What a hectic week I've had in the workshop! We have been so busy that we didn't realise that there is only four weeks to go before the big day!
Have started to make our heart shaped bath bombs again, it has been a while since I made them.
They make great stocking fillers or even a nice gift for the teachers. I will be putting them into their small organza bags tomorrow after wrapping up the May Chang Soap that's ready.
There is a lot going on next month, as you know we have all our products in Artology, Fochabers and we are also in with the Speyside Artisans for their pop up shop in the St. Giles Centre, Elgin for the first week in December.
I have been having some fun making some Chrismas Wax Melts, and they smell devine! The scents we have are: Cranberry & Orange, Christmas Orange (with Cinnamon & Cloves), and regular Patchouli & Lemongrass to keep you going after Christmas. Although these aren't on our website yet, you can still buy them from us through our venues or by contacting us direct.
Our Vanilla & Orange Sugar Body Scrub is gaining in popularity, we now have them in kilner jars that are perfect for them - although we haven't yet got the new jars showing on the website yet!
I think this has been our busiest year so far, but next year will be better. Leslie is in the process of updating our website so that it will be easier for our visitors to find what they are looking for and he's also making it mobile friendly too!
As always we have your favourites, and remember if you want anything changed in our range of gifts, just send us an email or why not phone for a chat - we'd love to hear from you.
You know winter isn't far away when you wake up to the colder mornings, it takes you longer to get motivated, but it is that time of year when Christmas is fast approaching...soon everyone will be busy with their Christmas shopping, getting the house ready for the festive season, stocking up on all the goodies that are out there...
We will have busy times ahead over the next few weeks stocking up ourselves with our handmade gifts which are all individually wrapped with care. We can also do bespoke gifts where you can pick and choose what you would like to be added to a natural wooden box or a natural jute bag. If you want something different, then must send us an email with what you would like and we will get back in touch with you.
Here are just some of our gifts...
A delight gift box for new mums - Lavender Body Butter and gentle Mum & Baby Lotion. For their young one there is Moisturising Baby Cream, Soothing Baby Soap.
Our Natural Wooden Gift Box holds a variety of delights... an assortment of three guest size soaps, relaxing Ylang Ylang Bath Salts with its own wooden scoop, moisturising Chamomile & Geranium Body Butter and our skin loving Vitamin Rich Body Cream.
For those who are looking for something inexpensive, we have our floral bath bombs arranged in a light weight wooden tray...delightful Ylang Ylang, calming Geranium and soothing Lavender...but we can make these up with just the scent of your choice.
Coming soon we have this lovely gift set with a larger jute bag, this bag is filled with herbaceous Lavender to soothe and protect, but we can easily change them with your favourites instead!
The bag will have Lavender Body Butter, Lavender Soap, Lavender Bath Salts and a cotton face cloth.
Lavender is one of the world's most well known herbs that not only helps us to calm us down in stressful situations, but has a wide variety of different benefits dependent on how it's used.
Throughout the ages Lavender has been used to soothe and calm, which is why it's so popular in baby products. Although most people today have showers instead of baths, there is nothing more relaxing than indulging in some time out with a soak in a lavender scented bath.
When used as soaks, Lavender Oil not only soothes and relaxes but it
can also help alleviate the symptoms of headaches, migraines and stress - making it ideal for those who have difficulty in sleeping in getting a
good nights rest.
Lavender is a favourite for use in skincare because of its abilities to gently heal and care for all skin types, with its anti-septic, anti-inflammatory, anti-bacterial and anti-viral properties.
These properties make Lavender Oil perfect for those with acne, allergies, burns and various forms of dermatitis! Used in soaps and moisturisers,
Lavender improves the overall skin condition and helps to heal any
damage your skin picks up from everyday life.
We have a large range of products with Lavender Oil because of all these lovely benefits, from our soaps (Lavender Soap, Soothing Baby Soap and Kitchen Soap), and our moisturisers (Lavender Body Butter, Moisturising Baby Cream, Mum & Baby Lotion), to soak (Lavender Bath Bombs, Lavender Mini Bath Bombs, Lavender Bath Salts).
Lavender Oil is
one of the few essential oils safe enough to be used neat on skin,
although it's best to leave this to the professionals as with all
essential oils they are extremely potent and may be harmful if used
incorrectly.
Making your own skincare products can be fun a lot of fun most of the time, but it's not always smooth running. This year has been totally different from the last few as you have probably seen from our website.
This year we have been so busy making our creams, lotions and body butters that we have almost forgotten about our soaps! Not to worry though, panic stations has set in and we have now started making them...
Making our soap is quite an easy process, weigh the oils, heat them up and then mix them with the lye (sodium hydroxide), once they get to a thick custard texture, they are then ready for the mould.
This is fine, but I forgot the last batch we made, we had to take the mould to bits as the soap wouldn't come out but we got there in the end, now this time the first soap to be made was Lavender and whoever put the mould back together again didn't put the screws right in, (I think you know what happened next), so here is me delighted to be making soap again, not knowing any better, pours the soap into the mould and low and behold it starts running out of the side...OMG...panic stations again! Luckily there was another mould ready nearby that was done for another batch and some quick thinking, grabbed the leaking mould and poured it into the other mould.
We had quite a bit of a mess to clean up, there was soap everywhere, but after a while we did see the funny side of it. Here are some photos of the soaps we made, which were chosen for the upcoming Christmas season...we've experimented with heart and round moulds too ready for some unique Christmas gifts (stocking fillers...)
Oh I know we are going to have a lot of fun decorating the hearts and the round ones, you will have to wait and see what we come up with.
We are very
aware of issues concerning the rainforest's and some people are maybe
fed up hearing them but this story is about a young biologist from
Indonesia.
Rudi
Putra who was awarded the goldman environmental prize for managing to
shut down 26 illegal palm oil operations, read more about his story here...it is very interesting.
The
environment is a very important issue with us and is something close to
our hearts. There is a lot happening in the world today and not all of
it is good.
As
an environmentally conscience company, we ourselves only use
sustainably sourced organic Palm Oil - this means that we don't promote
deforestation of the rainforest's that harbour endangered wildlife
(Orangutans, Tigers & Elephants), medicinal plants (some of which
are unique to rainforest's).
Deforestation on even a small scale can
cause localised flooding, which is happening on an increasing scale every year! Shockingly the Indonesian Government are set to increase Palm Oil production to double by 2020, of which the USA uses most of the 90% of the global market.
We'd love to hear any thoughts on this, so why not leave a comment below?
The Seabuckthorn shrub grows over large areas of Europe and Asia, it's highly coveted for its vitamin rich properties as well as its ability to speed up the healing of wounds. It has been used for centuries by alternative medicine for its abundance of nutritional and theraputic properties.
Seabuckthorn Oil is rich in Omega-7 (Palmitoleic Acid) making it potent with anti-viral, anti-bacterial, and anti-ageing, it may also help with those suffering from rosacea, eczema and acne.
Additional benefits of this wonderful plant are:
- Protects against harmful effects of chemical contaminants
- Acts as a powerful immune booster
- Improves the condition of hair & skin
- Reduces inflammation and promotes your skins new growth
Have you tried our Vitamin Rich Body Cream yet? Buy now, just add coupon 20OFF.
"This lotion feels amazing, like it's really nourishing the skin, leaving it so soft. It's non-greasy too which is great...when I used the lotion and then cuddled Elodie, she did seem to settle very easily..."
- Liz from Andover, July 2014
When we first started to formulate our gentlest lotion, the one thing it had to be was mild enough for both mother and child. This is why we have only used the mildest and gentlest oils we have, to make it extra special though we only used the most soothing of essential oils - chamomile and lavender!
We also didn't want it to be too heavy or greasy, which is why we carefully balanced the heavier Shea Butter with the lighter oils of Sweet Almond and Camellia - this combination is ideal for the soothing, healing, moisturising and nourishing properties that can be passed on to both mum and baby!
