Miz Bella's Bodacious Bitch Balm

Stressed out? Head pounding? Eyeballs ready to pop out of your head? Can you spin your head around 3 times at will?

Then Miz Bella's Bodacious Bitch Balm is just what you need!

The Bodacious Bitch Balm smells fabulous and has a slightly cooling effect. It may help melt away stress, soothe your senses and make whatever it is that’s causing your brain to do the Rumba to stop.

To use:  Rub fingers over the balm and then smooth over your forehead, wrists and rub into the back of your neck. Massage into your temples. Rub into your hands and then inhale from your hands.  Mmmm mmm!  


Miz Bella's Bodacious Bitch Balm is hand-crafted by me and comes packaged in a 1 ounce tin with a screw cap.  Yay!  No more lost tin caps!   Contains: Bulgarian Lavender, Peppermint, Spearmint, Lemongrass, Roman Chamomile and other essential oils that are in a balm base of Rice Bran Oil, Coconut Oil, and Beeswax.

1oz of Miz Bella's Bodacious Bitch Balm is &7.00 with FREE shipping for a limited time.  (The free shipping is for a limited time, not the Bitch Balm....lol)

Note: This product is NOT for children.

Just Poured

Bitch Balm.

(Oh please don't get your pahnteeze all in a bunch over the name.  You know we can all be one when pushed.)

My Oompa Loompa assistants, Micah-Vance and Zoe helped me out immensely by writing everything down in my secret book.  Something I'm not known for doing....it's usually a little bit of this, a little bit of that....more of this....with the recipe locked inside mah crazee leetle head.  Imagine that!  I actually have a hard copy formula now!  I hope it doesn't make Jeanne Rose faint.

Too tired to do the labeling tonight - so finished pics sometime tomorrow with details about the balm.

Bitch Balm

You are acting like a crazy, stressed-out bitch with a pounding headache.

You need this.

Oh please don't get your pahnteeze all in a bunch over the name.  You know we can all be one when pushed.


Smooth Bitch Balm over your forehead, wrists and rub into the back of your neck. Massage into your temples. Inhale it directly from the container. Let Bitch Balm help melt away stress, soothe your senses and make whatever it is that’s causing your brain to do the Rumba to stop.

Bitch Balm smells fabulous and has a slightly cooling effect. It is hand-crafted by me and for now comes packaged in a 1 oz tin container with a twist top.  Yay!  No more lost tops to the tin containers!  





Bitch Balm contains: Bulgarian Lavender, Peppermint, Spearmint, Lemongrass, Roman Chamomile and other essential oils that are in a balm base of Rice Bran Oil, Coconut Oil and Beeswax.



Note: This product is for adult use only.

What you won't find in the Butter Bars I make..........

• parabens

Super Harvest Moon

This has nothing to do with scent - it's just very cool and it's happening tonight :D

Super Harvest Moon

Essential Oil Inventory

Tonight I'll be taking an inventory of the essential oils that I have.  Right now most of them are carefully packed away so it'll be like Christmas opening everything up!

Well, hopefully tonight if those Oompa Loompas would ever fall asleep.  If I let them come down into the dungeon with me they'll be wanting to open bottles up and get their hands into everything.  I still haven't recovered from the time Oompa Loompa #1 and #2 found my hidden stash of rare and precious oils, some of them gifts from Jeanne Rose and other very special people.  The kids were how old....oh, lemme think.  #1 was probably 5 and #2 was 3.  Seems they decided that they were going to 'blend' oils just like mommy does! 

The little darlings blended Spikenard, Zdravetz, Jasmine, Bulgarian Rose, Neroli and a very special Patchouli all over their art table. Oh, the memory of it is going to give me the vapors!  Where are my smelling salts??  I can't think about it anymore or I'll end up throwing myself on the floor in a fit and have to surely be admitted to the loony bin to hang out with Baby Jane.

Thankfully I still  have an obnoxious amount of essential oils, especially since there are some oils that I hoard.  (Yes! Just as I do with my vintage art supplies!)  As my grandma and mom would say, "No tienes veruenza!  Meaning:  You have no shame!  Know what?  They're right.  I don't.  ha!

My private reserve Patchouli that is over 10 years old now.  mmmm, mmmmm!  If you don't know what aged Patchouli smells like -  don't expect it to smell like the stereotypical Patchouli scent of wet earth, smelly hippies and bad incense.  (Please, no hate mail from those over 60.  We all know that you know what I mean!)   

Aged Patchouli becomes the part of a perfume that makes you feel as if you've been kissed by an angel's wings and it's sillage keeps you looking for just one more kiss.

Of course, it would be a kiss from a fallen angel.......hehheh!  Yeah, good luck trying to get THAT oil from me.  Although I do have perfume blends that are made from it, one in particular that is quite wicked indeed.

Jeanne Rose had a mystical, magical, stunning Patchouli that was well over 30 years old.  I used to love to open the bottle and sniff/inhale it like a crack fiend who had finally lost their marbles. 

Unfortunately - something happened to it during one of Jeanne Rose's fabulous Perfume Workshops and alas!  It is no more.  Good thing I wasn't at that workshop - I'd have probably *accidently* had to push the offender out of the attic window. . . . 

Well it's now 11pm and 2 out of 3 Oompa Loompas are still awake.  I suppose the inventory will have to wait until tomorrow morning.  I'm sure there will be things to write about after that feat is accomplished!  (Maybe even some pictures.  Maybe.)

Waiting. Impatiently.

I am waiting impatiently for packages to arrive.

Tick. Tock.

Always Wild for Wilde

"And so he would now study perfumes. . . He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not its counterpart in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense that made one mystical, and in ambergrise that stirred one's passions, and in violets that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several influences of sweet-smelling roots, and scented pollen-laden flowers, or aromatic balms, and of dark and fragrant woods, of spikenard that sickens, of hovenia that makes men mad, and of aloes that are said to be able to expel melancholy from the soul." - Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Don't you think that Oscar Wilde would have been so much fun to create a perfume with?

Funny Face Mold

Imagine opening this up to use.....and even your butter bar is laughing at you.  OMG!  Is it laughing *at* me?  Or at my fat arse?  Can it see my cellulite?  Why is it laughing at meeeeee?  Definitely not for the easily paranoid!

Have been looking around for soap molds that I like (but not for soaps!) and found this one.  I can't decide if it's creepy-creepy (but not in a crepeldah sort of way) or if it's just funny.  Not sure why it's colored that gross brown either.....and the damn thing has TEETH! just sayin.

OK.  It's way creepy.  

Synchronicity

Today I got dressed as I normally do when I'm going to just schlep around the house, do a little cleaning, and get some long over-due reading done.  Of course most of what I accomplished was just obsessing.

Over the last couple of weeks I've received a series of emails from past customers and/or friends of mine who have been asking me to either make them specific products or asking if I still make products.  I've also been speaking to fabulous femmes I've trusted and adored for years in the aroma world who have encouraged me in this direction as well.

Which is funny to me.  Funny because I have been throwing around the idea in mah purtee leetle head to start making a few products again.  Butter Bars and Balms mainly.  Screaming Queenie (PMS blend), Bitch Balm (self-explanatory) and a couple of other blends come to mind that I'm keeping to myself, for now.  I've even wanted to start writing about aromatherapy once more!

I'm big on 'signs' and gifts from the Universe and thought, hmm.  Is all of this a sign?  Or am I MAKING it seem like a sign because I've really missed and regret not using the oils?

Today the icing on the cake (aka gift from the Universe!) for me was  was a mysterious package that arrived from the Grande Dame Jeanne Rose. I couldn't wait to open it because no matter WHAT the package contained - I knew that it would smell like the House of 1,000 Aromatic Wonders! 

Having been missing Jeanne Rose horribly I opened up the package and was immediately transported aromatically to my favorite home in the world.  Aaaah, the power of scent never ceases to amaze me!  If only I could find my ruby red slippers so that I could click them three times and be home.  *sigh*  The Oompa Loompas all had to have a turn inhaling directly from the box as well so they could "smell Jeanne Rose's house!"

No I am not willing to divulge what was in the box just yet - but trust me.  Once I am ready to tell everyone about it - you'll hear about it here first!

As for making products and getting back into working with the oils again - how can I turn down a direct sign from the Grande Dame herself?

Cape Chamomile For Stress Relief

Stress is awful.  It can age you, affect your health, your heart, your well-being in general and stress can do so many more creepy things to you.  

So why are we all running around clenching our teeth and periodically reaching up to make sure that our head is not about to fly off into outer space?   We over-commit ourselves.  We over-commit with our children, with work, with school, with ourselves and with our lives in general.   One just isn't doing enough unless one is running around town from this activity to the next. Or perhaps you have a monster of a boss (or you are the monster boss) and then you have to get home and run your children (or yourself) from point A to point B to point Z then back to point A but hey, don't forget to stop at point J before you head back to point B!  

Why do we do this?  Because gosh-darnit! We're going to stand out, be the head mucky-muck Stepford Wife/Husband Pod, amaze family, friends and those PTA members at the number of feats we can accomplish in one day running on a giant cup of Starbucks coffee and half a bite of whatever was grab-able on the kitchen counter on the race to the car to start our day of insanity!!

Sound familiar?

Or how about this:  Your husband works and lives in CA right now and you are home. Alone.  In another state, 2,000 miles away. With three children 10 and under whose mission it is (you swear!) is to push you into the mouth of madness on a daily basis OR force you to run screeching into the night like a banshee on crack as you pull at your clothes and rip your hair out piece by piece........

But I digress!

I often find it funny that I am an aromatherapist and can whip up the most fab stress-relief blends for other people but when it comes to myself - ho hum.  I'll get to it tomorrow.  Tomorrow.  Tomorrow.  Uh-huh.   I've decided to quit waiting until tomorrow and do something about it TODAY.

In conversation I mentioned to Marge Clark of Nature's Gift how stressed out I was and that I thought it was starting to affect my health.  She recommended trying out 'Cape Chamomile' (Eriocephalus punctulatus) for stress-relief so I did.  Skeptical of it, but I thought hey! I may as well or just keep on clenching those jaws of mine until my teeth crack!

Wow.  I was pleasantly surprised at how I could feel the stress just slipping down my neck, over my shoulders, and just sliding off of my back.  Inhaling Cape Chamomile works best for me, but I can see making a balm out of it as well or mixing some up in dead sea salts and taking a long bath in it.  In fact - right now it is sitting next to me just open and it's absolutely wonderful.  It is also worth having to help calm your mind right before bedtime, something I have a huge problem with between the kids, what's going on the next day, work, art and did I remember to let the dogs back in the house, whose class was I reading to the next day??  My personal opinion is that a bath right before bed with Cape Chamomile will do wonders for anyone! 

Take 3-5 drops of Cape Chamomile oil and mix it in with 2 cups of Epsom salts, add to running bath water, step in and relax!  How easy is that?

Cape Chamomile is similar to Blue Tansy in scent, but it's not quite the same and if you know the two oils you can detect the difference.  *Cape Chamomile is extraordinarily high in esters, over 50%, which account for its sweet fruity aroma.  Many of the esters seem to be unique to this delightful oil and it is also high in Linalyl Acetate.

*Read more: http://www.naturesgift.com/essential/Cape-Chamomile.htm#ixzz0zQsb10qR

Up Your Nose - The Beginning. Sort Of.

'Up Your Nose' will be devoted to the art of scent.

You will find posts and articles relating to the subject of aromatherapy, anointing oils, ritual oils,  herbs, and alternative perfumery.  Mainly aromatherapy which is my first of the scented passions.  Of course I'll have to slip in once-in-a-while when products from Crushed Velvet & Roses (that's me!) are released too ;)

Eventually I would love to include product reviews from some of the most amazing start-up indie scent companies.  Or at least one time they were indie,  perhaps a bit bigger now but still not too big for their britches ;)

You will find that I do not play politics, which believe me....there are tons of them in the aromatherapy/perfumery/soap worlds.  Dirty, dirty I tell you!   I never have and am not about to start now.  

Positive energy will flow through these posts, and there will be no bickering, pinching, biting, hair-pulling, slapping, fighting, punching or kicking in the legs and running off allowed. 

If you need something to read RIGHT NOW and can't wait on me to get things posted - hop on over and check out Jeanne Rose's latest newsletter or go hang out with Miz Permalia Flowerbottom at Oh, True Apothecary!