Natural Products

What’s in a Name?

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Shakespeare probably didn’t know how appropriate this quote would be:

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.”  Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2)

There is a lot of confusion out there on what rose oil is compared to rose essential oil compared to rose hip oil. It surprises me every time someone says something like, “Oh I would never put undiluted rose hip oil on my face” or “What do you infuse in your essential oils?” or “Do you make essential oils at home?” I get these comments and questions all the time and it throws me, until I realize they are not talking about the thing that they think they are talking about. If those questions sound reasonable to you, rest assured you are not alone. I was talking to an aesthetician this weekend who is a brand rep for a natural beauty company, and even he was confused on what rose hip oil is. He thought it was an essential oil, which it is not. It is a highly potent base oil, closer in properties to olive oil or coconut oil, and can absolutely go directly on the face undiluted. Rose hip oil is full of antioxidants and vitamin C, in fact you will find it in vitamin C supplements, and has been used for its beautifying properties for ages. It is known to improve texture and tone of the skin, lightening dark spots and reducing fine lines and wrinkles, as well as firming and brightening the skin. It can be found as an ingredient in many facial creams and serums, but can also just be used as is, on your face, hair, and body. Rose hips, sometimes spelled rosehips, are the little fruits left over after the rose petals have fallen away. The oil should be cold pressed, as heat can damage the active constituents.

Rose oil and rose essential oil are made with the rose petals themselves. To make rose essential oil, you need a rather large steam distillation system and quite a few roses, around 60,000 rose blossoms in fact to make one ounce of essential oil. This is why rose essential oil is one of the most expensive oils you can buy. (This is also why I get taken aback by the question of making my own at home. Although that is possible with the right equipment and access to a lot of fresh flowers, it is pretty rare. I can only think of a couple of herbalists that have their own distillation equipment, and they are people who live on farms, not the ‘burbs.) Rose essential oil is also known to be great for the skin, but it should be diluted before going on the skin. It makes a great addition to a toner, serum, or moisturizer, and is especially good for mature skin. You cannot “infuse essential oils” with anything, though you can add essential oils to bath and body products, thereby infusing them with the qualities of the essential oils. In other words, essential oils cannot be a menstruum (solvent) for other products, but they can be added to common solvents such as a base oil or alcohol.

Here’s a quick video to show you how to keep your rosehip oil from going rancid, which essential oils can be added to your rosehip oil to take it to full serum status, and how to get the benefits of rose essential oil at a more affordable price:

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Rose oil is easy to make in any kitchen and far less expensive than rose essential oil. I’ve made it here a couple of times, once using the Folk Method and once using the Quick Method. This is a great way to use rose petals from your own garden because you can make as small of a batch as you want. Rose oil makes a great base for perfumed body oils, balms, and butters. It is easy and fun to make, and makes lovely gifts as well.

Rose water or hydrosol is another beauty staple for green beauty lovers. These are especially good in homemade toners. Roses have a long history entwined with beauty and love, and there are many ways to take advantage of the their traditional qualities. I hope this clears up any name confusion out there, and maybe entice some of you to look at including roses in some form in your face and body routines. We are in an age of self care and self love reminders, and roses do it all like no other.

Thank you for reading and please share with anyone who might have questions about how to use roses in their beauty regimes.

*This website has links to affiliations with amazon which provide a small incentive back to me. This helps to keep the information coming in such a way that is free to the reader. I only talk about products or services I truly love and believe in and hope this information brings every reader/watcher closer to their optimal health and wellness whether or not they buy anything through these links.

New Foods and Supps for Health

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The New Hope Blogger Box always has great gluten free goodies in it, and this month’s was no exception. I love granola and was thrilled to find Jessica’s Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Granola in the box because if there is anything better than granola, it’s granola with chocolate chips. This is a delicious treat for breakfast or an afternoon snack, with just right amount of sweetness. I ate it with unsweetened vanilla coconut yogurt or milk with a half teaspoon of my anti-inflammatory digestive spice mix.

My oldest son was thrilled with these unique Tahini Bars from the company Mighty Sesame. These are gluten free and only 100 calories a bar, and make for a nutty tasting, not-too-sweet snack or even a dessert. These bars come in different flavors but we tried the Pistachio Halva Bar and it was a hit, especially with my son who has taken all but one in his lunch bag. (I managed to grab that one for myself!)

Swanson Health’s Vanilla Protein Powder is packed with 20 grams of vegan sourced protein and one serving of veggies. I used this in the smoothies I make every morning and it blended in nicely and tastes good. It has 120 calories per serving which is similar to the other vegan protein I regularly use, and zero sugars. One bag has 20 servings in it.

My oldest son agreed to be the guinea pig for a natural deodorant by Prep U Products. He is almost 15, bikes uphill 1.75 miles to school everyday, and has PE there every day as well. He then bikes home. He also has sensitive skin and we have been through at least five (or more) brands of natural deodorants to find one that works and doesn’t irritate his skin. This deodorant works for him. It is gentle enough not to irritate, and yet it actually works throughout the day despite his physical activities off and on all day long. This is a golden find.

Here’s a supplement to get you fully transitioned out of cold and flu season safely and healthfully. Nature’s Answer has combined elderberry extract with probiotics which specifically target the immune system to create a powerful immune support supplement. This has 32,000 mg elderberry (which is an herb traditionally used to boost the immune system) per serving as well as 10 billion cfu probiotics. This is a great supplement to have on hand through cold and flu system and it doesn’t even need to be refrigerated. The directions are to take two per day with food or water.

The supplement’s color is so pretty!

Two bars that deserve mentioning are Hemp Health’s Cookie Dough Hemp Bar and gt brands’ good Snacks! Chocolate Peanut Butter protein bar. The hemp bar uses hemp for the main protein source and is quite tasty with a surprisingly good nutrition profile, including a decent amount of iron. It also has 12 grams of protein per bar, 5 grams of fiber and 4 grams of sugar. They have several flavors and other hemp products as well. The good snacks’ chocolate and peanut butter bar is delicious with a nod towards Reese’s peanut butter cups, though not as sweet. These have 15 grams of protein, 11 grams of fiber, and 9 grams of sugar. Both of the bars are gluten free, soy free, and vegan.

I’ve posted about Bellucci’s Olive Oil before, but in case you missed it, these olive oil packets are perfect for lunch bags, camping, or picnics. Now that spring is finally officially here (in the Northern hemisphere anyway) nothing sounds better than some outdoors noshing. With Bellucci you can actually trace your olive oil from the batch number to its roots so you know you have an authentic product, which is important because there is a surprising amount of oil out there masquerading as EVOO.

Thank you for reading and I hope you see something new to try. Happy Equinox!

Supplements and Beverage Featuring CBD

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CBD continues to take the natural products industry into new and uncharted territories, mostly because the legal status of CBD is still seen as somewhat precarious. If you are confused on CBD, you are in very good company. Despite the confusion, CBD’s fan base is growing substantially at an extremely fast rate as the benefits of CBD become more known, which are many, including help with anxiety, focus, acne, aches, serious pain, and more. As a reminder, CBD comes from hemp but does not have psychoactive components (like THC), so though your mood may change from getting anxiety relief from CBD, don’t expect a euphoric high (nor the munchies!) Here’re what came in the latest New Hope Blogger Box of samples.

Most CBD supplements so far have been oils which you take through a dropper or capsules. Plus +CBD Oil has come out with gummies that have 5 mg CBD per serving. They are tasty, not overly sweet, and the dosage is just one per day. They have several different lines of CBD products with different potencies, and many ways to take them such as balms, sprays, and capsules, so they are a nice place to start if you are brand new to CBD and want to give it a try. What I personally notice most when taking any CBD product, including these gummies, is a reduction in feelings of stress and anxiety. I notice it most when driving, as there are certain instances that normally cause those feelings of stress and anxiety to pop up (traffic, getting turned around, running late, turns with heights that seem roller coaster-ish). When I take CBD I feel calmer and more able to make sound decisions while behind the wheel, even when in a situation that would normally throw me off my game a bit. I know others really get relief from aches and pains with CBD~ more on that next.

Myriad Wellness makes quite a few CBD products including ones for pets. (It’s my understanding that CBD can help pets with anxiety, aches, and pains just as with humans. People recommend it for many reasons, from nurturing rescue dogs to easing cancer pain.) They sent their muscle and tension stick in the New Hope Blogger Box which has 125 mg of CBD in it. Normally I don’t have a lot of muscle pain, but sometimes at night my legs will be a tad sore from over exertion or just a new exercise that day. The other night I was feeling that bit of soreness so I lathered on this CBD infused stick because the directions say to “apply liberally.’ I might have gone a bit overboard because this stick not only has CBD, it has menthol and camphor in it so the tension relieving action is a very active feeling, not a subtle ‘Hm, I-think-it-might-be-doing-something action’ at all. Once I put this on, I knew it was definitely working right away. It might have been overkill for the slight soreness I felt, but I know for sure I can recommend this product to the athletes I know. And by the way, I tried the regular strength which was plenty strong, but there is also an extra strength if you tend to get hard-core sore. 

Just as adaptogenic herbs are big in the functional food department, CBD can be now be found in drinks. Acme Naturals sent three of their Tree Below Zero sparkling juice beverages which have 25mg of hemp oil extract in them. So far I have tried the mandarin blood orange and it tastes kind of like a mimosa since it has an effervescent orange flavor. It is really good and apparently is even an award winner for both best tasting Hemp/CBD beverage and one of the 2018 Top 5 most innovative beverages. They also pride themselves on being FDA compliant and Health Canada certified, made with sustainability, no preservatives and no artificial ingredients. It’s a nice way to incorporate CBD into your life without adding more supplements.

There are more supplements and foods that I will share next week from the New Hope Blogger Box, but since these are all CBD infused products I wanted to give them space to themselves because CBD is both insanely popular and also still confusing to a lot of people. If you are having trouble finding CBD products in stores, look on Amazon or go directly to the website of the product in which you are interested. Most of the CBD websites are also shops.

Thank you for reading and please comment below what your experiences have been with CBD products. I’d love to hear!

 

Herbs for Constipation

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Ayurveda doesn’t shy way from talking about bodily functions. In fact, ask any Ayurvedic practitioner about elimination and chances are they will have a rather strong opinion and be able to give you a lengthy description on what it should like, how often it should be happening, and when it should be happening in relation to your meals. I’m not an Ayurvedic practitioner myself but one of my herbal teachers and mentors, Karta Purkh Singh Khalsa, was steeped in Ayurvedic herbalism so I do remember long class discussions on the subject. As for the looks, think of an overripe banana~ brown, in-tact,  and buoyant. With timing, food should take about 18-24 hours to travel from one end of your digestive system (mouth) to the other. If the timing is shorter than that, you may not be getting all the nutrients out of your food. If it’s longer than that, you could be experiencing chronic toxic build-up. If you don’t know how long the process takes for you, eat something that you will recognize when it pops back out such as beets, which like to make quite the dramatic exit if you aren’t expecting the bright red color. (You’ve been forewarned.) Elimination should happen for every meal, so around three times a day is ideal.

One way to get things moving first thing in the morning is to drink a cup of lukewarm water with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice. This can also be done at other times of the day, on an empty stomach, but first thing in the morning works best. It’s a nice morning ritual for general cleansing as well.

For occasional issues with constipation, there are two common herbs used traditionally as stimulant laxatives: senna and cascara sagrada. Both should only be used occasionally, because as with any stimulant laxative, herbal or otherwise, they lose effectiveness over time as they train the intestines to rely on the outside stimulation. They do normally produce results within hours of ingesting, (pills, teas, or tinctures), but keep in mind, they are not fixing the root of the problem. Herbalism works best when focused on balancing out health issues at their root, so although these herbs can get you through a rough patch, it’s important to dig deeper into the problem and make adjustments there, so look into the foods you are eating, the amount of water you are drinking, the amount of exercise you might be getting, etc.

There is an herbal combination called triphala that can be taken long-term to enhance intestinal health and kick constipation to the curb (as long as the root of the issue is also properly addressed.) Triphala is a combination of three herbs: Amla, Haritaki, and Bibhitaki. These three herbs each have special benefits for the three doshas, Pitta, Vata, and Kapha, therefore when they are all together they are considered tri-doshic, meaning good for all three doshas. (You can take a dosha quiz here to find your personal doshic profile.) This tri-doshic quality is one of the reasons it is one of the most well-known and popularly used Ayurvedic formulations of all time. In fact, it has been around for over 2,000 years and still going strong. This combination might take longer to work than the herbs above, but within 24 hours elimination should occur and you don’t need to worry about taking it for an extended amount of time. Although it’s a relatively safe formula for most people, Banyan Botanicals lists these cautions: “Contraindications can include diarrhea, dysentery, and if you are pregnant or nursing. There are no known drug interactions with the herbs that make up triphala.1, 6 Some studies do report findings that would advise caution in people taking blood-thinning medicines,7, 8 as triphala may affect platelet function. From an Ayurvedic perspective, if your stools are dry and hard, consider using haritaki in place of triphala.” (Banyan Botanicals)

When I worked at health food stores, the box of tea that was far and away the top seller was Smooth Move by Traditional Medicinals, which, as you might have guessed, is for constipation. It has senna plus other herbs that support the digestive system, and is only supposed to be for occasional use only. They have a couple of different flavors for the teas and also capsules.

As with many health issues, making sure you are drinking plenty of water, eating plenty of fruits and vegetables, and actively moving your body everyday will get you far on your path towards optimal health. Herbs offer another level of support in those health, body, and life goals.

Wishing you health, happiness, and at least one herbal ally in your life.

 

 

 

Valentine’s Day Herbal Gifts

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Homemade gifts made with heart and intention are perfect for the holiday that celebrates love. Valentine’s Day is a warm reminder during this cold season that love should be celebrated fully and joyfully in all its forms, from friendship to family, and of course that special someone. Everyone can appreciate an herbal gift that conveys not only love, but also health, beauty, and green thoughtfulness.

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What plant could be more associated with Valentine’s than the rose? A flower of beauty that signifies love, it also has healing attributes that qualify it as an herb. Drinking rose petal tea is relaxing, due to its mildly sedative properties, and it also has some historical use as a headache reliever. The petals are used extensively for skin health, anti-aging, and beautification, while rose hips are full of bio-available vitamin C. Rose oil makes a lovely base for a massage or bath oil, and bath salts with rose petals would make a relaxing gift that encourages self-care and rejuvenation. Baths full of rose petals are picturesque and you will see plenty on Instagram, but if you don’t want to clean up wet petals after a restful bath, I suggest packing them in a muslin bag. You get all the benefits without worrying about the messy clean-up afterwards. The proportion of salts to rose petals is completely up to you, but if you want to add essential oils to the mixture, keep the essential oils down to about 10-20 drops per cup of mixture. Example: 1 cup Dead Sea Salt, 1/2 cup rose petals, 15 drops of lavender oil, and 10 drops of rose absolute in jojoba. Mix all together in a bowl before adding to a jar with a tight cap for gifting. Don’t forget to add the reusable muslin bag inside the jar, or tie it on the outside. 

Making a rose petal mask is another lovely way to gift roses and encourage self-care. Make a powder from dried rose petals either by using a mortar and pestle or a food processor. I actually use an old coffee grinder for making herbal powders and it works great. Mix the rose powder with either French Green Clay or another clay that suits the skin of your recipient (or yourself if this is a self-love gift) in the proportion of 1/3 rose powder, 2/3 clay. Example: 1 tablespoon rose powder mixed with 2 tablespoons clay. Store in a dark glass jar and mix one tablespoon at a time with either a water, a hydrosol, honey, or yogurt to apply. Actually, adding the powder mix to any of these one ingredient masks will make a multifaceted concoction, and you can choose if you want more of a firming, brightening, or evening out action. Leave on for 10-15 minutes, then rinse off with warm water. Skin will be moisturized, clean, firmer, and more even-toned.

Making a massage oil out of rose oil is as easy as adding the desired essential oils to the homemade rose oil. Aim for no more than 50-60 drops of essential oil per cup of base oil. You can also add in more base oils to the rose oil, so the mixture is more suited to the recipient’s particular skin. The heavier the oil, the more appropriate for dryer skin, and the lighter oils are more beneficial for oilier skin. Massage oil should not soak into the skin but rather allow for easy gliding, so sticking with sweet almond oil, avocado oil, apricot kernel oil, and grapeseed oil are good choices, especially when mixed together. Here’s a sample recipe including the aphrodisiac scents of rose, vanilla, and jasmine:

Massage Oil

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Making Massage Oil
1/2 cup Rose Oil (olive oil infusion)

1/2 cup Vanilla Oil (sweet almond infusion)

1/4 cup Avocado Oil

1/4 cup Apricot Kernel Oil

30 drops Sandalwood absolute in jojoba

40 drops Vanilla CO2 essential oil

5 drops Jasmine absolute in jojoba

 

I hope your Valentine’s day is full of love for your family, your friends, your partner, and yourself. We are experiencing the most snow in most of our lifetimes here in the Seattle region right now so I’ll be herbal crafting away happily this week. I also managed to make my first sourdough loaf this past weekend and it turned out splendidly! There’s a pic on my Instagram if you are interested.

Thank you for reading and Happy Valentine’s Day!

 

 

 

Vanilla Oil DIY

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Vanilla is a delicious, comforting, and sensual scent that is much loved. Like so many other good things, vanilla also happens to be a little bit high maintenance. For starters, it is second only to saffron in expense, largely due to how vanilla has to be handled and processed, plus it also cannot be made into an essential oil in the same manner as other plants (through distillation). You can find absolutes and CO2 extracts, but usually these are already premixed with a carrier oil and quite expensive. No worries though, because just as with vanilla extract, it’s simple to make your own vanilla infused oil to use in any bath/body product you want such as the base of a perfumed body oil, in body butter, lip balm, bath oil, or body scrub, etc. I’ll most likely be making all of those in fact, and more, because vanilla is just so all-around lovely and mood lifting.

Ingredients:

2 or 3 whole vanilla beans

2 cups carrier oil such as jojoba, sweet almond, or grapeseed oil

Prepackaged
Bulk Bin

Set up a double boiler arrangement with the water simmering. (I use a pyrex measuring cup in a pot of water.) C1719A6F-412D-401F-859C-9BA7BCDE381C Cut the vanilla beans down the middle and scoop out the insides into the top of your double boiler, then chop up the beans and add them as well. Pour the carrier oil over the beans, stir occasionally, and add more water to the bottom of the double boiler as needed. 2370B7C6-7D90-4DC7-B5E5-20FD7B049162 It will take an hour or two, so do this when you know you’ll be home for a while. Strain the oil once it has cooled, or just leave the vanilla bits in the oil to impart more scent over time. (It’s impossible to get all those little seeds out so don’t worry about that.) I put half of a vanilla bean into each of my containers to keep the infusion process going. 3D4EB8D7-3071-42D4-9D7A-8536996187CD You can add vitamin E for preservative properties if you aren’t going to use the oil within a month or two. Different carrier oils have different shelf-lives, but jojoba has the longest of the three I mentioned. The other two, almond and grapeseed, have about a year or so of shelf-life. I don’t think any vanilla infused oil is at risk of not getting used within a year though, it smells too good!

Thanks for reading and please share with the vanilla lovers in your life. Happy health and sweet scents to you!

Fragrance vs. Essential Oils

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Today I’d like to share a few minutes of my workshop on making your own natural perfumes with essential oils. What I’m sharing below explains why it is important to be conscious of the fragrances we are inundated by, and also how beneficial essential oils are to our physical, mental, and emotional bodies and to the earth as a whole. There are two main reasons I make my own body oils, perfumes, and salves~ to avoid fragrances and to enhance my overall health with essential oils. The sad truth is, there is no way to avoid fragrances completely because they are everywhere, but you can absolutely very easily avoid them in your personal care routine. By not having artificial fragrances in the products you wear on your body all day/every day, you will be taking a huge step in a cleaner, greener, healthier body and environment.

This is what the Environmental Working Group (EWG) has to say about it: –“Fragrance”: Federal law doesn’t require companies to list on product labels any of the chemicals in their fragrance mixture. Research from EWG and the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics found an average of 14 chemicals in 17 name-brand fragrance products, and none of them was listed on the label. Fragrances can contain hormone disruptors and are among the top five allergens in the world. Our advice? Look for products that disclose their fragrance ingredients. From: https://www.ewg.org/skindeep/top-tips-for-safer-products/

I made the perfume pictured with vanilla extract that I’ve been curing for about four months. Once you know the proportions and the ingredients that can be used, it’s easy to then take it a step further with infusing the oil and/or alcohol with herbs for scent or other healing or aesthetic reasons, such as making rose oil for your base, or concocting a bay rum cologne. It’s extremely easy to get started right away though with simple ingredients you have in your kitchen right now. As long as you have an essential oil or two on hand, you can make yourself a perfume in less than five minutes. Here’s the quick and dirty on why limiting your exposure to artificial fragrances matters:

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To learn more, visit my workshop intro page here: https://botanical-alchemy-and-apothecary.teachable.com/p/make-your-own-natural-perfumes-with-essential-oils

Happy New Year~ I hope it’s a healthier, happier, greener year for everyone. Please share this with anyone you know who might be interested, and please subscribe for weekly wellness posts.

Cleansing for the New Year

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This is a repost of a blog I wrote around this time last year. Happy New Year everyone.

Is anyone else ready to put away the dairy and desserts and cleanse for the New Year? I personally love a good cleanse, though I’m partial to the low-suffering kind. I know people who think it’s not a real cleanse unless you take in nothing but fresh juice and water, but that never made sense to me. Our bodies like balance, and balance by extremes is not really balance at all at the human level. Just look at how bad yo-yo dieting is for people or how hard it is on the body when there are huge weight fluctuations. Gentle detox is a way to cleanse while giving the body support to adjust, instead of shocking the body and then reeling from its effects. Of course, there is a time and place for everything and if you know what you are doing and have the right support, then by all means juice away your days. If you prefer a cleansing reboot that doesn’t leave your blood sugar levels bouncing and your mood-o-meter permanently set to hangry, keep reading for some options.

Adding powdered greens to your daily routine is one way to activate detox mechanisms in your body. While cleansing you should be drinking extra glasses of water anyway, so adding a scoop or packet to one of your glasses or bottles of water is a great way to get extra goodness. It is worth noting that some green mixes, like Paradise Herbs, are formulated for energy~

while others, like the Food Science one below, are formulated more specifically for cleansing. Greens in general, whether in a powder or in a whole fresh or cooked form, are cleansing though so an energy greens mix will still work towards detoxing your system. Both these mixes came in my New Hope Blogger Box and they are tasty as well as healthy blends, but there are of course other reputable greens out there. Just be sure to read ingredients lists thoroughly.

Adding a cup or two of detoxifying herbal tea a day is another easy way to help your body cleanse. There are plenty of blends out there, such as detox teas by Yogi and Traditional Medicinals that are as easy as boiling water. Flora makes a tea concentrate that you just pour a bit out and add hot water to. They promote their cleanse every year on Facebook so you can actually join a group of others using their product to get tips and expand your knowledge a bit into the world of detox. (Plus if you join in you just might get a coupon I believe.) They do have a dry blend as well.

If you want to do something a little more involved than greens and teas, making up a batch of kitchari is what one of my herbal teachers drilled into us as the most healing, cleansing, tri-doshic thing you could do. Kitchari is a meal from the tradition of Ayurveda that is made up of mung beans and basmati rice (brown or white depending on your preference), spices, and ghee. You can eat it once a day to support a general cleanse, or you can eat kitchari three times a day and nothing else but herbal teas for 6 days straight for a more intense detox. As with all things herbal, kitchari is a traditional dish that you can find a thousand variations for so this recipe can be modified as you like. What follows is how my herbal teacher told us to make it and it has never failed me. It’s a calming meal, easy on the digestive system, and healing.

Kitchari Recipe:

1 C mung beans

1 C brown basmati rice (my herbal teacher actually used white basmati rice, so your choice really)

1 tbsp. ghee (vegans can use coconut oil)

1 tsp. each turmeric, cumin, and coriander

After soaking the mung beans overnight (or at least 6 hours), cook them in 4 C of water until they are thoroughly soft, about half an hour.

Cook rice according to its instructions, depending on white or brown, then mix together with beans.

Warm the ghee in a sauce or sauté pan and add the spices, cooking until fragrant, about 2 minutes or so.

Mix the spices and ghee with the rice and beans and you are finished. Eat as often as you like.

I’ve never been big on resolutions, but I do like the spirit of renewal that January sweeps in. A gentle cleanse sets a nice tone for the year~ a reminder to think better, feel better, act better, and be better. Best wishes for health, fulfillment, beauty, and peace to everyone for the New Year. Please subscribe for weekly posts about herbs, natural health, and green beauty, and please share this with anyone who might be interested.

 

Survey Incentive

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Hello! This is just a brief post letting you know about a survey you can take involving the natural foods/products industry. The first 250 people to take it will get a $10 Amazon gift card, so if you want to do it, act fast! Here’s the link:  bit.ly/2rsd9WO Stay warm and stay well! 

Supplements and Substitutes for New Year’s Resolutions

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That time of year is approaching where we review our habits and try to replace the ones that no longer serve us with better options. The New Hope Blogger Box had some products that will start the year off right with the intentions of better and healthier. One easy way to improve daily nutrition is to drink some powdered super foods each day. These greens from Natural Factors are fermented, organic, non-GMO, gluten free, and contain medicinal mushrooms as well as 6 grams of protein. Adding one serving of greens in the form of powdered super foods really packs a nutritious punch and could be a great habit to add in to the upcoming new year’s routines. I’ve been mixing this with water and it tastes good and…. green. Although it is very tasty to me  this way, you can always add it to juice or to smoothies or a smoothie bowl as well.

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This immune supporting supplement from Redd Remedies features medicinal mushrooms too, which doesn’t surprise me a bit. I have a feeling medicinal mushrooms are going to start being ubiquitous in 2019 as their benefits become more well known, and supporting the immune system is one of their specialties. Immune Everyday also has the adaptogen, Ashwagandha, in it, as well as vitamin C to keep the immune system working optimally.

Probiotics are generally thought of as for gastrointestinal health, but the link between gut health and brain health has long been known and the gut is even called the ‘second brain’ in many circles. This probiotic supplement from Klaire Labs has kept that brain-gut link central in the formulation of these powdered packets. I suggest you read more about how this probiotic supports positive moods on their website, but here’s a snippet to spark your curiosity: “Target gb-X is a probiotic supplement specifically designed to support positive mood by influencing the gut-brain axis through the microbiome. It is powered by Ecologic BARRIER, a 5B CFU blend of 9 probiotic strains, that has been clinically shown to decrease overall cognitive reactivity to sad mood, rumination, negative thoughts, and aggressive thoughts.”~ from Klair Labs website.

Thinking of taming an overly enthusiastic sweet tooth in the new year? These syrups from NuNaturals are sugar free and net carb free and come in a variety of flavors. Besides being low glycemic, they are also gluten free, vegan, and non GMO, so they actually suit just about any diet, but might be an especially good find for those following a keto diet. Please share with any keto-devotees and they will surely be very grateful for a bit of sweetness in the new year.

For those wanting to reduce their soda consumption, Tohi has some tasty alternatives. These juice drinks are packed with antioxidants, have no artificial ingredients, and are invigorating without caffeine. The (only!) five ingredients on their ingredient list is as refreshing as the taste, and if you need a reminder of why antioxidants are so important, it’s because they help fight signs of aging as well as the internal wear and tear that can lead to disease. in short, antioxidants support healthy aging, healthy beauty, and a healthy immune system.

And if you missed last week’s post, it has even more supplements that can set up New Year’s resolutions for success. Here are a few of the items targeting brain health, skin health, and anxiety, but check out the whole post for more.

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I hope your season is filled with joy, peace, and health for you and your loved ones. If you haven’t already, please subscribe for a weekly wellness blog post, and as always, sharing is caring. Happy Holidays!