Can't Sleep? Make Yourself Some Skullcap Tincture

Skullcap (Scutellaria lateriflora - aka scullcap) is a sedative and general tonic for the nervous system. It calms anxiety and irritability while it lifts spirits and even eases the pain of headaches.  I like to use it at night when my mind is racing and I'm having trouble sleeping.  A dropper full of skullcap tincture usually sends me off into a deep, restful sleep.

Be sure to make a positive ID first before gathering the wild herb and never gather more than 1/3 of what's available.  Freshly wilted skullcap leaves are best, but you can also purchase dried organic skullcap leaves for use in this recipe.  (You can purchase the finished tincture too for that matter.)

To make the tincture you'll need a clean half pint glass jar, 1/2 cup of wilted or dried skullcap leaves, and enough 100 proof vodka or Everclear to fill your jar.  Add the leaves and alcohol, then stir, cap and label your tincture.  Be sure to put the date on it too.  Keep the jar visible so you can shake it every day or so but keep it out of direct sunlight.  At the end of six weeks, strain the tincture through several layers of cheesecloth or an unbleached coffee filter and compost the leaves.

Use skullcap to promote sleep and relaxation or to get you through a particularly stressful day.  Although considered completely safe when taken in normal doses, skullcap is not recommended for pregnant or nursing women or for young children.  You can add 15-20 drops to any beverage 3 or 4 times a day, or if you're brave like me, just swallow it straight.  Good medicine is supposed to taste bad, right?  

The Ultimate Quick Change Soap Loaf Cutter

Nearly 3/4 of a million bars of handmade soap cut with our trusty old Chestnut Farms soap loaf cutter (the wooden one on the left) and it's still going strong, but Jory finally got around to making a new more easily adjustable one.  And when I say easy, I do mean E.A.S.Y.!  This HDPE beauty will cut loaves (or bars for that matter) from .5 - 4" thick.   But it's most impressive feature is that you'll NEVER have to loosen (then tighten) the wire in order to change the height of the cut.  Which means the wire will probably NEVER break and you'll probably NEVER have to replace it!  I don't know about you people, but that has us doing the happy soapers dance into the wee hours of the morning!    

Now I'm not going to go into the exact mechanics of this thing because we're going to offer them for sale at some point.  But trust me, this is the EASIEST adjustable soap loaf cutter you'll ever use!  If you do custom work or have the need to change the height of the cut frequently, this tool's for you!  He's still tweaking the design a little (the final one will be a bit less bulky), but would you be interested in owning one for $225?  It will come with a standard 1/2" and 1 1/2" cutting height capability, but you'd get to choose 3 other sizes for free, with additional cutting heights available at $10 each.  

This soap cutter is built to last a lifetime and it's so easy to change the cutting height that even a 5 year old could do it!  

If you're interested or if you have constructive feedback...please leave your comment below. 

Give More

OK, so I'm obsessed with the success of our new Kiva lending team!  Why not?  :o)

wild about good™

It never hurts to do a little extra for someone.  Especially when you've been blessed with good fortune yourself.  That's why I started my wild about good™ Kiva lending team in April 2012 and since then I've made 11 microloans to people all over the world.  Good, honest, hard working people who just needed a little extra help to move ahead.  Knowing that I've improved someone's life, even if just a little, feels...well...GOOD!

Then I got to thinking, how can I kick this up a notch to do even more good?  Enter 100% real castile made with saponified organic extra virgin olive oil and nothing else.  As far as natural handmade soap goes, it's the cream of the crop!

100% of the profits from the sale of this wonderful new soap will go to lift people up through microlending and training worldwide.  And when the original loans are paid off, I'll relend the money to somebody new!  It's like a circle of kindness that keeps on growing!  100% of the profits, from 100% real soap, going to people who deserve it 100%.  It's all good.

Won't you join me?

expo west: the finishing touch

I knew it would be a good show.  All the signs were there. Every step of the way, everything that could go right....did. All of our display materials fit in the wooden crate as if it was custom made for them.  Our flight out of Austin was smooth and we easily made our connecting flight in Las Vegas.  (The landing in Anaheim was pretty hairy, but we'll pretend that didn't happen.)  We had an excellent booth location and we got the display set up exactly as we had envisioned it.  And we hadn't even forgotten a single thing!  Even the little plants I brought from Texas were still blooming.  Nice.

When we got to the Best Western Plus Pavilion, it was all we had hoped for.  Clean and comfy with a tall enough shower head!  And the beds were heavenly too.  Thanks to tripadvisor...we'd done our homework well.  It was a fairly short walk from the convention center and there were plenty of restaurants nearby. Things were shaping up quite nicely.

But there was one little detail left undone.  I'd brought an antique milk bottle from home in hopes that I could find a beautiful flower to stick in it.  It would be the finishing touch that would make our booth absolutely perfect.  Surely I could find a flower to pluck somewhere...this was southern California!  But my attempts at finding a discreet location where I could safely snatch one had been unsuccessful.

Until the morning of the show!  Shortly after leaving our hotel room, I found a beautiful freshly cut sunflower lying right on the sidewalk.  I wouldn't have to risk plucking one from a flowerbed after all.  And  the soap loaf it would be sitting next to in the display was...SUNFLOWER!  A sign from above.

I knew it would be a good show. Doesn't it look so cheery?