Patchouli & Pumpkin make Halloween Magic - Limited Time Offer

Patchouli is one of those fragrances that people seem to either love or hate. It has a rich, sweetly earthy scent which only improves with age. It's a wonderful essential oil for you skin, as well as anti-inflammatory and anti-depressant. The fragrance always reminds me of Halloween.

And what would Halloween be without pumpkin! Pumpkin seed butter and oil are rejuvenating and restorative for dry and damaged skin.

And so, we created two products for your Halloween Holiday pleasure.

Rhiannon's Midnight Moon Lotion Bar  
Sensual patchouli laced with jasmine blossoming under a midnight full moon. Ginger adds brightness like the light. These lovely essential oils are wrapped in pumpkin seed butter, hemp seed oil, seabuckthorn berry oils and other butters and oils that will nourish, soften and add a little magic to your skin.
$6.00 for 1.5 oz bar                               $5.00 for a .75oz push up tube

Autumn Amber Whipped Sugar Scrub
This sugar scrub is a heavenly Autumn blend of patchouli, roses and amber. A lusty and lush fragrance blended with pumpkin seed oil, hemp seed butter and seabuckthorn berry oil . The sugars gently exfoliate while the butters and oil provide nourishment and moisture. And then there's the fragrance! It lingers loving on your skin.
$6.00 for a 4oz jar                                    $11.00 for an 8oz jar



 

Both items are only available until October 31st! 

Get them while supplies last!

Ringing in the Halloween Season at the Witches Ball

We're so excited to be a part of this magical, festive 

and merry event! Join us at

Saturday, October 13

6 pm to 11 pm

Come in costume or just enjoy the show. There will be lots of music, vendors, whimsy and wonders abounding.

We'll even have some special new skin moisturizing treats just for the occasion. You'll be able to find us in the Bizarre Bazaar area. Let's welcome in the Halloween season right! Don't miss The Witches Ball.

Do You Strew?

I bet you do and don't even know it!

Me, I love herbs. I’m forever drying them or using them fresh. And when I’m working with them in the house, invariably some of them get on the floor. But I don’t clean them up right away. I let them get crunched and stepped on until I’m done with my work. That way I get the lovely scent wafting all over. And then it’s vacuum time and the herbal fragrance is let loose again.

Using strewing herbs to help freshen and protect the home dates back throughout medieval history. Since most homes then had earth floors, straw or threshes were placed around to absorb a variety of rather unpleasant liquids. That could get pretty stinky, so they added herbs to create a fresh aroma. The herbs also helped repel insects and rodents. Those who strewed provided some protection to the plague, since it was spread by rats and lice.

If you've used one of those carpet powders that you sprinkle on and then vacuum, you're a modern day strewer. You can make your own strewing powder, or add herbs to your home to release aromatheraputic scent as we close the windows and doors to the coming chill. 

To make your own strewing powder, take one small box of baking powder and pour into a dry, glass jar. Baking powder is wonderful for absorbing unpleasant odors. Grind any of the following herbs, or you can use their essential oil. Add two teaspoons of the ground dried herbs or 6 to 12 drops of essential oil to the powder. Shake well. Sprinkle over the carpet. Allow to sit for 10 minutes to a few hours, then vacuum it up (always test a corner of carpet or flooring first for possible staining). Your carpet and home will smell fabulous!

Great herb choices include:

Lavender, rosemary, mint, sage, roses, sweet fennel, lemon balm, chamomile, or bay leaf.

I also make a wonderful strewing powder to help get rid of fleas, mold, bacteria, bugs and such. Having lots of cats, and harboring kittens till they find homes, we have periodic flea battles in our home and this is always at the ready for battle… and for some lovely, brightening fragrance.

Battle Strew
2 cups of borax (20 Mule team version works well)
1 cup diatomaceous earth (you can get this in garden centers and on line)
¼ cup salt
1 tbsp ground lavender
2 tbsp ground penny royal
1 tbsp ground wormwood
2 tsp peppermint
(many of these herbs can be purchased through Mountain Rose Herbs)

Combine all of the ingredients into a quart mason jar. Shake well and sprinkle over carpet and/or furniture. Let sit 5 to 10 minutes and vacuum up.
Sometimes I like to add ground pine needles, or some ground dried orange rind for a little extra kick. You can use any herbs you might have in your cabinet! But be cautious with things like clove or cinnamon as they might stain.

It’s a wonderful and inexpensive way to protect and freshen your home. We may have improved hygiene since the Middle Ages, but we can always use a little herbal fragrance boost.

For more great strewing tips and ideas to add scent to every step, check out this article:  Ancient Aromatherapy Technique. Two other great articles are The Royal Herb Strewer and What are Strewing Herbs?

Join us at the Beach Plum Festival this Sunday!

It's one of the first events we book every year. We hope you'll join us at this wonderful, fun and educational event to close out the summer.

Annual Beach Plum Festival

 Sunday, September 9, 2012

9 am to 4 pm

Island Beach State Park

Just past Seaside Heights, NJ

There's so much to do:

Beach Plum Picking

Beach Plum Ice Cream

Kayak tours

Educational displays

Raffles

Food

Music

The Beach

Crafters.... and us!

And if you're looking for something to do on Saturday, stop by the Smithville Art Walk to see the works of my amazingly talented other daughter, Maggie Moran.

It's going to be a great weekend! Hope to see you at the Beach... Plum Festival that is.

Celebrate the Heart of Summer in the Garden....................................... Rutgers Gardens that is

Colorful flowers, butterfly's, shade trees, wine tasting, yoga demonstrations, food, shopping and tours. What a marvelous way to celebrate the heart of the summer season.

We hope you'll join us this Saturday, July 28th at the Rutgers Gardens Annual Open House and Wine Tasting.

Admission is $5 per person. Children under 17 are free, as are Rutgers Garden members. To partake in the wine tasting is an additional $10. 

Personally, I can't wait for the Yoga Demonstration from Inner Light Yoga Center, and the Aromatherapy for Your Senses seminar by Gwenn Fried. The tours are always so informative and there are plenty of experts around to help solve some of your pesky garden problems. 

Cindy and I will be spending time at our booth as well! We'll have lots of Gardeners Salve and Dó Gréine Sunburn Spray on hand, and maybe even a few new surprises.

Mention this Rutgers Garden Blog post and we'll take 10% off your order of $5 or more.

Play with Your Food - Herbal Sugars

I have an infusion fascination. I admit it. I love taking all those lovely herbs and flowers from my garden and infusing them into a multitude of other things to make intriguing new flavors.

If you saw my apothecarium right now, you'd see 8 or 9 different flavored sugars setting up. There's also about 12 honeys, 10 vinegars, a few salts and many herbal alcohol based extracts waiting for the herbal and fruity goodness to be fully released.

I've talked about herbal sugars before. The simplicity of it makes me wonder why everyone doesn't have some of these herbal sweets in their cabinets at home.

As a quick refresher:
You'll need:

• 1 large, extremely well cleaned dry glass jar with a lid. Quart size
• About 1 cup (loosely packed) of your herb of choice - see some suggestions below.
• Sugar to fill your jar.

1. I prefer to use dried herbs. They infuse their flavor and fragrance without making the sugar clumpy. You can use fresh, but make sure they are rinsed off and then thoroughly dried.
2. Lightly crush the herbs to help release some of the oils.
3. Put about 1/2 inch worth of sugar in the jar.
4. Place a layer of herbs on top of the sugar.
5. Continue layering until you reach within 1/2 inch of the top of the jar.
6. Seal the jar tightly.
7. Let this sit on a shelf for at least two weeks, but the longer you let it sit, the stronger the flavor.

I have a jar of vanilla sugar that's been sitting on the shelf for a few years. Whenever I want to add a vanilla flavor to something, I sift out the measure of sugar that I need. Then I add more sugar to the jar and shake it up well. It smells fabulous when I open the jar!

The best herbs to use for infused sugars are once with a strong fragrance. Here are some of my favorites and how I use them.

Lemon Herb - dried lemon peels, lemon verbena, and lemon balm
Vanilla - just vanilla beans
Cinnamon - several crushed cinnamon sticks
Rose Geranium - Lots of lovely rose geranium leaves
Bee Balm (Monarda didyma, Bergamot, Oswego Tea) - flower heads as well as leaves
Chai Blend - Cinnamon sticks, cloves, a nutmeg, small piece of vanilla bean, a few pepper corns, some holy basil leaves and cardamom pods
Mint - mint leaves
Lime - dried lime peels and lime scented geranium
 
The uses for these delectable sugars are limitless. I like to use all of them when I'm baking. The vanilla or chai make great angel food cake. Blend the Rose Geranium with Strawberry lemonade for a truly refreshing summer treat. There are some wonderful Sorbet recipes at The Herb Companion site - use any of these sugars to bring a different twist to these frozen concoctions. Sprinkle a little Bee Balm sugar on a fruit salad and toss lightly to add some sweet pizazz. I LOVE using the Cinnamon sugar on French Toast, or when I make glazed carrots. I've used the Lime sugar when making a blueberry crumble.


If you have flavored sugars set up, whenever you're creating in the kitchen you can use them instead of regular sugar to add that little something extra to you dish. Have fun with a recipe and play with your food!


Of course, we use them all them time in our sugar scrubs, too.

Rain or Shine - there will be Wine!

Let the Memorial Day festivities begin as we unofficially start summer! 

Join us this weekend at

The Garden State Wine Growers

Wine & Blues Festival

Natirar Park, Peapack-Gladstone, Somerset NJ

Saturday & Sunday, May 26  & 27, 11:30 to 5

Rain date Monday May 28

$25 admission includes wine glass and all the wine sampling you'd like.  Under 21 is free.

Free if you are not sampling wines. Cash only if purchasing tickets at the admission tent.

Come on out and enjoy fabulous music in the amazing Natirar Park. 

Kick back with some wine from one of the 25 New Jersey vineyards present, grab something to eat, do a little shopping at the fine vendors 

(like Celtic Chairde Creations!).

 It's a great way to kick off summer with out stressing.

Mention this blog post while shopping at our booth, and receive a free lip balm!

Lilacs and More for Mom

My lilacs are still bursting forth with fragrance and cheerfulness! My roses are starting to bloom. Spring is springing up everywhere. With Mothers Day coming up quickly, we thought we'd celebrate with some wonderful specials - for you and your mom!


We're big fans of lilacs. And we've created a wonderful linen and air spray that truly captures that light, uplifting scent of spring without smelling soapy. Our Lilac Fairy Ceo Broingloid (Dream Mist) is on sale now through Mothers Day - $2.00 off the regular price!

But there's more...


Order one of our Gift Sets and you'll receive free shipping PLUS a free 4oz Lilac Fair Dream mist! Choose our Méla Tea Set which includes one each of our fabulous all natural, herbal tea bag packs. You can use each tea bag 2 or 3 times - so this is a real value as well as a wonderful mini-spa treat. Or choose our Gardeners Gift Pack with all the things you need for outdoor care.

You can also build your own gift set and receive free shipping and a free gift. Go to our website and select the items you'd like to include in your gift. During check out, enter Chairde Special in the comments area. We'll create a gift basket of those items and get them out to you in time for Mothers Day!

The specials will be available until May 9th (to assure delivery in time for Mothers Day).

If you have any questions, you can always email us and we'll be happy to help.

I've got good news, and...

We're coming up on our first event of the season, which is very exciting and I'll share more news on that within the next few days. But in the mean time, I wanted to let everyone know that we've got some good news ... and some bad news.

The bad news is that we have to adjust some of our prices, particularly on our body butters. Supply costs have risen tremendously over the past few years. We've maintained our prices as best we can, but it just isn't feasible any more.

The good news is that we've added a 4 ounce size to our body butters! This special size is only available on our website. It's perfect for those who love to indulge their whole body in these moisturizing and wonderfully decadent butters.

We're going to continue to add some new items over the next month or so. And we will continue to give you exciting, skin loving, magically inspired and wonderful products with reasonable prices.

A Dandy of a National Dandelion Day!

Spring is here, and with it the glory of those early blooming herbs and flowers. And what looks as cheery as the amazing little yellow flowers popping up every where - the lovely little dandelion!

There are many who look at this versatile and nutrition packed little herb as the bane of their existence. Not me - I love them! There is a plethora of information out there about the hardy dandelion, but here are a few of my favorite things to do with them:

• Feed them to my cat. Yep, that's right. My one cat, Sinbad (actually my daughters cat, but that's another story) LOVES dandelions. Any time he sees us go outside, he'll sit in the window and meow rather loudly until we bring some tender greens in for him. We think he learned about them when he used to share a nibble with our rabbit, Nibbles, when we used to bring them in for him. (Nibbles was my daughters, too). Dandelion is a great addition to your cat or dogs food. Just occasionally chop up some dandelion greens to toss in to their food. It will help keep their coats nice and shiny.
• In salads and recipes - replace some spinache with dandelion greens. Younger leaves are as bitter as the large, later season leaves (although I'll occasionally use them, too). They work very nicely in Quinoa Salad or lightly sauteed in a little oil, then tossed with cranberries and walnuts. Yum!
• I like taking the flowers and flower petals and tossing them in with scrambled eggs or omelets.
• Infusing apple cider vinegar with dandelion flowers, leaves and roots make a very nourishing addition to salads, seltzer spritzers, and a refreshing toner for your skin!

For more scoop on this prolific herbal wonder, try check the Herb Companion articles like this, the Herb Quarterly, Learning Herbs - or go on your own dandelion hunt! It's a dandy thing to do on a spring day!

Spring Specials for a Special Spring

This has been a very warm spring - heck a very warm winter! All this lovely weather in the east is putting us in mind of getting out to the garden and celebrate this special spring. Well, we've decided that we want to celebrate as well. To do that, we're offering you some great specials for the month of March.


For the rest of the month of March, there's free shipping! Why not take advantage of that with one of our special offer gift sets.

Gardeners Gift Pack

The greening of the trees and plants calls us out to the garden. There's nothing as soothing as digging down in the dirt or smelling freshly blooming flowers. But it takes it's toll on your skin. This gift pack helps keep your skin at its natural best.

• 1 oz Gardeners Salve - great for those nick's, scratches and work worn hands.
• .75 oz Muscle Rub - Gardening puts your muscles to some extra work. This salve is powered with Arnica and capsicum from hot peppers. Soothes muscles and smells fabulous. Choose from 4 scents.
• 8 oz Dó Gréine Spray - Don't let the spring sun fool you - you can still get burned. This all natural spray ease the pain of burns (sun or otherwise) as well as itchiness and bug bites. Even helps repel some bugs (does not work well for gnats though).
• Sweetest Kisses Lip Balm - Honey makes this lip balm extra soothing and softening for wind and sun damaged lips.

Sale Price: $21.00

(If purchased separately - $23.50)

The gift pack comes in a nice little spring bucket and gets you ready to get out and play in the dirt. Perfect for a nice gift or for yourself. Our newsletter also has a Mela Tae gift set special. You don't get our emailed newsletter? You can sign up for it in the box in the right column here. Or you can see it in our archive here.

Enjoy!

Playing with Your Food

We all have little traits and habits that we've picked up during our life. Sometimes they are easy to track back and find, sometimes the lines are fuzzy.

My father is a fabulous amateur chef. He can create meals that would rival the finest restaurants. He's taken classes with Jacques Pepin as well as other renown chefs. He finds recipes that intrigue him and follows them at least once. Then he may doctor, adjust, or tweak to his liking. 99.9% of the time it is a wonderful and delectable improvement. I think that's where I got this habit of playing with my food.

It's a running joke in our house that if you like some thing I've made for dinner enjoy it, because it will never happen exactly that way again. My intent is to follow the recipe - but I just can't help myself. I wonder what will happen if I add a pinch of this, or some of that instead of this. Usually, it's a win. Sometimes, it's at least edible and won't kill anyone. Always - without question - it is fun and educational for everyone.

One of my recent forays into food play was with cupcakes. My lovely daughter has moved out to California. We had a very festive party to send her on her way. Somehow, we went from me making a traditional family cake to baking over 120 cupcakes. And on those cupcakes we wrote our well wishes. I couldn't, I just couldn't bake simple and plain cupcakes from a mix. Oh no, not I. The mix might be used - but only as a base for my baking madness. That's how we wound up with this interesting selection:

• Funfetti with Chocolate or Vanilla Frosting (OK, these were the one exception to the rule, but only because it was requested.)
• Chocolate Stout with Cream Cheese Frosting
• Cappuccino Stout with Mocha Cream Cheese Frosting
• Red Velvet (from scratch using mashed beets and beet juice)with Cream Cheese Frosting
• Aztec Fire Chocolate with Whipped & Zipped Frosting
• Apple Butter with Cinnamon Maple Frosting

What's particularly scary is I had about 6 other recipes waiting in the wings - but I ran out of time, and cupcake liners.

How did I play? Well, the Funfetti, as I said, was made as a special request for a guests birthday, so there was no playing there.

The Chocolate Stout Cupcake recipe I found here at the FoodNetwork site. I used Vanilla infused sugar and added a touch of chocolate extract. For the Cream Cheese Frosting, I took about 1/2 cup of Guinness and reduced it down to about 1/2 cup. Then I whipped that into the frosting.

The Cappuccino Stout Cupcakes use the same basic recipe, but I used Lagunitas Cappuccino Stout and blended some instant cappuccino mix into the heavy cream before making the frosting.

I have a recipe for Red Velvet cake from scratch. Admittedly, I don't know where I got it from, but most scratch recipes are similar. Instead of oil, I used boiled and mashed beets. I use powdered buttermilk - you add the powder to the dry components and the liquid to the wet components to make the buttermilk. So I used the beet juice instead of plain water.

The Azteca Fire Chocolate was interesting to create. It was simply a box of devil's food cake mix. But instead of just adding water, I made a strong tea using Teavana's Azteca Fire Tea, which uses chocolate and chili's (this is also a great tea to blend in with chai). I added an additional pinch of cayenne pepper (just a little pinch). For the frosting, I warmed the cream with some Azteca Fire Tea and added some powdered chocolate chai mix before whipping.

These were all BIG hits. But the surprising star of the evening was a last minute addition. I had thought I picked up a box of store brand yellow cake mix, but it was actually a butter flavor cake mix. Hmmm, what to do? Well, I chopped up some lovely dried apple slices I'd picked up at Target and tossed them with some cinnamon and sugar and added them to the packaged mix. Then I found a recipe for Maple Frosting and added a dash of cinnamon to that as well.

Next time you're baking or cooking, take a look at the recipe. Does it include water? What juice or tea can you use instead? Are there any dried fruits or even veggies you can add? Maybe some herbs or spices? Go ahead! It really is OK to play with your food!

Welcome 2012! The Year of the Rose

The New Year has now swept. Hopefully, you have all welcomed it in merrily, safely and soundly.

After the whirlwind of the holidays - shopping, visiting, wrapping, baking and making gifts - I'm finally catching up on some reading and emails. I was reading an email from the International Herb Association and was absolutely delighted to discover that the Herb of The Year is a top favorite of mine - The Rose! 

In my younger days, I merely thought of roses as OK. My parents had some growing, as did my grandmothers, and they smelled nice but didn't really move me. 

Much later (I'm not fessing up to the number of years), I was in Island Beach State Park and became entranced by the beautiful abundance of the lovely and vigorous roses growing throughout the park. Yep, I'd fallen in love with the hearty Rosa Rugosa. I never realized they grew in such abundance along the shore line. The scent was full and entrancing, they had huge rose hips that made wonderful teas and jellies, and - this is the best part - they are pretty darn easy to grow! 

I'll be exploring the many wonders of the rose all year, and sharing my discoveries and ideas. Please feel free to share any ideas or discoveries of your own? Do you have a favorite rose?  Do you cook with roses? Let's see where this adventure can take us!