Featuring more than 100 step-by-step recipes, The Beeswax Workshop presents easy-to-follow recipes that utilize the amazing flexibility of beeswax for crafting safe, highly effective home products. From lotions and salves to candles and cleaners, this book shows you how to make organic alternatives to chemical-laden store-bought items. You will love stocking first aid kits with natural sunburn salve and antimicrobial ointment; making beeswax-based beauty products such as lip balm, blush, perfume, shampoo, and hair pomade; and even waterproofing gardening tools and camping equipment. The Beeswax Workshop provides you with a wonderful collection of new and creative ways to use sustainable beeswax.

In this interactive workbook, filled with helpful checklists and worksheets, Gary will guide you toward identifying an ideal off-the-grid set up that suits your budget and desires so you can begin living the life you want!

Great formulas for all sorts of skin conditions, from dry to oily and from young to old.

Health-enhancing oils from around the world form the base for all natural cosmetics. With these easy-to-follow recipes and widely available natural ingredients, creating effective, soothing and above all natural creams, balms, face and body oils, exfoliating scrubs, shampoos, shower and bath gels and lip balms is easier than ever.

Mar Gomez features really lovely oils such as monoi oil (a coconut and flower oil that is a staple in beauty and skin regimens in Tahiti), soy oil, nut oils (such as macadamia, almond and peanut), seed oils (such as sesame, hemp, pumpkin seed and flax) and some really beautiful exotic natural oils such as piqui, andiroba, prickly pear seed, tamanu and argan.

All these oils have wonderful skin-care properties, and there are specific formulas for all sorts of skin conditions, from dry to oily, from acne-prone to wrinkled, from young to old.

Each formula is very easy to make and only requires normal kitchen equipment and a good scale. There are formulas for anti-aging creams, firming recipes to fight against cellulite, freckle- and spot-removing oil, moisturizing facial wrinkle cream, anti-dandruff shampoos and many others.

Making luxurious, heavenly-smelling homemade cosmetics is surprisingly simple and satisfying with this book.

Rainfall levels are rarely optimal, but there are hundreds of things you can do to efficiently conserve and use the water you do have and to reduce the impact of drought on your soil, crops, livestock, and farm or ranch ecosystem.

An EcoNest is not just a home … it is a breathtakingly beautiful structure that nurtures health and embraces ecology. This unique approach to construction combines light straw clay, timber framing, earthen floors, natural plasters and other natural techniques with the principles of building biology to create a handcrafted living sanctuary. By bringing together time-honored traditions and modern innovations, owners of EcoNests enjoy living spaces that reflect the best of both worlds.

The EcoNest Home is an in-depth exploration of the benefits of choosing this technique over conventional alternatives, combined with a complete practical guide for prospective designers and builders. Authors Paula Baker-Laporte and Robert Laporte draw on their own extensive experience to provide:

• A detailed explanation of the nature-based science behind EcoNests.
• Fully illustrated, step-by-step instructions to guide you through construction.
• Dozens of inspiring photos of completed projects.

The most comprehensive, North American resource on light straw clay construction, written by its leading proponents, The EcoNest Home is a must-read for anyone considering building their own healthy, affordable, environmentally friendly, natural home.

Create beautiful, natural soaps without leaving home!

Ever wonder what's really in your store-bought soap? Once you start making your own soap, you'll never have to wonder again! The Everything Soapmaking Book, 3rd Edition is a comprehensive guide to making all kinds of soap, whether you want to decorate your home or pamper your skin or your family's skin. Homemade soap is not only an easy project for any level of craft lover, but it's beautiful, too!

Completely revised and updated with information on natural and organic ingredients, this easy-to-use guide shows you how to:

• Choose the right soapmaking equipment
• Blend colors and aromatic scents
• Create all kinds of soap, from bath soap to facial cleanser
• Make soaps for holidays and special occasions

Written by a celebrated floral designer and lavishly illustrated with full-color photography, this book provides step-by-step instructions for 50 stunning floral projects from simple to spectacular and equips readers with the skills to customize arrangements at home. Whether hosting a party, helping out with a friend’s wedding, or wishing to incorporate the beauty of flowers into everyday life, The Flower Workshop allows you to create dazzling arrangements that go beyond merely pretty and into realms of the dramatic, the unexpected, and sometimes even the magical. Written by a celebrated floral designer and lavishly illustrated with full-color photography, this book not only provides step-by-step instructions for more than forty-five stunning floral projects from simple to spectacular, but also equips you with the skills to customize arrangements at home. Known for her hands-on flower workshops at FlowerSchool New York, Ariella Chezar walks you through the nuts and bolts of creating a variety of small flourishes, tonal arrangements, branch arrangements, handheld bouquets, wreathes, garlands, grand gestures, and more—all accompanied by detailed photography. Chezar offers advice and philosophy on everything from texture and color to foliage and containers, providing an overall approach to living and working with flowers, with an eye toward fresh, local, wild, seasonally influenced floral design. For every occasion, from relaxed and simple to lavish and monumental, The Flower Workshop celebrates the special moments in your life with glorious, fragrant floral arrangements and enhances your surroundings with abundant beauty.

Christophe Pourny learned the art of furniture restoration in his father’s atelier in the south of France. In this, his first book, he teaches readers everything they need to know about the provenance and history of furniture, as well as how to restore, update and care for it—from antiques to midcentury pieces, family heirlooms and funky flea-market finds. The heart of the book is an overview of Pourny’s favorite techniques—ceruse, vernis anglais and water gilding, among many others—with full-color step-by-step photographs to ensure that readers can easily replicate each refinishing technique at home. Pourny brings these techniques to life with a chapter devoted to real-world refinishing projects, from a veneered table to an ebonized desk, a gilt frame to a painted northern European hutch. Rounding out this comprehensive guide is care and maintenance information, including how to properly clean leather, polish hardware, fix a broken leg and replace felt pads, as well as recipes to make your own wax, shellac, varnish, stain, and more.

Country Living magazine knows that beautiful handcrafted accents are as essential a part of a home, sweet home as a comfy cushion to sink into at the end of a long day. Whether it's richly indulgent herbal soaps, vintage-inspired woven pillows, a keepsake family album, or beeswax tapers to illuminate a dinner party, the 75 projects in this varied collection will warm your heart … and give a personal touch to every room in the house.

If you love camping, but you’re tired of sleeping on the ground (or you have a dream of simply checking out and hitting the road), then a teardrop trailer is the perfect DIY project for you. Sleek, nimble, and oh-so-comfortable, a custom-built teardrop trailer lets you escape in head-turning style. Covering everything from sketchbook ideas to the complete step-by-step know-how, The Handmade Teardrop Trailer trains you up like a pro on how to successfully build this iconic camper.