Archive for the ‘Family’ Category

Charlotte just phoned me on instructions from her mother to order some Achy Breaky Rub for her arthritis.

Now this is not an unusual request…but the back story is amazing that I just had to tell you all.

You see Chralotte’s mum lives in England ( Charlotte lives in Western Australia) – and she was talking to a friend and complaining about how her arthritis was really beginning to be very bothersome and restrictive.

Well Charlotte’s mum’s friend said -

“why don’t you try this Achy Breaky Rub – its fantastic for my arthritis, in fact it is the only thing that has worked for me in all the years I have had arthritis.”

Now you have to realise that this is occurring in England and the gentleman friend had just visited Australia and had picked up a jar of Achy Breaky Rub when he was visitng Margaret River.

So Charlotte’s mum gets onto the phone to her daughter Charlotte in WA and asks her to hunt down Achy Breaky Rub…which after a quick internet search Cahrlotte does..and hence the phone call and this lovely story spanning the globe.

It just goes to show that the word is spreading far and wide about our products and somehow it all comes back to us here at the Moon Haven cottage in the far flung south west of Western Australia. Amazing…truly amazing.

Let me introduce you to Maggie May… one of  85  marvellous mooos who have come to visit us here in the Margaret River Wine Region for the 2010 Cow Parade

maggie may - cow parade visitor at moon haven

.Moon Haven is proud to present Maggie May – a beautifully decorated with delicate and intricate artworks painted by world renown and yet local flora and fauna artist Patricia Negus of Swallow’s Welcome.

Maggie May has been lovingly decoupaged with Patricia’s artworks of mushrooms, frogs, butterflies, spiders and beautiful native flowers and plants. Miss MM is truly a sight to behold … she is certainly attracting a lot of attention out the front of Moon Haven.

So when you are next down south do call in to have your photo taken with the Divine Miss Maggie May.

Sam turns 30 on Monday

Samantha – Sam to everyone at Moon Haven-  turns 30 on Monday.  Sam, along with Kerryn, Marri and Becca, looks after the front of house in the Moon Haven cottage,   and we would have to say that she is the ultra efficient one of our team – keeping the rest of us on our toes.

Well Sam is celebrating her birthday by taking the week off and going to Perth for a shopping and girly time.  Have fun Sam… Happy Birthday and remember 30 is the new 20!

Earlier this week Julie (known as Julie Patchouli to the Moon Haven crew and our clients) was killed in a horrific traffic accident between Cowaramup and Margaret River.

She leaves behind two small children, Jade and Jye, and a shocked and deeply saddened community.

Julie worked in Moon Haven’s  front of house for an extended period leaving us just over 18 months ago to work at Brookland Valley.  Her vibrant champagne bubbly personality and extremely dry sense of humour will be sorely missed. As you can imagine at Moon Haven we are very sad and there have been many tears shed.

Julie had with her in the car, young Samuel who she was babysitting at the time.  Samuel, while badly injured is recovering well from all accounts.  Our thoughts are with him and his family as he continues to recover.

Moon Haven's Soothing Salve is fantastic for helping to soothe and repair cracked heels

I would have to say that cracked heels would have to be one of the most common issues that we deal with at Moon Haven.

We developed our Seven Day Cracked Heel Challenge to help give our clients an easy to follow regime for their Cracked Heels.  And from the excited emails, feedback and phone calls we receive it obviously works..and works well.

So here is our simple easy to follow Seven Day Cracked Heel Challenge protocol.

Seven Day Cracked Heel Challenge

Using a large foot smoother - an emery board for feet- gently file down the calluses on your feet

1. Commit to doing the following for seven nights/days in a row and your feet will thank you.
2. Before your shower-Using a foot smoother (looks like a large black emery board using wet and dry sandpaper) gently file down the calluses on each foot.  Just smooth it a little, you don’t have to have a to achieve perfect smoothness in the first night.  A little each day will achieve amazing results
3. After your shower- Using a the popstick supplied, scrape a small amount of  Moon Haven’s Soothing Salve from the jar.
4. Apply the Soothing Salve to the cracked heels in a thin coat.  Do not apply thickly or smother the area thinking that more is better. This is far from that case as what we are aiming for is the damaged skin to absorb all of the salve with very little residue on the surface of the skin after 10 or so minutes.
5. Rest your heels until all of the salve is absorbed.  This should occur in 5 to 10 minutes.  If there is still evidence of excessive slave on the skin after this time just remove the excess and apply less next time.
6. Repeat the above process each night for 7 nights in a row

The feedback we receive from people who have followed this protocol has been amazing.  I think the key is to not use too much salve and ensuring that it is absorbed into the skin.  Excess salve not only  blocks the skin and makes a mess of your sheets at night but also is wasteful and is certainly counter productive.

I also do not believe in using socks (and gloves for dry cracked hands) to help the skin absorb more of the salve.  This technique often results in a build up of heat and makes for unnecessary washing and waste.  The skin will absorb what it needs as it needs it there is no need to force feed it by occluding the skin with gloves and similar techniques.

A section of the Moon Haven Vegie Garden

The summer vegie garden is truly prolific and it is around Christmas that our bounty really starts to mount up.

We do not grow many things…just the basics as we are more often at our moon haven cottage than at home – so our vegies (Australian slang for vegetables) have to be relatively self sufficient.

Luckily we have automatic reticulation from a bore (underground water) so our watering duties are limited to a little additional water to new plants and seedlings.

With adding some seaweed based plant food once every week or two and resupplying  compost ocaisonally, the biggest job this time of year is harvesting and then eating or preserving the produce.

2009???

What will 2009 bring for you and your family? With talks of recession and doom and gloom it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking in the same way.

Yet we all can take this opportunity to consolidate and take stock of the good things in life, take time to count our blessings and find better ways of living in this world.

Is it time to:

• grow that vegie patch,
• look at installing your own solar hot water system
• look at putting in a photo voltaic power system,
• harness the grey water we casually throw away
• build a simple compost bin to recycle vegetable scraps and lawn clippings,
• plant a few flowers to brighten up the garden
• plant up a kitchen herb pot for the back step
• have that garage sale and get let others enjoy those possessions you no longer need
• better still donate all your extra ‘stuff’ to charity

Is it time to take on a little volunteer work, or to find a way to help others less fortunate than ourselves?

Or is it time to turn off the News and TV shows one night a week and re-create a little more?

For many, as things slow down, a recession is a time to gird ones loins and examine the way we live and work towards making it better in small tangible ways.

So while uncertainty abounds around us… at Moon Haven and on this blog I will continue to spread the word about  the good things in life and how we should all take the time to see  what we can do better and how we can make things easier not only for ourselves but those around us.

It is going to be an excellent year, full of opportunity and discoveries.. I can feel it in the very core of my being.

Moon Haven’s Cowaramup Cottage is 6 today!

We opened our doors 3 days before Christmas 2002, with all the hopes and ideals of new business owners. Little did Eric and I  know what we were letting ourselves into!

Six years later Eric and I can look back and all we can say is Wow…

Moon Haven has become something much greater than we could every have imagined 6 years ago.

What started out as a humble attempt to bring our skin saving soaps, our pain relieving Achy Breaky Rub and our aromatherapy preparations to a demanding public, has turned into a place of  creativity, friendship and healing,  where random acts of thoughtfulness happen on a daily, if not hourly basis.

Moon Haven soaps, lotions and potions can be found in countries around the world and across Australia.  We continue to be astounded by the thoughtfulness of people who write to tell us of their Moon Haven experiences and success with our products.

This feedback helps us to keep on producing and thinking and researching for  better ways of combining our herbs, oils and other ingredients to come up with even more solutions.

Of course while Moon Haven in our Cowaramup cottage may be 6 today, Moon Haven itself  is now well over 8 years old with our first products being made  in our kitchen.  How far we have come…how far we have to go!

A friend passed this on to me (courtesy of Dr Seuss) and it has been swirling in my head all day.

From:

And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow, Stood puzzling and puzzling: “How could it be so?”

“It came with out ribbons! It came without tags!” “It came without packages, boxes or bags!”

And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!

“Maybe Christmas,” he thought, “doesn’t come from a store.”

“Maybe Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!”

Dr Suess

Scotty with Eric

Scotty the dog , my constant companion and friend, died in the early hours of this morning. As can be expected Eric and I are devastated at his passing. Yet we readily recognise that it was definitely his time to go.

Scotty was happy right up to his last moments, with his tail wagging at any sign of attention.  He even went on a lovely car trip to Little Meelup beach yesterday and had a small wander in the bush smelling all the great bush smells there are to smell.

At 21 years of age he was a long time member of the Moon Haven Family as well as a large part of our children Ben and Chris’s lives. (Though at 23 and 24 they might not appreciate being classed as children.)

Scotty will be remembered as Moon Haven’s doggy door greeter who met each visitor with a wag of his tail and a sniff of the ankle.  He loved children and was always gentle even when young ones pulled and pawed at him.

Such a good friend and now at rest.  It will take some time to come to terms that he isn’t here any more but then again that is just a measure of how much he was a part of our lives.  Rest my friend…you were certainly and will continue to be a very large part of our lives.