glbc bottle winner! new scents! east side! west side!

it’s been awhile.  i’ve been a busy girl.  but, sorry it HAS been so long…

our glbc bottle winner is mike b, from solon! thanks to mike and everyone who contributed to our recycling, um, event?  the xmas ale candles will be widely available starting this weekend at bazaar bizarre, in the w 78th street studios.

and remember, we will always take your recyclables!

terra has new scents! see us this weekend for cinnamint, northern pine, lavender mint, holiday kitchen, & cherry almond candles.  we are re-introuducing mojito and summer crush (which was formerly tamarindo, for those of you who have been with terra from the get-go) lotion bars, and have oodles of new soap scents:  cranberry pomegranate, grassy dunes, and new beer soaps.

east side:  sean & the salty girls (sans moi  ) will be knocking down the first wall tomorrow…more to come on this developing story.

west side:  again, COME SEE US AT BAZAAR BIZARRE!!

shop local & handmade,

melly

blogertising- how to find terra in the l.c.

i was pretty sure i made that word up, but upon searching the inter-web, it seems others MAY have thought of it first.  cock-a-doodle-doo.

so original word or not, i’d like to blogertise terra’s new soap sets, premiering this week!

porter beer soap sets, made with glbc’s edmund fitzgerald.  vanilla porter & coffee porter set:

o-h-i-o soap set, with handmade buckeye bracelets, made by my awesome friend patti.  soap sets include the ‘o-h’ black peppermint soap and ‘i-0′ red cherry almond soap.

we’re bringing these babies to you- – if you live south of the city, crash our salty not sweet pre trunk show trunk show in cuyahoga falls, tomorrow evening, wednesday 12/2.

east siders- utrech in cleveland hts is host to the first ‘official’ salty trunk show!  thursday, 12/3.

west siders- bela dubby, lakewood, will have us saturday, 12/5.

the west side l.c. (that’s lorain county, if you are not hip to my street lingo)- terra will be at a craft fair supporting the american red cross at the abbewood in elyria on friday, 12/4.

the east side l.c. (lake cty…)- i mean, if i know you well enough to have shared my home address with you, feel free to stop by.

oh, and if you live either in or with good connections to quicken loans arena, terra is still looking to bid on becoming ‘the official soap of the cleveland cavaliers locker room’…

hint hint/wink wink,

melly

p.s.- the name of the november glbc bottle drawing will be drawn later this week…i’m the only one awake in this joint right now, and everyone knows that 2 peeps have to be present when drawing names.

i miss my mac.

i’m not a pc.  nothing else to say.  ‘cept 2 more things:

lilly chocolate- just had ‘the redhead.’  super excited to eat the lavender, but saving that for tomorrow.

and, terra did a drop at shoparooni today.  we’ll be part of the holiday art bomb, starting 12/5.  go purchase yourself some hemp soap.

toodles,

mel

a-b: no. c-z: :-D

i’m afraid basketball loses probably 50% of it’s appeal when andy’s benched.  get that hip working again, dude.  i miss you.  in the meantime, multi-task random thought blogging during the game:

a.  this game is on espn, but i’m watching the local feed.  the nat’l commentators are pissing me off already, and it’s only november.

b.  you know what’s really boring?  sticking wicks inside of straws.  it’s part of the candle making process that frequently gets done while watching the telly.  the straws keep the wicks straight until i pour the wax.  clever, i know.  i call it straw stuffing.

c.  know what’s really good?  lavender tea.

d.  josh gates.  when do you come back, man?

e.  carrying finn upstairs to go to bed in a laundry basket.  he likes it.

f.  spanish.  i need to start practicing again.

g.  volcanoes.

h.  those minnesota cheerleaders that had on sweet ghostbusters costumes back around halloween.  these dc chicks look lame & whoreish.

i.  pedro, mi conejo de cerveza

j.  the sound of busy

k.  vintage paisley

l.  candra’s super awesome bday furniture/future salty cash wrap

m.  lbj blocks.  the game is still on and one might think this just happened.  it did not, but when it does, it is so hot.

n.  jumpers.  i can’t wait to have an un-factory job i can wear dresses to.  but only dresses i can wear w/ my chuck taylors.

o.  how much terra i sold the past 2 days.  it was quite lovely.

p.  the super awesome candle-perfecting trade secret i learned today.

q.  the letter q!

r.  c-town.  i love you, cleveland gray.

s.  that ‘500 days of summer’ dvd release date is december 22nd.

t.  my september lotion bar.  it smells good, and i made it all by myself.

u.  chicken paprikash

v.  puerto rican chicken

w.  dreams

x.  watching ‘dora’ with baby peyton

y.  when live music is so loud you can feel the bass in your chest

z.  taking back sunday.  i am in another spell of ‘can’t stop listening to the same album over and over again.’

i hope you remember that, way back on letter b., i said ‘ know what’s really good?’  and then you understood the rest of the letters were things i think are really good…

and the 2 things i used to love but now would not make that list:

-a.  duck brand duct tape.  screw you, colored duck tape.

-b.  glitter.  i am SO.  FREAKING.  SICK.  OF.  GLITTER.  you are so 2008.  please go away.  i will never glue stick you to another piece of poster board, ever again.

peace,

melly

you’ve kept me busy and shut me up

it’s been a busy few weeks.  but i will focus and bust out some news.

lots pending on the horizon for terra:  gonna stay mum til anything happens but if/when it happens…the bash will be grand, the beer will be tasty, and i will immediately be adding an 8th day to the week.  i’ll probably go ahead and add a second thursday, b/c jueves is my favorite.

i just taught you spanish.

candra squire, quite possibly my new favorite person in the whole wide world, has been keeping me awfully busy as well.  getting heavily involved in salty not sweet’s growth, and loving every minute of it.  there is some crazy exciting stuff gonna happen soon, so keep your eyes peeled for salty updates, and us girls are looking forward to seeing everyone at the trunk shows in a few weeks.

if you haven’t checked out made in the 216 yet, go.  now.  we already had to replenish candles once.  i’d love nothing more than to have to do it again.

btw, new spicy & sweet seasonal holiday scents are being born as i type…i’ll let you know when the terra shop on etsy is updated w/ the scents.

do you remember when i didn’t know how to use links on this site?  i feel i am absolutely abusing it now.  but 3 more- my yummy local eats of last week:

jim’s open kitchen, solon.  uber fantastic grilled cheese, and you can practically pay for lunch w/ the change  you dig out from under your car seats and/or couch cushions.

winking lizard tavern, various locations.  it’s pretty much fact that the lizard is great, but i felt like giving a shout-out as i was there multiple times this past week, and every bartender girl was incredibly fantastic.

the old angle tavern, ohio city.  you know when you eat a club sandwich so yummy it makes the cuts you get from the bread crust on the roof of your mouth just part of the whole club sandwich experience?  yeah, that happens here.

read often & read hard,

melly

terra verde bottle collection extravaganza!

drink local craft beer!  save landfill space!  let us reward you!

terra verde soap & candle co wants your great lakes brewing company beer bottles.  for every glbc 6 pack you donate to terra in the month of november, your name will be entered into a drawing for a terra verde gift package!

we upcycle these bottles into 100% soy wax, scented candles, so we are looking for rinsed bottles w/ the glbc labels intact.

logistics for pick ups/drop offs will be handled case by case- please email me if you have donations and we’ll work whatever is easiest for you, within reason of our own time/location restraints.

thank you!  cheers to recycling!

melly

so…this could be yours.  and, um,that stuff all smells really good.

maybe she can plan the cleveland cavaliers championship party?

busy, busy, busy…and i’ve neglected you, beloved blog o’ mine.  lo siento.

 

in professional life, it appears that the holiday craft show season is in full swing.  and in personal life, basketball season is in full swing.  that does not leave a girl much free time to write, but i will continue to do my best.

 

i’d like to document the pisspants excitedness that was cleveland handmade releasing their newest member list, of which included yours truly.  cleveland handmade is an etsy street team for local area artists.  i’m looking forward to making some new contacts & friends, and to the promotional perks of being a member. 

 

terra has also been prepping for the oddmall show, this saturday in hudson.  we have 100% recycled bags, tissue & candle boxes, and just ordered a stamp w/ our logo & website address.  my little sister has helped me again w/ table design, and if all goes well, i’ll be hawking my wares on a glorious new logo’d table cover.  we’ll also be debuting some new & improved minimal packaging/labeling at the show, and mi espouso has a few tricks up his sleeve for this weekend, as well.  by ‘tricks up his sleeve,’ i mean he’s been making things.  rest assured they are hella cool things, so you should make sure to swing by hudson from 10a-6p to check them out.  they are handmade, original, useful, and recycled.  b/c that’s the terra way.

 

i’m pretty sure it’s time again for ’shameless promo of a company other then mine:’ 

 

my dear friend sarah is an experienced event planner extraordinare.  (that’s what i call her.  you can also find her as principal designer, heart and crown event design.)  check out sarah’s h&c blog while you are there- current trends/fresh ideas/etc.  this girl knows her stuff, and you can trust you’d want your big bashes in her hands.

 

oh, and i’m still having rockstar marketing ideas in the shower, so i’d like to thank christi for scoring some shower crayons for me after my last blog.  can’t wait to use them.  [insert edward cullen 'thank you!' photo here.]

 

read often & read hard,

 

melly

canada, you are being classless! i’m gonna throw my barbie watch at your head!

dearest toronto,

stop chanting ‘bullshit’ b/c you are pouting over a ref call.  & while we are arguing, i’m gonna go ahead and stoop to your level and say sometimes i just want to punch chris bosh in the face.

there.

other than that, i really do very much love your country.

anyway, i really had no intention of blogging about basketball today, but tis the season, so get used to it.

today, i more wanted to talk about how i thought sean and i were on the same path- – leading away from the waste of mass consumerism.  that is, until i opened the box that was on my front porch when i got home this evening.

my husband freaking ordered a ‘mystery box’ from midnight box.  $11.44 later, we now own:

1.  a 4 peg coat rack

2.  2 barbie watches

SUCK IT TURKALUG; SUCK IT BOSH.  I TAKE IT BACK, I ACTUALLY HATE YOU, CANADA.  I KNOW THAT’S NOT HOW YOU SPELL TURKALUG.  AND YOU KNOW WHAT?  I DON’T EVEN RESPECT YOU ENOUGH TO CARE.

3.  really ugly headphones

4.  5 blank cds

really?  REALLY?  barbie watches??

the toronto raptors coulda jumped out of this box and it wouldn’t have been any stupider.  i want our $11.44 back, please.

read often & read hard,

melly

i thought it woulda been lily…

…but i’m pretty sure my baby’s name is terra.  i have worked for and argued over and defended her like i never thought possible.

almost done packaging up my wares to drop off tomorrow for an upcoming multi-week show.  prepping for said show has been the most difficult part of the terra verde saga to date.  not even really sure why?  but communication was a trainwreck, i was at times wishy-washy, expectations were not always clear, sean and i fought like nuts, i was at times wishy-washy…

anyway, after almost a month long ordeal, my contribution is all prettied up and ready for it’s hand delivery tomorrow, and i’m finally in a good place about this and am actually excited to do the drop-off.  i feel it necessary to give due thanks to my best girl christi for her assistance, and for letting me be, at times, wishy-washy…  christi was totally sane, logical, and had some industry smarts that it was very helpful for me to be privy to.

she also at one time reminded me that- although the baby analogy is cute, and that it’s MAYBE comparable to parenthood that i get so preoccupied pouring candle wax that i don’t feel i have the time to take to stop and piss- it’s not really the same thing.  b/c my soap doesn’t poo all over itself and my candles don’t wake up sick in the middle of the night.

which is excellent.  b/c i am pretty sure i would not be doing this if they did.

in other terra verde news, i need some of those crayons you can write on showers with.  but only if they write on tile too, b/c that’s the kind of wall i have by my shower.  i keep having the best of marketing ideas in the shower.  ironically awesome, since i of course have them while using terra soap.  anyway, i’m pretty much just telling you i want shower crayons, b/c i’m not going to share my marketing ideas with you yet.  they are just too huge.

i definitely need to wait until i get a pr person for that.

one more quick thing- in ’shameless promo of a company other than mine’ news:  i was checking out our oddmall neighbors for the show next week, and found the itsy bitsy spider.  hello, super cute.  as far as general survival, i have no idea why anyone would technically need a ‘drinking bunny,‘ but i want one.  restated:  I HAVE TO HAVE ONE.  it’s a knit bunny, and i’m a fool for knit things w/ eyes. i just want to pull it’s little ears and smile. it’s wearing an earring, for crying out loud.

that was shameless promo for, like, two things.  feeling so philanthropic today…there’s three…and you can see below for numero cuatro.

read often & read hard,

melly

CHRISTI, HERE’S YOUR THANKS. HE’S STILL SO DARN PALE & SHIMMERY.

‘THEY HAVE FREE CHEESE!’: the brewzilla cleveland beer week party

so last night was the brewzilla cleveland beer week party, and i was pretty sure this totally had the makings of being a drunken late-night post last night, but sometimes life happens, and unlimited mountains of free cheese becomes just…free cheese, and by no means the most important thing in the whole world.

regardless, free cheese still deserves props.  and in my now completely sober state, i’d absolutely like to give my kudos to this whole fiesta de cerveza (y queso.)

c-town, i gotta be honest and say the promotion for this was so shitty i was fearful to get my hopes up for the party.  anytime we’d tell someone where we were going we’d get ‘huh?’ looks, but…it was kinda super-fantastic.

for a $50 ticket, you get 4-hour access to the arcade, which was hosting 30-some breweries.  you score a cute little 3ish oz tasting mug, filled with drink & eat tickets.  supposedly you pay for 20 beer tickets, and each tasting is one ticket.  over a hour and countless beers into the night, i decided to count my tickets.  i had 17 left…cleveland obviously counts about as well as i do.  (i’m pretty sure the limited # of tickets was for nothing more then to show some sense of maintaining responsibility, and maybe not allowing the area to become full of drunken frat boys, chugging anything in sight.  i get it.  smart move.)

you also got 3 food tickets, good for, like, real food.  giant brats, soft pretzels, and that beautiful cheese counter.  and actually, you didn’t use tickets for the cheese.  you used toothpicks, and you just took as much damn cheese as you wanted.  i suppose one should be wary of shared food counters in the midst of a media-induced flu season tizzy, but…after you have tasted the first glbc christmas ale of the season, you are so happy you just don’t care.  that’s right.  WE.  HAD.  CHRISTMAS.  ALE.  LAST.  NIGHT.

quite frankly, if you were not there, you really missed out, and you should already be marking your calendars for next year’s beer week.  again, we had christmas ale last night, october 24th, 2009.  did you?  bet not.  we had dogfishead red & white, indigo imp winter solstice (a new cleveland brewery that was quite lovely), sam adams imperial white (highly recommended), and ommegang 3 philosophers (a fave if only b/c sean can’t say it when he drinks- it always becomes ‘3 philophosers’). apricot wheat is pretty good, and lindeman’s framboise is maybe even tastier in a tiny cup, over discussions with strangers about how dogfishead 90-minute ipa is the best beer ever.

i could go on & on: about the paper mache goat, the funny girls who couldn’t really walk with their high heels & skinny jeans but tried so damn hard, the bacon chocolate truffle samples, the leinenkugel chapstick, how i drank with elvis.  but i’ve probably exhausted the attention span of most, so i’ll wrap up w/ my (very short) list of improvement suggestions:

1.  get some recycling bins, dude.  the free water…AWESOME.  but having to keep throwing plastic bottles in the trash…boo.

2.  along the same lines:

dear henien’s,

thanks for the mystery meat and never ending cheese.  please stop serving it on styrofoam.

thanks,

me

(sidenote:  in reviewing my text log from last night (which is always fun to do after drunk-texting), i remembered that i texted falco that i found out the mystery meat was ‘wild boat.’  i of course meant ‘wild boar.’  though i’m not sure ‘wild boat’ would’ve been any more gross then the boar was…)

3.  the band was totally not necessary, even with said band playing sublime covers at ironically appropriate moments.  nice thought, but combined w/ the never-ending drone of thousands of people…it was too much.

4.  enforce that breweries actually have to send people who know at least SOMETHING about their beers…

and lastly…don’t let it grow.  keep your location.  add days, if needed.  just don’t ix center this one.  keep it classy.  and keep the glass taste cups.  that was a nice touch.

read often & read hard,

melly

i told you i drank with elvis. (to my twilight whores, i was gonna drink w/ edward cullen but i figured he’d maybe have been so pale & shimmery i wasn’t sure he’d show up in the photo.)

i drank with sean, too. he’s my favorite drinking boy. plus, he’s 3-dimensional.

the arcade, filled w/ beer lovers.