Within the past month, and primarily within the last week, I have received a plethora of great reviews and mentions in gift guides. So, I would like to return the favor and thank all the blogs and websites that have featured my products — I appreciate your kind words! Here are the people I would like to thank, and whose gift guides I would also like to recommend to you, dear reader…

Dallas Star-Telegram “When you buy holiday gifts that benefit a charity, the good feeling is priceless” A holiday guide to products that support a cause, a charity, a relief effort, a positive change in the world.

Going Green DC “2nd Annual Going Green DC Gift Guide” A guide to some of the coolest eco-friendly gifts that are made right here in the DC area.

We Love DC “We Love Really Cool Gifts” Great gifts made by DC area artists and craftspersons.

Chic & Green Christmas Wishes 2009 Daily handcrafted holiday gift recommendations from the Chic & Green blog.

Bella Sugar “10 Feel-Good Gifts For Dad on Any Budget” A guide to “the perfect holiday gifts for the Y chromosome who loves you most.”

EcoLeeko “4th Day of Christmas” Twelve days of eco-friendly, artisan gift suggestions handpicked by EcoLeeko.

Nuorganics’ “On the 1st Day of Christmas” Greenworks offers 12 days of recommendations for handcrafted, unique, quality products from independent artisans.

Whitz World of Beauty “More Christmas Gift Ideas with Herban Lifestyle” A listing of some of my best-selling products, many of which were featured in…

Create your own Spa Week with Herban Lifestyle featured in the Examiner in September.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. And Happy Holidays!!!

I love this poster that I received from the creative guys at Squidfire advertising their annual Holiday Art Mart. I posted about this show earlier in the week, but just had to share this image. It reminds me of the animated Abominable Snowman in the Rudolph the Reindeer Christmas movie that terrorized me as a child, except this one looks much friendlier and I wouldn’t mind shopping where he shops.

I hope you can join us and 60 other amazing artisans at Du Burns Arena, 1301 South Ellwood Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21224 on Saturday, December 12, from 11am to 6pm!

Join us and 60 other amazing artists and crafters at Squidfire’s Winter Art Mart in downtown Baltimore on December 12. This year’s festivities will be held at the Du Burns Arena in Canton. As always, the art mart will feature some of the best diy/indie crafters from all over the East Coast. Whether you’re looking for handmade soap, freshly baked dog treats, unique paper goods, or even locally roasted coffee beans, they will have it there.

So I hope you can join us on December 12, from 11am-6pm, at the:

Du Burns Arena
1301 S Ellwood Ave
Baltimore, MD 21224

Beginning this Friday, my products will be available at Craftland, “an annual holiday sale in downtown Providence, RI that celebrates all kinds of sparkly handmade objects and the people who make them.”

An amazing 170 crafters will have their unique handmade wares on display. The colorful handcrafted displays will be filled with jewelry, plushies, ceramics, soaps, and various other fun, quirky and beautiful objets d’art.

This year’s Craftland runs from December 4 through December 31. They are open seven days a week from 10am – 6pm, except Thursdays and Saturdays, when they are open from 10am – 8pm. The Craftland store is located at 235 Westminster Street, Providence, RI 02903.

For more information, you can visit the Craftland website, call 401.272.4285 or email info@craftlandshow.com.

Exterior view of Craftland, copyright @Craftland

Please join Herban Lifestyle at the 17^th Annual City of Falls Church Holiday Craft Show. This juried show will featured more than 60 crafters on two floors of the Falls Church Community Center. There will be a wonderful selection of unique handmade items and baked goods.

The show will be held on two days: Saturday, December 5th from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday, Dec. 6, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Admission to the craft show is $1 for adults and 50 cents for children 12 and older; admission is free for children under age 12. Children’s activities include a craft corner, face painting, and breakfast with Santa.

Falls Church Community Center
223 Little Falls Street
Falls Church, Virginia
(703) 248-5077

Terasol Artisans will be hosting a holiday artisans show on Saturday, Dec 5th, from 10:00am to 5:00pm. The show, which will feature the work of several talented local potters and woodworkers (as well as my handcrafted bath and body products), will be held in the Chevy Chase section of DC, at 3216 Patterson Street NW, Washington, DC 20015.

For more information, you can call Terasol owner Sabrina Ousmaal at (202) 237-5555 or visit www.terasolartisans.com.

Sign outside of Cibola Farms, Culpepper, VA

Two weekends ago, I had the good fortune of attending a screening of Fresh in Oakton, VA. This film starts by discussing the detrimental effects of industrial farming to the Earth and to our health, including food contamination, environmental pollution, depletion of natural resources, and morbid obesity. Then it takes a positive turn by showing examples of people who are pioneering innovative sustainable farming methods. The screening was followed by a panel of speakers that included one of the pioneers from the film, Joel Salatin.

Salatin, a self-described “Christian-libertarian-environmentalist-capitalist farmer,” is the owner of Polyface Farms in Swoope, VA , who was made famous by Michael Pollan’s book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma. Salatin has developed innovative methods of farm management that utilize the natural interactions of farm animals with the land and with one another. By avoiding chemical pesticides, industrial feed, animal crowding and nutrient depletion in the soil, his animals are far healthier and provide greater nutrition to people eating them, than those raised in industrial conditions. In following these practices, Salatin saves quite a bit of money by not having to purchase pesticides, chemical fertilizers, feed and antibiotics. As a result, he yields a much, much higher profit per acre used than farmers using less natural means.

Buffalo grazing in the fields at Cibola Farms

Impressed by the movie and Salatin’s presentation, I have signed up to receive delivery of his free-range, grass-fed poultry as I have not been able to find good local chicken since my favorite farmers market meat supplier, Cibola Farms, stopped offering poultry. I feel very fortunate to be within delivery range of Polyface Farm. As a matter of fact, one of the great advantages of living in the DC Metro area is close proximity to a huge range of farms.

Inspired by Fresh and other information I have been gathering about my local farms, yesterday my family and I decided to take a road trip to the Cibola Farms ranch in Culpepper, VA where they raise the free-range buffalo and pork that we still purchase regularly at our local farmers market.

Upon arriving, there was a notable lack of livestock scent to the area. As I walked around, I realized that this was because the animals had huge tracts of land around which they could move. There were herds of buffalo, and few dairy cows, several chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys, pigs, honey bees, and a very gregarious farm cat.

A happy, friendly dairy cow at Cibola Farms

This bucolic lifestyle was in stark contrast to the images of factory farms I had seen in Fresh, and Food, Inc., another movie about industrial farming. The Cibola animals looked relaxed, happy and well taken care of. They were grazing on grass, weeds and insects that exist naturally within the farm’s eco-system.

If you eat meat, it is worth considering where your meat comes from. Ultimately, we take in what our food sources take in, regardless of whether they are plants of animals. By making a conscious choice in the purchase of our food, we have an opportunity to help support more sustainable farming practices.

Even if you don’t live in the Greater DC Metro area, there are many places throughout the country where you can purchase locally grown, healthy food. A great place to start is the USDA’s website, which has a search page where you can locate a farmers market near you.

This article, which I authored, originally appeared on the Etsy Earth blog.

Recently I found myself behind a car whose license plate read: “IMEDIT8.” I couldn’t help but smile. I had been thinking about how stressful the holidays can get – it seems that everyone I speak with mentions in the same breath how the holidays are coming up so quickly and how busy they will be as a result. Quite often, it’s said in the tone of someone bracing for a huge undertaking.

Every year I find myself taking on a lot of extra responsibilities around the holidays, so I work hard to make sure I don’t overextend myself. I do this by continually reassessing what is necessary and what isn’t, what is possible and what isn’t. For example, during my first holiday season in the DC area after moving from Connecticut, I ended up driving for several hours there and back for Thanksgiving and Christmas. While it was wonderful to spend time with friends and family, I found myself exhausted, and not spending enough time in any one place. This year I chose to limit my travels to just Christmas, but for a longer period of time. So, while it would have been wonderful to spend time with close friends and family at Thanksgiving, avoiding the stress of too much travel will allow me to enjoy the time I do have with them that much more. Plus, I had a wonderful first Thanksgiving in Virginia!

In addition to trying to do too many things in too short a time, a large source of stress around the holidays comes from our expectations (even if only subconsciously) that everything should be perfect – our family will gather in peace and love, everyone’s wishes will come true and everyone will sing in perfect harmony. However, this Norman Rockwell ideal is generally not in line with the reality of the holidays. Often we become stressed striving for perfection that is neither attainable, nor even necessarily desirable.

It is important to be alert to signs that you are under too much stress such as irritability, anxiety, inability to concentrate, forgetfulness, headaches, neck and back pain, or stomachaches. If you are experiencing these symptoms, it is probably time to take a breather, delegate, or drop the things that aren’t really necessary. Simplify.

There is an organization devoted to promoting the idea of simplifying our lives by de-emphasizing the material. The mission of New American Dream is to offer resources that make it easier to live consciously and buy wisely. Last year I attended an alternative gift fair that they sponsored, in which several local non-profit organizations were selling donation gift cards, which make great gifts for the people on your list who “have everything.” There is a Holiday Survival Kit that you can download from their website that includes a booklet on ways to make your holidays more simple and more enjoyable. It also features Gift of Time vouchers to print out and give to people instead of physical gifts, tips for a less stressful holiday season, and much more.

Here are some ideas on how to reduce your holiday stress:

1) Don’t demand perfection. Instead, focus on what is most important to you, and be realistic about what you can accomplish given your time and budget. Remember, the holidays are supposed to be joyful!

2) Set boundaries around how you are willing to allocate your time. If you feel overextended, realize that you don’t have to please everyone. It’s okay to spread out your visits, or have shorter ones.

3) Many experts recommend humor as one of the keys to surviving the holidays with family. On a physical level, it lowers blood pressure, releases endorphins, and diffuses tension. And from a mental perspective, it helps you to keep things in perspective – if you can laugh off your quirks and your family’s idiosyncrasies, potentially annoying situations will go more smoothly for you and those around you.

4) Take time for yourself. Make time for fun and relaxation: take a walk, play a game, read, meditate. It’s also important not to let exercise fall by the wayside. Exercise helps to reduce stress, improve sleep, and increase your energy and stamina by increasing levels of mood-enhancing, energy-promoting neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine.

Happy Holidays!

Storefront in downtown Billings, MT

The following post is by blogger, Julia Guarino

In January of 2009, I moved from the Washington, DC area to a small city of about 100,000 residents in the middle of Montana. I came to Billings to perform a year of service with AmeriCorps, and although I looked forward to being exposed to elements of American culture that I had never encountered before, I was a little concerned about being able to maintain a vegetarian diet. After all, Montana is “beef country” (as they proclaim on billboards along the highway), and I knew from some online research that there would be no Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods. Billings, although it is the largest city in Montana and several surrounding states, is just too small to attract that kind of chain. I also assumed that in beef country, where cowboy hats and pickup trucks abound, there would be little demand for tofu, seitan and other meat substitutes.

And it’s true that at times I get a strange look when I confess that I’m a vegetarian. Sometimes I get odd questions, like “Do you drink coffee, then?” or “Do you eat cookies?” For many, vegetarianism is not something they’ve witnessed first-hand; which makes sense in a place where, I’ve been told, you can get the most incredible steak even in the cheapest little places. However, I have been a life-long vegetarian, and it is something I cannot imagine ever giving up, so tofu or no, I planned to forge on.

One of my first stops after arriving in Billings, being an impoverished volunteer, was the Super Wal-Mart. I honestly don’t feel particularly good about supporting a big-box store, and try to avoid them when I can, but I was in need of inexpensive food and cleaning products, and I must admit, I was impressed. Wal-Mart had an extensive array of green cleaning products, carried recycled paper goods, and, to my great delight, had an entire case full of vegetarian meat substitutes.

Good earth Market, Billings, MT

As I began to explore Billings’ trendy and historic downtown, however, I came across a colorful building with big beautiful windows that quietly occupies a quarter block on the western edge of downtown. The Good Earth Market is, to this day, one of my favorite places in the city of Billings (and in fact competes for the best grocery store I’ve ever shopped in). Bright and spacious, with colorful displays and smiling staff, the Good Earth carries a wide variety of natural, organic, local and vegetarian friendly products (though you can get fresh local meat as well). With an incredible deli, salad and coffee bar, cafe seating downstairs or in the loft, and free WIFI, it is also a relaxing place to spend an afternoon. They even have a parking space out front, equipped with an electrical outlet, that is reserved for electric cars! Now I never grocery shop anywhere else.

Off the Leaf Coffee Shop, Billings, MT

In the time that I have spent in Billings, there is much that I have grown to love, and much that has surprised me about this small city. There are incredible pockets of world-class art, performance and music mixed in with the charming western cowboy culture, and I have learned much about another part of my own country, while never feeling deprived of the great cultural opportunities I was used to accessing in more urban areas. And it turns out that being a vegetarian in Montana wasn’t so difficult after all!

And I am not the only person who thinks that Billings has a lot to offer — the November 2009 issue of Fortune Small Business Magazine named Billings as the #1 place to start a small business!

Image from Simply Recipes

Posted by guest blogger, Kia Guarino

A few weeks ago, my annual fall craving for everything pumpkin kicked into full swing. I found and bought a big can of pumpkin puree at Whole Foods with grand plans…and let it sit. Finally, after staring at it wistfully for a few weeks, I decided to make pumpkin bread today.

After conducting a general Google search on “pumpkin bread recipes,” I figured out a consistent list of ingredients and decided to do something a little different: make it as healthy and eco-friendly as possible.

Two main points that I kept in mind: everything in moderation and natural is always better than processed!

Improved Recipe
1 cup (organic) pumpkin puree
½ cup organic butter (melted)
1 cup organic cane sugar
2 free-range grass-fed chicken eggs
1½ cups locally grown pesticide-free whole wheat flower
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp ground cloves

Pumpkin Puree:
Having already purchased non-organic pumpkin puree, I let this one slide. In the future I will definitely use organic instead. Either way, pumpkins are full of natural health benefits. Like carrots, the orange color indicates that it is an excellent source of beta-carotene, which is an antioxidant and has been shown to help prevent certain cancers.

Vegetable Oil:
One thing Americans need to learn is to not be afraid to use butter. The original recipe calls for ½ cup of vegetable oil, but I decided to use organic butter instead. Many vegetable oils on the market are made from genetically modified plants and go through extraction processes that can leave behind chemical solvent residues. You can use sunflower or safflower oils if they’re organic and cold pressed, but quite frankly, butter tastes better.

Sugar:
Refined white sugar has had all the minerals, vitamins and other benefits of natural cane removed. In a time when immune system strength is particularly important (to battle swine flu!), it is important to avoid refined sugar, which can lower the immune system and feed bacteria. I decided to use organic evaporated cane juice instead, since it does not undergo the same processing as refined white sugar and therefore maintains its natural calcium, iron and potassium.

Eggs:
Although they appear to be identical products, free-range eggs are much higher in Omega-3 than the factory farmed equivalent. There is also a significant difference between what chickens are fed in factories compared with those that are free-range grass-fed. These differences are then transferred to the egg. Plus, free-range just tastes better.

Flour:
As with processed white sugars, white flour is stripped of most of its natural nutrients and usually bleached. You can buy unbleached flours, but they are still missing the essential nutrients, including fiber. Using whole wheat makes the pleasure of pumpkin bread a little less guilty and is overall much healthier. Using locally grown flour is important on a much larger scale for long-term sustainability. While this might be hard to do, whenever you can buy local, do it! King Arthur flour is a good alternative since they are employee-owned and high quality.

Spices:
The spices used in pumpkin bread and in many fall favorites (cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg) also have many natural health benefits. Cinnamon and nutmeg have been known to help with stomach and digestive issues and clove with pain management. Cinnamon and clove also have antibacterial and anti-fungal properties.

Cooking Instructions
1 Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C) and grease a 9×5 baking dish.

2 In a large bowl, mix the pumpkin puree, melted butter, sugar and eggs.

3 In another bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, then combine with the other ingredients. Mix slowly.

3 Pour into a well-buttered 9×5x3 inch loaf pan. Bake 45 minutes to an hour until a thin skewer poked in the middle of the loaf comes out clean. Let it cool.

This recipe makes one moist and delicious loaf!