Hello, everyone. It’s Sarah Southwell with groWise be Well on a beautiful summer day. We just had summer solstice this past week, and so we are definitely right smack dab in the middle of this quarter of summer, believe it or not, right? It doesn’t feel like that so much up here in Montana. It feels like we just started summer but it truly is, in the quarters of the year with earth phases, it is truly smack dab in the middle of the summer quarter.

Today, I am really, really excited. I know you guys may find this – I don’t think you’re going to find this boring because I mean, gosh, I don’t know, I’m never boring, am I? Alright, don’t answer that. Please don’t answer that. But I really am excited about some things that are on the horizon for groWise be Well and I want to tell you about them today. 

Today is not so much this big question of what to do, what not to do, and what’s right, what’s wrong. It’s a nice refreshing, summer cooler time where we’re going to stay cool and we’re going to tell you about some amazing, awesome, exciting things that are going on here at groWise be Well. 

I want to start off today with this project that I dreamt up and put together piece by piece over the past year-and-a-half to two years. I’ve been working on this project for a while, it’s taken that long to get all the pieces put together and we’re getting ready to launch it to the world. We are putting all the pieces together by hand and we hope to have it out to people, available to people, by the end of August.

It’s so exciting and it’s almost here. It is called the Roller Friends, and it is a collection of roll-on’s that have one essential oil in them and one crystal. It comes in a box that looks like a book because all of the rollers are named after literary characters or songs, anything that we found could help people or children associate the energies of the crystal oil combination and make sense of it.

It’s a way to help you all learn, what does this crystal really do for me? What does this essential oil really do for me? Oh, it’s named after Despereaux. A character in a movie and book written by Kate DiCamillo called The Tale of Despereaux. This little mouse, he thinks that he’s got great adventures ahead, but no one else seems to think that he does or that he should, that he’s small, and he’s weird looking, and how could he possibly save anyone’s day? 

We labeled one of our rollers The Superhero after Despereaux because he believed in himself so much that he had this super power of confidence that allowed him to go out there and be something he knew he could be. In that roller, there is cinnamon, which is energizing and fortifying and it gently kindles your inner fire. Then, we combined it with gold sheen obsidian, which is a power-up crystal with the ability to help reveal your hidden talents and the untapped superhero potential within all of us.

We made it super simple by deciding to not just call this a cinnamon gold sheen roll-on. We named it after a character that everyone can read about. We are absolutely, by doing this, encouraging parents and anyone who buys these rollers to read the stories that go along with them. 

We even sell the books in our shop that we took the character names out of those stories, because we really truly believe that this is just a multifaceted project and it’s not only going to teach you the power of the crystal, it’s going to teach you the power of the essential oil and it’s going to get you to read. We are really kind of going after many different angles with this product. 

The reason why we chose one essential oil and one crystal was because we don’t want it to be confusing at all. We are really thinking about education. We’re really thinking about helping everyone truly, simply understand what that crystal can do for you and what that essential oil can do for you, and the best way to do that is to keep it simple. 

You’re going to learn to recognize the smell of that particular essential oil and you’re going to learn what it does for you. In this case, when you open up The Superhero roll-on, you are going to smell cinnamon and you’re going to now know, from now on, whenever you smell cinnamon, you’re going to know that that is going to be energizing and fortifying and it will kindle your inner fire. 

Then, whenever you see gold sheen obsidian on a bracelet, in jewelry, just as a palm stone, you’re going to say, “Ah, yeah, I know that. It’s going to help me be a superhero in my own life.” A superhero opens doors for people at the grocery store or the local store and a superhero helps someone if they drop something on the ground, they pick it up for them in return it back to them.

So, there’s so many small ways to be a superhero in your everyday life that may mean the world to whoever it is that you’re helping. You’re going to now know that cinnamon is going to help with that and gold sheen obsidian is going to help with that.

There are a lot of other crystals and there are a lot of other essential oils that will also help with that, but let’s not make it confusing. Let’s not overwhelm you. Let’s help you understand what is going to work right from the start and how can you just get going?

We don’t need to sell you an entire rack of essential oils and then give you a big old book that you have to read. We can really make it easy for people to understand and for children to start to learn about these tools. I call them tools but, really, they’re elements. They’re part of our planet that are here to assist us.

They are our allies, they’re our friends in life and they truly are just waiting for us to look over and say, “Ah, hey, could you help me with this?” Because if we know one simple thing, it’s like wild crafting herbs. If you know a handful of herbs that can do, “Oh, that one can calm me and that one could help my tummy,” you’re going to be all right. 

You don’t need to know every single herb in your backyard or in the forest. You don’t. You can literally be drawn to very specific things that you need and that’s what it’s all about, is really getting to know these allies we have right here on our planet. These Roller Friends are amazing because they are beautiful. 

We have these bright color caps. They are in glass roller jars so you can see the crystals inside. The label is bright colored and lovely, it’s on one side of the roller and, guess what? I even went a step further. I couldn’t stop myself because I did find them after I scoured the earth it felt like. I found enough roller heads that were specialty gemstone roller heads that were able to match up some of the crystals that are in the rollers with the roller head. It’s just like double the power.

It’s pretty fun. There are a lot of pieces that go into this; that gemstone roller head, the crystal chips that go inside, the essential oil inside. It’s not just pure essential oil by the way, we put organic MCT oil in it, which is a coconut oil. It’s a multi-chain triglyceride oil, and we put that in there because it has absolutely no effect on, or should I say, any negative effect on sensitive skin, but it helps dilute the oil enough to where it’s safe to roll these oils on your skin.

Please, always do a little skin test and make sure that you’re not going to react to anything, but everything we put into these, all the oils, the essential oils, the MCT oil, it’s organic. It’s all organic. It is all free of chemicals and pesticides because, of course, I personally cannot create a product that would use an element that has been spoiled by those chemicals and I couldn’t support that industry.

These things are amazing. It’s a trilogy, actually. There are three book boxes and in each book box, there are eight rollers, inside each book box, which is amazing. You’re getting a lot in each book. You can buy the books individually or you can buy them as the trilogy. So, it’s really neat.

I don’t want to talk anymore about it because I feel like I’ll just go on and on about it because I love them. Check us out on Instagram, check out some videos and vlogs I might do, showing you the product but we’ll go into presale in August. There are only 1,000 of this by the way. There’s only 1,000. 

I can’t make anymore right now. When we sell out of these, we sell out and I will have to find a manufacturer who can use our ingredients and make them for us in the future because these are very intensive to put together. I don’t know if I mentioned but we are putting them together by hand.

We have a team here that has all pitched in and helped fill each of the rollers with the crystals and the MCT and the essential oil and then you pop the roller head on and then you put the label on and then you put the cap on and then you put it in the box. So, it’s a time intensive project and to find the crystal chips and the roller heads has been a real challenge. 

Right now, we only have 1,000 of each of the three boxes but, if you buy the trilogy, that’s going to take up one of those boxes out of the individual pool for sales. So, gosh, it could even seem like less than that once we get the trilogies together but, right now, it’s 1,000 of each that we’re making. 

There’s eight rollers in each. When you’re done, you’re going to have 24 rollers, which is amazing. That’s a really nice collection and then you can travel with those if you put them in little pouch. But right now, they’re in this book box that you can put right on your shelf and pull it off when you need it. They are magical, so definitely be on the lookout for those. 

Another thing we have coming up, hopefully by the end of the year is an app. We’re doing an app. We’re working on a groWise be Well App and I just am really excited about this. We should probably should have done this a long time ago. I’m realizing now, after having the website up for a year, that people don’t really go to websites much anymore. 

I mean, it’s been very hard for me to realize that because websites, they’re so large. I mean, you can fit a lot of content in a website. You can fit a lot of graphics. We have our shop on our website, but I’m finding that I really think people are more mobile with their communication style and their connection. I want to be where you all are at, so we’re creating this app that you can download on to any device and it is going to offer all kinds of activities and information by month. 

There are subjects like crystals or earth phases and even a book club but it’s going to then, once you click on that button for that subject matter, there is even one for cooking, then you’re going to get 12 month buttons. You’re going to click on one of those months and, when you pull it up, you’re going to find, “Oh, okay, in June, we’re talking about the sun and we’re talking about fruits and maybe grilling something outside.” 

We’re talking about a book that might be something about getting organized and getting cleaned up, right? Getting ready to really produce because, really, the rest of the summer is kind of about this reaping the harvest and being super active, but you are going to get information by month, so that you can plan your get-togethers, your celebrations. 

You can actually look ahead and say, “Okay, so I want to look at the astrology write up for December because I am I thinking about traveling,” or “I am thinking about buying a house,” or whatever a decision is that’s coming up for you in December. You might want to just go ahead and look at that. Our astrology write-up by the way is done in-house. It super down to earth, super friendly. 

We do not list every single planet and meteor in the sky. I find some of them are too much for me because I’m not heavy into my knowledge of astrology. Sometimes, I get really bogged down with them telling me the positions of all the planets. Ours doesn’t do that. Ours is really simple and very down to earth. It’s very much like what you would want your friend to tell you about. It’s very friendly

So you could look that up. You could say, “Okay, well, gosh. It’s December. What’s it looking like? Oh okay, all right, Mercury is not in retrograde so maybe I can make that big decision in December.” So, anyway, it’s really, really exciting because I have contributing writers from the groWise be Well team. We’re all writing different parts of the content for the app and we’re super jazzed about getting people to start orienting their lives in an earth phase way, really getting aligned with the cycles of the earth instead of the Roman calendar.

When we started making it, when we started creating the content, we ourselves were so imbedded in the Roman calendar that we thought, “Oh well, okay, so we start in January.” No, no we don’t. We actually start, believe it or not, in November. 

You’ll find out all these information in the app but what you’ll see is that, if you go way back to Celtic, ancient Celtic times, they divided their year into two halves. Six months were the light time of the year and then the other six months were what they considered the dark time of the year.

That is exactly what we’re aiming to help people understand is really how the earth moves with the moon and the sun, how we have this place in it, and how it affects us and if we try and just march along to a Roman calendar that really doesn’t take into account how the earth moves, then we’re kind of resisting, always resisting this flow of the earth, of the planet, and we are very much aligned with the planet. We’re trying to get everybody into the flow. 

The app is going to have all the months on there but it is going to start with November. You might be confused at first but our year really starts with November because that’s when it really starts. October, it signifies the end. It’s like a death of something by the end of October and then November is kind of the first day of the light time of the year. 

Anyway, it’s very exciting. We are also coming out with a magazine and that as well is going to be a biannual magazine. It is only going to get printed twice a year and it’s going to be a light time of the year and the dark time of the year and you’re going to find that – oh, I’m sorry. I misspoke earlier. It starts in November 1^st with the dark time of the year. It starts with the dark time and then of course, the light time is after May, just to correct that.

The magazine is going to – the first one that gets put out, it would start in November, December, January, February, March, and April. It would cover those months and that’s the dark time of the year, the dark half and then, we of course go in May, into the light half. We’re going to be putting those out twice a year and it’s going to have very similar content to what’s in the app but there’s going to be graphics, there might be tear outs, or there might be things that you can keep to use in the coming months or even next year.

That is very, very exciting. I have really wanted to figure out a way to reach out to everybody and help them know some of the things that we all know around here and that we practice and that we read from the books on the shelves here at the shop and I think that this is a great way to do it. 

I’m sure there will be some other ideas that pop into my mind over the next few months about how also to reach out to you and maybe even give you kits to be able to work the earth phases such as summer solstice. Then, you would have not so much a kit but a little booklet that might give you a lot of great ideas of how you can celebrate the sun, because that’s what summer solstice is all about. 

We have some great things coming out. Like all projects, you always hope that they come out when they’re supposed to. If you don’t see the groWise be Well Magazine on your store shelf in November or December of this year, hang tight because we will be launching it. Sometimes, things happen. I have to kind of just allow the things that come along because I think it means that it’s giving me time to make them better. 

If for some reason you don’t see it on the shelf, please ask your local bookstore if they can get it in and we would definitely have it ready to launch by April, for sure, of 2023 but just be a little patient. This is our first time out and I want it to be great. I just want you guys to love it. So on another note, we also have our in-house herbalist, MacKenzie Rochester, she is constantly coming up with new ideas for products for people to use and classes to teach. 

She is an amazing herbal teacher. I have to say that I have met a lot of herbalists in my life and a lot of them are wonderful, amazing, knowledgeable people, but they aren’t necessarily good at teaching. They, of course, commune with the plants. It is kind of hard for them to commune with humans sometimes, but MacKenzie, she bridges both world beautifully and she’s got classes coming up on the horizon. 

She is even thinking about an herbal certificate program, which I love. Definitely check the website and of course, when the app launches, we will have it on there as well and you can check in for what the schedules would be for those but I wanted to tell you about some products that we are coming out with here in the next couple of weeks. One is a spider shield, you keep the creepy crawlies away. 

I came up with this recipe years ago and I think MacKenzie has tweaked it and made it even better because my children, we have Hobos here in Montana and not the kind that jump on the trains and travel across the country. They’re spiders and they love to come inside in nice, cool, dark places, like piles of stuffed animals and beds, and they have been known to bite people and what happens where the bite occurs is that there is a necrosis that happens almost like a brown recluse. 

There is a necrosis that happens to the skin where it starts to die away and you get a hole there, right? It’s not pretty. It’s not good. It’s not recommended that you take chances of getting bit by a Hobo. So, we tend to use this spider shield and I spray it all around their beds and wherever it’s needed and it really, really works, so that’s coming out. 

We’ve got a bite and sting repair clay. I will say that I don’t just use this for bites and stings. I use this for cracked heels. I use it for any wound. I put it on open wounds and it heals open wounds, or I’m sorry, is that against the FDA for me to say that? It helps your body heal, should I say. It’s amazing. It’s cooling and then the clay draws out any infection or any bite and it is just phenomenal. I love it. 

No Bugs On Me spray, it is a bug repellant and who doesn’t need an all-natural organic bug repellent that works? This one is a combination of a recipe that I used and then, of course, MacKenzie always – I kind of like throw out these things, I bring in some recipes and I say, “Okay, this is what I’ve done in my own herbal apothecary,” and then of course, she tweaks it and makes it better. 

I am sure she’s done that here as well but I made two different sprays a few years ago because we like to go huckleberry picking up here and, when you go huckleberry picking, you need to get out there early before the horseflies come around but when you go out early, there’s mosquitoes. I have to have two different sprays; one for mosquitoes and then one for horseflies and I got to tell you, they worked wonderfully. 

Well, she’s combined them together. So, that’s what it’s in our No Bugs On Me and I think it’s going to be awesome. I cannot wait to get my hands on it to be honest with you because huckleberry season is coming up and then we got an energy clearing spray, which is white sage and lavender and it’s black tourmaline infused. 

In case you want to clear the energy like you would with a sage wand and you can’t light anything on fire or have smoke in your apartment or hotel room, you can take this energy clearing spray and all the previous energy in that room or around you is cleared. It’s gone. I love that one. 

Then, we have of course, the after sun spray, calm and cool that sun-scorched skin. So, this is going to be really good to use if you just accidentally lose track of the time and go inside and find yourself beet-red. Definitely get some of that and spray it all over you. Those are very exciting, they’re coming out very soon. I have myself not even been able to get my hands on them and I can’t wait. 

Anyway, I think I wasted, I don’t know about wasted but, I mean, I have taken a lot of your time today telling you about what is going on with groWise be Well. I know, sometimes, I get on this podcast and I just talk about some ethical or moral or philosophical subjects and I wanted to let you know that we actually do stuff around here and there’s some really fun stuff coming out. Sometimes, it just takes a long time for us to get the pieces to get it out to you. 

Keep looking out on Instagram and TikTok and YouTube and Facebook for any updates and images of these products that are coming out to you all. Alright, happy summer, everybody. We’ll talk to you next time. Bye. 

Thank you again for tuning in. If you’ve missed any of the previous podcasts or just want to listen to some of them over and over again, which I hope you do, please go to our website, they’re all there for you and so easy to listen to from that platform, gwbw.com, www.gwbw.com. GroWise be Well, empowering you to live your best life.