Rustique Essentials is a farm-based family-owned company created in 2011 in Cedar Hill, Tennessee on their 18-acre farm. They will be offering a full day of family fun on the farm with Spring Fling on March 11. It is a perfect opportunity to bring the kids and learn about natural farm living. The event begins at 10:00 a.m.
They will be offering natural Easter egg dying as a free craft, a petting zoo, pig feeding, goat milking workshops, horseback riding lessons, and barn tours. Goat milking workshops will take place at 10:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., 12:00 p.m., and 1:00 p.m. Horseback riding lessons will take place at 10:45 a.m., 11:45 a.m., and 12:45 p.m.
Spring classes will sell out quickly, so they will be offering early-bird class sign ups. Their Homestead Classes include How to Make Natural Soap and Old-Fashioned Healing with Honey. Learn more about upcoming classes here.
All of their all-natural, handmade body care, home decor, and cleaning supplies will be available for sale in their homestead store during the event. They contain no parabens, dyes, or phylates. Owner Alya Whitehead uses things grown on the farm to make these all-natural products.
“Since 2010,” said Whitehead on their website, “I have made my own natural products using herbs and essential oils, and spent years of trial and error to master the craft of creating all-natural, non-toxic products that actually work…In addition to the all-natural body care products, salves, and cleaning supplies, we also offer a wide variety of natural or reclaimed home decor products at our vendor markets. We truly are dedicated to serving the needs of our family and our customers each and every day.”
All of the home and body care items she makes for her family are always available to anyone through their website. These products are made fresh when ordered online.
Whitehead began making these simple and purely natural products when her premature twins needed something safer than manufactured products.
“The thing that really opened my eyes to the fact that chemical-tainted items used daily can hurt us, was when I had my twin boys a month and a half early. Everything broke them out — I mean everything. As suggested by our pediatrician, I gave them baths with no soap, washed their clothes with soap nuts instead of laundry detergent, and wasn’t able to use any lotion at all on those little guys. It was crazy how sensitive skin brings out the side effects of chemical exposure that people with non-sensitive skin don’t see… so they just don’t believe that store bought stuff is bad.”
That is when she set out to find alternative products made with a mixture of natural oils, butters and essential oils rather than chemicals.
“Each day we get rid of a harmful product and replace it with something safe,” added Whitehead. “My daughter and I were making a jar of sugar scrub the other day and I turned around to find her licking the spoon. I asked her what she was doing and she replied that she forgot we were making “soap” and thought it was brownies. I just laughed when she said it didn’t taste as good as it looked. There was nothing in the scrub that would hurt her. Nothing that she couldn’t eat!
