Anna Liisa Land

Well, due to working 2 jobs at once and general fatigue, I have not blogged about the bath and body products for some time, but I do have a few new ones to tell you about that are my recent favorites:

A. I've mentioned them in 2 previous posts now, but in case you don't ever read those posts, my favorite new bath product is the line of bath teas by Lavender Moon, which you can purchase at the Newberry's Antiques store on Potomac Street in Brunswick or online at http://www.lavendermoonsoap.com/. These handmade bath teas smell nice and subtle, rinse clean, and relax you after a long, stressful day. My favorites are gardenia and honeysuckle.

B. If you want to smell like Hawaii, try Ile de Tahiti Moana Body Wash with Tiare Flower. I love all things tiki and tropical, so I was immediately drawn to this product, and I adore the intense, sugary scent, which lingers nicely on the skin without being overbearing or cloying. I got mine at Bath and Body Works.

C. Summer's heat and humidity makes me break out on both my face and elsewhere, so I need an effective yet gentle scrub to keep it at bay. I finally found my wonder product (it definitely delivers on its promises, and it even leaves my nose feeling soft and silky), but I have to warn you, it's pricy. It's so expensive I can't afford the full size, but I went with the small size, and let me tell you, it works great without overdrying the skin. I will at least buy a small size Murad Acne Body Wash every summer--a little bit goes a long way, and one tube should be enough to get me through the worst of the hot season. (Budget back up: St. Ives Apricot Scrub.) 

So, I'm supposed to tell you about 1 product per month, so I have officially caught up to....March. OK, so my goal is to blog about 3 more bath and body products by the end of June. Can I do it? Umm, I'm not sure. I have endless amounts of bath and body products I love, but time is the critical factor. We'll see what I can pull off.

So today I found what has to be Brunswick's best dessert: the $5 chocolate lava cake with vanilla ice cream at Beans in the Belfry. Imagine a petite moist chocolate cupcake with gooey fuge sauce inside, heated up until the chocolate lava bursts forth to mingle with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream. Even on a hot day, this combination of warm and cool elements works. I have yet to find a better, fresher dessert in Brunswick. And as barista Amy pointed out, you can go to chain restaurants and pay more for the same dessert, or you can just walk down to Beans and shell out a mere $5.

I also finally had a chance to poke into Newberry's Antiques on Potomac Street, which is run by the kind folks who used to run Ekster Scandinavian antiques in Leesburg, VA. Their Newberry's space in Brunswick is much larger and filled with beautiful decor items both new and old. I especially love the large mercury glass sconces that can be placed on the floor or on large dining room tables. I didn't have enough money to buy much there today, but I recommend you take a peek inside if you live in Brunswick. I especially recommend all of the lavender products: candles, lotions, sachets, sprigs, lip balm, etc. And then, my favorite item at Newberry's: Lavender Moon bath tea sachets, which I blogged about earlier. Lavender Moon had to close its Leesburg retail location but it still exists online, and I recommend its affordable, clean rinsing bath teas in honeysuckle, ginger lime, and milk and honey. They make your bath smell fresh and yummy without turning it funky colors or leaving you with a sticky film on your skin like some bath salts do.

As noted in the blog post below, we also went to the Brunswick Farmer's Market, to be held every Sunday afternoon from 1 PM until 4 PM (so you can sleep in late and still come down to do your shopping). We walked to the market and bought local goods including honey and zucchini, and it felt nice to buy fresh produce without using a drop of gasoline in the process. Tomato season starts in about 2 weeks so get ready for the market to have tomatoes and more as June turns into July. The market location, however, is moving from the city hall parking lot to the train station parking lot, so check it out one of these upcoming Sundays.

Happy Father's Day, all you Dads out there! A special shout out to all the military Dads who can't be with their kids today. Thanks for serving! You are appreciated.

My own father passed away in 2003 but I am convinced he is up in heaven having a good time and joking with his buddies over a heavenly beer. If your Dad is still alive today, call him. Call him even if you have a rocky relationship. My father and I used to fight like cats and dogs but we were able to patch things up in time to enjoy some time together before he died. How do you patch things up? By purposefully choosing to forgive and forget the majority of events that have transpired. You won't be able to ever forgive and forget everything, but you can in many cases forgive and forget enough to forge a rewarding relationship with whatever time you two have left.

In terms of updates...I am still alive. I am still working two jobs and gradually transitioning away from the job I have held for half a decade. I can't leave people in the lurch, so a suddent departure was not possible. This is more of a gradual weaning away. At any rate, my last day is July 16 or prior, because on July 17 I fly to Finland to see the family.

Thanks everyone for the camera ideas and tips and keep 'em coming! I still have not bought a new camera to replace the old Nikon Coolpix P2.

The cats are better now. We worried about Kahlua for awhile--she was coughing up mucus--but all the online vet websites say this was probably related to hairballs. She is a medium haired compulsive groomer so that makes sense that hairballs would be the culprit again.

Today I went to the Brunswick Farmer's Market in the City Hall parking lot and loved it. You can still go today--it is open until 4 PM. I got locally grown honey, a goat's milk lotion bar, a zucchini, a pint of strawberries, and a lavender plant. Next week the market moves to the larger railroad parking lot. Go! There is lots of yummy stuff on sale for cheap including cookies and snack mixes!

Ok, I am going to Finland in July and I want to document all the things I love there with a solid, dependable digital camera. The camera I own now is OK, but the damn rechargeable batteries keep fading out on me so fast! I typically have to charge three of them just to take photos for one day. Do any of you Voxers or Brunswickians have a recommendation for a good camera that has a decent battery life? I keep running out of power right in the middle of events I want to document. It's frustrating. I want something better to take with me to Finland. My budget is definitely $300 or below--I don't have the money for an uber-SLR right now, although that is certainly on my life's wish list.

Well, I've been gone awhile from Vox due to being overburdened by work and personal obligations, but tonight I am trying to play catch-up a little bit.

It's wild rose and honeysuckle season here, and we have been blessed with a cool May instead of a hot, humid May like we usually get in the Mid-Atlantic, so I've been able to drive around with the car windows down, which lets me smell the wildflowers growing by the roadside. Yum.

I have finished a lot of work in my back garden recently, although if you eyed it today, you would wonder what I was talking about because the recent rains turned it into a bit of a jungle. Nevertheless, I got a lot of new stuff planted and tonight I harvested my first pint of strawberries from the backyard.

Tickets have been purchased for my July trip to Finland to go see the family. Yay! The only down side is I can't take my husband and son with me this time. But plans are being set in motion to go to Finland with them in 2010. I am trying to get back to Finland every other year to stay close with the family. Plus I just love the country, the food, the sights, the saunas, the strawberries, the cobblestoned streets of old Porvoo, the ice cream, the modern designs, the Karelian pastries, and the vivid colors of summer in Finland, among many other things. I miss Finland sometimes. I know in some ways, with me being a hybrid mutt like I am, I am neither a real child of Finland nor a real child of the USA, but in other ways I belong to both places at once. Identity can be perplexing.

I hope to blog about some of my favorite new stuff soon as well as the recent charities we have supported. But in the mean time here's a quick set of 3 new favorites I discovered recently:

1. Bath tea sachets from Lavender Moon in Leesburg, Virginia: affordable, handmade, yummy-scented and relaxing bath salt mixes in scents like ginger lime and lilac.

2. The mouthwatering Wild Berry Salad in season now at Lightfoot restaurant in Leesburg--a perfect balance of sweet and tart.

3. Flautas from La Paz restaurant in Frederick--finally, some non-spicy yet thoroughly flavorful Mexican fare for a Scandi-girl with a spice-sensitive stomach. Intense tomato flavor combined with the gooey texture I love. Look, you kids who adore painfully spicy foods have plenty of places to eat at, but what about a chick like me with a sensitive gut? The flautas at La Paz let me indulge my love of tomato without pain.

 Anyway, I hope to blog more soon and get some of my photos developed and posted here to show how spectacular the spring/ early summer have been here in Brunswick.

"Around on You" lyrics by Screeching Weasel:

you think you've got something over

some kinda thing over me

well there's gonna come a day

when i can leave it all behind

if you'd open up your eyes you'd see

that doing all the stupid things that you do

means there's gonna come a day

when you're gonna fade away

and it's gonna come around on you

"There are men so incorrigibly lazy that no inducement that you can offer will tempt them to work; so eaten up by vice that virtue is abhorrent to them, and so inveterately dishonest that theft is to them a master passion. When a human being has reached that stage, there is only one course that can be rationally pursued. Sorrowfully, but remorselessly, it must be recognized that he has become lunatic, morally demented, incapable of self-government, and that upon him, therefore, must be passed the sentence of permanent seclusion from a world in which he is not fit to be at large."

William Booth