Guess what I found.......

I feel excited about sharing this discovery. I went over to youtube to see if there were any videos about growing Lavender and of course, silly me , yes there are lots. There are videos about planting Lavender, propagating Lavender from cuttings, making Lavender wreaths. So please go check them out and I attached one on the many varieties of Lavender.

Enjoy and Happy Saturday!

More about Lavender

Lavender and Lavender Essentail Oil (EO) has so many therapeutic qualities and also many emotional/spiritual qualities that it should be part of everyone's household. From something as simple Lavender sachets added to scent linens or in a eye pillow to ease headaches and help one relax to sleep. We also have a Lavender Farm in Eastern North Carolina that I visited several years back that grow several different varieties of Lavender at their harvest festival. You can visit them at

www.sunshinelavenderfarm.com/    While there we had Chocolate Lavender ice cream plus they had several Lavender crafts they were demonstating. Their site also has information on planting and also recipes for using the herb Lavender. 

Now Lavender Essential Oil is what I use most. I use it in several of the soaps I make - Lavender, Lavender Orange Oats, Lavender Rosemary, and Walk in the Woods Soaps. Lavender is a versatile oil that blends with many other scents from the citrus scents like Orange and Grapefruit, to the mints and to the really earthy oils of Patouchli and Oakmoss. I also use Lavender in my Soaking Salts as the EO has the therapeutic properties to be sedative, antidepressant and analgesic which is great after a stessful day at work! If you are adding jus the EO to your bath , only add about 5-6 drops to you bathwater as you will be inhaling the scent through you nose and into you skin. EO's are very concentrated and as the saying goes "less is more".

Please note these are properties not prescribed by medical field but from aromatherpy and anecdotal only. I also use Lavender in my lotion bars as much for the scent as for its know skin heaing properties. I have also applied a few drop for insect bites to ease itching on my grandaughter's bug bites.

A wonderful book by Valerie Ann Worwood titled The Fragrant Heavens  talks about the spiritual dimension of fragrances and she writes about Lavender being " caring, cherishing, and nurturing " and an oil that uplifts the spirit. Lavender is a physically and emotionally healing oil and I hope you will welcome it into you daily life.

One place I highly reccomend to purchase wonderful therapeutic grade essential oils is http://www.lovingscents.com/   They have a wonderful newsletter and allot of information on their oils.

Lavender

I have had a Lavender plant for the past several years that grew quite big but finally died this past season. It was not as lush as the picture here but I usually was able to harvest a bunch of  Lavender that I could enjoy every year. I will miss that plant but will be picking up some new ones at the local Farmer's Market this year. People have asked if I grow my own herbs for my soaps or make my own oils, unfortunately the amount of Lavender Essential Oil I use requires allot more than one plant and I do not have as green a thumb as my Mother had. Lavender Essential Oil is steam distilled from the flowering tops only so it takes many flower stalks to make the oil. One of my dream vacations is to go to Provence, France during the Lavender harvest on an aromatherapy tour. A field of Lavender - what a wondrous site that would be to behold and to smell ! I think my senses would be overwhelmed but very very happy!

Lavender is an oil that has had a long tradition. The person who first coined the term aromatherapy was Rene-Maurice Gattefosse was working in a perfumier business and when he got a sever burn , he stuck his hand in a vat of Lavender oil and as a result was able to heal his hand quite rapidly and the oil helped to prevent scarring. So Lavender was there at the start of modern day aromatherapy. Lavender is one of the few oils that is said can be applied directly to the skin.

The scent of Lavender is usually familiar to everyone with its fresh herbaceous, floral aroma. This little oil has over 100 constituents including linalyl acetate, linalol, labeandulol, etc. Its amazing to me that how these different components are broken out depends on how the Lavender smells and what its characteristics are. For example there is Lavender grown in France and there is also High-Altitude Lavender- both the same species but depending on where it grows affects the chemical makeup of the plant and the final scent of the flowers and this affects the therapeutic properties of the essential oil.

More tomorrow on the qualities of Lavender Essential Oil.

Ingredients - Calendula officinalis

Calendula officinalis is a wonderful herb that we use in several of our products. This beautiful flower is a perennial that is also known by the name of "pot marigold". Please note that it is not considered the "common marigold" or Mexican mariold as these are part of the Tagetes family and do NOT have the same properties.
The Calendula plant is easy to grow and will tolerate most soils if you are a gardener. The flowers are considered edible which I thought interesting and they vary in color from yellow to various shades of orange. This wonderful plant has been used as a dye plant to color butter and cheese in Europe and to flavor soups and stews. We add Calendula petals to our Calendula soap and the petals keep their wonderful orange color and do not turn brown. I have been wanting to try adding Calendula powder to the soap to see if it will impart a yellow color that stays through the soap curing. For the Calendula soap I infuse olive oil with Calendula flowers to make a nice soap for sensitive skin.
Calendula has many medicinal properties as it has anti-inflamatory, antiseptic properties, and is also antibacterial and antifungal. This makes it a great addition to any cream or salve and helps soothe irritated, chapped skin, eczema, and insect bites. We use Calendula infused olive oil in our Herbal Salve and all Lip Balms for these reasons.
We will be showcasing more of our ingredients in the coming weeks to explore why we choose our materials carefully in preparing our products for your use.
 

What has changed in Ritual Waters Soaps

I had made a decision several weeks ago to remove Palm Kernel oil from my soap formula. I had been using Palm Oil and Palm Kernel Oil to add hardness and lather to my bars for many years. But, in reading of the effects of the increased demand for Palm Oil and Palm Kernel Oil on the cutting down of the Rain Forests in Malaysia and Indonesia I am joining other soapmakers who have also decided to change over to other oils for their soap. The Oil Palm production is affecting the Rain Forest wildlife, particularly the Sumatran, Bornean Orangutans, Sumatran Tigers, Asian Elephant, and Sumatran Rhino are all in danger of disappearing. It appears that levelling and clearing the rain forest is cheaper than reworking the land that was used for rice paddies but at what cost? Sometimes the fires used to clear the Rain Forest burn out of control.  The Oil Palm is used mainly as an edible oil that China, India, the European Union, and the US supposedly use in processed foods to eliminate the trans fat from our diet. There are other oils that can help with this like Soybean Oil or Olive Oil but these are more costly than Oil Palm but the cost to the environment far outweighs the dollars saved. Oil Palm is sometimes the only oil in some US processed foods like packaged cookies, crackers and pop corn. Oil Palm is not as healthy as some would like us to believe and has been shown to promote heart disease. Please follow this link to learn more and read the full article - http://www.cspinet.org/palm/PalmOilReport.pdf

 

My soaps now have more Coco Butter which will replace the Palm Kernel Oil for its hardness and will make a more moisturizing bar. I feel this will hopefully have better impact on the environment. Please read ingredient labels and avoid processed foods that contain Palm Oil as a way to voice your opinion to save the Rain Forests in Malaysia and Indonesia.