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Look what I've been up to...

Has it really been 3 weeks since my last post? Sorry, sorry, sorry. I've been busy working on the Signature Collection launch (photography, copywriting, product prototype making, etc.) and about 2 weeks ago, our Facebook page went live (thank you Jill.) Speaking of Facebook, daaayummm, we have some good looking customers :) It's been fun putting faces to the names.

Anyway, so here's a sample of what we've been up to at CLC.

It looks like our Signature Collection will launch in early April. Stay tuned because we're going to have one helluva sale to celebrate!

There's a lot of stuff brewing (note: this is a hint to our Facebook contest) behind the scenes, but I'll save them till my next post. All you need to know is we're going to have one amazing summer!

Worldly Wednesday - Alaska!

Since we're on the topic of snow. Here are some pictures from our Alaska cruise.

Top & bottom picture: What we saw from our balcony. Check out how glassy and still the water's surface looks.

The Hubbard Glacier below:

Check out the boat getting up close and personal to the glacier.

A close up of the glacier:

Till next time...

You guessed it....more snow...

That's me (in my pimp/Yo Gabba Gabba hat), knee deep in snow. I've lost track of how much snow we've had in the last 2 weeks. All I know is that at 4 feet 11 inches (or 3 apples high as my friend Jill says), I need to start walking around with a flag in case I get burried in the snow.

Outbound packages will obviously be delayed. Our sorting facility is in NJ and they got hit pretty hard as well. It will take longer for our packages to get to the sorting facility and probably longer for it to leave the facility once sorted. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

On a non-weather related front, we're busy preparing for the launch of our Spring fragrances as well as our Signature Collection. The website will go through a minor cosmetic lift as we incorporate the Signature Collection into our line. It's about time for a change anyway.

Oh and for those of you who have been asking me about setting up a Facebook account - I'm putting the finishing touches on the page before I make it public. I am forever and deeply indebted to Jill who got our page started, held my hand and talked me through simple tasks such as uploading pictures and creating an account. Thanks Jilly. You have no idea how grateful I am for your friendship and never-ending patience :)

Feedback on the conditioners continue to come in and it looks like our testers have a clear preference of which formula works the best. With a little more tweaking, I think we'll be ready to launch sometime mid-March.

Thanks for reading. I'm off to dig my car out. If I don't write another post in the next 7 days, send someone to find me. I'm probably burried in a snow bank.

Worldly Wednesday - Please...NO. MORE. SNOW.

I know I wrote that my next WW post would be of Alaska, but I swear, if I see any more snow, I'm going to lose it. So, hoping that a bit of reverse psychology will do something positive to my psyche, I'm posting pictures of the warm sunny beaches of St. Maarten and St. Thomas.

The view as we approach the port.

White sand beach, clear blue waters...why must I be stuck in snowy New York!? (The yellow bag in my hand contains a box of the most delicious truffles I've ever tasted.)

The lush greenery of St. Thomas.

This Dish is B-A-N-A-N-A-S!

We're discontinuing our Moisture Whip Light Conditioner. In it's place is a new formula I've been working on since late last year. I've finally narrowed it down to 2 iterations and it's out to test with some of our customers.

I have high hopes and big expectations for this conditioner. So far, both versions of the recipe are working wonderfully for my hair, which is why I had to send it to a larger test panel than what we normally use. My hair likes both and if it were up to me, I'd never launch it because I can't make up my mind. I've formulated it specifically for colour-treated hair in need of some tender loving care and moisture. While it delivers a moisturizing punch, it's light enough for daily use.

Why a conditioner with bananas? For starters, I love bananas. And growing up, we had a family friend - Auntie Annie from Indonesia who had long, thick, shiny, luxurious hair. In that childlike fascination, I asked her how she got her "princess hair" and she said used mashed bananas mixed with a bit of oil as a weekly treatment. Indeed, bananas are very beneficial to the hair. It is rich in natural oils and proteins that soften hair and increase its elasticity, thereby preventing splits and breaks. In fact, many at-home remedies for dry, damaged hair call for applying mashed bananas to your hair and leaving it on for 20 to 30 minutes. The conditioner also contains green tea extract, a well known anti-oxidant, to combat the dulling effects of the environment on our (colour-treated) locks.

Auntie Annie also used to rub a clove of garlic on her fingernails for growth and strength, but I'm going to leave this one alone.

I'd like to thank the wonderful gals (and one unwitting guy - Chris) who agreed to test the formulas. As I type this, Chris is begrudgingly getting his haircut. He claims he's been having a string of good hair weeks and has no idea why. It's been so good in fact, that he's put off getting his haircut, until I finally commented that his hair was looking rather "floppy" lately. Unbeknownst to him, his good hair weeks are due to the switch-a-roo I did to his regular conditioner. Tee, hee.

The feedback is slowly trickling in and it looks promising - I'm really, really excited. If all goes well, I'm looking at a late February, early March launch. Stay tuned.

Worldly Wednesday - Oh Vancouver

In honour of this year's host of the Winter Olympics, here are some pictures of Vancouver from our trip last summer.

The opening and closing ceremony of the Winter Olympics will be held at B.C. Place. I don't know if shirtless guy (pictured behind me) will still be at his post.

No matter where we go, we always find our way to the local Chinatown. This is the Chinatown Arch in Vancouver. It's the gateway to the city's bustling Chinatown. It's also the gateway that led me to the hair salon where I walked in for a trim and walked out with a mullet. Good thing about hair is that it grows back and shows no sign of the trauma it once endured. My self-esteem however, has been permanently scarred. I spent the rest of the vacation listening to Chris serenade me with 80's music in honour of my haircut. That and he said I looked a bit like Bruce Lee.

Chris pondering the next CLC promotion at the Dr. Sun Yat Sen Classical Chinese Garden.

So that's pretty much it for Vancouver. We were only there for a few days as a stopover on our way to Alaska.

Next post - Alaska.