We are now offering a digital PDF version of The Essential Herbal Magazine especially for foreign subscribers and others who wish to go paperless. It has taken a couple of years worth of requests (when you may have thought we weren't listening), but we needed to first be sure that making this decision would not endanger our ability to continue printing the magazine. Overwhelmingly, our readers have let us know that they prefer to hold the magazine in their hands and turn the pages, savoring the experience. As long as there is a post office, we'll continue to print.
The postage on foreign subscriptions has almost reached the cost of the subscriptions though, so it is time to reluctantly make this change. New and renewing foreign subscriptions will be PDF version only, while US subscribers may choose either the print or the PDF version.
Otherwise, our 10th anniversary celebration continues with daily drawings from our subscribers through the end of the month. Little surprises (and some big ones) arrive in homes daily, and we're having a lot of fun with it. You can see the winners HERE.
Later this week we expect to be restocking our web shop, since it was decimated prior to the holidays (thank you!) so be sure to check back as we'll post about the new stuff here.
Work here on the farm doesn't slow down much over the winter, even if we aren't planting, weeding, and harvesting. Maryanne's wholesale soap business keeps us hopping as we work to refill the forlorn looking shelves (we're getting there). We just started work on the Mar/Apr '12 issue of The Essential Herbal yesterday, and we've begun a series of herbal classes here as well. We have several off-site lectures and classes scheduled for the next few months and the herb festivals are just over the horizon. In between, we get to play around with new recipes, formulate and test out new products, and just plain keep our hands in the herbs, oils, and scents.
That's it for now. In 10 years we haven't had too many big changes, sticking to our original vision of a grassroots publication of herbalists and herbal enthusiasts sharing information as if sitting around a kitchen table. That will never change. This is one of very few changes, and as we welcome 2012, we're excited to be offering this new option.