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Meet the Beeyoutiful Team: Stephanie Tallent

Posted on May 13, 2015 by Beeyoutiful Toni Leave a comment

We’re always so glad to get to know our customers better, and learn a little about what’s important to you! We’d like to show you a bit of our own lives, too, and help you see what goes on behind the scenes at Beeyoutiful. Today you’ll get a glimpse into Steph Tallent’s life.

Stephanie, what are you in charge of at Beeyoutiful?

As one of the company’s owners, I dabble in a lot of things! I oversee customer service (which involves very little daily work, because of my awesome team members who take care of almost all of it by themselves), new product development, marketing, sourcing, writing, and creative problem solving.

Stephanie Tallent from Beeyoutiful.com

What do you do every day?

One of my favorite parts of working with Beeyoutiful is that every day brings along something different… but every day involves working through my email and current to-do’s with ongoing projects, usually hammering away at various writing projects.

Sometimes I spend hours buried in piles of books researching some obscure thing, other days I’m “playing” with makeup, and sometimes you’ll find me in the kitchen experimenting with a new product mixture or blend of herbs. Today was all about essential oils!

What can customers count on you for?

I take feedback from our Beeyoutiful friends about what they want and like, and what they don’t like, very seriously. They can always count on us to personally test and use everything we carry with ourselves and our children (as it is applicable).

I hope customers know they can always count on us to seek out and offer products that will be beneficial to them and their families. They can also count on us to share helpful and useful information about how to live a healthier lifestyle, and safe ways to use various natural tools as we learn along the way.

What do you do to support your own health?

My own health journey has been difficult, taking several twists and turns over the years, and we went through multiple miscarriages before I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. My experience is part of why I am so passionate about helping and encouraging others in seeking good health!

Our family focuses on carefully-sourced whole foods in our diet, and we take digestion-supporting supplements to help get the most nutrients possible out of those whole foods. I’m currently on a fairly restricted diet and supplement protocol that is successfully managing my autoimmune issues, as well as doing a fairly intensive adrenal protocol.

One of the areas I’m really focusing on right now is reducing stress and getting enough rest. It’s easier for me to just focus on diet, and skip the powerful benefits of adequate rest and de-stressing along the way.

When you’re not working on Beeyoutiful projects, what’s one way that you enjoy spending your time?

Crocheting with a cup of hot tea and a good British mystery movie are my favorite down-time activities! But usually my non-work time is filled with homeschooling, trying to clean and manage the house, and occasionally putting my ‘black thumb’ to the test by trying to keep an herb and veggie garden going.

Leave a message for Steph in the comments below, and follow her on Facebook here and here, and on her blog. Meet the rest of the team here!

Blog

Welcome! By Steph Tallent- Fall 2013 Catalog

Posted on December 30, 2013 by Beeyoutiful Mary Leave a comment

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

Health

Steph’s Letter- Winter 2012-2013 Catalog

Posted on April 24, 2013 by Beeyoutiful Mary Leave a comment

Hello Beeyoutiful Friends,

It’s been a good while since I’ve had the privilege of sitting down to write to you. After our son Caleb was born a little more than a year ago, I took time off from Beeyoutiful and enjoyed a wonderful sabbatical. The break allowed me to relish Caleb’s baby days without the distraction and stress of work. But—I missed all the people like you who make Beeyoutiful the amazing business it is. So last month, Steve and I did a little switcheroo.

Steve now works part time from home while doing full time childcare-and-household management while I work full time at the Beeyoutiful office. One of the great things we’ve experienced in working together for so long is that we’ve learned to rely on each other’s strengths. His steady leadership, financial stewardship, desire to help people, and business savvy are the perfect balance to my creative bursts of new product and marketing inspirations and my delight in the relationships we have with you. Steve and I may well swap things up again in a few months, but for now, I’m incredibly happy to be welcoming you to another edition of our Beeyoutiful Living Catazine.

Making Ready for Makeup

A monumental undertaking that has been going on behind the scenes here for the past year or so was inspired by one of our all-time favorite product formulators. This incredible lady is the genius behind some of Beeyoutiful’s best-loved products such as Miracle, Winter Breeze, and Ow! Ease. A couple of years ago, she approached us with the idea of launching a full-disclosure, all-natural, safe line of cosmetics. In my (at the time) ignorance, I flatly turned her down. We do nutritional supplements and healing-focused skin care, I thought. Why on earth would I want to enter the ridiculously competitive world of makeup? She persisted, though, and peaked my curiosity regarding the lack of safety and helpful regulation, along with the moral implications of ingredients most makeup companies use.

Even though I was still determined that makeup would never be part of the Beeyoutiful product line, I decided to spend a few days digging into the concerns my friend had raised. I was stunned to discover how naïve I had been. I’ve been a consumer of makeup since my teens, and my faith in the acceptability of most cosmetics was turned on its ear, shaken upside down, and knocked to rubble. Disturbed and humbled, but seriously motivated, I re-directed my determination and began to evaluate whether or not launching a makeup line would be feasible.

I am enormously passionate about individuals taking responsibility and becoming informed consumers. That’s why at Beeyoutiful, we believe it is the consumer’s right to know exactly what she is buying, even if a particular ingredient comprises only half a percent of the product. And now my passion for such education has officially spilled over into the world of cosmetics. Much to my dismay, I’ve discovered that full disclosure in the makeup industry is even more foreign than in the world of nutritional supplements.

Shocking Non-Disclosure

You may be as disturbed as I was to know that most skincare and cosmetic companies not only do not support full-disclosure of product ingredients, they actually have policies against disclosure. But how do they get away with this? The bottom line reason is that there is no solid requirement that they “come clean” about what’s in the products they sell.

Cosmetics marketed in the United States, whether manufactured here or imported from other countries, must comply with the labeling requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA), the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act (FPLA), and the associated regulations published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). While that may seem like a lot of supervision and accountability, a less comforting picture emerges upon closer examination.

Under the FPLA, if a product is sold at retail, the ingredients must appear conspicuously on the product label, and they must be listed in descending order of quantity used. But the good news ends there because an “exceptions clause” offers a wide-as-the-horizon loophole. The worst provision allows for non-disclosure of “trade secret” ingredients. If the FDA approves a company’s request for trade secret exemption, then that proprietary ingredient does not have to be declared on the label. In lieu of naming it, the company may simply note that the product contains “other ingredients”—at the end of the list, no matter what quantity is in the product.

I used to be under the mistaken impression that as long as undeclared ingredients made up less than a certain percentage of the product, it did not have to be disclosed. For example, it had to be less than 3 percent of the product. Under this trade secret exemption, however, that is not true. No longer can I comfort myself upon reading the phrase “and other ingredients” with the thought, Oh well, at least it’s only a little bit of the total product.

Furthermore, the FDA does not have authority to approve the labeling of cosmetic products before they are placed on the market. It’s up to the manufacturer and/or distributor to ensure their products are labeled appropriately. This means that, unless someone blows the whistle for mis-labeling in a big enough way to attract the FDA’s attention, many companies will go for years without their products being tested and reviewed. So the actual accountability offered by the FDA for cosmetics is loose and randomly enforced, at best.

There are no words for how disturbing it was for me to learn that some of these protected ingredients, used by almost every cosmetic company out there, are cells from placentas, the tissue from circumcisions, and, most sickening of all, cloned cells from aborted babies. These components are used in everything from makeup, creams, toners, and moisturizers to body washes and shampoos. They are prized by the industry because of their skin-healing, regenerative properties. All those things we appreciate and marvel at in a baby’s beautiful skin make these ingredients valuable to this industry. They tend to show up especially in anything advertised as “anti-aging.”

So where does that leave us? Since labels aren’t required by governing agencies to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, this is the time to pick up the phone, hop on-line and shoot off an e-mail, chat up a live support person, or whatever avenue of communication you find easiest, and ask a very simple question of the companies that provide your makeup and skincare cosmetics: “Are you a full-disclosure company?”

The answer will tell you whether or not you can trust the company’s product labels. If the answer is balking, obfuscating, excuse-making (i.e., explaining the “moral obligation” to protect their proprietary ingredients), or even a simple “no,” then you’ll likely do well to find a new cosmetics supplier. Seek out full-disclosure companies by asking before you buy. You may not like everything they disclose, but at least you can choose whether or not to put those ingredients on your skin.

Disclosing Beeyoutiful’s Disclosure

By now, you can probably guess Beeyoutiful’s practice regarding full disclosure. It is my absolute joy and pleasure to introduce makeup that is made from nothing but minerals—minerals that are tested to avoid cross contamination with heavy metals and certified to be heavy metal free. We include no fillers, not even “natural” ones. You’ll find each and every ingredient listed on each and every one of our labels, no matter how small the quantity.

Our new cosmetics are available on the main Beeyoutiful website, so you can have the convenience of shopping for them along with the supplements and other items you usually shop for there. Please check out our makeup at www.beeyoutiful.com/beeyoutifulskin. We also have a makeup-specific site at www.beeyoutifulskin.com. And if you don’t have internet access, just call and ask for a Beeyoutiful Skin catalog. We’ll be happy to mail it to you.

It’s now dark outside, and my sweet family is waiting for me. Time to pack up the laptop and head home. I’m hoping to share a cup of hot cocoa with them around a warm fire tonight and maybe read a book with some Holiday Cheer.

Thank you for being part of Beeyoutiful. We are grateful that you make it possible for us to do what we do. May you experience the blessings of love, warmth, peace, and joy this Christmas.

With love and gratitude,

Steph Tallent

steph@beeyoutiful.com

Makeup

Steph’s BeeyoutifulSkin Makeup Story

Posted on April 24, 2013 by Beeyoutiful Mary 4 comments

Makeup is a rite of passage of sorts for many women. We grew up watching our moms apply it with a sense of wonder, amazed by the before and after transformation. It never seemed to quite work out that well for us when we attempted the same things though. With bright red cheeks and lipstick smeared mouths we wanted nothing more than to be beautiful. Just like our mamas.

Somewhere along the way, makeup would become more of a necessity than something to be desired as teenage skin with all it’s glorious blemishes made itself known. For some of us makeup would still feel pretty awkward to use. All the options, all the prices, all the brands, all competing for the real estate that is our face. Each one claiming to achieve better results than the next.

As a young women, I struggled with self esteem and had a difficult time accepting that I could be pretty. Makeup became my magic bullet for transforming what I felt was an ugly duckling into a more socially acceptable version of myself. I became a sales person for one of the biggest makeup companies in the nation. I believed that makeup was necessary for me to be attractive, and in order for me to look good it meant there needed to be parts of me hidden. Thick layers of makeup was my answer. When I put on my full war paint, chances were good you might not recognize me as the same person I was before the layers started going on. A good application for me meant only vestiges left of my natural self. Years flew by and I found myself married. One of the biggest adventures of our lives began shortly after we got married and we started a natural health supplement company. Red flags began to pop up for me as I became more educated and aware of the implications of what I put on my skin. Plus my husband seemed pretty convinced I was a beautiful woman and he disliked the essence of who I was vanishing behind piles of makeup. His validation gave me the confidence to be bold about celebrating my natural beauty by wearing less, but more carefully chosen, makeup. Also as a mom to two kids with exceedingly kissable, chubby cheeks I was worried about rubbing potentially toxic substances from my face to theirs, so it made sense that less was more.

As our reputation began to grow, different women began coming to me asking for a makeup recommendation. The truth was, I hadn’t found any at all I could, with a clear conscience, recommend. One of the biggest problems we ran into was the fact that every makeup company I researched,in hopes of being able to give a wholehearted endorsement, turned out not to be full disclosure in their labeling policies. Due to the way that labeling laws work there can be all sorts of ingredients used in cosmetics that are absolutely not required to be on the label. I needed a company I could trust, one that would be committed not only to full disclosure standards, but also believed in creating a makeup line that accents and celebrates women and who they are, from the inside out.

One of the core tenets my husband and I hold is that we desire in all that we do to treat others the way we would like to be treated. With that standard in mind BeeyoutifulSkin was created. What we’ve done is really pretty simple. It’s just minerals. And that’s all. No dyes, no fillers, no extras of anything. The variations of color are achieved when these minerals are baked at varying degrees of heat and then mixed and blended with care to create vibrant eye colors and precise foundation shades for a perfect match. One of the most surprising aspects of working with truly pure minerals was how long they last. I find myself saying all the time “A little goes a long way” and “You’ll be amazed at how little you need” and the women who use it frequently exclaim over how little is needed to accent and bring out their features, and even cover blemishes.

It’s taken us months of hard work to be able to make this available. I am so very excited and grateful to be able to wholeheartedly endorse it and make it available to fellow purists who like me may have struggled for years trying to find cosmetics they could use or recommend with a clear conscience.

Thank you for taking the time to read through this catalog. In it you will find photos and descriptions of every single color we carry along with honest reviews of different women’s experiences in using these minerals and brushes. Speaking of brushes, they are a crucial part of the product line and make a world of difference in how well the makeup performs. These brushes are truly one of a kind and you have to feel the silky perfection to appreciate how incredible they are.

These days, thanks to BeeyoutifulSkin, I’m able to wear makeup and kiss my kids without even a twinge of guilt. It’s makeup pure and safe enough for even their young, sensitive skin. My husband doesn’t mind a big smooch now and again either. I never thought I’d hear him say he actually likes me wearing makeup after all of his years of complaining about my war paint, but BeeyoutifulSkin minerals won him over. I invite you to try it for yourself and please let me know if you have any questions.

Blessings to you and yours,

–Steph Tallent

Founder, BeeyoutifulSkin, LLC

steph@beeyoutiful.com

Makeup

Winter 2011 Letter from Steph

Posted on February 3, 2011 by stevetallent

2011 Winter Letter

By Stephanie Walker Tallent

Hello Everybody,

It’s finally official: Winter is in full force here in Tennessee. It may arrive a little later than in Minnesota and Michigan, but temperatures in the teens and single digits are still cold wherever they hit. This is the only time of year I concede to wearing socks around the house. Even so, my feet still become blocks of ice according to my husband, Steve. He’s the resident expert on my foot temperature since he’s the one who finally manages to warm up said blocks of ice when we go to bed (one of the many fine uses for a husband—I really love that man!) It still baffles me how someone as effortlessly skinny as he is and someone as effortlessly chubby as I am can have such opposite body thermostats. I want a refund on my fat—the guaranteed extra insulation factor doesn’t seem to work at all.

If you’re life me, you’ve made it through the holidays with just a few dietary regrets under your belt (okay, maybe more than just a few—a lot?) Although I’ve successfully stuck to the gluten-free diet necessitated by my thyroid problem, I’ve fudged (literally) on the no-sugar-no-sweets-no-caffeine guidelines. I comforted my brief spurts of guilty conscience with “That’s what January and New Years Resolutions are for!” Although I’ve never been one to jump whole hog (so to speak) on the New Year’s weight loss or eat-healthier band wagon, I’m going to give it a try in 2011. It can’t hurt, and sticking to strict food rules in January will certainly be a lot easier without the temptations of holiday get-togethers lurking around every corner.

Speaking of the holidays, ours was wonderful. We decked out a Charlie Brown-esque Christmas tree with miles of popcorn string and paper chains. Although my eyes prefer the aesthetics of white lights, the Doodles was enthralled with the liberal winding of colored lights we employed at Christmas. Family and friends came over to help decorate the tree and play what has become our traditional game of Dutch Blitz. If you’ve never played you should order a deck (some friends of ours sell it online at http://www.creativecountryliving.com ). Very family-friendly, group-friendly, and people of all ages can play.

Part of the post-holiday challenge for me is how long winter seems to drag on after the December festivities. I get an itch for spring about three weeks into January and emotionally done with all the miserable coldness and drab, dreary days. And nope, not even another cup of hot tea and a snuggle by the fireplace with fix it. This year, though, I have a battle plan. I’m going to combat my spring longings by attempting (yet again) to germinate some seeds indoors for an early spring garden. Also, our front porch is outfitted with hooks for hanging baskets (which I’ve yet to use in four years), and I shall attempt some hanging baskets of herbs. Hopefully my herbs-in-fern-baskets will do better than my poor herb garden of the past couple years. While I admit to some neglect (okay, a lot of neglect), my biggest problem has been the rogue mint plants that seem determined to take over the yard, starting with the herb garden. At least in baskets, the less aggressive herbs will have a fighting chance—and in baskets, the less aggressive herbs will have a fighting chance—and maybe they won’t over-bake like they did last year in my raised beds.

Other than hoping a few bright green seedlings tide me over till spring, I’m continuing to take lots of Vitamin D3. My health has stabilized appreciably since I started steady supplementation of this utterly marvelous vitamin. I can’t sing its praises enough. It’s especially crucial in the heart of winter when exposure to the sun is limited—whether by cloudy skies or heavy clothes that leave little skin to absorb sunlight and convert the rays into Vitamin D.

In Beeyoutiful news: We’re working to get Geranium, Clary Sage, and Ylang Ylang Essential Oils added to our line. We hope to have them available within a few weeks of this catalog arriving at your doorstep. To let you know exactly when, we’ll send e-mail notices to everyone who’s signed up for our monthly newsletter. So if you haven’t already signed up, now would be a good time! It’s the very best way to get all the latest Beeyoutiful news, to find out about sales, and to receive special coupons or offers. (Get your free newsletter subscription at www.Beeyoutiful.com.

I’m SUPER excited about Geranium Essential Oil. This oil is a gift to womankind—and because of the mood-soothing wonders it works, a gift to husbands, too, Steve is quick to add. If you’ve ever struggled with that “time of the month” we love to give Eve credit for—especially with moodiness or an extra sharp tongue—you need this oil! We’ll be posting some recipes on how to use it when we get it on our shelves, so keep a look-out. It’s been such a helpful little tool, Steve assures me that if I can’t convince women of the effectiveness of Geranium, he’d like to talk to you. He’s sure any married man will want this in the family’s arsenal of EWMS (Emergency Wife Management Supplies). We may have to let him write his own “for women only” article about this in the next catalog or newsletter.

Speaking of Steve and his excitement over certain products, we appreciate your overwhelming response to his special diffuser sale before Christmas. Many of you now have diffusers sitting in your homes that you might not have been able to afford otherwise. Look on page 25 through 28 of this catalog for oil blends to try. And, if you haven’t yet, consider getting the Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy on page 12 of this catalog. It’s an incredibly practical resource for anybody who wants to learn more about how to use essential oils. From down to earth cleaning recipes to what blend of oils to use for chicken pox to mixing your own perfume blend, this great book has it all. With more than 600 recipes, I have yet to exhaust the book as a resource after almost two years of using it at least every other week.

A highlight of our 2010 was attending the Weston A. Price Foundation Conference as a vendor. Held in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, the conference was Beeyoutiful’s first time to have an exhibitor table. It was exciting for Steve an dme to meet some of our long-time customers face to face and meet many new customers as well, and it was gratifying to hear stories firsthand of how some of our products have helped people. News like that is a resfreshing reminder of why we do what we do.

We’re planning to attend several more conferences in 2011 and will keep the www.facebook.com/beeyoutiful page updated with dates and locations so if any of you are close enough, you can stop by our exhibit. We would love to meet you!

Three of my favorite ladies in the whole world are the featured writers in this catalog, and I hope you enjoy and learn as much from them as I have. Please pay special attention to Nancy Webster’s contribution on gut health. If you’ve never recognized the connection between what goes on in the digestive tract and every other aspect of your health—including mental health!—her article may offer some of the most life-changing information you’ll discover this year.

I hope you’re staying warm and cozy and that you enjoy reading this issue of Beeyoutiful’s info-catalog.

Grace and Peace,

Steph Tallent

steph@beeyoutiful.com

Health

Letter from Steph – Summer 2010 Catalog

Posted on September 7, 2010 by stevetallent Leave a comment

Hello!

I feel as though our world has been turned upside down, shaken around, and plopped back upright since I wrote the letter for our Spring 2010 Catalog. I still feel a bit dizzy from the rapid sequence of events in our already eventful lives.

A few weeks after our Spring catalog went to press, my wonderful man left for a two week mission trip to Malawi. (For those of you who draw a blank when trying to figure out which continent Malawi belongs to, I’ll tell you so you can stop wondering.Malawi is located in Central Africa.)Bidding him good-bye was hard. Since we’ve been married, Steve and I have never been apart for more than a week. We’ve gotten used to the luxury of living and working together day in and day out. (Allow me to insert here that my respect and admiration for you military wives whose husbands are away for extended periods of time has reached new levels! God bless you and your families for the sacrifices you make.)

Before he left, Steve went above and beyond the call of duty to make sure everything was in good working order in the business and in our personal lives. Yet my main concern was for him. I’ll confess to having more than a few moments of anxiety over his safety. After all, Africa is very far away and offers some of the world’s scariest diseases, most dangerous animals, rugged terrain, and less-than-stable political climates. If anybody had told me we would end up having more adventures here in Tennessee than he did in Africa I would have laughed! But the joke would have been on me.

A few days after Steve left, I woke with a start one morning to the pale face of our basement tenant looking down at me. “The basement is flooding!” she said, and I bolted out of bed. For the next two days, friends and family helped battle the water pouring into our basement. Although I realized it had been raining—a lot!—I had no clue what a tsunami had poured from the sky on Tennessee’s corner of the world.

We worked night and day to keep the water low enough so it wouldn’t ruin sheetrock or mess with electrical wiring. Around day two, the blinders that had me so focused on my own water problems were blown away by the arrival of my soaking wet mother-in-law. She had been rescued from rising waters in her yard by caring neighbors who got her out before the water could trap her inside her house. It finally dawned on me that we were dealing with an actual flood (although I still didn’t appreciate the stunning proportions of the situation), not just a problem with our particular basement. One moral of this story could be that if your basement floods, it might be a good idea to check the news to find out if the rest of your area is having water problems as well!

As hours turned into days, our home ended up looking like a refugee camp. We had seven adults and our Noelle girl stranded at our house by floodwaters. My courageous brother, John, and his dually truck saved the day innumerable times, plowing through rising waters to obtain necessities.

One wet night in the basement, bailing water gave us something to do while we hid from tornadoes that also blasted our area during the flood. In an ironic twist, Noelle stayed dry in the bathtub, where she slept in a nest of pillows while the rest of us made do, propped on couches and waking periodically to do water patrol. The power went off that night and stayed off for five days and nights.

Then, once the rain stopped, the real flooding began as the run-off dumped into streams and rivers, raising them above the 500-year flood levels in many areas. Still, we made it to a local store and stocked up on necessities like candles, easy-to-prepare junk food (emergency rations, right?), and bottled water. Our city’s drinking water was contaminated for weeks since both the power plant and water purification plant were under water.

Although the laminate flooring in our basement was ruined, we count ourselves among the fortunate.In nearby Nashville, 44,000 homes were destroyed, and within just a mile or two of our house, many homes were 100 percent ruined by floodwaters. Roads washed away. And countless properties, fences, shops, and barns were decimated.

Living through a disaster big enough to earn the FEMA stamp of approval has been amazing. I’m incredibly grateful for the spirit of people in this part of Tennessee. Whereas many natural disasters are made worse by the horror stories of chaos, pillaging, gang rule, and out of control violence, nothing of the kind happened here. Neighbors helped neighbors. People risked their property and, in some instances, their own safety to save or aid others.

Selfless giving of time, resources, energy, and care was the rule of the day. Neighbors rotated the use of one generator a few hours at a time so all their food could be saved. Another drove his truck through deep water to help stranded friends. Someone else risked flooded roads to help stop water from pouring into the home of an elderly couple. A man brought extra ice to his neighbors just in case they could use it to save their refrigerated food. A lady with a flood-damaged home offered clothes to anyone who was worse off and lost everything. Two men whose own homes were under water offered to drive down a flooded road to find the missing grandmother of strangers.

And you: I want to thank customers who ordered during this trauma for your patience. We couldn’t ship orders in the timely manner that is always our goal because the main highway to our shipping facility developed a rather drastic pot-hole (more like a Grand Canyon wanna-be). As you can see in the photo on the _______, it could have swallowed two large trucks whole. Road crews repaired a less extensively damaged alternate route within a couple of days and our local staff gratefully made their way to work—where there was internet service, hot running water, and electricity. (Oh, those seemingly small things we are tempted to take for granted!)

To say we welcomed Steve’s return is an understatement as big as the flood itself. Noelle and I engulfed him and didn’t let go for most of the day. By contrast to our time in the wild world of Tennessee, he had a safe and comparatively laid back couple of weeks in Africa. One of the highlights for him was looking out the window of his hut to see an elephant munching about eight feet from his window.

Life here has been slowly returning to normal. More roads are being repaired so we can use regular routes again. But driving by condemned and abandoned homes is a stark reminder of how many people lost everything. Most did not have flood insurance (no one will insure against floods that “can’t happen”) and are dependent upon family and friends to rebuild their lives. Please pray for their long-term healing and recovery and that the still-acute needs of many will be met.

We’re thankful our shipping facility and products sustained no damage. And we’re especially grateful our friends and family members survived this disaster. We’re likewise thankful for customers and friends who have been so kind and caring through this entire experience.

And finally: A warm-weather catalog letter just wouldn’t be complete without an update on my garden. I’m thrilled to report that my early garden miraculously did not wash away in the flood. Those little plants must have dug their roots in and hung on tight because they all survived—every single one! An explosion of growth has resulted from the rain, and it looks like we just might have the best summer garden ever. Very thankful for that as well.

Enjoy your family this summer. Have fun in the sun and take advantage of as much natural, free vitamin D as you can! If you get a little over-toasted in the quest for D, remember that Miracle Salve and HairShine are sunburn healers. Spritz with HairShine, allow its cooling effect to begin, and then slather with Miracle Salve. After the Miracle has absorbed, spritz again liberally with HairShine. Continue alternating the two until the burn heals. Although we marshmallow people have suffered some pretty severe sunburns around here, peeling is a thing of the past and discomfort disappears almost immediately when we use these two products together.

Thank you for being part of our Beeyoutiful family!

Grace and Peace,

–Steph (Walker) Tallent

steph@beeyoutiful.com

Health

Winter 2010 Letter from Steph

Posted on August 11, 2010 by stevetallent Leave a comment

Hello to all our Beeyoutiful friends!

Another season change has arrived since our last catalog. Winter came nipping at the heels of Fall and took over-all too soon, in my opinion. The gorgeous leaves and vibrant colors are gone, leaving the bare limbs of trees reaching unadorned to the sky. Unlike some of you in other parts of the country, we rarely get snow around here so our winter months can be rather drab and colorless without a beautiful blanket of fluffy white. On the other hand, since we don’t have to deal with muddy slush and other snow-related complications, “drab” is not so bad when I stop to think about it.

Our lives seem to get busier with each passing month. Noelle is talking up a storm and has a strong opinion on just about everything. Her presence is a constant joy and humbling reminder of our shortcomings. One of her new favorite phrases is “I don’t wANt to!” in response to an instruction or request. It’s proving to be a tough lesson for her that life is filled with many things we don’t want to do but must do anyway. The difficult, the dirty, the mundane, and the frustrating are all part of life as well as the fun, exciting and enjoyable. Nevertheless, even though she is only two-and-a-half, Noelle’s learning to help with daily chores. She loves doing anything with water and has become quite the little dishwashing and rinsing marvel. This tops the list of her favorite household duties for which to volunteer. The floor is usually covered in water by the time she’s done, but she cheerfully helps clean it up, and I can count that as an impromptu mopping of the kitchen floor.

My wonderful husband and Beeyoutiful’s CEO, Steve, facilitated an incredible surprise for me and three ladies on our Beeyoutiful staff. As you may know, we sell the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon, president of the Weston A. Price Foundation. I’ve had a lot of respect for the work of Sally and the WAPF for several years now although I’ve never been able to become a member or attend any WAPF conferences. But in November, Steve surprised us with a trip to Chicago to attend the 2009 WAPF Conference. One of our most valuable take-aways is that we interviewed some of the vendors at the conference who are excellent resources for healthy foods with difficult-to-find quality and safety sources. The interviews are posted on YouTube under the username stephtallent. They can also be found in the Education forum: www.merryheartmedicine.com.

Looking ahead to the next few months: You’ll see various resources become available in several forms, one being articles from experts that participated in the conference.This month we feature an article from one of my favorite vendors: a delightful couple I dubbed “The Sprouted Grain Folks.” Co-owner of To Your Health Sprouted Flour Co. (www.organicsproutedflour.net), Peggy Sutton graciously agreed to write an article for our customers to teach them step-by-step how to sprout grains and prepare them for grinding. We also have a companion article written by my sister-in-law, Stephanie Kuvik-Tallent, sharing her story on soaking (un-sprouted) flour and also her step-by-step recipe with pictures. Articles like this get me excited and make me want to run to the kitchen and create something nutritious for my family!

Someone at the conference asked me who and what Beeyoutiful is as a company and why they should trust us. The question startled me because I frequently take for granted that our customers have a relationship with us and know the work and quality control that goes into each and every product we carry. I also assume people know they can trust us to always try to do the right thing, whether we succeed or not. I realize, though, that both of these assumptions are very wrong. We have new customers coming to our metaphorical doors all the time. Questions about quality control and why a company should be trusted are both trademarks of a wise consumer. I ask them myself before trusting the integrity of a new company or giving my hard earned dollars to purchase a new product.

So, Quality Control: How well is the quality of the manufacturing processes managed for Beeyoutiful products?

I could bombard you with a lot of nitty gritty manufacturing details but in a few paragraphs, your eyes would glaze over, and you would skip to more interesting parts of the catalog. So I’ll stick with the bottom line version.

For any of you who want some particular nit or grit detail that I don’t cover here, please, as always, feel free to write us. We are what the industry calls a “full disclosure company” (the rare breed that seems to be ever more endangered). That means if you ask us, we’ll tell you. It also means that each product label tells exactly what is in the product. The law allows that, if any ingredient is less than 1% of the whole of a product, a company is not required to report it in the nutritional facts. At Beeyoutiful, though, we know that for consumers this is a terrible thing. Sometimes even trace amounts of an ingredient make a difference. So in the spirit of doing unto others what we would like done unto us, we are committed to disclosing every single component of every single product, no matter how tiny the amount may be.

Our supplements are all made at facilities with a Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) certification. GMP is a quality control check of every step of the manufacturing process. It ensures the final product is safe for consumption, is not contaminated, and that every unit is produced with consistent care. What’s more, our primary manufacturer goes above and beyond the basic GMP requirements. The company takes 11 random samples from each individual raw ingredient shipped to their facility and runs them through a mass spectrometer. If there is any trace of a pesticide, heavy metal, or any other harmful compound, the shipment is refused and not even allowed into the facility. The detection capabilities are so refined that in examining the raw materials, they can detect the equivalent of one grain of sand in a five-mile beach. This is significant because, even in certified organic shipments, they’ve found contaminants and refused to use the materials.

We also like to support home businesses. Most of our skincare products are made by cottage industries. We’ve found that large companies often cut corners to reduce expenses, and the quality of the products intended for external use suffers. It can also be difficult for large companies to consistently locate enough high quality ingredients. Small manufacturers, on the other hand, can usually buy raw herbs, beeswax, and other components locally and can personally check out the quality of the sources to ensure purity.

We’ve seen how several “natural” body product companies that we respected changed policies as they grew, letting in what we consider inferior ingredients once they had won the publics’ trust. This is something small, home-based manufacturers do not have the luxury of doing. They see their customers face to face at farmer’s markets and use their products on their own children, family, and friends. This provides a highly personal element of accountability that can be missing in large-scale skincare production.

A last comment on quality control but certainly not the least important: All of our products are manufactured in the US. While quality products can be found overseas, it’s much more difficult to personally check up on the consistency of quality controls. And it’s almost impossible to enforce any special requests. We would be at the mercy of the discretion and trustworthiness of local management, a situation complicated by the potential miscommunications due to language barriers.

Many people wonder how we go about adding products. Do we design them ourselves, or do we have a professional do it? How do we come up with the blends we carry?

Our goal is to make available the most affordable and highest quality products for families that we can. As we learn and expand the range of natural living products we use for ourselves, we try our best to make them available for our customers. Sometimes this means going to the manufacturer/designer of a particular product that we think is amazing and asking if they will allow us to private label it. Other times, this means we come up with the idea of a product and propose it to a formulator and manufacturer, having a custom product made just for us. A classic example is our Organic Red Raspberry leaf capsules.

We’ve always offered a 30-day, 100% satisfaction guarantee to our customers. If you order something and don’t like it for any reason at all, you can return it, and we will refund the full cost of the product (I would say “no questions asked” except that we do usually ask for the reason because feedback helps us learn how to improve our products in the future). Recently, though, we’ve increased the 30-day policy to a 60-day policy in order to give even more time for folks to try a product and decide if it is beneficial or not. It’s another way for us to underscore just how important your satisfaction is to us.

Finally, the most compelling assurance I can offer that we always strive to have the highest quality products is that we take these products ourselves on a daily basis and use them with our children and loved ones. Our personal best interest mandates that we maintain the integrity of our products.

In a way, we hope that someday a company like Beeyoutiful will no longer be needed. The ideal would be for our society to offer genuinely nourishing, beneficial, and affordable foods as well as education for food preparation methods that deliver the nutrients needed to maintain good health.

In striving to learn for ourselves and pass this knowledge on to others, I recommend an amazing educational resource: the video documentary Food Inc. Request it at your local library, borrow it from a friend, or rent it. The education it provides as to why our nation has reached its current food and nutritional crisis is priceless.

I hope you enjoy this Winter Catalog. Snuggle up in front of a fire, or curl up under a blanket, get a hot cup of whatever beverage makes you happy, and enjoy! May you and your families be warm, well nourished, and healthy this winter.

As always, if there’s anything I can do to help or encourage you or your family, please write to me anytime at steph@beeyoutiful.com

Blessings,

Steph Tallent

Health

Spring 2010 Letter from Stephanie

Posted on June 10, 2010 by stevetallent

Hello on a balmy spring day here in Middle Tennessee!

For those of you still caught in winter’s grip, I encourage you to be patient. Warm weather is truly on the way! The rest of you have already welcomed spring in its sunshiny glory and are soaking in the warmth. I’m relieved to have this winter behind us. The 2009-10 season has brought with it some of the toughest illnesses we’ve seen in years. Several people I know struggled with sickness in one form or another for most of the season. Steve and I have been more grateful than ever for the diversity and effectiveness of our health-supporting products.

Warm weather means I’m now out in the garden and excited about how luxurious our soil is looking after three years of effort! Snow peas are poking their vibrant green heads out of the dirt and already looking for something to climb. Lettuce and other seedlings are sprouting, looking healthy and robust. I keep close tabs because Noelle runs out to check on their progress several times a day. At least now that they’ve emerged from the ground I don’t have to worry about her digging them up to see if they are “Gwowing Mommy? Plants gwowing?” I love how involved she is in the process—even as a 3 year-old—and the joy it brings her.

For the past few months, we’ve been on an exciting journey of pursuing a Home Study for Adoption, done through a non-profit organization. We hope to adopt an infant from here in the States—either a boy or a girl—later this year. The home study is almost complete and we’re excited to see what happens. Although the process has been more challenging than expected, we’ve come to appreciate the thoroughness of the agency’s measures and know it is for the protection of the children.We would appreciate prayers as our family will no doubt experience hope and excitement and, very possibly, disappointments as we await the outcome.

One requirement of the home study has been that our whole family has had medical check-ups. Between that and Steve having a tooth pulled, we’ve been in and out of doctors’ offices quite a bit more than usual. As a result, we’re more motivated than ever to take good care of our teeth and general health. Steve says, in particular, he wishes he’d been more careful with his teeth in his younger years. On pages 6 and 8 of this catalog we feature two great articles about dental care. One is written by my dear friend and regular catalog contributor, Nancy Webster, and discusses how to prevent tooth decay from the inside out. The other is written by my mother-in-law, Sharon Tallent, and the products she has discovered in her quest for oral health. Both are full of great resources and information.

We have several new products that I’m excited about. Our essential oil collection continues to grow. Every time a new oil is added to our collection, a whole new realm of possibilities opens for which to better care for our bodies and the environment.What I’m most excited about is that we now offer two carrier oils. Sweet Almond Oil—known for its ability to increase absorption through the skin to maximize the benefits of the essential oils—is a personal favorite of mine. Another great carrier is Jojoba, which is a light super-beneficial oil. I love Jojoba because it has the longest shelf life of all the most popular carrier oils. These two carriers make it easier to mix up and dilute blends of essential oils with an appropriate base. On page 10, we have a fantastic article by Mary Ewing. She shares her journey in learning to appreciate and use essential oils as well as some of her favorite recipes and usage ideas.

I always feel a very personal connection with the products we supply because so much care and attention to detail goes into each and every one. Like a mother with children, I know I’m not supposed to have favorites among our product line—because they all have their own unique benefits—but I can’t help myself. I do have favorites. And every so often a new product has me bursting with maternal pride and joy.My “newest favorite” is Katalyst, otherwise known as Vitamin K2. It joins the team with Dynamic Duo (Vitamin A and D3), announced in our last catalog. Research suggests that there is a beneficial synergy when vitamins A, D3, and K2 work together in the body. Ideally, people would obtain this uniquely beneficial triad of fat-soluble vitamins by eating nutrient-dense foods. A whole-food source is the most effective way to utilize and absorb these fantastic nutrients. However, many of us cannot afford the time or money to obtain and prepare the foods that possess these amazing nutrients. That’s why there’s Beeyoutiful.

We recently began carrying what we believe are high quality, food-based sources of this life-supporting trinity of vitamins, manufactured by the company called Green Pasture. The article on page 12 is about these vitamins and the innumerable ways they benefit the body. So with this in mind, We’ve also found lower cost alternative sources, in Katalyst and Dynamic Duo. They do a great job of filling the gap for families with a need for these nutrients but without the means to afford High Vitamin Butter Oil and Fermented Cod Liver Oil in the quantities required. If Dynamic Duo and Katalyst are taken with meals high in good animal fats, we believe they are enormously beneficial. We plan to offer even more articles about these products in the future and share any additional research we come across as we learn more about them.

Before I close I need to add a housekeeping note. I’m always delighted to hear from our customers, yet a frustrating—but manageable—technological glitch occasionally gets in the way. Several of our customers who wrote recently had to send a second note to say they had never received a reply (although I had responded). I sent another e-mail and got even more frustrated e-mails back because they still didn’t receive my note. The problem, we discovered, is usually a customer’s spam protection. Every now and then we even have the same problem with our customer service e-mails. So: A way to troubleshoot when you think you haven’t received a response from Beeyoutiful is to check your spam box and spam settings. Many e-mail services automatically put e-mails originating from a company into a spam folder, assuming it is unwanted marketing information.My one disclaimer about our responding, though, is that sometimes it takes a couple of business days to catch up on our e-mails, so don’t go “dumpster diving” through your spam box if you haven’t heard back within a couple of hours.We do love communicating with our customers and will write back as soon as we’re able.

Thank you, as always, for supporting Beeyoutiful. We value our customers and deeply appreciate the opportunity to share products and resources that have so greatly impacted our lives. As always, if there’s anything I can do to help or encourage you and your family, feel free to write. And if, by chance, you don’t hear back within a week, dig through the spam box to see if my response is sitting there along with enhancement ads and notifications that a wealthy foreigner wants to bestow his copious life savings upon you.

I’m off to water the seedlings and start supper. Take a few minutes to enjoy the sun—and even the pollen-laden spring air. A swig of Berry Well and a couple capsules of Bee Strong or local bee pollen taken internally can help if you suffer from seasonal allergies. So throw open the windows and let the beautiful spring weather in for a few hours! Every house can benefit from a good airing-out.

Grace and Peace,

Stephanie Walker Tallent

steph@beeyoutiful.com

Health

Hello from Tennessee- Introductory Letter Fall 2009

Posted on November 2, 2009 by stevetallent

Hello From Tennessee

by Stephanie Tallent

The witty, funny, and informative letter from my husband and Beeyoutiful’s CEO, Steve, usually graces the opening pages of our catalog, but as Beeyoutiful continues to grow, Steve’s responsibilities have been expanding along with it. So, due to the burgeoning load he carries, the honor and privilege of sharing with you something from our lives and work has passed to me.

As I write, I have a cup of hot tea by my side and a blanket around my shoulders. The laptop is gently warming my legs, which are propped comfortably on the couch. It’s late at night and Steve and Noelle, our two-year-old, are asleep. I’m soaking in a few rare moments of peace and solitude.

Although fall is barely upon us, temperatures have dropped just enough at night to let us know cold weather is around the corner. Hot tea is one of the little treats I try to enjoy once or twice a day in the midst of the business of our lives. Noelle also loves tea so herbal teas are perfect for our mommy and daughter tea times. They’re caffeine-free and beneficial to her growing body and immune system. Sometimes Noelle even helps me fix a cup and take it to Daddy in his office as a surprise. Herbal teas are becoming part of our little family’s tradition and culture.

Page 4 of this catalog features a great article about herbal medicinal teas. With medicinal teas being a part of the backbone of our family’s medicine chest, I am especially grateful for the ease and convenience of individually bagged, high-quality herbal tea blends available from folks like Traditional Medicinals. We sweeten our herb teas with a bit of raw honey or with Beeyoutiful’s de-bittered liquid Stevia. Just a couple drops of Stevia is all it takes to gently enhance the flavor of a large mug of tea and the 1-ounce bottle lasts a surprisingly long time considering how much we use it around here.

This week, I reluctantly said goodbye to my summer garden. After a long season, it was time to rip the corn stalks, zucchini, squash, and pumpkin plants out and put them on my wanna-be compost pile. Still very much a novice gardener under some serious restraints- lack of space, not much money to spend on equipment and garden infrastructure, and a 50/50 natural mix of clay and rocks for soil- I routinely face a challenging garden situation. Nevertheless, for our family budget, I’m convinced that the best way for me to get the organic vegetables we need is to grow them ourselves.

Steve braces himself for the coming storm of work whenever I get that gardening-bug look on my face, babble about green houses, as well as soil, and weather conditions, and start pouring over heirloom seed catalogs. Alongside a country road near our house this past spring, we found an intact, abandoned roll of hay that had fallen off the back of someone’s truck. After waiting a couple of weeks to see if the owners would return to get it, we decided it was fair game and hauled the thing home. A $15 ancient tiller got a new lease on life thanks to the brilliant mechanical abilities of my brother. It wheezed out three small plots and churned a thick layer of hay into the top stratum of our rock/clay soil. After two years of doing my best with a measly compost pile and whatever natural, free resources are at hand (mostly leaves gathered from the woods and some grass clippings) I’m delighted to report that I have what can pass as a layer of topsoil. Instead of the pale, gray-toned clay we started with, the soil in snow a nutty brown color and in some places starting to look quite rich.

My summer garden this year had a few successes, some very disappointing failures, and a lovely surprise at the end. The cabbage became the favorite buffet of every worm and bug in the area and the creatures selfishly didn’t leave enough for us humans to enjoy. My tomatoes tried their best but were so poorly maintained (I can’t imagine whose fault that might have been?) they produced little more than some red garnish for a salad here and there. And I suspect the corn was offended over the soil I subjected it to. It grew barely more than three feet tall and produced such scrawny ears that they weren’t even worth the time to harvest.

The major disappointment of the year, though, came from what I thought would be my crowing achievement. In the plot I had set aside for zucchini, squash, pumpkins, watermelons, and cucumbers, a huge jungle grew, completely spilling over its assigned borders and tumbling down the hill through our yard. Pleased at first, I harvested and froze lots and lots of zucchini. Then disaster struck. My ne’er do well pumpkins cross-pollinated with every other plant in the vicinity. Instead of watermelons, we grew a bizarre, seedless hybrid that boasted of the juice and texture of a watermelon with a deceptive watermelon-ish exterior but the color and flavor of pumpkin. While I took solace in the few pumpkins that managed to develop into their intact pumpkin form, I had to banish to the compost pile every one of my weird but lovely amalagmations I dubbed Cantumpkins and Pumkimelons.

My experiment with heirloom Asian pole beans saved the season. Although, it too nearly ended in disaster when my rigged string support system collapsed, the beans themselves were so long they were almost the stuff of science fiction stories!

At Beeyoutiful, we’re always trying to add good products and make the catalog informative, but I’m particularly excited about this issue. Jessica Bischof, the author of a book to help people manage their thyroid and underlying issues, graciously agreed to write a series of articles for our customers. You’ll see from what she reports that millions of Americans have some degree of untreated or under-treated thyroid dysfunction. Even if you don’t have thyroid issues yourself, somebody close to you probably does. I’m starting my own journey towards thyroid and adrenal health and have been looking, not only for a safe thyroid supplement (see page 24), but also for a resource to help me understand health from top to bottom. Jessica’s article has helped me so much!

In an effort to communicate with you more effectively, we’re planning to start a monthly or bi-monthly e-mail newsletter. It will feature articles much like the catalog but also include coupon codes and featured products, as well as information about special package deals. If you want to receive the newsletter, please go to http://www.beeyoutiful.com/newsletter and enter your e-mail address. We promise never to spam your account or sell your e-mail address to anybody else.

The time has come for me to power-down my laptop, and myself, and join Steve and Noelle for some rest. May you and your families be blessed with peace and good health through the coming fall and winter months. Please contact us if there is any way we can help or encourage you and your family.

Until next time,

Steph (steph@beeyoutiful.com)

Health

Miracle Dust – Summer 2009 Catalog

Posted on September 7, 2009 by stevetallent Leave a comment

Miracle Dust

By Stephanie Walker Tallent

Before marriage, I knew nothing about activated charcoal. When my husband Steve and I were first married, he had a big container of the loose, tarry-black and very messy looking powder in his bare bones of bachelor medicine cabinet. He mentioned that it was really great stuff. “Ick” was all I could think the first time I opened the container and tried to picture actually eating any of the grainy stuff. I had no way of knowing then that this amazing substance would earn my heartfelt respect and a permanent place of honor in our medicine cabinet for all time!

One particular event in our lives caused me to gain firsthand experience with activated charcoal. Until last summer I didn’t have a thing against spiders. As far as I was concerned, all spiders and I had a mutual contract. The terms of our agreement were that they stay out of my way and quietly eat flies, and I would not squish them. Live and let live. Spider Kind very nicely honored our unspoken understanding until that fateful summer day.

“Ouch” I thought, feeling a twinge on my leg as I got dressed one morning. “Wonder what that was?” Looking at my calf, I didn’t see anything and, after a quick brushing down just to make sure nothing was there, proceeded on with my day. Several hours later, I started to feel kind of odd, like I might be coming down with the flu. A bit later, I began to notice a rather dull ache in my calf. It finally bothered me enough to take a look. A raised pustule and a swollen area that looked like a huge fire ant bite explained the irritation. Puzzled, due to the fact that I had been nowhere near fire ants or any other biting bug, insect, or creepy crawly, I began searching the list of symptoms and pictures of bites.

A few websites and book resources later, I came to the unpleasant conclusion that I had been bitten by a spider, likely a Brown Recluse. After talking to a couple of medical professionals, it was explained to me that, since I had neither seen nor caught the horrible beast that had so generously decided to bestow it’s poison upon my leg, my treatment options at the ER would be limited. I learned that the poisons of the Brown Recluse and Black Widow are bacteria based venoms that rapidly erode skin (my skin in this case) and cause the classic “crater” sign of poisonous spider bites. There are anti-venoms for these spider’s bites but, without a positive identification, the ER would not be able to give me a specific anti-venom treatment because the risk for side effects was too great. All they would be able to do is administer a broad spectrum antibiotic.

After carefully weighing my options and taking into consideration that the bite was not near any major arteries or blood vessels (thus making it less likely for the poison to spread to the main parts of my body), I decided to try some treatments at home while carefully monitoring the situation. My ever helpful and wonderful husband Steve aided me in figuring out a treatment protocol. I immediately and aggressively started taking every immune boosting supplement Beeyoutiful carries and, in addition to that, added the following:

– 1 Clove of Raw Garlic, finely chopped (and eaten every hour to act as a powerful, natural, broad spectrum antibiotic)

– 1 Capsule or tablet of Activated Charcoal, taken internally to bind with the poison in my system as my body tried to flush it out (alternating times with the garlic and other supplements so that it did not bind with the supplements and render them less effective)

– A straight essential oil blend applied directly to the bite every other hour (recipe in side bar)

– Activated Charcoal paste/poultice applied every other hour, alternating with the essential oil so that the charcoal would not bind with the oil and make it less effective.

I was happy to discover that charcoal not only comes in the large loose quantities that are ideal for poultice making, but also in capsules and tablets, which makes it tremendously easier for those of us with texture sensitivities to swallow.

The following few days were very rough. I got as sick as I have ever gotten before in my life and ran a high fever for three days. The bite, however, never appeared to be infected and we carefully cleaned away the corroded tissue to help prevent any secondary infection. Never have I been more grateful for Steve and his calm helpfulness! From the pictures I could find, I knew that my bite was doing amazingly well compared to most that were treated the traditional way in the hospital. The erosion of the flesh was not nearly as severe as most Brown Recluse bites get.

On day four, my fever broke and I felt immensely better. The erosion of the skin stopped. Now, the only thing I have to remember the whole experience by is a small scar on my calf that looks as though I caught a stray BB. My brother assures me that it is a very cool look, like I might have been shot…even if it was by a BB. I choose to think of it as a trophy commemorating the first time I have been able to deal with a very serious health problem using exclusively all natural products and remedies at home.

A couple of months after my incident with a Brown Recluse, my brother-in-law Paul had the misfortune to encounter one as well. His bite was far more severe than mine and in a more dangerous location, near his femoral artery. This bite location put his whole body in great danger should the poison spread even one inch too far in the wrong direction. His wife, Steph, started putting recommended essential oils on it and, on the advice of his doctor, he immediately started taking a powerful antibiotic. Although this helped with his systemic reaction to the bite, it did not seem to help the actual bite location very much at all, and it continued to spread and deteriorate. Since Steve and I still had most of the natural supplies on hand with which to wage war on the venom, Paul’s wife Steph packed their family up and made the several hour trip to our house.

As we worked to formulate the oil mixtures and mix and prepare the poultices, Steph and I joked about opening an in-home Emergency Spider Treatment Facility. We set timers and were very careful to alternate his charcoal treatments, both internal and external, with the essential oils applications and his antibiotic and other internal immune boosting products.

Due to the very dark and very fine nature of activated charcoal powder, some warn that use of the charcoal with an injury or bite can permanently “tattoo” the damaged skin. The concern is that, as the wound heals, it traps some of the charcoal under the skin resulting in a darkish tint. This is something to keep in mind and an incentive to keep a wound well flushed out between charcoal poultice applications. I personally did not experience any charcoal tinting of my scar and neither did Paul. Even if we had, I would still feel that the risk of a slightly darker scar is very much worth the amazing benefits of using the activated charcoal.

Within 24 hours of starting the activated charcoal and essential oil treatment, the continued deterioration of Paul’s bite had halted, and by 48 hours, it looked incredibly better. Much of the inflammation and swelling had gone down and the necrosis of the flesh stopped. We marveled again at how phenomenally well and fast these amazing had products worked.

Inspired by our rather dramatic experiences, I was encouraged to start researching more about this marvelous substance. I found that activated charcoal is beneficial for a staggering array of ailments and maladies, both internally and externally. It is safe not only for very small children, but also animals. As I learned more, I became increasingly convinced that this is a product that no home should be without.

One of the recommendations I read was in regard to how effective it is for individuals who suffer with extremely severe acid reflux or other acid related stomach problems. The charcoal binds with the extra acid providing immediate relief when taken as needed. Intrigued by this information and wondering just how well it worked, all I needed was a guinea pig to try my new favorite product on. An ideal test subject presented itself in our Dr. Pepper loving, coffee drinking, severe acid reflux and bleeding-stomach-ulcer suffering cowboy friend. He was on two strong prescription medications to help with his acid problems, yet he still suffered on a regular basis from the symptoms. Some meals were pure misery for him, sometimes for hours afterward. Pretty much willing to try anything at that point, he was elated and not a little surprised by how rapidly the activated charcoal tablets neutralized and, in time, eliminated any after-mealtime acid related pain. He has let his prescriptions expire and keeps a bottle of activated charcoal on hand for any unexpected flare ups.

My husband Steve’s family has successfully used activated charcoal for years in treating stomach viruses, diarrhea and food poisoning. I found out that, because of its amazing ability to bind with such a broad spectrum of toxins and poisons activated charcoal is often used in Emergency Rooms if poisoning of some kind is suspected.

Even some of the most miserable side-effects from dietary cleanses can be mitigated with the internal use of activated charcoal. Richard Kaufman, PhD is a bio-nutritional chemist. He states, “Activated charcoal can be an effective adjunct to any regimen for the treatment of systemic Candida albicans infections.” The toxins produced by Candida, absorbed by the blood and carried throughout the body are effectively absorbed by charcoal. When, as a result of successful treatment of Candida Albicans overgrowth, there is a large die off of yeast cells, there can be a severe, short term aggravation of Candida symptoms due to the increased amount of toxins produced by the dying bacteria. Taking activated charcoal is one option for alleviating the symptoms of yeast die-off so that the cleanse can be continued and the individual not suffer.” Dr. Kauffman suggests 20-35 grams of activated charcoal a day in divided dosages on an empty stomach until the problem is eliminated. The larger amount should be taken for more severe situations. Activated charcoal should not be taken internally within 2 hours of supplements or medications.

An excellent resource on the subject is Charcoal Remedies: The Complete Handbook of Medicinal Charcoal and Its Applications, by John Dinsley. This is the most complete and thorough how-to guide for the safe and practical use of activated charcoal that I have been able to find anywhere. I suggest requesting it at your local library if they do not already have it or, if you find the information it contains as valuable as we have, purchasing a copy for yourself to have on hand.

Charcoal products offered at Beeyoutiful.com:

Activated Charcoal- capsules

Activated Charcoal- powder, 10 oz.

Charcoal Remedies – book

Charcoal Colic Calm Gripe Water

Bamboo Charcoal Unscented Soap