are a number of these plants that help, and I
15:01will
15:01give you the whole of that, the plants and the smokes and the old ways, in another video, for it
15:07deserves
15:08its own telling. And the plainest old protection of all was the good screen on the window and the porch,
15:16for a well-screened porch lets you sit in the cool evening with the bugs kept out, and no spray
15:22needed
15:23at all. And there is wisdom too in when you are out among them, for the mosquito bites worst at
15:30dusk and
15:31at dawn, those still soft hours at the edges of the day, and lies lower in the heat of noon
15:38and in a good
15:39wind. So if you can do your outdoor sitting in a breeze, on a porch where the air moves, the
15:46mosquito
15:46struggles to fly and fewer trouble you, for they are weak fliers and a wind defeats them. A simple fan
15:55on a porch will keep them off you for that very reason, they cannot fly against it. Between denying
16:03them their breeding water, screening your sitting places, sitting where the air moves, and this sweet
16:10homemade spray for when you must be out among them, you can keep the mosquitoes from ruining your
16:16summer without ever coating yourself in the harsh chemical stuff. Now let me say the small honest
16:23word about who profits from your not knowing how to mix your own. Not to rile you up, just so
16:31you see
16:31the shape of it. There is good money in the chemical bug sprays, the cans and bottles bought again and
16:38again every summer. And there is no money at all in a man knowing he can mix a better smelling
16:45repellent
16:45himself from a little cinnamon oil and vanilla for pennies. You cannot patent a thing your grandmother
16:53could mix in her kitchen. So nobody advertises the homemade way, no business is built on teaching it,
17:00and these cheap old mixes simply fell out of the common knowing while the cans got all the telling.
17:08I am not saying a man schemed this. No one had to. It is worse than a conspiracy because it
17:15is a system
17:15nobody had to coordinate. It simply pays to sell the can and pays nothing to teach the homemade mix,
17:23and so the old ways went quietly untaught. The old people kept the bugs off without any of it,
17:30because they had to, and they knew how. So there is the whole of it, a homemade mosquito spray that
17:37keeps
17:37the biters off you well, smells like cinnamon and vanilla rather than a chemical works, and costs you
17:44next to nothing. A teaspoon of cinnamon oil, a tablespoon of vanilla, a few spoons of witch hazel, and pure
17:52water
17:52shook up in a bottle. Mind the cinnamon, test it on your wrist, keep it off your face, shake it
17:59before
18:00use, and keep it cool. Put it on again as it wears off, and do not trust a folk mix
18:06where real disease
18:08is the danger. But for your porch and your garden of a summer evening, it will keep the mosquitoes off
18:14you,
18:15sweet and cheap and natural, the old homemade way. And paired with the plain housekeeping
18:21of draining your standing water and a good screen on your porch, it is the whole of what most folks
18:28need to take their summer evenings back from the biters without a chemical can ever entering the
18:34house. Now I want to hear from you, and I ask honest because I learned the whole country from these
18:42comments. Tell me in the comments below, how bad are the mosquitoes where you are, and will you try this
18:49sweet cinnamon and vanilla spray? And tell me your county, and how damp your ground is, because the
18:56mosquitoes plague the wet, low places far worse than the dry, and I like to map it by where you
19:02all
19:02write from. I read every one. Next time I want to show you the older ways, still, of keeping the
19:10biting
19:11bugs off without any chemicals at all, the plants the mosquitoes cannot abide, the smudges and smokes the
19:19old people used of an evening, and the plain housekeeping that keeps a yard from breeding the torment in the
19:26first place. The old people sat out on their porches of a summer evening and kept the biting bugs off
19:33with
19:33sweet-smelling things from their own kitchens and gardens and a bit of plain knowing, not a harsh chemical
19:40can in sight. There is a quiet pleasure in keeping the mosquitoes off with something that smells of cinnamon
19:48and vanilla mixed by your own hand for pennies. The porch kept pleasant by a sweet homemade spray and a
19:56little old knowing is the porch that remembers how the old people passed a summer evening. The people who
20:04built this country with their hands knew that, and we are only just starting to remember it.
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