Waconda Springs

I spent all weekend rushing around. Taking care of business. Taking care of our abundant garden.

I spent it so busy that I refused to allow myself time to stop and think. I knew the next few days were dangerous thinking days for me. The busier I was/am, the better off I’d be.

Then I received a message about a soaping friend. Her son who has been terminal for as long as I’ve known her passed away yesterday. My heart twisted.

Then it came to a stop. No longer was I able to do all the things on my list to make sure I didn’t have time to think. I had to stop long enough to let my friend know she wasn’t alone. That there are many who feel her pain with her.

But do I? How much of what I’m feeling is because she lost her son and how much is because I was forced to stop and think about what happened on a Sunday morning a year ago today?

I still miss my dad. I can’t believe it’s been a year. There are times I can almost hear his voice, or laughter, or one of his corny jokes, or that grin was that his.

I’ve survived a year without him. Some days that was all I did. Survive. Exist. Other days, I was able to forge ahead and take steps to building a life.

Today is a hard day. Tomorrow I’ll be at work and hopefully too busy to dwell on it much. Of course, working in a hospital where death comes too often…well, we’ll have to wait and see.

As I told Sindy today after hearing about Brandon passing, the pain will never go away completely, but it will decrease with time. At other times it will feel as fresh as the day she lost him.

But those days will be fewer as time passes.

I can’t compare my grief with hers. On so many levels there is no comparison between losing a child and losing a parent. But on our most basic level, when we lose a loved one it hurts. It hurts like hell.

Hold your loved ones close while you can. It’s cliche, but we don’t really don’t know when the day will come when we can’t hold them again.

Go forth and dedicate this week to your family. Do something wonderful and unexpected for them, just to let them know you thought of them.

Currently, Waconda Springs is a one woman business. The one woman also has a day job.

I’m not relating this in an attempt to garner sympathy, because I’m sure everyone of you who reads this blog is just as busy. So, before I forget, thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to read here, too.

I really do appreciate it.

Back to the first paragraph. I have a new day job. It requires that I leave home very, very early Monday morning and I don’t return home until late Wednesday evening. Monday through Wednesday are rough days. However, I love the four day weekend.

Of course, I don’t really have a four day weekend. Waconda Springs takes up a lot of that time. I’m not whining about that. Waconda Springs is something I love doing.

As I’m adjusting to this new schedule, some things have had to take a backseat. This blog is one of the things that has suffered.

I will try to do better here.

There are a lot of things going on behind the scenes with Waconda Springs. I hope you’ll find them fun and exciting. I know I’m anxious.

And that is one thing of the toughest things about owning your own business, creating items, and plans to bring the items out into the world. I’m constantly stopping myself to make sure I’m not bringing something out too early.

Testing is important. Not only to make sure the product works right out of the box, but that it will hold up over time.

I, of all people, understand the importance of bath and beauty products being able to stand the test of time. It’s how I stumbled into this business.

I’ve used handmade soap for about fifteen years. I loved the stuff then, and still love handmade soaps.

During one of my times as a traveling medical technologist I ran out of lovely handmade soap. A co-worker made soap. I bought four or five bars from her. The last bar had turned rancid by the time I got around to using it. It was less than six months after the purchase.

I harumphed and decided then and there that I was just as capable of making my own rancid soap.

That my friends is how Waconda Springs was born.

It wasn’t that easy. I had a lot of studying to do, plus a few years of testing recipes. But that was the driving force of it was deciding I didn’t want to pay for another bar of rancid soap.

That’s why at Waconda Springs we test, test, and test some more. We leave the first batch of a new recipe on our shelf for at least a year, and usually longer. We want to make sure you don’t open a box and get the surprise that I had a few years ago.