This Week's Featured Shop

This week, I am featuring Soap For Your Soul, an all natural soap vendor from Etsy.

Meet Emily, owner and operator of Soap For Your Soul:

I love to make soap. That's about it.  I love the smells, the colors, the designs, the herbs, spices, and the chemistry involved. It's become quite a challenge to make them look like they smell! Mike, my husband, has recently joined me in my passion for saponification. Now he dreams about soap. :) (It's catching, so don't get too close to a soapmaker!) Thanks to our loyal customers, we get to spend every day together in our home with our family making a superior bar of natural soap!

My Aunt learned from the Amish to make soap using tallow, lard and so on....I was intrigued, and being it was 2000, there was very little information available. So I started experimenting...

Soapmaking becomes a passion… If you ever think you might want to just try it, be careful! It's super addicting. "Well, I'll try these scents together", or "Wonder what color this will make my soap?"...That's how it starts. The next thing you know your kitchen turns into one big experimental lab for cooking up new receipes for soap, and your dining room has a soap drying rack built into the wall.

I do love to make the soap. I've been doing it for over 10 years now, and have narrowed my recipes to my family's and customer's favorites. Each bar is truly vegan, handmade by cold process with herbs, essential oils, botanical identicals, and vegetable oils.

As of late, I am making a selection of my peep's <---that's YOU< favorite scents, and have started to play with the color and design aspect of cold process soap...It's my canvas, now, so to speak. I fully intend to continue pushing the boundries of design in cold process soap, while keeping it as organic as possible.

AT HOME:
I love kids, my man and my garden. Mike and I share almost every aspect of running our lives, of which our trade: http://www.etsy.com/SoapForYourSoul is a huge part of. He is my God-send when it comes to "running to town". ~haha

Together we are teaching and passing on our talents and love for the crafts and arts of old. We are also passing the next generation an example of a life more focused on LIVING. :)

Thank you so much for supporting work at home Moms, Independent Artists, and lndie/Cottage businesses! We love Etsy!

By ordering from me, you are allowing me to do what I love to do everyday, while being here with my little one and for that I can never THANK YOU enough!

Love your now~
Peace and Joy to you and yours,

Emily Anne

By email: champachic@yahoo.com

I have two other shops on ETSY.COM
http://www.etsy.com/shop/TheCrochetQueen
http://www.etsy.com/shop/GoodDaySunshineStore
be sure to check them out while you're here!
Soooooooo visit my shop here:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/SoapForYourSoul :)

Zechariah 9:9

Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O Daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King comes to you; He is [uncompromisingly] just and having salvation [triumphant and victorious], patient, meek, lowly, and riding on a donkey, upon a colt, the foal of a donkey.

Featured Shop of 8/1/2011

This week I have chosen Kat Baker Photography from Etsy.com

Meet Kathryn Baker owner of Kat Baker Photography:

Photography has been passion for as long as I can remember. My love for it greatly increased when I received my first digital camera in 2003. Soon, I was finding my "photo victims"....mostly my first child.

Then I went into what my husband lovingly nicknames as "photo junkie" when I finally got my first DSLR camera, an Olympus e420. Nature, family, friends, and even when we attend a NASCAR race, you can bet my camera will be in hand...ready to capture the moment.

Camera of choice:  Canon EOS Rebel T1i DSLR camera and extra long zoom lens 

Week of 7/25 Featured Shop

This week, I have chosen a relatively new shop to Etsy,  Miriel Jewelry.

Meet Sara Valentim, owner of Miriel Jewelry.

There are many things in this world that move me, that make me dream. I'm an earth lover, so I love all the three primary life forms on this planet, nature, animals, and (honest) people.

My influences are Celtic and Nordic cultures and Tolkien. But my biggest influence is all around us, the natural world inspires me every day. Not only for my work, but for my personality as well.

Miriel on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Miriel/219917438037015

Personal Page: http://www.facebook.com/svalentim1

Check us out on Squiddo

Here are the two links to our Squiddo.com pages

http://www.squidoo.com/razieladesigns
http://www.squidoo.com/jewelry-addicts

Week of 7/18 Featured Shop

This week I have chosen SoapSudsBabyDuds to feature:

Meet Christine, owner of SoapSudsBabyDuds:

Hello! I am a stay at home mom of 2 little boys who loves crafting!! I mostly make bath and body products, but I also knit and make various things at my sewing machine. I love what I do and could not imagine doing anything else.  Right now I make soap, sugar scrubs, body butters, and baby ribbon sensory blankets. I hope to have all of these in my shop soon!! Just keep checking back for a variety of new things!

I just started a blog, follow me here to keep up on my new things!!
http://soapsudsbabyduds.blogspot.com

A Godly Woman

What does a Godly woman look like? Who is she? Is she modern or old fashioned? Is she real and if so how can I be like her? Legitimate questions that all women who seek after the heart of God should be asking. These are questions that our young ladies should be asking themselves as they desire and seek to become women after God's own heart.

Proverbs 31:10 tells us that, “A capable, intelligent, and virtuous woman--who is he who can find her? She is far more precious than jewels and her value is far above rubies or pearls” (AMP). The God' s Word translation of the Bible describes this same woman as having a strong character. A Godly woman is a woman of worth, substance, slow to anger and speak, quick to forgive.

A Godly woman's character speaks for itself. People know her by her character or virtue. The book of Ruth talks about this. Boaz addresses Ruth in chapter 3 verse 10 - 11 with this. “And he said, Blessed be thou of the LORD, my daughter: for thou hast shewed more kindness in the latter end than at the beginning, inasmuch as thou followedst not young men, whether poor or rich. And now, my daughter, fear not; I will do to thee all that thou requirest: for all the city of my people doth know that thou art a virtuous woman” (KJV).

The entire town knew Ruth by her actions as being a virtuous woman. Can the world say the same about us?

I believe a Godly women is modest in all she does. She clothes and conducts herself in a manner that is pleasing to the Lord. I believe a Godly woman is a modest woman worthy of the title “Lady”.

My friend, Carmen Bruno posted this list of characteristic of a Godly woman on her blog written by a young man named Luke Otterstad in response to his roomates' questions about what a Godly woman looked like:

1. She handles herself gracefully (Proverbs 11:16)
2. She loves and embraces children (Psalm 113:9, Titus 2:4)
3. She speaks with wisdom (Proverbs 31:26)
4. She has discretion (Proverbs 11:22)
5. She is able to be fully trusted by her husband (Proverbs 31:11)
6. She desires to be her husband’s most faithful companion and closest confidant (Malachi 2:14)
7. She joyfully embraces being a woman and abhors feminism (Psalm 113:9, Romans 12:9)
8. She can manage her home well (Proverbs 31:27, Titus 2:5, 1 Tim 5:14)
9. She is diligent to accomplish anything entrusted to her care (Proverbs 31:13, 1 Tim 5:10)
10. She is firm in her convictions and desires to teach younger women the virtues of godly
womanhood through her example and instruction. (Titus 2:4)
11. She desires for, and encourages men to be leaders in their families, churches and society. (Isaiah 3:12, Eph. 5:23, Titus 1:5-6)
12. She desires to build up and strengthen her home (Proverbs 14:1)
13. She desires to raise and train the next president, not BE the next president (Proverbs 31:1, Isaiah 3:12)
14. She believes children are a blessing from God, not a burden (Deut. 7:14, 33:24, 127:3)
15. She has a humble spirit (1 Peter 3:4)
16. She looks up to, follows, and respects her husband as the leader of the home (1 Cor. 14:35, Eph. 5:33)
17. She has a quiet spirit, and influences others through godly conduct (1 Peter 3:1-2, 4, 1 Tim. 2:12)
18. She desires to be a mother of nations, not a leader of nations (Genesis 24:60)
19. She has a heart to open her home to hospitality and service to others (1 Tim. 5:10)
20. She cares for the saints (1 Tim. 5:10)
21. She is capable and skilled to clothe her family and decorate her home (Prov. 31:21-22)
22. She desires to model the examples of holy women in Scripture (1 Peter 3:5)
23. She has skills to prepare meals for her family and bless others through hospitality (Prov. 31:15)
24. She is able to teach her children with practical, life instruction (Proverbs 31:1, 26, 6:20)
25. She desires to please her husband and do him good all his life (Prov. 31:12, 1 Cor. 7:34)
26. She is able to manage a business from her home (Prov. 31:18)
27. She can be trusted with wise discretion in spending (Prov. 31:16)
28. She cares for the poor and the needy (Prov. 31:20)
29. She clothes herself in modesty and good works and does not desire to attract or distract men’s eyes (1 Peter 3:3-4, 1 Tim. 2:9-10)
30. She has a kind and helpful attitude (Prov. 31:26-27)
31. She is prudent: intelligent, productive, skillful, wise and has understanding (Prov. 19:14)

A woman such as this is priceless: her value is far above rubies. Her husband will exalt her, praise her, love her, give up his life for her, and her children will call her blessed. The man that finds such a woman, is truly undeserving of such an honor, as God has bestowed upon him a blessing only few will find.

As I pondered Otterstad’s list, I wondered what quality I displayed to all of those around me. Is my Godly character evident in my actions, by mannerisms, the way I conduct myself, the way I dress?  I find myself wondering if I measure up and if I ever would.  I know there are areas in my live the are in dire need of improvement, but I am moving forward longing to be a woman after God’s own heart. I pray that each of us, young and old, will ponder this list and take a personal inventory of ourselves.  We must reflect God’s love and character to the world around us if we are to reach them for the Kingdom of God.

List taken from Carmen Bruno's blog Pebble Crossing .