MY STORY
Hi, I'm Krissy
We all have a reason; for working, for living, for doing. This is my reason.
How it all began…
I’ve always been passionate about health, the human body and the planet.
In my past life, I was a Health and Physical Education teacher. I simply LOVED my job. I taught straight out of uni and up until I had my daughter Charlotte in 2009.
I had some time off to enjoy the season of new motherhood and then welcomed Lucas into the world in 2011. When the kids were 2 and 4, and I felt like it was time to go back to ‘work’, I was devastated to realise that my passion for teaching in schools was missing.
I knew I couldn’t go back into a profession that deserves that quality – it just wouldn’t be fair on the children. My passion for health and education didn’t waver though; in fact, it was as strong as ever.
When I started this particular chapter of my life, it happened quickly. To keep it short, I simply woke up one day to the crazy number of ingredients in my cleaning and body care products (and I had way too many). There wasn’t one single fancy-pants earth-shattering, news-worthy event led me to this realisation; I couldn’t even tell you which product exactly started it. But once I noticed what was going on, I began investigating and couldn’t stop.
Once I learned about a particular chemical within a product I was using in my home, on my family, I couldn’t unlearn it. And I certainly couldn’t, in good conscience, continue to use it.
In the early days I was shocked, then I was mad, furious even (how can they let companies use this stuff?), and then I reverted back to my get-on-with-it mentality and became focused on making better choices and taking control.
Now, we were already in such control over what we put into our bodies (thank you, Thermomix), I figured ‘how hard can it be to control what we put on our bodies’? This led to a whirlwind of research, recipe testing, and tweaking.
I’ve always been a creative soul (it runs in the family, mum is a magician with a sewing machine and my aunt is a crazy-good artist) so I found it to be not only fun and rewarding but empowering and educational. It was an awesome feeling. Yes, I was putting in a little more effort than I did when I was shopping for these items, but I was and still am okay with that.
It was so worth it.
As a side bonus, I also worked out that we simply needed way less stuff, and we were saving money. (The whole needing less bit, has led to an avalanche of ideas and decluttering and simplification of home and life, but that’s another story!)
Naturally, I told my friends about what I was up to. I then started a Facebook page after loads of encouragement, to reach friends of friends, and it turned out that I was not alone on my quest to lead a life with less crap! So it snowballed from there, and what a wonderful snowball it has been!
This is me at the 2018 AusMumpreneur Awards, in Melbourne. I’m proudly holding silver trophies for the categories of ‘Women Will Change the World’ and ‘Making a Difference’.
I genuinely love being in the kitchen, writing and testing, truly natural, DIY recipes. The more I create and share, the better off we all are!
The process of recipe development…
When I create DIY recipes, I keep simplicity at the forefront of my mind. I know that in order to instil long-lasting, positive change in people, the recipes need to be as simple and achievable as possible, so multiple different products can be created from (mostly) the same collection of ingredients.
I look at commercial products that people are buying, using and relying on daily. I then research the ingredients, the function, and purpose of the product and start playing with ingredients until I find something that is comparable. It’s easier than it may seem; once you’ve made one balm and one cleaning spray, you’ve just about made them all! Lots of tweaking and refinement takes place, as well as weeks (or months) of testing.
Eventually, I am left with a perfectly acceptable, and far superior, replacement to the commercial product I initially used as my muse. That’s when I share the recipe with my community and wait for the (positive) feedback to flow!
What now…?
I started on this journey with the intention of changing our own lives for the better, but I continue on it because I need as many people as possible to know that there is another way. We do not have to rely on store-bought, fragrance-filled products, with ingredients that are potentially harmful to our health. DIY is becoming more and more popular and the thirst for natural products, remedies and methods is growing every day – yahoo!
Of course, our gorgeous planet needs some love and attention and it is something I dedicate a lot of energy to.
I’m excited to have you here, exploring this gorgeous website, and I truly hope the resources and recipes you find here inspire you to live a more natural, sustainable and eco-conscious life.
Happy Making 💚