Essential Oils for Allergies

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chocolatecoveredcarrotsyounglivingallergies(pp_w730_h283) A couple of years ago I said goodbye to my allergy medication.  What did I do?  I eliminated dairy during allergy season (for me that’s pretty much through the summer) and started taking 1 TBSP of raw, local honey a day (I love honey so it’s easy to consume more than that as I’ll have it on toast or in tea but you can also just take a spoonful, a spoonful of sugar right?).  Well that totally took care of the bulk of my issues but occasionally I still get itchy eyes and/or itchy ears on the worst pollen days and when there’s lots of wind.  This spring I started using Young Living essential oils (learn more/get started) and I’m fit as a fiddle!  What do I do?  I start at the top and move my way down the list below, saving taking oils internally for the very worst of days! TOPICAL roller of 4 drops lavender, 4 drops peppermint, and 4 drops lemon with the carrier oils of your choosing…

  • itchy eyes:  I like to apply it on my eye lids and on the bags under my eyes and it feels amazing!  But if that’s too much of a thrill for you, simply apply around your eyes (eyebrows, cheekbones, etc)
  • itchy ears:  apply all around and over your ears (do not put inside your ear)

apply peppermint directly to the back of the neck, sinus, and vitaflex points AROMATIC diffuse 3 drops lavender, 3 drops peppermint, and 3 drops RC  OR 4 drops lavender and 4 drops peppermint if you only have the premium starter kit (still does the trick pretty well, the RC tackles congestion, sneezing, and a runny nose in addition to other allergy symptoms) diffuse 5 – 8 drops of tea tree for itchy eyes diffuse 4 drops purification and 4 drops lemon for cough INTERNAL ingest 1 drop of each peppermint and lavender either in a capsule, in a small shot of water, or in a spoonful of honey. allergy-trio IN THE END, if these don’t work for you I have plenty more ideas and options where these came from!  First step is to GET YOUR KIT, then I will meet with you (near: in person; far: Skype or Google Hangouts) to get you started using them for whatever ails you, and I send you off with a handy dandy handbook and some other awesome materials! Happy allergy season everyone!  May you find some respite with any of these natural remedies 🙂

RESOURCES

Essential Oil Guide: FAQ and Getting Started

Buy some oils and/or get the starter kit… [HERE]

Images used from: https://txtulip73.wordpress.com/ and http://www.chocolatecoveredcarrots.com/allergy-congestion-be-gone/

Essential Oil Guide: FAQ and Getting Started

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I feel like there is so much to share about essential oils (EO) that I don’t really know where to start. In this little post I will try to address some FAQ and then give you a quicky guide to getting started!  Also, subscribe to my blog to stay tuned for more posts about EO, especially my up-an-coming series of posts called “Essential Moments with Kaia” where I will share my personal success stories with oils!

Buy some oils and/or get the starter kit… [HERE]

FAQ

Q: What’s the big idea behind all this hype about EO?

A: People are fired up about a means to get on a path to health and wellness that doesn’t involve medications with bazillions of side effects but instead uses God given plants to heal our bodies. These oils can and do cure everything from scrapes and burns, to warts and moles, to allergies and asthma, and some say even vision and cancer! Personally I’ve have so far been able to get my baby to sleep (to me, that was as good as curing cancer), cure some really bad diaper rashes, kick a wicked stomach bug in less than 18 hours (and before getting on a flight), and so much more! I’m currently working on getting rid of a wart and repairing my vision, I’ll keep you posted on those happenings 🙂

Q: What is so special about Young Living (YL)?

A: All EO are not created equal. Some mere months from today I had no idea that this was the case! Now, from a researched and first hand basis I wholeheartedly know otherwise. Young Living stood out to me because they sell pure theraputic grade EO farmed from virgin fields. This is a step up from organic folks, in fact, it doesn’t get better that this! These oils are primarily extracted through careful steam distillation but also through cold pressing, the purest essential oils are far more powerful than the botanicals from which they were extracted – one drop of peppermint oil, for example, is equal to 28 cups of peppermint tea! What’s great about YL as well is they are plum full of resources and when you become a member you get a sponsor (in your case, me!) who becomes your direct line to a world of information!

Q: How do I get started?

A: You have two choices: become a member and buy wholesale forever and ever OR purchase retail (24% more expensive). I recommend becoming a member and doing so with the Premium Starter Kit (cost $150/value $300) which includes 11 of the every day, most popular oils (the Every Day Oils set and Citrus Fresh), a diffuser, sample packs of oils, 2 Nixgia Red to-go packs (an anti-oxidant drink), and some informational pieces. It is an investment but this kit offers the most comprehensive and handy means to getting started. If you are still overwhelmed I am happy to help you one-on-one. You can come to my house and we’ll get you set up! Also, after you order I like to meet with you to give you some handy dandy materials to get you started with your new oily friends.

Buy some oils and/or get the starter kit… [HERE]

Short Stories From the Past 24 Hours

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First Trip to the Zoo

Yesterday Maisy and I went to the zoo with some of the in-laws for my nephew’s second birthday.  We walked through all the exhibits, rode the train, and rode the merry go round.  While I was busy enjoying the animals and telling my niece all sorts of fun facts about each one, Maisy was busy enjoying watching the kids.  At least one of us actually observed the animal part of the zoo.

Confession From Your Average Mother

Yesterday evening I resolved to take Maisy to the park for a ride on the swing.  When this stubborn Swede resolves to do something you better believe it’s going to get done, even if it’s by tooth and nail.  So, when we show up to a partially busted baby swing I plop Maisy in anyway.  My strong 10-month-old latches her killer grip onto the chains and off she goes smiling and laughing successfully for several minutes.  Now, this next moment I’ve played over and over again in my head and I still can’t figure out how it happened, but suddenly my secure little girl has flipped over the front of the swing, done a front flip, and landed flat on her belly.  I’m frozen like a deer in headlights for a split second waiting for her to scream.  She doesn’t make a sound.  I pick up my baby girl to find her working on a mouthful of sand.  She doesn’t even look upset, just perplexed at this new in-mouth phenomenon.  As I’m cleaning her off and trying to help get the sand out of her mouth I realize she’s getting mad that I’m trying to help.  So I let her eat the sand, she deserves to eat sand if she wants after tumbling off a swing.

Mama Bear to the Rescue

Last night I’m hanging clothes on the line (yeah I forgot to do the load when I could benefit from faster drying by the sun shine) when I spot Sam in the garden.  Now that it’s warm out one of my goals is to train the dogs to stay out of the garden, so I start commanding him to get out.  Instead, he does this dance.  I command again as I start walking towards him, getting more furious by the second.  He does his dance again.  I command him yet again though I’m slowly realizing something else is going on.  He does a dance again.  Then I’m upon him, I scoop him up and plop him out of the raised bed.  My eyes settle on a patch of downy fur.  Sure enough, the dance that signals Sam has happened upon an unknown source of movement was legitimate.  I see the area surrounding the fur rustle.  Once.  Twice.  Three times.  I’m trying to glimpse what I have here thinking that some of the rustling will reveal a little more.  No luck, so I grab a nearby small planter to act as a shovel to help me investigate – don’t want my fingers nipped by whatever is in there nor do I want to get diseased bird germs all over my hands.  I’m ruffling through the leaf and fur debris expecting to happen upon a wounded bird.  Instead, I uncover a whole pile of baby bunnies.  These cute little buggers are nestled right next to the row of carrots I just planted.  Of course.  If only Maisy were old enough to at least enjoy these cute little pests.  Instead, the animal enthusiast and mama bear that I am, I am standing guard over these little babes every time I have to let Sam out to pee.  Please grow up fast little bunnies.

Confession of a Sleep Deprived Mother

Just before dawn Maisy wakes to nurse yet again.  I doze off as soon as she gets to work only to wake moments later to an odd warm sensation on my leg.  In my half dream state my mind bounces through the possibilities.  Did I wet myself?  No, that’s not possible from the outer side of my leg.  Did my water break?  No, I don’t have one of those.  Is a really hot Maisy leg touching me?  No.  Did she throw up.  No.  Is my breastmilk leaking all over?  No, my breasts are too far away from my thigh (at least for now, talk to me after more babies and maybe I’ll be whistling a different tune).  Did Maisy pee?  Did her diaper fall off?  That’s an awful lot of pee to be coming from her.

I root around in the dark.  Maisy feels bone dry.  And then I feel just under the side of her rump that’s nestled in closest to me.  Soaking wet.  I have two choices:  one, wake my now sleeping baby and change everything from her diaper to her sleep sack to my clothes to the sheets; two, embrace the warmth and go to sleep.  I chose the latter.

The Day I Lost My Dog

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Once upon a week or so ago I hit the freeway with two dogs, a baby, and all our stuff crammed in to every spare nook of my compact Chevy Cruze.  The day was probably the worst in Maisy’s life (at least that she or I can remember as of now).  Within the span of the 12 something hours of daylight we get these days she got a face full of snow, was a mess of an emotional baby through the entirety of our trip to Minnesota, tipped over in the tub and got a mouth full of water, and hit herself in the face with some keys. In all these moments Maisy was varying degrees of pathetic baby and I felt like the worst mom on the planet.  Feel free to judge me, it’s a sad and constant side effect of the job anyway, but I promise I watch this girl like a hawk!

Well we hit the road and, as always, I had a sense I’d forgotten something.  Not too far into the trip I realized the missing items where the dogs leashes.  Instead of turning around I resolved to simply encourage them to hold it until we got to Minnesota. Worked like a charm actually, the second success of the day (the first being that I installed Maisy’s new car seat super securely). The rest of the trip was a battle though.  Maisy cried the better part of our 6 hour drive.  Do you know what that feels like?  Fellow moms unite!  The rest of you can, at best, sympathize.  To a mother, your baby crying (or sometimes any baby) feels like you are actually on a high speed chase.  Compound that about ten times the duration of the actual duration of the crying and you have a sense for the wreckage this ensures on a mom’s state of emotional, physical, and otherwise wellbeing at the end of it all.  Despite my frequent stopping to nurse and otherwise care for Maisy on our trip she just screamed.  By the time I got to Minnesota it felt like we were traveling for a week, not just half a day, and I was in such a state of brain fog and in such a tortured emotional state after having to listen to my precious baby girl scream for so long that I couldn’t even talk straight – I managed to blindly shovel random portions of food into my mouth and stutter incoherent segments of sentences out.  Yeah, turns out Maisy screamed my brains out… go figure that out.

Oh wait, I got a little ahead of myself.  So, when we arrived I parked the car along the street.  I took a minute to figure out what I should grab to go inside right away – again… brain mush.  Then I walked around to the back door to get Maisy.  Halfway through unbuckling her it occurred to me that Sam was not graciously ducking out of my way in the seat that I have to reach over to get Maisy out (her car seat is secured in the center of the back seat).  I increasingly frantically looked on the seat thinking maybe in addition to my brain being mush that I also went slightly blind and my black dog blended into the black upholstery so thoroughly he disappeared.  Nope not there.  I frantically started saying his name.  I glanced to the floor, in Haley’s seat, in the front of the car… nothing.  I stood their blank faced and helpless.  My mind cycled back to our last stop – some gas station a couple of hours away.  That’s it, I lost our dog and was so busy getting my brains screamed out by my baby that I didn’t even notice he wasn’t in the car with us for the last two hours.  I pictured my fluffy little ragamuffin wandering around the gas station all by himself and then taking off into oblivion to look for us.  I would never find him again.  How would I tell Josh?

Then I heard a big dog territorially barking.  And I heard a little tinkling noise.

“Sam!” I yelled.

“Sam?”

“Sam! Sam. Sam. Sam!”

And there he was.  Fur raised along his spine like the ridge of scales along a dinosaur’s back, collar tinkling, and whimpering his remarks at the big dog.  With some meandering and more probing on my part he finally started towards me with some reserve – he always knows it’s naughty to run off but does it anyway.

“You little stinker.”  I couldn’t even be mad. I was so relieved that I simply plopped him back into the car – the better to finish getting Maisy out while maintaining his safety from death by car or some other force outside of my control.

The End.

Poop Everywhere

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When it’s meal time at the Calhoun house Maisy gets stripped down, socks and diaper alone remain.  She’s a downright messy eater and we can hardly go around in public with her clothes tie dyed with food stains.  I like to make quick work of the ritual stripping so this usually involves me flinging the shirt off up over her head and then whipping the pants off in turn.  Before I whipped her pants off yesterday I noted a peculiar stain on them that I didn’t recall being there earlier.  I shrugged and whipped anyway.  As the pants flew off so did poop.  That peculiar stain was no stain, that was poop trying to escape the confines of her pants.  I set Maisy and her slimy butt down not knowing what to do.  Then quickly realized the trail of poop on the floor as Maisy started reaching for it – undoubtedly to put it in her mouth.  After cleaning the area surrounding Maisy I chose to clean the poop off my favorite light colored pants even though I was fully aware Sam may or may not snack on baby poop while I did so. Then I went back for the baby and held her at arms length, which she thinks is hysterical, all the way up to the nursery.  I proceeded first with damage control getting the poop smear all the way up her leg cleaned up then went in for the kill.  Yeah, lame kill.  Turns out most of the poop squished out the side rather than planting inside the diaper itself.  For good measure I plopped Maisy in the bath for a little extra scrub and then we were onto meal time.  Upon my return to the dining room however, I realized I still hadn’t cleaned up the rest of the sweet stinking sludge as I found it on the walls (when I say I whip the pants off I mean it) and still all over the floor with the exception of the circle around where Maisy once sat.  I laughed as I cleaned the poop off my walls.  Come on, it’s funny.