U-Bee-Well Lip Balms featured in Grid Magazine and now available at stores in Philadelphia!

We have been featured in Grid Magazine's Holiday Gift Guide.  We are very thankful as it has opened up doors to local businesses who are now carrying the balms!

 We are honored to now be found at the Herbiary in Chestnut Hill and in the Reading Terminal.  You can also find us at Milk & Honey in West Philly.  Soon we will also be found at Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction in Old City.


I am inviting you to consider U-Bee-Well as you are buying gifts this holiday season.


In addition to wholesaling the lip balms,  I have been working very hard to develop gift packages for the holiday season, and I am super excited and proud to bring them to the public! I use the fine...st ingredients I can afford.. all consciously chosen, and most of my products even include plants from my garden!

In the event you have not heard, my lip balms are being featured in Grid Magazine in their upcoming issue in the holiday guide. This has been a complete blessing as it has become easier to get local stores such as The Herbiary (located in the Reading Terminal and in Chestnut Hill) and Milk & Honey (in West Philly) to carry them. The lip balms will be found in these stores by next week.

Although I am only trying to put the lip balms into stores, I am excited to offer to my immediate community of friends and family gift baskets.



THESE GIFT BASKETS CAN INCLUDE ANY COMBINATION OF THE ITEMS BELOW.


***CONTACT US TO PLACE YOUR ORDER AT
you.bee.well@gmail.com


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~Lip Balms, my staple product...

*Ingredients; Local Beeswax, Local Honey, Lavender Essential Oil, Organic Tea Tree Oil, and the best olive oil I can afford!
~~~You won't be disappointed and the lip balms are PERFECT stocking stuffers!

$4
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~Bath Tea (** calming for both little ones and grown-ups!)

Ingredients; *Lavender *Chamomile * Calendula

$12
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~A choose your own blend for drinking tea;

*Lavender
*Chamomile
*Mint

$12
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~'The Magic Blend' of drinking tea. Awesomely calming and cleansing.. (My personal favorite!)

Ingredients; *Red Clover *Scullcap *Catnip *Chamomile * Calendula * Mint * Mugwort * Lavender

$12


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AND Lastly;

Absolutely amazing **Clove Sugar Scrub

Fantastic for moisturizing during these cold months. The smell will blow your mind, no joke.

Ingredients; Organic Sugar, Organic Coconut Oil, Vitamin E, Raw Shea Butter, Rosemary Oil (Rosemary from my garden!) & Essential Oil of Cloves.

$15


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***ORDER ANY ITEMS YOU WISH.  IF YOU WOULD LIKE A BASKET THERE IS AN ADDITIONAL CHARGE OF $5.



***BASKETS MAY ALSO BE DELIVERED FOR AN ADDITIONAL COST (Pending on your drop of location in relation to West Philly!)

If are interested in any combination of these products, please let me know at your earliest convenience so I can start making them.

Again.. Please place your orders via email;

you.bee.well@gmail.com

Thanks so much for considering us in this season of giving!

Fall time is the Right Time!

I love the turning of seasons.  The energies are always inspiring.  In the event you don't know, Mike and I (The Spinning Leaves  thespinningleaves.com) set out for a 2 & 1/2 month tour of the country.  27 states.. oh, man was it amazing.  I feel like it should be a mandatory requirement for all U.S citizens to make the trek cross country.

Anyway, I just got out of a big meeting with our music label which followed a long meeting yesterday.. talking about music business and events and things.

I feel like part of the reason why I like to work with plants is because it grounds me when the pursuit of music is endless and flighty.

With this said, I have decided to take my lip balms that I created to a new level.  I am offering an opportunity for small businesses, non profits and independent folks (or bands) marketing a product to use the lip balms to market themselves.  Getting a logo and website on a lip balm is an awesome way to market a product.  It's re-usable, ya know?  I learned about ETSY via a lip balm they were giving away at a table at the folk fest a few years ago.

I recently learned that the more I make, the cheaper it can be.  Unfortunately, when doing the larger orders I won't be able to use all plants from my garden and the lavender essential oil made by the Menonite women just outside of Philadelphia, but I will use the finest ingredients that I can afford at this point.  It will still be a great lip balm, promise..  Fine ingredients meaning (I'll get the essential oil from Whole Foods.. ya dig?)

Anyway, if you're interested, please let me know as soon as possible.

    It will take me a few weeks to complete one order right now because I don't have 500 empty tubes in my house.. I have to order them. I have to go get the ingredients. And then~ send YOUR logo to the lovely Angela Miles who will work her graphic art magic... get the labels printed..  and then, I drop the lip balms off to you!

I'm very excited to get this rolling.  I hope to hear from you soon.
Email me at you.bee.well@gmail.com

As for other happenings~  I have been researching lotion making recipes.  I am getting very excited to make some great lotions soon... as well as some perfume and candles! 
ALSO~~ it's cold season. If you're a friend and want something to boost your immune system, let me know if you're interested and I'll make you my special potions.
*You have to be a friend for the medicines though.  I am not licensed. Can't sell to the public.
With this said~~ my medicines are effective and I take them myself, as long as a few friends to date.

I hope you were out somewhere today in this glorious weather we're having.  Thankfully we got out early and hiked around Fairmount Park.  I was the more successful than I have ever been with skipping stones.  I got one to skim the 'wooder' once!

Before I sign off, I will be offering gift baskets for the holidays.  Lip balms, lotions, teas candles and perfumes.. Just planting the seed.
Keep your eyes open for more info in the near future.

Thanks for reading.

Let me know what you think of my blog!!

Love,
me, Barbara.

~*~*Grow Your Dreams~*~*

Grow Your Dreams... I've decided that I am going to get these words printed on my stickers and postcards that I will be distributing in stores.
Today, I had an awesome day in Philadelphia.
I visited great herbal resource stores right in the city.  One is the Penn Herbal Company; located at 2nd & Spring Garden..   http://www.pennherb.com/
 And the other is the Herbiary; a store in the Redding Terminal  (also with a location in Chestnut Hill)  http://www.herbiary.com/
Since I have started making balms, I have been getting my beeswax, honey and essential oils from Kings.  This spot has become a mecca to me.  It is family run by the sweetest Mennonite women, about an hour outside of Philadelphia.  If you are ever up for a little journey, I would highly recommend making a trip..http://www.kingsherbs.com/
Although, Kings will continue to be my favorite for my ingredients both the Herbiary and Penn Herb are really incredible resources that we are lucky to have here within Philadelphia's city limits.
In addition to deciding to use 'Grow Your Dreams' on my stickers and postcards, I have recently made another great realization on why I want to bring my balms to the public.    I found that making balms is a fun way to ground myself in the pursuit of my musical happenings, and life in general.  It has been truly a blessing to find a way to be connected to the planet while living in the city and my big hope is that whoever ends up having a u-bee-well lip balm will be triggered to also find a small way to get connected to the planet in their lives.  Be it going to a farmers market, or composting..  supporting the sustainable, independent businesses...  Even if you don't consider yourself an environmentalist; there is a no debate that a tomato from the farmers market is 10 billion times more scrumptious than one that comes from a far off place and treated with hormones and pesticides..    I hope that u-bee-well will spawn the activist in every person that encounters one of the lip balms..  If we each do just a little~~ together we can shake it!!
**Cheeeers to dreams~~~  Growing dreams......

U-bee-well lip balms!!

Hello friends, i'm not going to ramble on as long as I did in my last post a few months as it is late at night and I have such a busy day ahead of me. With this said, I have perfected my chapstick recipe if I don't say so myself! I started using plants from my garden. I infuse olive oil with the calendula and lavender of which I have been watching flourish in our herbal wheel and garden right in west Philadelphia. I got my labels made at fireball printing just last week and I am now officially ready to bring the chopsticks to the public! This past weekend I met with my good friend Megan from art star in the northern liberties section of philly who was so kind to give me a crash course on wholesale. I then called my best friend, robin who is a buyer for a hip boutique in Venice beach, ca. She gave me a whole lot of insight on the art of presenting a product to a business. After I spoke with robin I got insight from my cousin, Melissa in Florida who owns a store.
Lastly, earlier this evening I met with angela, the genius behind the u-bee-well label. Megan,robin, melissa, and angela.. A billion thank you's for your shared expertise! Today I made the dive and bought myself an iPhone so I can be more efficient I developing this line coupled with my music career. And now.. I'm about ready to go! I have decided I want to stick to sustainable and Eco- friendly businesses and organizations. In my music career with the spinning leaves, we have worked so hard and continue to work so hard to build and empower communities. We have done this through means such as the philly folk parade and getting involved with as many communities and organizations using music as a tool. I feel that these chapsticks Are an extension of that. This planet is plagued with disconnectedness. I use music as a tool to help bring folks eye to eye. A large part of that disconnectedness is also person to Planet. Developing relationships with plants is one of the ways that helps me feel connected.. Even while living in a city! My hope is that this will also inspire others to find ways to connect with the planet amidst whatever it is you do! When this happens we will surely grow...together!

U-BEE-WELL!

Hi! Perhaps you've seen or heard whispers of my growing attachment to witchy things..   Plants for healing, plants for fun..
I am creating this blog as a way for me to share my explorations and relationships with plants and their powers.

I first heard of mugwort (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mugwort)  while living in California from a naturalist that I encountered through a summer program I volunteered with.  One of the characteristics of mugwort is that it enhances dreams.  I am not one to indulge in too many drugs (recreational or for medicine), but man..  the fact that there is any substance that enhances dreams~~ what a dream!  So.. I went on a mission years ago to find mugwort.  I gave up after a round-about pursuit including an in-person visit the the horticultural society asking where i could find mugwort.  It was before the farmers markets and urban farming initiatives were completely on fire in Philadelphia.  Before the 'green movement', before Grid Magazine...  Before the 'Herbiary' opening up in the Reading Terminal..  I gave up.

Little did I know then that I would stumble upon plants a few years down the road, in a garden outside of a yurt on a farm that I was living on in New Hampshire.  In the event you do not know, I am in a band called The Spinning Leaves.  I sing with a fella named Michael.  He's my Clyde, my partner in crime.  Two summers ago we were on tour with our friends The Great Unknown up in New England.   We wound up befriending a farmer named Paul Harlow. We had one day off on our tour and wound up at the cafe at Harlow's Farm.  That day ended up being my introduction to eating my first meal made from food all from the land we were walking on, swimming in..  We were talking to the pigs, and helping to rid weeds from around the carrots.  Paul would ask if we liked tomatoes.. and would pick a few tomatoes. It turned out that Paul owns one of the largest organic farms in Vermont and ships his produce as far south as some Whole Foods stores in New Jersey.  It was hard to leave Harlow's Farm that day.  Mike and I arranged a way to come back and live at a farm, not so far from Harlow's Farm called Orchard Hill.  Orchard Hill was a little less industrious as far as mass.  There was an artisan of bread, a Waldorf inspired school and summer camp, and a CSA.  Orchard Hill, sort of an epicenter for the rural communities in the area opened up their community to us.. and HERE is where the connection of plants happened.

Mike and I helped Noah in the bakery and Ellen with harvesting.  We played shows in the local towns surrounding Orchard Hill on the weekends and special community pizza nights and Harvest Fires for the community at Orchard Hill.  Mike opened up to vigor, I opened up to plants.

This is a song that came out of that time;

The following year came and went, and Mike and I came back to Philadelphia becoming more involved with the local food movements in the Philadelphia area.  Playing farmers markets, helping to organize events with Kennet Square's Farmers Market such as the Fermentation Festival.

The following summer, my Dad was sadly diagnosed with Brain Cancer.  Stage 4 Melanoma. We were told 4-6 months.  But he fought long and hard for a solid year and a half.  The Spinning Leaves did not travel much throughout that year and a half.  Although we managed a 2 week tour of Moscow, Russia and maybe one or two trips to Kentucky..I couldn't bring myself to leave my Dad.  As I watched his body get weaker and weaker through the radiation, gama knife, chemo.... I pleaded with him to at least open up to alternative healing.  Alternative healing in any capacity.  Although, he would not even eat miso, I did not want to have regret in not being able to offer help.  Not that I could offer healing to this type of disease, but I wanted to offer ways for him to possibly heal in a more holistic way, being that the conversations never seemed to come up with the oncologists..

I started reading and reading about plants.  I started making tinctures, tea blends, syrups..


Although I am in the pursuit of music, and I do not have the ability to go back to school right now to become a practioner, I encourage my friends with ailments to tell me what is ailing them and suggest a quasi-regiment of herbs to take to help heal them.
I am no doctor, but I have good intuition.. and for now, I'm going with that intuition and have helped to heal friends with my cold syrups and suggested herbs!

On a side note, I've always had a weakness for 'products'.  My latest exploration with using plants comes into the form of chapsticks.  I have done a few series now using raw local honey, olive oil infused with roses, calendula, mint.. and adding some rose water.

I started selling my chapsticks at some local flea markets and will start selling them at my shows.  The Spring is springing now, and as the plants get more potent around us, I will be collecting them and making tinctures and tea blends.

My good friend Angela at Carpe Diem Constructions was so kind to design me a beautiful label for my products.  Because I use honey and bee products in much of what I do, I came up with the name U-BEE-WELL.  Please do keep your eyes and hearts open! Thank you for reading, and u-bee-well! Please keep posted and we will learn together!

~Barbara