We have fresh morel mushrooms at the shop...this weekend only!!!

We are ready for our open house! We're stocked with herb plants. We have gorgeous roving from Abi. We have jams and jellies to clearance out (so we can make new this coming harvest season). We have TONS of popcorn, and, are ready to go!

We took the morning to help a friend burn her 10 acre restored prairie (with wetlands area in the middle). it was FUN!! here's a few good pics. :)

We've got some scent blends marinating to test both in candles and for our new "Guy line" (men's products)....we'll keep you posted! :)

Some days, we have more office "help" than we know what to do with. Mo (black and white kitty) loves to lay right in front of the printer, so we have to scooch him over every time an order needs to be printed (every few minutes). Violet (calico) loves to sit on top of the printer and attack the papers as they come out. They are a very effective duo!

Here are a bunch of pictures, in no particular order, from our Soapmaking 101 Class last Saturday. We had 6 people - 3 guys, and 3 girls, which we thought was really cool (we usually have far more women than men at our classes!). I think they all had a really good time!

BUSY day yesterday!!!

We had 100 lbs of shea delivered - 50 for us and 50 for Karla, our soapmaker friend. We get it from agbanga karite, they have lovely fair trade butters, oils, black soap and more. This is what 50 lbs of shea butter looks like - I put a 4 oz. bar of soap next to it, for perspective. Who knew owning a herb shop meant quite so much heavy lifting???



With that shea, I made tons of patchouli body balms. These are for soul-flower, and then I turned around and made another batch, just as big, for us. We LOVE shea butter. So creamy, so moisturizing!!!









Then I made some Just Plain Shea balm, and these samples - these are lavender body balm samples, I think about 100. These will go in our sample basket, and be given out to any customers that walk in the door, or shipped out with our orders.








Donna did TONS of orders - this is her, working in our teensy weensy office. Doesn't she look nice?? She remembered we had a photographer coming to take photos of us and our shop today. I, however, did not, so I wore grungy clothes and had a bad hair day. *sigh*







I got a picture of the photographer taking photos of our stuff too. :)

Weather here is crazy. Last monday, this:
Excellent blizzard pics

This Tuesday? 78 degrees. People running around in sandals, with not-yet-melted snowdrifts all around.

CRAZY!

But, the catnip and thyme are greening up! We'll have some pictures soon!

Well, I think the needlefelting class on Saturday went really well. Everyone seemed to have a good time! Here are some pics of the grand event. Diane, who taught the class, has agreed to come back maybe in the summer or fall to do this class again, or maybe even something else related (felted jewelry anyone??? :) )

Okay! We have revamped and added to our class schedule. Here are the updates:

Crochet class moved from March 24th to March 31st.

Now we have SECOND Soapmaking 101 class open on March 24th (We think the March 17th one is full; we are just waiting for final confirmation/payment from one person).

Clear as mud? :)

WOW! You guys sure love learning how to make soap! Our Soapmaking 101 class is nearly full - we're waiting on confirmation from one person who verbally signed up. SO! If you are interested in learning to make soap...but 1) haven't yet signed up, or 2) want to take the class but that date/time doesn't work for you....let us know. If demand is great enough we will see if Karla can fit in another Soapmaking 101 class. Otherwise, I won't be until June...kind of a long time to wait!

On a related note, there's still spaces available for the Milk Soaps and Hot Process Crock Pot Soap classes. And, we MAY have one space available in our rescheduled March 10th Needlefelting Class...... please email us or call if you are interested!

Our Needlefeling class is rescheduled for Saturday, March 10th, from 1-4. I hope all our original participants can make it!

We had us an honest-to-gosh blizzard! Well, technically, it's still going on. EVERYTHING is closed. By everything I mean businesses, schools, county and national governmental offices...yep. everything!

So - Donna is at work (after trudging through much snow to get from the house to the shop), answering emails and packing up everyone's FREE FACIAL SERUMS (if you aren't subscribed to our enewsletter, you should be! So we can notify you of freebies and specials!)

I (Maggie) am home, working on very exciting things like 1) updating our wholesale price list, and 2) writing press releases. Oh, and updating this blog. I admit, a fair amount of knitting is getting done too. :) But I'm knitting the hat we're going to be making in our March 24th Knit/Crochet an Earflap Cap so it's "real" work....right??? I will post a pic when I get it finished. it's so cute!

In other good news, Karla, our self-proclaimed crazy soaplady , is also snowed in at home (she lives further to the north than we do, so she's even more snowed in!) and making soap like a madwoman. yay!!!

I took these pics from my house. Please note - while they do not look blizzard-worthy by themselves, understand that these are in my VERY PROTECTED backyard. I'm in a very protected part of town, AND have a 6 foot privacy fence. So just imagine what it's like out in the country where Donna is! Snow is blowing everywhere, visibility is practically zero, and the roads are drifted like crazy.

Ahhh...March in Iowa. You gotta love it.

*deep sigh*

More snow is on the way! BLAH!

We'll see what goes on...if the weather is like they're predicting (4 inches of blowing snow, possible ice/rain...yuk!), we may not be able to get out to mail packages tomorrow. We'll let you know....

THIS is why we didn't get to have our Needlefelting class on Saturday. BIG snow. big big BIG wet heavy snow! WIth ice underneath, because it rained alot, then froze, and then dumped snow on top!

These pictures are from Maggie's house. Donna is safe at her place at the acreage where PLH is....hopefully, they will plow her road tomorrow so that Maggie can get into work!

Okay, it's official - our Needlefelting class for today is CANCELLED. We will wait to hear from the instructor about other dates she can come, and will be rescheduling this class.

Sorry everyone!!

WEATHER! GAH.

Well, we've got icy icky stuff here. I'm waiting for the official word that our class is cancelled (we need to get ahold of the instructor), but, I'm 99% sure that today's needlefelting class will be rescheduled.

I'll keep everyone posted!!

Okay. I *think* the site is re-uploaded. If anyone has problems with it, please let me know?

Which brings me to another point - I'm not entirely sure the email is working, and won't know until I get to work tomorrow. So if you emailed us today and we didn't answer...may want to double-check that we got it. You can post here and I will be sure to check on all the comments.

still taking comments on our new prototype site! Tell us what you think!

Well, Mercury Retrograde is in full force....we are having some difficulties with our website. As in, it's not there. Please bear with us while we get it fixed!!!!

So last Friday was COLD, cold cold...we were baking a lasagna for lunch and happened to think...hmm..some nice local wine would go great with this! So we zipped over to Picket Fence Creamery for some Midnight Rain Wine (YUM!) from Madison County Winery (their Prairie Fire is a big fave of ours too).

Some days, it's not at all bad to be your own boss. :)

Whew. The storm rolled past us with out too much incident. Schools were cancelled yesterday, so Donna was home with her 5 year old grandson. Maggie stayed home and looked up new shopping carts. That's right, folks - prairielandherbs is getting a new website and new shopping cart! Do you want to see what it's going to look like (probably?) Check out www.soluscandles.com and see what you think (we're just using that address to park our new site - our actual web address will remain the same.

In other news? We are *just* about to unleash a brand new product in celebration of Donna's birthday. Facial Serums. Yep...they are AWESOME. stay tuned...they'll be on the website very soon!

It continues to be EXTREMELY cold here. Right now, the actual temp is -1, and windchills are hovering in the -20 degree range. COLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We had a great class Wednesday night - the weather was icky and super-cold, and yet everyone still came! Yay students! We had 15 students (kind of a small class for us, through the Des Moines Adult Ed program) and they were great! paid attention, asked great questions, and had tons of fun. We really like teaching classes because we always get to learn something, and the student's creativity is infectious. They always have a new scent blend or new idea that I NEVER would have thought of. And it's really fun to show people how easy it can be to create your own customzied herbal stuff.

Speaking of classes, we have our Hot Process Crock Pot soap class on Saturday. Karla (our soapmaker friend) is teaching it, so basically just have to get the classroom ready for her, and be around in case she needs us to get anything or help. So today, John and I will be spending some quality time in the classroom, getting it organized, rearranged, and ready for Saturday's class. And, most importantly, getting the room heated up!! We keep it pretty cool when we're not in there, so we'll have to bump up the heater before we even THINK about starting to work in there!

It's COLD. really, really, REALLY cold! Well, actually it' s a "heat wave" today...a high of 25, which means the wind chill might actually go above zero. Yesterday we had high temps of, oh, 5, with wind chills -15 and such. On Sunday the predicted high is TWO. gah. It's so cold, we open the door to let the kitties out, and they look up at us accusingly "you want me to go outside in THIS???" Winter sucks!

So, yesterday we all stayed in the shop. John is working on a new, updated version of prairielandherbs.com. It will be a while, but we think we have the basic look and structure down. We're just aiming to make it as clean, simple, and easy to use as possible! Donna filled orders all day (apparently, it's really cold so everyone is staying indoors and ordering online!), and I (Maggie) made oodles of moisturizing things - 4 kinds of whipped shea, and a couple of big batches of shea butter body balm. So, I also made up lots of samples of aforementioned moisturizing things, in nice 2 oz. tins. Our sample basket is full of "Simply Shea" whipped shea, 3 citrus whipped shea, and raw shea butter samples. So if you were to order in the next few days, chances are some of those samples would end up in your box. I'm just sayin.... ;)

In other news: Our classes for Feb. are filling up nicely! Still room for a *few* more in all classes. We have a COOL lineup in the works for March/April/May including: crocheting, Energy 101, Milk Soaps, Dream pillows, and more....we'll be announcing that real soon. :)

stay warm everyone!

I (maggie) am back from mexico, and home this week with a WICKED sinus infection. gah. I have begged several people to cut my head off to relieve this pain but so far...no takers. I am subsisting on echinacea tea and whiskey tea (recipe to follow). It really DOES help, and tastes yummy too!

A class note: We have ONE space available for the Hot Process Crock Pot Soapmaking class Feb. 3rd. If you want to sign up, do it now!


Whiskey Tea (Irish version)

1 lemon
1 teabag black irish tea (Barry's, if you can get it)
honey
Irish whiskey (I prefer Jamesons)
whole cloves
cinnamon stick


Cut a 1/4 inch slice out of the middle of the lemon. Stick 4-6 cloves into this lemon slice, and set aside. Juice the 2 halves of lemon into a large cup (using a clear cup is easiest). Then add a roughly equal amount of honey, and a roughly equal amount of whiskey. Stir whiskey, lemon, and honey together, and add a cinnamon stick. In a separate cup, brew a strong cup of black tea - about 6-8 oz. Remove teabag, and pour tea into the whiskey/lemon/honey mixture. Float the clove-studded lemon slice on top of the entire mixture, and drink quickly before all the "good" stuff evaporates! This really does work to help cut phlegm, soothe coughs and sore throats, make you warm and toasty, and make you feel better!

When you buy essential oils in bigger quantities (this is 5 kg, or approx 11 lbs), you get them in these KICK-ASS sexy aluminum containers. We're getting quite a stash of these built up. I wonder what we can do with them once they're empty??

So, the other day, I got to make some catnip toys. Get out dried catnip, place in bowl. Place bowl on counter. Go to kitchen to get muslin bags. Come back to counter....and laugh hysterically at the huge cat that has stuffed himself IN the bowl, on TOP of the catnip.

Yep, Sassy got in the bowl of catnip and claimed it for himself. Furthermore, he SLEPT in the bowl, for several hours. We moved the bowl from the counter, to other parts of the shop, numerous times...not once did he get out.

Silly cat!

here's a delicious white chili recipe given to us by some of our favorite friends! :)
enjoy!

Lora's White Chili

2 size #4 cans great northern white beans
1-3 chopped onions
2 lbs ground turkey
2 cans salsa verda (about 14 oz total)
2 cans copped green chilies (or cut up fresh ones)
1 small bottle La Victoria green taco sauce
2 cans (about 32 oz) chicken broth
1 tsp cumin or to taste
1 tsp oregano or to taste

Fry turkey, onions, cumin, oregano together. When fully cooked, add other ingredients and simmer for 30 minutes or until ready.

Enjoy!

BEESWAX! We get our beeswax from a local fellow - he's super nice, and has GREAT beeswax. And we love to support our local farmers. Here is what it looks like when we get it. It's fairly clean, but there's pollen and bee bits and stuff in it. This is what about 100 lbs of beeswax looks like.


We put it in a biiiiig pot we have (purchased from our local secondhand store, and kept used just for this purpose) and melt it over low heat. Everything smells SOOOOOO good when we do this! The smell of warm beeswax is one of my most favorite scents in the world.

Then we strain out the ooky stuff from the melted beeswax, using very high-tech tools such as cheesecloth and an embroidery hoop. :) We've read that actually used sweatshirts make fabulous straining material - we plan to try that as soon as we get to Goodwill to pick some up.


This is all the stuff we strain out from the beeswax. Aren't you glad that doesn't end up in your lip balms or salves? :)


And here it is cooling in metal loaf pans. The large ones hold 2 lbs of beeswax and the small ones hold 1.

This is what our shop looks like about 4PM, just before we head to the post office. :)



And this is what our shop looked like Tuesday mornign when we got to work, after Paul, or fabulous UPS guy, delivered to us late Monday night. You are looking at: 250 lbs. of soywax, boxes full of organza bags and cello bags, about 600 solid perfume tins and shrink bands, 300 soy wax melt containers, 144 - 2 oz. tins, about 30 deodorants, 11 lbs. of eucalyptus oil, and a few other things which I've now forgotten. All in boxes and bubblewrap and peanuts of course.

Here's a little post about our birdie (and human) friends at Iowa Parrot Rescue. Mike, who runs the rescue with his wife Abi, says this:

"We currently have about 45 birds in care here. 9 are permanent residents. 4 are refugees from Hurricane Katrina...their home was destroyed and they're here while it waits to be rebuilt. One is just visiting while his family is out of town. The rest are awaiting adoption. We get them from people who can no longer care for them, from humane societies, and recently we got 36 from the US Govt. They were part of a seized illegal import shipment. People find us via our web
page at _www.mikebear.org_ (http://www.mikebear.org) , or by word of mouth. People who want to adopt birds must apply and visit here for an interview, and then have a home visit by us. We have to make sure that the birds will have a stable permanent home, in safe and healthy
conditions. We don't charge any adoption fees. We are funded partly by donations and partly
from our own pockets. Depending on circumstances, it costs anywhere from
$500 to $1000 monthly to feed, maintain, and care for the birds. We are an Iowa
non-profit corporation and a 501(c)3 tax exempt charity under federal law.


_Iowa Parrot Rescue_
(http://www.mikeoso.homestead.com/rescue.html)
"


What he doesn't talk about is how much work he and Abi do to care for these birds! Abi (who runs High Prairie Fibers) gave up her studio for most of the summer, so her 36 birds would have somwhere to live! They do great work, and could use a little extra help. So visit their website, and maybe donate or purchase some of their bonky balls, candles, or other goodies.

Last week, I spent most of one day just ordering stuff - stuff to make stuff with. :) Like tins, jars, bottles, shea butter, oils, essential oils...that kind of stuff. So we can be all ready for the holidays. And it's started arriving! This lot of boxes was waiting for us on Monday morning when we opened. It took me 2 hours to unpack and put everything away!!! And there will probably be more today. :)

Howdy all! I've been really bad about posting this past week, sorry! We had a CRAZY weekend. We had a blast at the downtown farmer's market, and had a wonderful class on Saturday too - 14 people learned to make Body Scrubs. I think they had a geat time- I know Donna had agreat time teaching them. Then, we had a 3-farm party with a Sample Sunday - I scored a great bottle of wine from Prairie Moon Winery. Anyway....we're really busy getting things made and stocked up, but I promise I will post with some interesting recipes and news VERY soon. Our next schedule of classes looks totally cool , I'm really excited!!

-maggie

WOW! The fiber classes this past weekend were AWESOME! We had SUCH a good time. This pictures shows what John dyed during the Sunday "Dyeing with Jacquard Acid Dyes" class. It was a day-long class (10-4), and I can't believe how much we learned during this one day. Abi, from High Prairie Fibers, was our patient, generous teacher. We learned how to use acid dyes to dye yarn, roving, batts, fleece (locks) and wool fabric, and used a different technique to dye EACH ONE. It was amazing. We had several spinners, an experienced needlefelter, and several fiber producers there, so there was a wide range of interests and experiences among the students. Visit Maggie's blog to see what she dyed!

And this kitty lives at our neighbors, at Picket Fence Creamery. I don't know her name, but we just happened to see he cuddled up in these flowers when we went to get milk. Isn't that a great pic?

Sorry, guys, I've been really bad about posting lately. Ill try to make up for it!
This is "Go", which is Japanese for "five". Maggie has 4 tabby cats...and so she's the fifth total. but her name also fits her personality, in that she's very energetic and loves to GO! :) She's about 6 months old now, and really likes living in a herb shop.

So - it's that time of year when the garden is put to bed, so, we spend time now (october and early Nov.) really stocking up for the holiday shopping season. Which means, for instance, making several pounds of bath tea. This could easily be one day's project. Here is "Harmony" bath tea, about 5 lbs of it. it takes a LONG time to put a small amount in each tea bag, seal the teabags shut, then package and label the bath teas. But then, we're stocked up on bath teas through the holiday season!

Here's a lovely recipe to warm up your November day! Thank you to Betty, who let me post it!

Betty's Chocolate Chai

Betty says " I developed this after much experimentation. You can adjust the seasonings
to suit your taste. Please, please, please, don’t use this recipe without
giving me credit and a link to my website!"

3 slices fresh ginger root
6 whole cloves
½ teaspoon coriander seeds, crushed
1 teaspoon quality cinnamon
5 black peppercorns
¼ tsp. crushed cardamom seed
2 Tablespoons Darjeeling tea leaves
2 cups milk
1 cup boiling water

Infuse the spices in the boiling water for 15 minutes. Strain. Pour
infused water into saucepan, add milk. Heat til warmed thoroughly, but do
not let boil. In each serving cup, squirt a bit of chocolate syrup, add the
hot, spiced infusion, stir. ENJOY!

www.bettypillsbury.com

I am experimenting and playing with natural dyes, and, have saved the leftover "tea" from our last few batches of hydrosol. The water lleft over from distilling the eucalyptus hydrosol was a really, REALLY interesting red color. I used some of the actual eucalyptus plant matter to compost dye some silk squares...those won't be ready for a few weeks, so I don't know what they look like. But I dyed this roving with the eucalyptus "tea" and think it's a really pretty color! Next, I'll try the leftover tea from the lemon eucalyptus we did a week or two ago. :)

FROST!

We had our official hard freeze on Wednesday night. *sigh* I had some lemongrass, lemon verbena, and a bit of lemon eucalyptus that hadn't made it into the still yet, so I cut those and they are in the drying shed now. I'll distill them as soon as the weather cooperates. Those were the most "tender" herbs I wanted to save. I still have rosemary to distill, but it likes the cold, so it will be okay for a while! It's always sad to have the first frost come....but also kind of a relief in a way, because that means the bulk of our summer work is done!

John took this picture of a spider hanging out in our garden. We love spiders!