I'm amazed at how fast May is going by.   It's almost the second market weekend of the year, May 12.  Tomorrow, in fact!   Of course I had meant to be spending this week diligently making soaps, salves, etc. but got completely side tracked with this hideous cold.   Ugh.   Colds in May??   It's just not right!!!!

I'll be at the Quesnel Farmer's market tomorrow, May 12.   I'm hoping to have a couple of new knitting items out for sale tomorrow, plus a re-stocking of clay facial masks.

I'm "patiently" waiting for a new shipment of jars for body butter.   I've got a one-off jar of body butter with my Sweet Dreams bath salt blend.  It got rave reviews from sniffers last weekend, and was thinking I could make single batches of different scents through the summer, something different from the standard selection of orange, lavender, lemon verbena, and vanilla spice.   But I need more jars before I can try that!

It's getting close to mosquito season, and I'll be bottling "Outdoor Spray" to bring to the market tomorrow.   I'm now using a base of water instead of the cyclomethicone.   Same great essential oils, different carrier liquid!   I'm toying with the idea of making a solid butter "Outdoor Spray" that can be rubbed on.   I'll see how the spring goes and how much time I've got between soccer season and pipe band!    Remember that I can't make any sorts of claims regarding insect repellency!!!  If I do that, then the "Outdoor Spray" becomes classified as a pesticide.  

See you Saturday at the market!   It's forecast to be a beautiful day :)

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

May 5 - first Farmer's Market of the season!   I'm busy scheming a new booth arrangement, new shelves, new display...lots of scheming but so far no actual building.   Or soapmaking for that matter!   That will be happening tomorrow.  And the day after.   And all next week :)

Also new is my involvement in Small Town Love.   I'll keep you posted when my site there is fully operational.  The possibilities are very exciting!

Also exciting are the four new lavender plants I bought while in Vernon!   Four beautiful new Hidcote lavender, a variety of English Lavender, or Lavandula angustifolia if we want to get picky and use the International Nomenclature label!   All I'm interested in are the incredibly beautiful deep purple flowers that will be in my garden this year!  And the fabulous lavender essential oil that I am planning on distilling this summer with my wonderful lavender!

Off to the soap mines....

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Crocuses

and lavender!

Can't wait for the garden and herbs to get growing!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Oh dear!  A scheduling conflict means we're postponing the soap demo at Green Tree Health and Wellness to a future date.  I'll let you all know when the new date will be.

I guess this means I'd better make soap at home tomorrow!

Happy Spring Equinox!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Come see soap making live in action down at Green Tree Health and Wellness on Wednesday March 21.  I'll be mixing Energy soap sometime between 11 and 11:30, and pouring into moulds....well, when it's ready to be poured!  I'll be stirring by hand and that can take a half hour or longer to get the soap to the pouring stage.  We'll just wait and see what happens tomorrow!

Come on down to Green Tree tomorrow and check it out!  

See you there,

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Normal 0 false false false EN-CA X-NONE X-NONE

I had an Alexander Technique lesson yesterday, and as I was driving up I was stricken with envy of my two friends I'm doing it with.  The teacher, of course, has her passion in teaching Alexander Technique.  My other friend has found her passion with a healing thing called Quantum Biofeedback.  And me?   Um....passionless, except for knitting.  And where does that get me in the world?  And why should I care if I'm not creating world peace with my knitting?   

  I've always liked the quote from Mahatma Gandhi - "Be the change you want to see in the world".   Maybe the challenge for myself is to really embrace that at my own microscopic little level of home and hearth.  Knit, with love, beautiful clothes for people to wear.  Make, with love, beautiful soap for people to use.  Garden, with love, so that my family has good food to eat in the summer and through the winter.   Don't sweat over not having a large passion.  Enjoy and embrace all the small passions that I pursue every day.

as long as that doesn't include having to wash the floor every day!!!

happy days everyone :)

Lisa

I think I'd better go wash the bathroom floor.....ick!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Normal 0 false false false EN-CA X-NONE X-NONE

Looking forward to 2012 being full of wool and warmth!  And soap, of course!

All the best for the Christmas season.

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Happy Christmas to all!

This past year went by in a blur!  Where did it go?  Somewhere happy, I hope.

.

much love to all for this season and the seasons to come.

Merry Christmas!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

is ticking.

note to self, from self. 

Dear self:

STOP PROCRASTINATING!!!

Get away from the computer and in to the other room and wrap soap for tomorrow's Christmas Market at the Quesnel rec centre!  Don't forget to make more body butter!  And salves, especially now that the new stock of tins has come in.  Did I mention soap?  Yes, wrap more!

Okay, okay.  I know!  There's only so much time today, and so much to do if I want to get to bed before midnight. 

I did manage to get a new shipment of soap in to Cariboo Keepsakes.  And a new shelf display in to Green Tree soaps. 

Yes, I know.  It's very nice, but it's not helping you get ready for tomorrow's market.

Okay!  Away I go.

See you tomorrow at the market!

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

A wee hint of summer - Blackberry Sage soap.  It looks delicious!

Towers of Shampoo Bars - Tea Tree Mint, and Chamomile

A 3 kg batch of body butter, waiting to be divided in to scents - French Lavender, Lemon Coconut, Orange.  Maybe a trial batch of Vanilla Spice body butter.  It would be brown from the Vanilla essential oil, but maybe that's okay?  Brenda at Rocky Peak is lobbying for it!

The Christmas market preparation continues...I'll sleep next week!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Vanilla Spice Soap!  You never know what is going to come out of that soap mold!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

Because you never know when something cool is going to happen.

Even though I mixed the colours

with the intention that something cool would happen,

This is a lovely batch of Energy soap, getting ready for Christmas Farmer's Market #1 this coming Saturday, November 26!

I'll be busy at a piping workshop that weekend, which I organized before I knew it was also the farmer's market weekend.  If only I had known!!!  Luckily a good friend has offered to work my market table for me.  Look for Christine Kraayvanger at my soap table this weekend!  Thank you Christine!!!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

This still isn't soap.  But it's fun and woolly!

www.wovember.com

A warm, woollen alternative to Movember :)

Lisa

p.s.  soaping is coming soon, I promise!  I'll be at the rec centre most of Sunday on a pottery binge, making soap dishes and shaving mugs.   AND I've ordered in a bunch of supplies for a soap making bonanza next week!

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

I am continually amazed at how fast a month can zing by.  You'd think I'd have figured that out by now, 12 years into child rearing.  12 years?  Really?  I can still vividly remember the joyful glow of being seriously nauseous for nine months, ha ha!  And now look at the size of those sweet little darlings...yes, look at how Number 12 yrs old has outgrown his mens size 9.5 shoes again!

I have finally changed around my blog page and website.  I have had a site on Big Cartel for a year and a half which I finally cancelled today.  I had hoped to create an opportunity for some online sales, but it didn't work out.  Instead, I'm switching the whole works over here to my Posterous blog site.  There is now a Products & Ordering page.  There are product descriptions.  Once my internet is hooked up again, I will be able to load some product photos too!   It's not too exciting, but it's another big leap for me out into cyberspace.  Check it out and let me know what you think!

As for time warps...has it really been two months since I did my lavender distilling?  I STILL haven't got those darn photos off my cell phone.  Maybe tomorrow...today is already done!  My husband was all keen to distill some lodgepole pine, after listening to a CBC radio presentation on the wonders of  pine essential oil.  It sounds like one of those Contributes to World Peace things - does everything for you, plus makes you happy!   (Hmmmm....did a quick google search but only came up stuff on Turpentine.  Definitely NOT what we're trying to make!  I'll try to find the CBC link to the radio program).  We've now got three wine bottles of pine hydrosol sitting on the counter, adding to the general clutter and mayhem, as I try to figure out what to do with the stuff.  Maybe I will bottle it and bring it to the Christmas Farmer's Markets at the Quesnel rec centre.

And time warps...yup, being tossed back in time to the days when my kids were wee and little and could completely turn my day upside down by being home sick.  Claire is home sick today, which means all my best laid plans to do pottery today have gang awry.  But thankfully she's a little older, and doesn't need quite so many cuddles when sick.  That means I could doodle on the laptop and tackle changing around web pages, a little job that I've procrastinated about for a few months but only got to thanks to an enforced day at home.  Thanks Claire!  A day well spent :)

And now...with the best intentions to post again very soon, preferably with lots of photos of lavender distillation... I'm off to work on halloween costumes.

talk to you soon,

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

ack!  there's a mouse in my soap room!

I'm supposed to be making soap tonight but instead I'll be putting on the face mask and cleaning up "mouse evidence" and setting up traps to remove the intruder.

From Robert Burns, To a Mouse:

Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim'rous beastie,

O what panic's in thy breastie!

Thou need na start awa sae hasty,

Wi' bickering brattle!

I was be laith to rin an' chase thee,

Wi' murd'ring pattle!

Of course, that doesn't make me feel any better about seeing a mouse in the basement!  I hope everyone has a fabulous Thanksgiving weekend.  I know I've a great deal to be thankful for!

See you at the farmer's market this Saturday.  It's the last market of the summer, so come on out and stock up on veggies and soap!

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

It turns out that getting photos out of my cell phone is much more complicated than I thought.  It's not just a plug in and drag out the photos operation.  It's a insert micro SD card, copy to card, insert card into computer, and then drag out the photos operation!  I just found my micro SD card this afternoon so hopefully some time this weekend I will have photos of my beautiful copper Alembic essential oil distiller.

I was reading this tonight, procrastinating when I should have been wrapping soap for the farmer's market tomorrow. 

http://impulsivearts.typepad.com/knitting/2011/04/more-than-one-thing.html

I thought it was a brilliant discussion on the dichotomy of women's lives , and talks clearly about things that I struggle with daily.

ta ta for now,

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

I've thrown caution to the winds, and ordered an essential oil distiller today from the Essential Oil Company in Oregon

http://www.essentialoil.com/product_info.php?products_id=2642&osCsid=2ff150a83ede528e304d4ae47a39c044

I'll need to check the lavender crop this afternoon - when it stops raining! - and see how the flower crop is looking, and whether I need to pick now, or if I can wait a few days until my distiller arrives.  Oh, a thrill is running up my spine!!  Lavender essential oil, from my own garden!!!!  All those years of dreaming while looking at gardening magazines with those photos of incredible fields of French lavender, now to be realized in my own kitchen and yard!  Oh, and oh!  Maybe I can cook up rosehips in there too while I'm at it!!!

It will be shipped tomorrow, and then I'm at the mercy of UPS to see how fast it gets here.  I'm also at the mercy of Mother Nature to see how long the lavender crop will keep producing! 

hee hee hee! 

have a happy day!

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

for your regularly scheduled program!  We're currently experiencing site difficulties due to the incredibly beautiful weather and the intense desire to be out enjoying it with my family.  We will return August 20 to the Quesnel Farmer's market programming, complete with fresh body butter, salves, and soaps. 

As for the August 13 farmer's market, I'm afraid I'll be out hiking around Wells for the day with family, friends, and of course Maggie the dog.

I hope everyone is enjoying this blast of summer weather as much as I am!

see you soon,

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

I'll be at the market this Saturday, July 23.  Wow, summer is whistling past fast!

I've been watching this today:

Nadine Artemis, www.livinglibations.com   I've been trying her dental care products for a few months now and am enjoying them very much.  She's got some incredible things to say about skin care too!

See you this weekend.  I'm crossing my fingers for sun :)  Or at least only clouds!  I've had enough rain for a while!

Lisa

Permalink | Leave a comment  »

What a busy week it's been.  Last day of school on Wednesday.  Canada Day on Friday.  Every day felt like a Saturday!  I've felt completely disoriented every day this week, which has made it very difficult to keep on top of the various jobs that needed doing.  Quite a few fell off the plate.  I'm sure all those tasks will be right back there with the next serving.

I'm off to the market tomorrow.  I know it's late notice, but better late than never, right?!

See you tomorrow!

Lisa 

Permalink | Leave a comment  »