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17: How A Passion For Essential Oil DIYs Became A Business with Oil & Glass Authors Yael & Johonna

whimsy + wellness podcast essential oil diy ep 17
The Whimsy and Wellness Podcast
The Whimsy and Wellness Podcast
17: How A Passion For Essential Oil DIYs Became A Business with Oil & Glass Authors Yael & Johonna
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Have you ever just needed a quick oil recipe for a child’s skinned knee or a headache that just won’t go away? There’s a book for that – and it’s stunning! Oils don’t have to be overwhelming or intimidating, especially when you have a book with all the oil recipes, safety icons, dilution charts, and diffuser recipes you can think of.

In today’s episode, I am talking to Yael Marmar & Johonna Katz, friends, founders, and authors of Oil + Glass, a beautifully in-depth book filled with simple, accessible oil recipes that bring people together no matter what stage you’re at in oils. In our amazing conversation, Yael and Johonna are sharing their journey of passion, friendship, business, and all things oils – and I can’t wait to share it with you!

 

Follow along with @oil.and.glass

 

Essential Oils Mentioned:

Northern Lights Black Spruce

 

Follow Whimsy + Wellness on Instagram

Get 10% off at Whimsy + Wellness!

 

Resources Mentioned:

Oil & Glass

 

Thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of the Whimsy & Wellness Podcast hosted by Meg Ryan and brought to you by Whimsy & Wellness; your go-to shop for essential oil accessories, crystals, and more!

If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean so much if you subscribed, left a review, and posted a screenshot on social! Every review and share matters and helps us reach and inspire more friends like you!

 

Music by Taylor Ryan


“We also wanted to empower parents to not be intimidated, but use it as their first line of defense. It doesn’t have to be complicated. Oils don’t have to be overwhelming. The book makes it easy. For beginners it’s entry-level. And at the same time, we wrote this book so that you can grow into it as you get more complicated in the recipe. So there’s a longevity to it.”

– Yael 

“We wanted to empower parents to not be intimidated, but use it as their first line of defense. It doesn’t have to be complicated. Oils don’t have to be overwhelming.”

-Yael

Meg: Friends, today I have Yael and Johonna here with me, authors of Oil + Glass. Welcome, ladies, I’m so excited to talk to you.

Johonna: We’re excited to be here.

Meg: So, most people might be familiar with Oil + Glass, but if you aren’t, listeners, it is an amazing resource. And what I was so excited to talk to these ladies about today is the similarity between their book and Whimsy and Wellness is that Haylee, our founder, she originally started the company because she was super passionate about DIY, but she couldn’t find cute roller bottles. And so she’s like, “I’ll just make my own,” and that’s kind of how Whimsy and Wellness started. 

I know your story is similar. You wanted something that wasn’t out there, and you created it, and so I love that similarity between the three of you. And I just love the passion for creating and DIY being in the oily world, so I’m excited for our listeners to hear from you and learn from you, and if they don’t have your recipe book yet, get your recipes. So, do you want to just start out by introducing yourself and give us a little snapshot of who you are, before we dive into the book and all of that?

Yael: Definitely. Yes. Thank you. I think we started around the same time Whimsy and Wellness probably started, I think we were all just trying to insert this wild west essential oil world, and we needed to create something that didn’t exist, right. So yeah, it’s nice to be here with you guys. So, I’m Yael, and I live in Sonoma County, which is in Northern California. The wine country just an hour north of San Francisco. I have two boys, six and nine, and I think what is interesting about my end of the story is that I actually was born and raised in natural households my whole life. My mom was serving up organic foods and tonics and elixirs like a total, even before there was even awareness around it. So, I feel fortunate to come with that in my back pocket, that this is what I expected. This is how I expect to live, and I was just so excited to share it with other people. And I am a Young Living Gold. I love my team. And yeah, that’s me.

Meg: I love that.

Johonna: I’m Johonna Katz. I also live in Northern California, not far from Yael, near Palo Alto, and I also have two kids, two girls, ages eight and 11, and they keep me very busy. And similarly to Yael, probably around 12 years ago, I started shifting to a healthier lifestyle, kind of roughly around the time I was pregnant. Just the awareness around what I was putting in my body and how that was going to be affecting this child and kind of really thinking about it from all angles, not just food, but household and plastics, and you know, what that daily chemical burden is. And then really, nine years ago, my mom, unfortunately, was diagnosed with lung cancer as a nonsmoker. So we figured, gosh, this is from the environment, what can we do? And then that was when I shifted, in earnest, completely; my children cannot get this, how do we protect them, and do a deep dive into the healthy, clean lifestyle?

Meg: Amazing. I don’t know if you guys feel this way. But every time I hear how people got started with oils it always just makes me so excited. We’re all connected with oils. But some people get started, like Haylee, who just wanted to make things, and then we have stories like both of yours. I had a chronic health issue that I wanted to tackle and I just always love hearing people’s stories. I think sometimes when it’s our own story, we’re like, “What’s the impact?” But it’s so impactful. Every time I hear someone’s story, it just makes me smile. So, thank you guys for sharing yours. So, how did you meet one another? Are you in each other’s downlines? How did that come about?

Johonna: Go ahead Yael. We have a lovely nickname for each other, which actually comes from college. So, it’s very weird for us to call each other by our names. The name is Schmutz or Schmidtzee. So, if you hear that, that’s why. But anyway, we’re really trying to say the name. Yeah, no, we met when we were 18 and freshmen in college. We went to UC Davis, and we were roommates in San Francisco. We started our professional careers together, later bridesmaids in each other’s weddings, and kept our friendship going through living through various countries. I lived abroad in Singapore for four years. Yael was in Amsterdam. And then had children roughly around the same time, and we’ve just been on this journey through motherhood together this whole time.

Meg: Wow, how cool. That is amazing. And nicknames are totally welcome here. 

Johonna: We often refer to each other as each other’s rock, through motherhood, because as we know, it’s not easy. And because we’re so aligned in how we believe in keeping a clean home and clean food and a clean lifestyle, we’re constantly checking in with each other. What do you think about this? Would you do that? What about this product? We’ve constantly got each other’s back, and have a sounding board.

Yael: Yeah. Young Living actually was way later in our journey together, but I introduced Johonna to Young Living, so technically, she’s in my downline, but I don’t really see it that way. 

Meg: Wow. There’s something about having someone that you can just hold as a sounding board, and to hold you accountable and keep you excited about things. When I’m surrounded by people who maybe aren’t using oils, or into the same things, whatever those may be, not that I don’t mind that they don’t, but it’s so nice sometimes to just be surrounded by people who are similar so I can stay accountable to myself.

 

What’s Inside Oil + Glass

So, your recipe book, Oil + Glass, which I just personally love by the way, it is so beautiful. It’s the most beautiful oil reference. I hope I’m allowed to say that, but it totally is. You guys did such a great job with it. Can you share a little bit about what it is for listeners who aren’t familiar with it?

Johonna: Well, first of all, thank you for that. We have a lot of pride that went into creating this and a lot of  blood, sweat, and tears as well. It was a very time consuming endeavor. We’ll get more into that later on, but it’s a recipe book using essential oils, much like a cookbook. We both like to cook. We wanted something tangible in our kitchens that we could have out as a reference guide at all times. 

Yael had a beautiful design, I was like, this is not going to be any oil book. This is gonna be beautiful with the materials that we chose. But we wanted this to be a one-stop-shop and all in one resource that people could turn to with simple accessible recipes.

We both had young children at the time, and we wanted to be able to use oil with our children. But every time we had to do it, we were doing these calculations in our head. “God, how do you dilute this safely for this age child, and then this age child and for myself?” They were just posted everywhere. And so we had put in adult and child dilutions, which is my favorite part of it. Safety icons, dilution charts, diffuser recipes. Everything that we wanted as we were getting started in one place.

Yael: Yeah, definitely. To be honest, people say, “Well, did you plan on writing a book?” We never planned this. It was really an accidental project, but we wrote it for ourselves. We truly wanted them all in one place as a hard copy and there was a void in the market. There was nothing like it. We were looking online, we were looking on reference books here and there, but we really wanted it to be beautiful enough to leave out on the table. 

We also wanted to empower parents to not be intimidated, but use it as their first line of defense. It doesn’t have to be complicated. Oils don’t have to be overwhelming. The book makes it easy. For Beginners it’s entry level. And at the same time, we wrote this book so that you can grow into it as you get more complicated in the recipe. So, there’s a longevity to it. Photography was really important to me, I used to be a photographer, and I really, really, really wanted the design to be great.  

Meg: With essential oil recipes, everyone listening can relate, we all have the 8 million Pinterest pins, and the note in our phone, or the screenshot of the recipe. And it’s so nice to just have everything in this beautiful book. It is so beautiful. When I was flipping through it thinking about this interview and all the things I wanted to ask I’m like, “Wow, there’s literally everything from chicken coop spray to belly butter.” This is so perfect. So, a lot of range in the book.

 

A Reference For Every Phase Of Life

Yael: I was just gonna pull up the table of contents. There’s really seven chapters, and then there’s resources built around it. Like we said, a few recipes and icons but that we span. The first one is health and wellness, then body woes and all the hard stuff that comes our way, beauty and skincare, babies and children, home and garden, which is where you get your chicken coop spray, and then pregnancy and birth, and then mind/body spirit. So,we really tried it. It’s funny, I’m looking at this, and I’m like this is so Johonna and I. This is our life right here. You know, she’s got the chicken coop, I’m doing my Savasana, she does Savasana too, yoga, anyways. 

Meg: Yeah, that table of content. I love it. I’m just thinking back over the past four years that I’ve been using oils, I open up Oil + Glass, and I’m like, “There’s got to be something in here.” Even when I first had my baby, I knew that you’d have my back. So, it’s such a great reference. So, you decided to write it because there was nothing like that out there.

Yael: I think it’s really important to both Johonna and I, that we’re all constantly on our phones all the time, and we wanted something tangible that we would put the phone down and just be in the kitchen with our kids making stuff. And it kind of grew with us, right? Like in the beginning, it was making playdough. Johonna, you have some of your favorites. When we had our little ones, which by the way, our kids were babies when we wrote this, and now we’ve got these older kids. So, I had a three and a five year old at the time writing this and they’re almost nine and 11 now, right? You were breastfeeding in the book, you can see it.

We’ve grown with them. I mean, I made a lot of that peppermint scented playdough. That was  on weekly rotation. We’ve kind of grown into different recipes as our kids have aged.

Johonna: I’ll say that Oil + Glass started as a Google Doc, literally, it was just a Google Doc of recipes and it evolved into chapters, which evolved into design, and then a small business and our minds are just blown that there’s been over 75,000 copies sold. 

And to me, thinking about it like, it’s nine o’clock at night, I’ve got my six month old and I’ve got my three year old and I’m exhausted. The laundry is definitely not folded, but there was a passion for it. Johonna and I talked on the phone from like nine to midnight to write this thing or when we were driving to pick up milk at the market, we would work on it in the cracks of time. “What about this edit? What do you think about this? What do you think about that?” And even then we sacrificed a lot. It was just a calling to write this thing. It’s just wild that that was just a passion calling became a business, you know?

Meg: So many of the best businesses happened like that. Haylee and I were just talking the other day about how even the biggest brands use Google Drive and it’s almost comforting. Oh, they have a Google. It’s just such an encouragement. I know a lot of mama entrepreneurs listen to the podcast and so I’m really grateful that you shared that. Because I think sometimes in our own minds, we think it has to be perfect. We have to have a business background. And it’s like, you just have to have a passion and a need. So, thank you for sharing that.  

whimsy + wellness podcast essential oil diy ep 17

How To Empower Yourself Using Oils

Meg: So I often have friends, and even my mom, who says I can’t DIY because I’m not crafty, right? They pair crafts and DIY. You don’t have to be crafty to do essential oil DIY because it’s not like you’re painting shutters and making this beautiful frame, right? You don’t have to be crafty to mix a roller. So, can you kind of share? Why do you both love DIYs? And why are they a great option for everyone, but especially moms?

Johonna: Well, first of all, the exact ingredients that go in there, there’s no wondering and looking up ingredients, right? So to me, knowing what I’m putting exactly on my kids skin that will go into their bloodstream feels amazing. It’s way more affordable, people think essential oils are so expensive, but when you break down the cost of oils and making a roller or making a bomb, or whatever you’re going to make, it’s way more affordable.

It’s made with love. You can feel energy and things sometimes when I’m rubbing a foot balm on my kids feet, and I know I made it and they know I made it, there’s love in that that’s just energy. We love that it’s a family activity, we make things together, and then we love that it’s a community activity, whether it’s at a making take our book ends up often at parties, and people can do things together. So, in a way it brings people together.

Yael: And just to further that point with DIY, I don’t think I would have considered myself a huge DIY-er before this. But literally the time that it takes to make a roller, once I did it once, I mean dropping seven drops in, it takes less than two minutes, and it’s there. 

I found that in the middle of the night, when something comes up with one of your children, I’m not going to run to the pharmacy, I’m not gonna run to the grocery store to buy these ingredients. Because in the middle of the night, I have everything there. In less than two minutes, I can have something that I can use that provides comfort, and nurturing care for my child. We keep using the word empowering, but truly, that’s what it comes down to.

Meg: Yeah, for sure. Can we just talk about how it is so much easier to make roller one time than trying to put the drop and then pump the carrier oil in your hand while not spilling it and then getting it on your baby, and then you’re like wiping off the excess.

Yael: That is so much harder. Remember, when I first started oiling I’ll never forget, I had these little glass jars throughout my kitchen with little pieces of paper on what they were. And I didn’t even realize it would dry up eventually or it was just a mess. And then I realized I can have my cabinet to go to to just take it off the shelf. 

Speaking of cabinets, it’s really important to have your oils in a place that has I keep everything in a pump easy to go. So if I need to whip out a roller, I have my fractionated coconut oil in a pump, big 16 ounce bottle ready to go. I have my witch hazel ready to go. I have everything right there so I can get in and I can get out. And I find most of it is for gifting these days. Someone’s over the house, like you know what, let’s make you one of these. And they’re like, “Wow, look at your set up over there.”

Johonna: Yeah, not only having the oils out but having the book out and accessible. If you have the book out and we keep it out like a coffee table book. Right? If you see it just you open it up and you make things. It’s just there.

Meg: Yeah. You’re reminded because whether people have owned the book or not, I think if they use essential oils, they know when our oils are out and around us we’re remembering to use them. Whereas sometimes if they’re out of sight, and an issue comes up, we forget that there is even an oil or a recipe for that issue. And we’re like, oh, we have to but when the oils are out or the recipe book is out, we can just be like, oh I wonder if there’s something in there and with all your recipes. Odds are, there’s something in there.

You don’t have to be crafty to make this. I love that in the beginning, you both said that you love to cook. I do feel like a lot of the essential oil recipes mimic cooking more than crafting. But  people often say I can’t craft. It’s like, but can you cook?

Yael: I think that’s a really good point. To say when we were prepping for this, one of my favorite parts was going to really great bookstores. I think you did too, Johonna, where we would look at cookbooks first for layout design. And so much of it, as far as design goes, we did mimic cookbooks. That’s what we wanted it to be like, it’s laid out. It’s just laid out so well that I don’t feel overwhelmed. Especially when I was new.  

Meg: When you’re new, essential oils is like learning a new language. At least that’s how I felt I was very much like, “How many drops?” And so I think a lot of times the resources can be way over my head. But the layout is so nicely done I feel like I can do this. What I also love about essential oil DIY is, and maybe you’ll agree, is if you don’t have one ingredient, it won’t ruin the whole thing like cooking sometimes does. You can definitely mix it up. Oh, I don’t have this, but I have this.

Yael: We added tips often in the bottom of recipes for variations because we know that you don’t always have everything or if you want to try something new the next time. And I think your emphasis, as much as it was a visual, was to make sure that the writing was just as on par. 

Johonna and I just share a brain. We would just ping pong and write sentences together. And we were a little thing. “How do I say this? Oh, what are you trying to say?: We iterate until we get it exactly. 

Johonna: Well, we were obsessive about it. I’ll say it. We are completely obsessive over every word. Just how everything was portrayed and how it was delivered. Editing was a very big piece of it and time consuming. Especially when you’re already with little kids.

 

Favorite Recipe From The Book

Meg: Yeah, I applaud you for that. I’m on that end with a no sleeping baby right now. So, I cannot imagine. So, everything from belly butter to chicken coop spray. I’ve never made the chicken coop spray because we don’t have chickens, but I remember sending the recipe to a friend when she got chickens and she just started with essential oils. I’m like, “Ah look at chicken coops right.” And she’s so excited. So that one always sticks out in my brain, which is just so funny. Such a huge array of recipes, which I love. Can you both share what your favorite recipe in the book is if you could possibly choose?

Johonna: I would say the face serum for me just because it’s something that I use daily if not multiple times a day and because one of its main ingredients is Frankincense, which to me is a top go to. Can’t live without oil. I just love the smell. My skin reacts really well to soaking it in and I love the kind of the ritual of smelling it in the morning, putting it on it. It’s a mood booster. So, face serum for sure. Hard to choose though.

Yael: Yeah, hard one. I agree our skincare ones are really wonderful. I went with a more practical one actually. This is kind of a funny one to pick, but I picked the bug spray. And that is because it works so well. Bugs love me. If there’s a mosquito they’re gonna find me, and that is just great again, to know that I’m not going out to the store spending way more than I can give you spending with ingredients. I don’t know when I could just make it with nature’s pharmacy and I’m happy. The sprays are really great. 

Meg: Yes! Now I’m like, “Oh, I have to go look this up.” And I’ve definitely made the bug spray before and I do love it. And this is a little side story but, my dad golfs every morning and he always would use bug spray that’s applied outdoors because it’s so toxic, right on the bottle. So, one day I’m like, you should use my oil spray. To this day, he’ll call me and be like, “I’m out of my bug spray for golf, can you make me a new one?” And it’s your recipe. So, I love that. 

Yael: When you look in those recipes, you’ll see there are essential oils, but they’re probably just using it for smell, but, when really that is the active ingredient that deters bugs, because plants do that. That’s what the essential oil is in the plants is often an insect repellent. So, it’s like a natural protector of the plant. So, we’re just using that on our bodies.

Johonna: And with that recipe, my favorite variation is for the dogs. We live in an area where we hike every day with our two dogs, and there are so many ticks, so to spray it on them as a tick repellent. And I’ve tested it because I’ve tested hiking without the spray on the dogs and they’re covered in them. And then with it. It’s pretty remarkable. 

Meg: Oh, yeah. Which is such a bonus. Do you have that recipe handy? And would you be willing to share it for our listeners? So they have a little takeaway? 

Johonna: We can absolutely. So, it’s called Pest Away Spray in our book, on page 51. The regular bug spray is just with lavender, eucalyptus purification, and lemongrass, and you mix it with witch hazel and distilled water. But the variation, I use it in a 16 ounce glass spray bottle, a giant one because I’m covering the whole dog multiple times a day; combine 20 drops of eucalyptus, 20 drops of lemongrass, and 20 drops of purification with one cup of distilled vinegar and top it off with distilled water. And again, that sounds like a lot of drops, but this is for a 16 ounce glass spray bottle.

Keep it by the door and when we leave, we just spray them down.

Meg: Can we just like, talk about how nice natural bug spray is? You don’t have the oily feeling. I always used to hate how bad I would smell after using bug spray. You can’t go anywhere after putting it on. So, I just love it. So, thank you for sharing that. How did you begin to choose the recipes for this book? Were they all your recipes? Tell me the story behind that.

whimsy + wellness podcast essential oil diy ep 17

How They Chose Recipes For The Book

Yael: I’d say we definitely adapted some of our favorite go-tos. Some are just known in the oil world. Seasonal allergy relief, those are just known. If you have stomach issues, we just want to make sure everyone had those. And then others we created in our test kitchen. Getting by as young moms, we were trying to figure out what worked best for us and we thought it would work best for us, then surely it would hopefully help someone else. We were constantly making variations daily and working on it. Some of it was tribal knowledge. We don’t want them to miss out on what we know as Young Living members of what works, but we really wanted to make sure that it was one stop and as far as the book goes, and that it was all in one place because again, that’s our main goal.  

It’s funny because we get messages on Instagram, “Oh, this is our Bible, this is our oil Bible” and like wow, that’s so flattering that what works in our home. It’s like kitchen table wisdom from a parent to a parent or not even parents. People who don’t have children are using it, but it’s just nice to pass along the knowledge.

Meg: Definitely. I know there’s people who don’t have that big, oily community and so the moms out there or non moms who have that book. Your book is their community and that’s empowering. The theme of this episode is empowering. So, speaking of Young Living members and Brand Partners, how are our members and Brand Partners using the book?

 

How Young Living Members & Brand Partners Use The Book

Yael: Yeah we often find that a lot of people like to gift this book as an onboarding, here’s a reference for you. So members either are finding us through our Instagram or on Amazon, and/or being gifted it, or seeing it at a gathering or whatnot. 

I think we’ve talked really about how members use it in this call. But as far as Brand Partners go, we’ve found that people are really grateful to have this for giveaways. We find that when they have their members get into it, what started as a starter kit, or a couple of oils that they got in on, they now say, “Well, wait, now I need ylang ylang because I need to make this recipe.”

So, it’s helping their customers explore the oils without them having to sell anything. So, we’re seeing a big jump in volume. We’re seeing people hop on ER, people are using them as incentives promos, and so it’s just a nice specialty item for people to level up with and get their business up and get their members oiling. That’s the whole point. The last thing you want is a friend to buy a bunch of oils and it sits on the shelf. This gets them using it.

Meg: Yeah definitely, like you mentioned at the beginning, you don’t have to try to come up with a recipe or find something on the internet. Just have your book and invite some friends over and there’s your make and take. 

Yael: There’s been members that have reached out and said, “Can we have an Oil + Glass make and take”? Awesome. Yes. Have an Oil + Glass make and take, it’s sweet. Yeah, it’s really great.

whimsy + wellness podcast essential oil diy ep 17

Taking Oil & Glass Global

Meg: So, I heard that you’re currently working on an international expansion. Is that right? Can you share a little bit about that?

Johonna: Yeah, so we just recently launched in Mexico, and in Canada on Amazon, and we’re super close to shipping our first pallet out to Australia. Tomorrow, shipping tomorrow. So, this is very timely. Following Australia will be Europe.

Yael: We hear you if you’re watching this, we’ve not ignored you. We get the messages daily. We are doing everything. It’s not easy crossing borders, there’s all kinds of stuff to consider and work out. We want to make sure we do it right. I would even dare to say South Africa is in the works. But that’s even harder because they don’t have Amazon. But yes, we’re doing our best. 

Also Life Science Publishing is our publisher. And when there were events, they were taking our books everywhere to all the events. So, when those come back too, usually they travel with them. So, that’s a great place to get them as well. 

Meg: Yay, that is so exciting. Do you feel so excited about that? It must be surreal, our book is across the world, not just the country.

Johonna: It does feel surreal. This is kind of a funny side note story. We found a plagiarized copy, in the Philippines, multiple times. But we’re like you made it, when they’re plagiarizing the book in the Philippines like we made it. 

Meg: Yes, I love the optimism. 

Johonna: Currently on Amazon right now that we’re trying but my gosh, people are funny. 

Yael: I have to say the feeling of being at convention when random people come running up to you from Malaysia, or from Japan or wherever they found this book, even though I don’t know how it got to them because we didn’t send them, that somehow people move them around, and I get to look in the eyes of international members. It’s that same feeling of I feel the void for myself by doing this for my kids, and we made this book. It’s the same thing for them and they get to just have that environment in the home. That’s the best feeling.

Johonna: In addition to just getting the books to these different countries, we’re also working on translating it to other languages. So that’s a bigger endeavor, but we just take one thing at a time. We’re getting there. 

Meg: I love that you listen hard a lot. So, what has been the best part about working together?

Johonna: I have to say, it’s worked so well, better than I could have ever expected. Because you, Yael and I have very complementary skill sets. Like I said earlier, I’m more kind of the chrome Marian editors, she’s got the design eye, and the photography and the sense of layout. 

Yael: But that said, while we have these complementary skills, we work together on every element of the book. And they’re just great synergies and we work. Everything feels very fair, our communication is always very open because we have this history of being friends first. We are able to just have complete open communication. And it’s been, I want to say seamless, which you go as far as saying. 

It’s just been seamless working together, no drama. We don’t have to use any sort of stress oils together. It’s funny people are like, “Oh, you wrote a book,” but that is 1% of what this business is. Day to day we are dealing with so many things that business entrepreneurs deal with, between marketing and taxes, and all kinds of stuff, customer service, livery fulfillment, logistics, reverse logistics, all of it. But it really takes both being all in and, again, like Johonna said, respect for each other. We always find a way to move through it together. It’s the best partnership I could have ever asked for.

Johonna: Absolutely. I agree.

Meg: I love that. When I was looking for guests for the podcast, I had your book. So I’m like, “Oh, I want the author of Oil + Glass.” So, I went to your website, or somehow I discovered there’s two authors, it made me so excited. A lot of us who use essential oils can be like sisterhood. I couldn’t wait to hear your story. Before we dive into rapid fire, do you have any closing encouragement for listeners about using your book or even essential oils and creating DIY-ers?

Yael: Don’t complicate things. I think people think it’s so hard to keep things simple. Keep the supplies in your kitchen nearby, and use the book with all that it offers in the icons with the dilution charts, but don’t overthink it. In the beginning I used my family as my test kitchen and I get really excited when we got a scraped knee because I got to use my oil. I think we all have had that experience. Start with the few things that go on in your home and then build that foundational knowledge from there. 

Meg: Yeah, that is such such a good word. Are you ready for rapid fire? This is my favorite part. I get so excited. So, you can just take turns and you can both answer because I know you’ll have different answers. So number one, tell us something fun about yourselves outside of oils or your book.

Yael: Something fun. So, we have this really funky old camper van. It’s like an ‘86 camper van and just hitting the road with my family is just freedom to me and seeing as much of this world as possible in regards to adventure and travel. That’s me. Love it.

Johonna: We are a super active outdoor family. So like I said, I have a nine, or almost nine, and 11 year old and we take them on all sorts of adventures. We go backpacking, mountain biking, skiing, you name it. We’re all out as a family doing these things. And our latest is a horse as an adventure and taking that on and trading, so we call it the COVID horse. A lot of people got COVID puppies. We got a COVID horse.

Meg: Yes that’s so funny. I heard on the radio some country singer was bored from not being on tour, so they bought a pack of bison. And I’m just like, “COVID bison?” If you’re bored. Who is your entrepreneurial girl crush?

Yael: I’m actually gonna say Michelle Obama. Because she gets the limelight. If you’ve read her book, you can see the amount of change she has made in this country at least for programs on healthy food for children to me, you never actually even heard about it but she did so much and her leadership and her passion. She saw the course that she wanted to take and she never left it. 

Meg: I love that one. I love that you picked a plot twist. When we think entrepreneurial people think the same answer. So, I love that you picked a plot twist, one that’s awesome. What single oil can’t you live without?

Johonna: Frankincense as I said earlier. So, I’m sticking by that. Cell regeneration, mood enhancing everything’s skin, everything, mood.

Yael: I would say Frankincense, but I don’t want to say that. So, this household loves Northern Lights Black Spruce. That is, first of all, the highest frequency oil that there is. Not a lot of people know that, they think rose is, but I got to actually visit that farm and the amount of energy that goes into that oil. I love trees. I love the nourishment of it. And that is our jam.

Meg: I love it. Interesting you both chose tree oils, too, right? Tree oils are so grounding. I remember when someone told that to me. I kept saying it’s so weird. I love all the tree oils and they’re like, “Well, it’s because they’re so grounding.” Oh, makes sense.

Last question. This one isn’t hard. Where can people find you and follow along with you? How can they get your book all that fun stuff?

Yael: So we are on Instagram, it’s Oil.and.Glass. We are always up for chatting in the DM if you have any questions. We’re also on Facebook as Oil and Glass, we are also on Amazon if you just search Oil + Glass recipe book. We are on discoverlsb.com with our publisher and also the international Amazon so if it’s you know canada.ca or Mexico .mx and eventually .au for Australia and so on. So, you cannot miss us. We will see you at conventions, we are in your living room, on your coffee table. 

Meg: Yes, I love it and I will link the book for listeners in the show notes. So, if you guys want to just go right to the show notes and I’ll make it super easy for you to click over and buy if you don’t have it yet, or gift to a friend. I wanted to add, when you were talking about how people are using it. Some oily references are so informative but they’re not super pretty, so you feel weird. Happy birthday, here’s this textbook looking. It doesn’t really work. But your book is so pretty that it can work as a gift whether it’s birthday or wedding. That was just a thought I had that I forgot to say so I wanted to share. But thank you both so, so much. I learned a lot and I just hope people walk away feeling empowered to use their oils and these rescues.

Johonna: Thank you so much for having us, Meg. That was great.

Join Haylee Crowley, Creator of Whimsy + Wellness, and Meg Ryan, content creator at Whimsy + Wellness, to talk all things wellness, entrepreneurship, motherhood, and womanhood.

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