I love products by a company called Beaded Hemp. Beaded Hemp is a small company run by a lovely woman named Robyn. She handmakes, to order, the most marvelous goodies. My number one favorite product is her Foaming Whipped Bath Butter. It comes in a large number of scents. Right now I am crazy over her Frankincense and Myrrh. What an amazingly sexy warm scent. The Foaming Whipped Bath Butter is a great product. A small amount in a poof makes an astonishing amount of lather. It cleans, you, moisturizes you and scents you. It can be used on your face if you want - I don't normally. But you can. Some people use it as shampoo, and it does work well as shampoo. It is great for shaving your legs.
I like to combine it with the matching sugar scrub. Beaded Hemp's Foaming Whipped Sugar Scrubs are just incredible. Robyn will make them extra scrubby if you like. They lightly lather and really exfoliate well.
Top it off with a some matching Body Mousse and you will be soft, smooth, and smell divine.
When I look good, I feel good. That is probably the case for most of us.
I have been doing the NaNoWriMo challenge. So far I am doing okay. I get up early every day, shower, dress, makeup, make some coffee and then hit keyboard a while. What I am most liking so far is that I am already in a nice routine of this. And this year I have told a number of people I am doing this, and most important perhaps is that I really do feel like a writer. That seems to be making a world of difference. So, I decided to come back to this blog. And give it another go.
I was reading an article today in my local paper about how this 78 year old woman makes a ton of fruitcake every year. She started off making it for gifts, and then people began paying her to make it. Like over 50 years ago. Here is the article http://www.bnd.com/living/story/172566.html
There is a recipe included for her fruitcake that makes 18 pounds! That is a lot of fruitcake. I saved the recipe but will have to cut it at least in half - and that is still 9 pounds, which is also a lot of fruticake. I confess, I kind of like fruitcake. I am not overly fond of the candied fruit that is used. Somewhere I found a nice recipe that was really good - it used more dried fruits and left out the candied. I think I will be tinkering with cutting this recipe down and also adjusting the fruits. I will replace at least half of the candied fruit with dried. I might try making some with all dried - cranberries, cherries, blueberries sound good. I also notice she swears by using magarine and since I am kind of a butter person, I will probably change that. I have a set of mini loaf pans and will probably make some one pound loafs and then a bunch of minis. Although I mihgt try her idea of making tea cake sized. The small ones would be great added to a gift basket, or to fill a container. Also, I have learned that most people like fruitcake, and like it a lot when you call it tea bread. I guess it is some stigma on the name fruitcake. I will post more about my experiments as we go.
I am thinking of the holidays. Contrary to what some people expect, I don't get things done by July. I don't get them done by October. I actually did have all my shopping done by Mid October once and for me it really took a lot of fun of the holiday season away. So generally I get going in early November. I always think I should start earlier, and some year I might.
Right now I am planning gift lists. I do a combination of made and bought. Most of the bought is actually for my child and a few family members. I like to make things as I feel like they give more of me. This year I am making a number of things and will then make up baskets for some people. Things I making are soap, bubble bath, whipped shea butter cream (maybe on this one, I have to tinker with it a bit). And then tea blends, and some baked things - breads, cookies, etc. And fudge. What I give to each person is still up in the air. I have actually done some shopping and have a present stash - I try to keep this going all the time, so, if and when needed I can actually pull together a nice gift. Some of that will go toward holiday gifts.
But I am putting together my own Holiday Countdown. This week I am focusing on living room and great room. Big clean on living room, less of a big clean, what I call a medium clean on great room, more than a once over, but not a big clean. That will come next week. Doing a bit of a medium cleaning makes me feel like I have a head start on the big clean, and it gives more of an ongoing sense of accomplishment.
Also, I hope to have a full gift list done by the end of this week and especially a good list of what I am making, so we can get started on that. I will also list what I have versus what I need to buy. And then make a project schedule.
