Hello, Beeyoutiful Friends!

We are diving headlong into Fall and Winter here at Beeyoutiful. This is definitely the busiest season of the year for us as a business. On a personal level, it is also by far the busiest season of my life to date! Our third-born arrived in June of this year. We were so thankful for his safe arrival after weeks of bed-rest. I delivered him at The Farm in Summertown TN, made famous by Ina Mae Gaskin who was recently inducted into the Women’s Hall of Fame. She and the other midwives of The Farm have preserved an incredible birthing culture founded in knowledge gathered from around the globe that is all but lost in our modern world. We were so thankful to be the recipients of their loving, wise, experienced, and professional care before, during, and after Mark’s birth.

Mark is the easiest-going of our babies thus far for which I am beyond thankful. We have dubbed the mellow fellow Sir Squish, and he tranquilly presides over his siblings from his adored place of honor in the family as the current baby. At six years old, Noelle is in first grade of homeschool this year, which means we get to juggle formal school lessons into our work days. She is learning to read this year and it makes me smile to see her randomly sounding out words here and there. I can’t wait until she is able to start reading some of my favorite books from childhood! Our big Caleb (or Cman as we like to call him) has just turned 2 years old and is a gigantic hunk of a toddler. He’s all about trucks and trains and anything else with wheels that crosses his path. He seems to believe any and all boundaries are meant to be moved, shoved, climbed over, dismantled, or crawled under. He keeps the house in a regular state of disaster and you can frequently find us laughing in bemused exasperation over his latest antics. We are so grateful for these funny, quirky small people who keep us on our toes!

I was actually able to get Steve to write something for the catalog this time! We sell more multivitamins than any other product at Beeyoutiful and as a result get a lot of questions about them. Steve took the time to address in his article some of the most common questions we get. If you are a skeptic, wondering if multivitamins are worth anybody’s while, or even if you use a multi vitamin from another company, his article is informative and helpful in understanding what role a multivitamin should play and how to figure out if one is of good value and benefit to you.

Our good friend, Nancy Webster, wrote a great article about liver health. She addresses the role the liver plays in most major functions in the body and what we can do to help our livers heal, cleanse, and maintain good health despite the toxic world in which we live. If you have followed Beeyoutiful publications for very long, you know that we are huge fans of bone broth, particularly gelatin-rich broths. Bone broth has bio-available nutrients, high calcium and magnesium levels, and all around deliciousness that adds to meals. This makes it a favorite in our house! Plus, it makes the frugal side of me happy knowing that parts of the animal that would normally go to waste can be put to good use. I recently learned yet another benefit to gelatin-rich broth. It is excellent for liver health!

Discovering this liver beneficial fact, in combination with what I learned from Nancy’s article, gave me extra motivation to track down a good source of gelatin-rich components to use in our regular bone broths. I ended up buying a 40 lb. box of frozen, all-natural, free-range chicken feet—feet with the legs, toes and fingernails still attached! Truth be told, I find a lot of things disgusting. Despite having grown up with family members as deer hunters, even helping with the processing of deer and other animals, it still gets to me. But I am here to tell you that few things are as gross as a pile of chicken feet. It was with much internal angst and some external gagging that I forced myself to hack off a chunk of those feet and into the broth pot. After three days of slowly simmering I cringed, pouring the beyond disgusting-looking liquid with golden fat floating on the top through a fine mesh strainer to catch all the little bits of feet bone and chunks of skin. “Never again!” I said to myself as I poured the filtered broth into the quart-sized repurposed spaghetti sauce jars designated for broth in our house. “I’ll give the rest of those feet away. I am NEVER doing this again. So, so, SO disgusting!” The broth cooled and was slid into the refrigerator. The next day I pulled some out to start supper and was incredulous to realize that the broth had so much gelatin in it that it was solid. Like a rubber bouncy ball kind of solid and jiggly. I had to scoop and scrape it out with a spoon it was so rich and thick. By far the most gelatin rich broth we’ve ever made. Gross or not, chicken feet are now officially a cheap way for our family to get gelatin into our diet. I’m determined to get past my gagging, city-girl sensitivities! Mind over matter, right?

Also in this edition, we have an article about the essential, fat-soluble combination of vitamins A, D, and K. The importance of this trilogy of nutrients cannot be overstated. My dear friend, Toni Gatlin, writes about how to obtain these nutrients. Most Americans remain chronically depleted in these specific nutrients and many of us, in order to begin healing and restoring good health, need to supplement with intensive amounts of them, more than we reasonably get with even a good diet. Toni covers the dietary sources of these nutrients and the options available in supplement form as well. It’s well worth the time to read!

As those of you who receive our e-mail newsletters already know, our Beeyoutiful building caught fire a few weeks before this catalog was published. We lost some inventory but are so very grateful for most of the building having been spared. There was water and smoke damage and we have been doing cleanup, repairs, inventory rebuilding and everything else that is entailed in recovering from such an event. Although in the grand scheme of things this incident was minor (and could have so very easily been a horrible disaster!), and we are so blessed to be able to recover from it as rapidly as we have, it still served as catalyst for me appreciating what we are able to do more than I usually do. Beeyoutiful is a business that has grown to mean much more than just a business to me and our family and many of our staff. It is how we are able to be connected with so many wonderful people across the nation and around the world. It is the tool which allows us to continue to learn new information, find new resources, and get new insight into various aspects of how to support good health. It has allowed us to partner hand in hand with many of you who are on healing journeys for yourselves or loved ones. Thank you for allowing us to work with you. Thank you for allowing us to have this business and do what we do. We are so very grateful for you and to you!

We hope you enjoy this catazine! We absolutely love feedback and constructive criticism. If it’s feasible for us to make changes for the better, we want to hear how we can! And it absolutely makes our day to hear if we are doing something well. Please let us know what you would like to see more or less of!

May you and your families have a wonderful Fall and Winter. Enjoy the holidays that punctuate this season. We have included some fun, yummy recipes that are not only delicious but also healthy and very appropriate to bring to family gatherings. We’re also passing along several helpful essential oil recipes just incase you have need of them for any illnesses this fall and winter.

With much love and gratitude,

—Steph Tallent
steph@beeyoutiful.com