Tuesday Spotlight: Lavender, Lavender and Oatmeal, and Lavender Moisturizer

This week, the spotlight is shining upon our lavender-scented products. Lavender is one of my favorite scents, and our lavender products are my go-to. I enjoy the fresh, floral scent to help me relax, ease tension, and help me feel calm and less anxious. My appreciation for lavender does not stop at soap and moisturizer. I frequently drink lavender tea, add lavender syrup to my morning coffee, add lavender buds to chicken cassoulet, and add lavender sugar to simple cookies.

Lavender essential oil is wonderful for one's skin. Lavender oil is anti-fungal, anti-microbial, and anti-inflammatory and is believed to even skin tone and ease the itch of bug bites. Lavender essential oil is to me what Sea Breeze was to my grandmother. As a child, my grandmother treated many ailments with Sea Breeze. If I had a fever, I was rubbed down with Sea Breeze. I was forced to smell Sea Breeze from the bottle if I had a cold. Bug bites, bee stings, weird rashes, or any skin affliction were treated with Sea Breeze. If she could have made us do it, she would have given us Sea Breeze by the tablespoon. I take the same approach with lavender essential oil, but I really do ingest it.

Although our soap is all-natural, I don't recommend eating it. However, it is lovely for aromatherapy and soothes dry, itchy, irritated skin. This week, save 25% on lavender soap, lavender and oatmeal soap, and lavender moisturizer. No promo code is needed to save on the weekly special. The savings will be applied at checkout. As always, orders totaling $50 or more after the discount will ship for free.

On this warm, sunny December day, stay safe, be smart, enjoy the savings, and keep washing your hands.

I Am A Red Assed Buffoon

WARNING: THERE IS SO MUCH OVERSHARING GOING ON IN THIS POST!

I readily admit I am a product junkie. I love to try new beauty products. Give me new make-up, serums, shampoos, hair products, or the latest bath product trends, and I will be like a kid in a candy store. Don't get me wrong, I am discerning about the products I try. There are big stores and big brands that are the equivalent of dirty words in my world. Bath and Body Works, Dove, or gasp, Irish Spring, you might as well use the "C" word as speak to me about your use of these products. By the way, using the "C" word is the ultimate swear in my world. Depending on the audience, I will sling the "F" word around like it's nobody's business, but using the "C" word is saved for extreme provocation and rarely happens. Now, back to my story.

I don't know if you know about the latest body care trend, but whipped tallow is all the rage online—every time I scroll through Pinterest or Instagram, an influencer raves about its benefits. I was intrigued but not interested enough to purchase the product they were pushing. Then, a kind, talented, and reputable maker gifted me a jar of whipped tallow moisturizer. The only ingredient was grass-fed beef tallow.

Well, dear reader, I can only say that I did not follow my own advice. I always advise people new to our products or any products to do a spot test before slathering their bodies in them. I should have heeded my sage advice. I showered and did my daily hygiene routine. When I stepped out of the shower, I grabbed the jar of tallow and proceeded to slather myself in beef fat. Sigh.

The first thing I noticed was the smell. I smelled like a Sunday pot roast. The second thing I noticed was the greasy consistency that did not absorb quickly into my skin. Those things can be expected when slathering oneself in beef fat, common sense, right? Ha! I cannot preach about common sense because I lack it. I put the tallow everywhere, and when I say everywhere, dear reader, I mean EVERYWHERE.

So, yes, I'm oversharing; please stop reading if you are easily offended. However, I will press on. My now saggy, draggy, granny bottom cheeks get dry in the winter. I slather our goat's milk moisturizer onto my bottom cheeks every day without issue. I did not think about covering myself with a single ingredient of beef tallow. I simply did what I do every day: I moisturized my bottom.

Let's just say I did not respond well to whipped beef tallow. After an hour or so, I noticed my legs, arms, and, yes, bottom were abnormally itchy. I scratched at them. The Bibbed Wonder informed me I looked like a primate digging its a$$. It did not occur to me that I was reacting to the beef tallow. I dug my arms and legs raw in a matter of minutes. When I used the restroom, the first thing I noticed was the very beefy smell coming from my body. Then, I discovered the mother of all diaper rashes on my saggy, draggy, granny butt.

Have you ever tried looking at your bottom in a mirror, dear reader? I was standing in front of a full-length mirror, with my pants around my ankles, trying to angle a hand mirror so I could see what was happening to my nether regions. It was not a pretty sight. However, I got the right angle and saw my poor bottom. Have you ever seen a red-assed baboon? Yeah, that was my butt. Red, swollen, angry, and oh, so very itchy! I actually gasped when I saw myself.

I immediately got in the shower and washed off the tallow. However, it was too late, and the damage was done. I had angry red scratches up and down my arms and legs. My poor butt was a red, swollen mess and painful to the touch. I decided putting Calmaseptine on my diaper rash was a sensible solution. Wrong! Calmaseptine has a mild menthol tingle to it when used on healthy skin. It is like setting oneself on fire when you have the mother of all diaper rash on your bottom. Then, it gets warm and melts. It travels south to your bottom's more delicate neighbor when it melts. That led to a wiggly dance and yet another shower. Sigh.

It has been four days, and I continue to suffer from my reaction to beef tallow. My skin is a mess. I am using our unscented soaps and moisturizer to calm my angry skin. The rash is clearing; I am not as itchy, but the scratches I inflicted upon myself continue to be angry and sore. Take it from a red-assed buffoon, do a spot test before you cover yourself in anything, even if it is only one ingredient. As my parents used to say, "Do as I say, not as I do."

I am not trying to deter you from using beef tallow if that is your thing. However, I encourage you to proceed cautiously and do a spot test before covering yourself in anything. Lesson learned. I will stick to my soap and moisturizer, which I know I don't react to. I may be mildly biased, but I like how my products make my skin feel. I also like not being compared to a red-assed baboon every time my husband sees me naked.

On this mild December day, stay safe, be smart, don't cover yourself in a new product from head to toe, use common sense, do a spot test, and keep washing your hands...and all your parts if you have an allergic reaction.

The vibe for the day

Foodie Friday: Old-Fashioned Applesauce Cookies

When I think of Christmas cookies, I think of the cookies my family made with my Grandma Haney. My Grandma Haney was my mom's mom. Of our grandparents, we spent most of our time with Grandma Haney. Grandma Haney moved in with our family when I was eight. My parents put a small efficiency apartment in one half of our basement, and my Gram and Pop spent six to eight months of the year in Pennsylvania with us. It was nice to have my Gram that close.

A few weeks before Christmas, my Grandma, mom, sister, and I would spend a day baking our favorite holiday treats. It was a busy day, but it was fun. My favorite holiday cookies were of the spiced variety. I enjoy soft molasses cookies, ginger snaps, and applesauce cookies. I am among the few weird individuals who love raisins in my cookies and cinnamon rolls. Making apple sauce cookies using my Grandma's Grange Cookbook was my favorite to mix up and bake. I believe I ate more batter than actual cookies.

My Gram had an old Grange Cookbook from the 1930s, from which many of our favorite recipes came. The cookbook had a cream-colored cover with red and black writing and a red spiral binding. I'm unsure what happened to my Gram's cookbook, but I picked up a copy of the same book from an antique store several years ago. Sitting and reading through the recipes was like being transported back to my childhood.

While perusing the recipes, I had a picture in my mind's eye of old women wearing cotton house dresses with snaps down the front in loud floral patterns or polyester "slacks" in bright pastels, dark-rimmed glasses, and overly styled hair with lots of volume and accentuated curls created by roller sets. These women smelled of talcum powder with a bouquet of floral scents: rose, gardenia, violet, and lily of the valley. In soft voices, they offered firm instructions on how to mix, fold, and roll the cookie dough correctly.

When reading the recipes, one sees words that are no longer or rarely used in cooking modern meals. Words like oleo, lard, chicken fat, mince meat, and jell-0 are the norm. These recipes take us back to a simpler time when people performed more manual labor in everyday life and worked off the high calories and fat created by old-fashioned cooking. I can remember my Grandma Haney being exasperated when chicken wings became all the rage in bars and restaurants. She declared that in her day, chicken wings were food synonymous with the poor. A respectable family would not be caught dead eating chicken wings. Now, they charge more for a dozen wings than the scant, stringy meat is worth. My Gram had a lot of opinions.

Today, I will share the recipe for applesauce cookies from the old Grange Cookbook. Yes, this recipe includes raisins and nuts. We never put nuts in our applesauce cookies. Often, we'd make two batches, one with raisins and one without. In my opinion, the raisins make them delightful, but they are almost as good without them. Almost.

This is a simple drop cookie recipe that mixes up reasonably quickly. The cookies are moist, soft, and delicious. They freeze well. However, if you make them ahead of the holiday, be sure to freeze them because their high moisture content leads to early molding. Regardless of your opinion on raisins, with or without, this simple, old-fashioned, delicious spice cookie will be a welcome addition to your holiday cookie tray. To me, this cookie is pure nostalgia.

Applesauce Cookies

Ingredients:

2 1/4 Cups All Purpose Flour

1 tsp. Cinnamon

1 tsp. Nutmeg

1/4 tsp. Cloves

3/4 Cup Butter

1 Cup Sugar

1 Cup Warm Applesauce

1 tsp. Baking Soda

3/4 Cup Raisins (Optional)

1 Cup Nuts (Optional)

Directions:

Cream butter and gradually add sugar. Dissolve baking soda in applesauce and add to the butter and sugar mixture. Sift the flour and spices together and add to the mixture. Fold in the raisins and nuts, which have been dredged in part of the measured flour. Drop by spoonfuls on a well-greased baking sheet. Bake in a moderate oven (350 degrees) for 20 minutes.

I hope you enjoy this simple, soft, moist, cake-like applesauce cookie recipe. It is one of my favorites, and I am happy to share it and my memories with you. The Bean and I will be making cookies with GB this Saturday. Although slightly altered, this tradition is one I enjoy sharing with my girl. Hopefully, someday, my favorite bean and her children will come to my house and bake Christmas cookies with me when I am old.

On this cold and chilly December Friday, stay safe, be smart, enjoy recipes that remind you of your childhood, pass on loved traditions, and keep washing your hands, especially when cooking.