"A week in the life of an ACHS Aromatherapy Instructor"
We have had quite the week here. We had a fun camping trip over the 4th of July holiday weekend, however, within the first five minutes of our arrival at the campsite, Hazel (my 5-year old) managed to fall off a rock and cut her face pretty badly. Fortunately I had my Aromatherapy first aid kit handy, and with regular applications of tea tree oil and my infused calendula oil, her cut is healing quite nicely. And amazingly, even with three days of camping and playing in the dirt, it didn't become infected. The rest of our camping trip was fun and relaxing.
Unfortunately once we got home, in the midst of doing all the camping laundry, our washer died (and it's a Maytag!), and that night, Matt (my 7-year old) was up all night with the stomach flu. I mixed two of the strongest antivirals I know: clove and cinnamon essential oils, and put them in the diffuser. It smelled like Christmas in July here, but thankfully, no one else got sick. Since bad things are supposed to come in 3's, I assumed we were "home free" for a while. Lesson learned: Never assume!
Yesterday we had the invasion of the bees: a swarm of bees moved into our garage, for the second time in a month! By swarm I mean thousands; the first time the exterminator took away a hive with over a pound of honey (two days work for bees), and charged us $400.00. Yesterday they showed up again; in the morning I saw a couple of bees in the front yard and I didn't think too much about it, but two hours later our front yard and inside the garage were covered with a black cloud of bees. So I sent the kids to a friend's house and called the exterminator again. He showed up in his bee keeper/hazmat suit and took care of them in about half an hour (this time for free - thank goodness!). So, of course, what I wanted to know was "why me?". The bee guy said that it's because we've been leaving the garage door open (the kids are around for the summer and they leave it open so they can get their bikes, scooters, etc.) and the bees come in through the open door. But as to what is drawing them in the first place -- he hands me a box with my 5 pound block of bees wax that I use for making creams and lotions! I keep my supplies in a cabinet in the garage, and the bees smelled the bees wax and thought this was a great place to build a hive! Who knew?! Another lesson learned: Don't keep your bees wax where bees have access to it. Sheesh!
Then, Geoff, my oldest, who is in Jr. Lifeguard training, forgot to apply sunscreen yesterday and came home with a terrible sunburn. We've been applying my mixture of jojoba oil, aloe gel, and lavender essential oil, and this morning it looked great!
Thankfully, the Maytag repairman arrived today to fix the washer. Then we discovered that with everything else that was going on, I had forgotten to remove the load of laundry that I was doing on Tuesday when the washer broke. It is amazing how fast a load of wet laundry can grow mold in 90 degree weather. It is even more amazing how quickly tea tree essential oil can kill that mold!
How do people survive without essential oils?
I'm looking forward to a relaxing weekend:) What else could happen, right?!"
Deborah Halvorson, BA, Cert Aroma, RA
deborahhalvorson@achs.edu
