alternative to petroleum jelly for belly casting?

I used Burt's Bees Apricot baby oil... I think any kind of oil will do, really. My MIL (who did the cast, and who does body casts of other people as part of her art on a very regular basis, and always uses petroluem jelly) was very impressed.

Since we also did part of my legs (the upper thighs) I put saran wrap over my "girly bits" (I still oiled the hairy parts, but not overly much, just enough to get the saran wrap to stick).

But I didn't bother saran wrapping my armpits, and I do have pretty long (tho sparse) pit hair! I just covered the hair with oil and no hair was torn out!

HTH!

BTW, here's a pic of my cast:

http://alexisyael.livejournal.com/254050.html

And here's a pic of the first one my MIL did of me (this is five years or so ago, before I was pregnant -- I was her first body cast, when she was learning how to do them for her art class. Obviously this one was back and front): http://alexisyael.com/A_cast.jpg

we used olive oil. reminded me of eating fresh ciabatta bread dipped in it...

~claudia

We used un-patroleum jelly and I thought it worked great. I would be worried about oils dripping on the carpet or running down my body and onto the floor. I liked the un-patroleum because it stay put and did a great job.

Keri

I second the oil option. I used jelly the first time and it's a HUGE mess. I had to lather up with soap 5 times before I STARTED to get the stuff off, then the tub was covered and SOOOO slippery!!!
I used baby oil the second time. just rubbed it in to absorbtion, then added a little more for lube, not dripping off. Then showered it off in one shot. If you're going low, I just put plastic wrap over the lower hair (it suck fine to the oil).