AROMATHERAPY NECKLACE

  I have been asked a lot about aromatherapy jewelry for those who do not have their ears pierced. Well, here is the solution: aromatherapy necklace!

Now available on Nelland Boutique!

  It took a lot of research to find the proper type of pendant, because I want all my jewelry to be first and foremost be safe to wear. Essential oils are so strong, that I do not want to risk their contact with the skin.
  This pendant is solid in the back, so it will not leak any oil when in touch with clothing or the skin. The front is abundantly cut open for the oil to evaporate through, while still protecting clothes from staining.
  I fixed the pendant to the middle of the chain, so that it always stays in place, keeping the lock in it´s place in the neck as well.

  I welcome this new type of aromatherapy jewelry to my collection with open arms! On days when I want to wear teeny tiny stud earrings (on which it is impossible to add essential oil), I can now boost my being with aromatherapy via my new necklace! Cool!

  Check out more on Nelland Boutique on Etsy!

OSTARA EARRINGS

  These are the latest additions to the selection of my aromatherapy earrings. Designed and hand made by me, of pure wool, metal and glass, these earrings upgrade any look with a touch of sophistication. Pastel colors suit Ostara/spring perfectly, while white and blue suit any season.

  
  All available online on NellandBoutique, only 20 euro/pair (including shipping + handling worldwide).
  Needless to say, a pair of aromatherapy earrings make an excellent and unique gift idea!

CELEBRATE WINTER WITH COOL SNOWFLAKE EARRINGS

  Proud to present to you, the newest aromatherapy earrings! Enjoy and embrace the season in a new and beautiful way, and most of all, enjoy life.

These cute metal snowflakes are adorned with tiny "snowballs" (a.k.a. pearls  =). They complete your everyday look perfectly, making you hip and tuned in with the season. Classic snowflakes are easy to combine with anything, from jeans to blazers. 

For more festive occasions go these bigger and fancier earrings. Rhinestones glisten along with nature´s authentic snowflakes, making the bearer a sophisticated, but fun, classy beauty. Perfect for evening wear, and they go with any colored clothing!

  Add peppermint or eucalyptus essential oil on these earrings, and you feel as cool as you look!

  Both earrings are available on my online shop Nelland Boutique for 20/22e (incl. shipping & handling).

NELLAND FAERY - NEW MINI COLLECTION

  My artistic, sabbat based, fashion collection is my way to let loose my creativity in one way. The clothes are unique and quite bold for the everyday work wear. I love every single outfit, forty all together, and I feel great wearing them. But they all require certain levels of energy to carry. They stand out from the crowd, and draw attention. Mostly that´s all nice and fun, but sometimes it feels comfortable to blend more in.

  For those occasions, I now begin to build a whole new mini-collection, which is also based on the wheel-of-the-year and it´s sabbats, but with only two outfits per season.
  I call it Nelland Faery.
  The idea is to wear more ordinary, but cool and neat, clothes that will go for any occasion. The key words to describe this new garderobe could be: fresh, girly, fun, and ethereal.
  For years I´ve dreamed of slipping in one faery-like outfit to every sabbat´s collection, but failed to do so because of my such strong visions of the looks each sabbat represents. So here´s my chance to express this more feminine and frail side of me, in form of faery-like everyday clothes.

  Here is the first ever outfit from my new Nelland Faery- collection:

An ordinary-shaped t-shirt with pants (not jeans). No gimmicks, nothing extraordinary, but neat enough to go anywhere in. The base is then accessorized rather heavily, with mostly matching-colored, jewelry to give it "faery dust". I just love using these terms here! How about that, an outfit sprinkled with faery dust?! Cool, girly, and fun.

Making a slight statement by writing "imbolc" at the chest... Pagan fashion is really hard to find anywhere, and often my searches lead to black cloaks and witches´ hats. Nobody wears that for real! Luckily I´ve learned to make my own clothes to express my own personal beliefs and style.

Makeup is very light and natural. Apart from my artistic collection, in Faery fashion makeup does not repeat the colors of the clothes. Here I wear natural shades to enhance me, not the clothes. Both styles are great, but I want to create a difference between the two collections, and it is fun to do this too. So here I wear grey eyeshadow, warm pink blush, and pink lip gloss. Also I left the eyebrows undefined, to achieve a lighter and more fresh look.

   Although I find this outfit and style rather young, I wish to have the guts to wear it in my fifties, sixties, and beyond (okay, perhaps this particular shirt may have worn out by then, but a new, similar one that is). I see no reason why an older woman could not wear this now. Heck, if I saw a senior citizen in this outfit now, I´d find her more stylish than myself in it! Age is no reason to let go of pretty! We are all gorgeous in our own way, and have stunning features we ought to accentuate and be proud of!
 

VALENTINE´S DAY GIFT TIP

  Valentine´s Day is practically just around the corner, and it´s time to start thinking about how to show love and appreciation for that special someone (or yourself!).
  I´ll be darned if these brand new aromatherapy earrings I made don´t do the trick, along with some sensual ylang-ylang essential oil! You can get them from my little shop Nelland Boutique for only 20 e/pair.

Sweet pink hearts are for the younger generation of lovely women.

And these beautiful classic red ones for the more experienced chicks.

  Love is the greatest power in the world, so let´s celebrate it to the fullest!
  Have a love-filled and most romantic upcoming Valentine´s Day! 

YULE FASHION: GINGERBREAD DRESS

  Gingerbread cookies are not on my menu (I rather eat it as dough =), but are now in my wardrobe. When thinking of Yule, gingerbread comes to my mind as an important factor of making the spirit bright. So in honor of the traditional treat, I made myself this Yule dress:

Dark brown knit dress with white accentuates. I didn´t plan to use a fabric with print on it, but this was the only proper dark brown I could find with some structure in it. After a little configuration, I came to the conclusion that this might even be better, less obvious, than a solid color. I went ahead and followed my original vision otherwise, including the white zig-zag ribbons at the hem resembling the icing used in cookies. To prevent appearing costume-ish, I accessorized the neck hole with a self-made necklace rather than adding zig-zag there too.

The white accessories bind the look to the snowy surrounding nature.

Natural makeup reflects the colors of the clothes, with mainly browns and off-white used. Earrings are light grey and white aromatherapy ones, in which I apply a Yule-scented combination of essential oils including cinnamon, pine, cardamom, and cloves.

BLACK & WHITE FOR WINTER

  Black and white is always a stylish choice, a classic combo that never goes out of style.
   Here´s my latest contribution to achieving the perfect look:

  All these earrings will not only make you look chic, but feel superb as well. They are aromatherapy earrings you can wear with a drop of any essential oil you like. Whether you need a kick in the morning, brighten up a rainy day, or spark up that relationship, there is an all natural oil for every occasion.
 You can get these earrings from my little shop Nelland Boutique!

SAMHAIN FASHION COLLECTION

  Here´s my complete artistic Samhain fashion collection, all five outfits:

The French Artist.

The 1800´s.

Besides Halloween, these spider & pearl aromatherapy earrings suit this outfit perfectly.

The Goth. Apparently lying flat on the floor does not do justice on the dress...

These fancy crosses are also aromatherapy earrings.

The Hobo.

Pentacle aromatherapy earrings.

Schoolgirl meets Ringu.

A pair of very classic bow earrings, found in numerous colors in my little shop Nelland Boutique.

  This collection of five outfits serves me throughout Samhain, each year from about mid-October until early December. It´s a bliss to pull out a new wardrobe each time a season changes!

MABON FASHION COLLECTION

  May I present to you, my whole artistic Mabon fashion collection!

"Oliver Twist".

"50´ Cheerleader" (the garments were pulled right out of storage for this picture, that´s why the creases.)

"Scottish Plaids".

"Romania".

"Turning Leaves".

 
 Cool, now I´ll always know what to wear, and I´m all set for the Mabons to come!

MABON FASHION: ROMANIA

  Once I was able to travel around Romania in fall, and it was breathtakingly beautiful! The tour took me through the capital Bucharest to the countryside, where I visited monasteries and local homes, and of course awed the gorgeous Carpathian Mountains. 
  What struck me the most was that most houses had numerous apple trees in their yards, and the size of the fruit was unbelievable. So large, great in number, and deliciously perfect-looking. They also commonly grew other foods too, like corn, and many houses had a cow and a horse. Horse carriages were a more common sight than cars in the countryside.
  And the people! So confidently stylish in their old-fashioned clothes. I watched them with admiration. The women wore floral dresses and a scarf around their hair, and the men had on straight pants, a collar shirt, and a type of hat, like a mini-stetson. It felt like I had rolled back in time about seventy years. Awesome!

  Romania left such an impression on me, that ever since I have longed for a similar dress to what the women there wore. And now the time has come. Here´s my tribute to Romania:

I made my dress way more streamlined than theirs, but we live in different cultures too. The fabric is rather busy with all the flowers around it, so I kept everything else to a minimum. No collars, buttons, or pockets. Nor big show-off pieces of jewelry.

The pattern is new, and this dress is the first one I´ve ever made with it. The style is more loose than in my earlier patterns, and that´s the reason I wanted to try this. For years now fashion has been exaggeratedly wide on tops, so I figured I´d give this a try for a change. Time will tell how it works, but so far it feels good, and is a nice change to my dresses.

Makeup is natural, only using different shades of brown. While the real Romanian belles might have chosen bright red for their lips, I opted for nude beige lipgloss. But I chose bright red for my earrings. Red roses with white pearls are such a classic over decades, that they complement this traditional look well.

  Thank you, Romania, for inspiration, showing me your beauty, and teaching me your way of life! What an awesome experience.

P.S. The pattern I used to make the dress is from here (number 14).

MABON FASHION: SCOTTISH PLAIDS

  Alike all of my outfits, this one also comes from my imagination. It is an image that has formed in my head over the years as a result of all the things I´ve seen so far.

  Why I associate green plaids with the Scots, I do not know, but this style suits Mabon so well, that I need the look in my collection:

A dark green kilt-like mini-skirt with a tweed top.

I was sooo tempted to make a miniature beret of the skirt fabric, and attach it to a headband or something, but it would have made the look too costume-like. So instead I opted for a regular woolen dark brown beret, which repeats the color of the pants nicely binding the whole together.

The outfit consists of several smallish pieces, the shirt, mini-skirt, and pants, so I added only earrings as accessory. And remotely imitating a kilt, it is also somewhat masculine, so loads of jewelry did not seem appropriate.

Makeup is surprisingly colorful (which once again does not show properly in the pic, but take my word for it =) to balance the muted brown in the tweed-like jersey top. I added bright light green on the inner 2/3 of the moving lid to repeat the green of the skirt. It is of different hue, but green nonetheless. Then the rest of the face is accentuated with different types of brown. Medium brown on the outer 1/3 of the moving lid, beige blush on the cheeks, and beige lipgloss. The earrings are, naturally, my own aromatherapy ones made of coppery metal and white wool.

  This outfit replaces the kilt one I made a couple of years ago. The skirt back then ended up twisting around me as I moved, being a drag to wear. What I´ve done different this time is sewn the skirt straight on to the waist of the pants, so it is impossible for it to twist and move around.

SPIDERS & PEARLS FOR HALLOWEEN

  Time to start planning for Halloween! I made these cool and gloomy aromatherapy earrings (the only kind I wear anymore!) for starters. They set just the right mood.

Made of jewelry metal, felt, glass beads, and silver plated hooks. Now also available on Nelland Boutique.

  My latest love in essential oils is rosemary. The scent is fresh, similar to eucalyptus, yet woodsy, and suits fall, along with these spider earrings, perfectly. Rosemary gives more energy, revives memory, blood circulation, and hair growth, and eases aches and pains. Suits me!

PURE HOME FASHION: COUNTRY DENIM DRESS

  This fall I have begun to listen to country music through online radio stations. That´s practically the only way to hear it over here, and one can not even by accident stumple on anything country overall. It has to be sought after, or created by your own. That´s what I did when designing and making this new home dress for myself:

Basic denim and ruffles combined with browns. Since this outfit is for the real-world use, I did not add layers of white lace or ruffles (which was tempting, but not easy to wear without looking ridiculously over-the-board  =). And since country style is not common in my neighborhood, I wanted to give hints of it rather than go all the way with cowboy hats and boots.

This is an authentic milieu I wear the dress in.

I can even sit on a tree stump without dirt showing too much on the dress. A nicely carefree garment for home wear and with kids.

The necklace has a big silvery sunflower on it as a focal point. It adds the same country feeling as traditionally big belt buckles do, but in a more subtle and feminine way.

 The beads are from a craft store, and were readily assorted to match each other. Making wired jewelry is a new thing to me, and I have completely fallen for it. It creates an airy, light, and modern look to beading.

This is a good apple year, and I have eaten them soooo much. This pair of my aromatherapy earrings suit country style well, and they have been my favorite recently.

Yummy!

  I first ran into country music, and the culture around it, during my exchange year in Kentucky long ago. It felt bizarre and overwhelming to hear only country music, and see folks wear boots and hats and stuff. But I got used to it of course, and now it feels somehow nostalgic and intriguing.
  The movie Country Strong was on tv some time ago, and it inspired me even further. And as a funny coincidence, I learned recently that my sister has also listened to some country lately.