IT’S AROUND THE CORNER !

It really is. What will Mother Nature find when she launches her precious “SPRING” on to our world ?

Could the world be any more outrageous and crazy than it is right now?

I mean really !!!!! Is this ” WORLD WIDE BAD KARMA ” or what ?

Yet, amidst it all , one day you will smell the earth ,all the trees will bud ,skies will turn bright blue with big fat white clouds,birds everywhere will sing into the night and flowers will be throwing their sweet heads up to the sky in praise.

THERE WILL BE CLOVER !

We have added 2 NEW STATEMENT SOAPS to our wonderful collection. I have  chosen to open up this year with JOY SOAP and FAITH SOAP.

I cannot help but wonder how many people start each and every day of their lives taking a shower. Imagine lathering up with amazing smelling soap, the bathroom becomes beautifully aromatic and you are relaxed and reminded that :

JOY IN YOUR HEART , NO MATTER WHAT, MAKES A PERFECT DAY AND ALWAYS , ALWAYS KEEP THE FAITH FOR THAT IS A …..

BEAUTIFUL THING !

JOY and FAITH soaps with a statement inside each box and when you lather up the letters on the soaps turn white and you can read their reminder.

NEW FOR YOU FROM KALASTYLE

I could not agree more !

After a summer of sun, sunblock build-up, and sweating, it’s time to get serious about your skin!

“BAILOUT” summer dry skin with a luscious MARIA EVORA BODY MOIST, in Beach Rose  or Carob Mineral. M-M-M- Your guy will love the way you feel and smell.

“REFORM” those beat-up, clogged pores after months of sunblock and sweat with a Swedish Eggwhite Facial. Victoria Eggwhite Facial Soaps will do the trick. Eggwhites and rosewater will gently draw build up from your pores and simply leave you GLOWING this Autumn!

“STIMULATE” your shower now, boys and girls, with Swedish TALLBA Pine Soap. Tangy , lemony , pure pine soap from Sweden will get you moving each day feeling FRESH and ready to take on the world! (Great vintage soap design and packaging… ditto the Eggwhite soaps!)

SO, CHEERS!!! Farewell to summer and welcome to a NEW season and better days ahead!

Kate

Summer is upon us and at Kalastyle we offer some perfect summer-time soaps and toiletries.  Be sure to check out our “Crisp, Clean and Refreshing” Collection on our homepage.

Don’t forget to “BEAT THE HEAT” with beautiful Borotalco powder.  Smell fresh and really clean on a hot, sticky day with an all-over dusting of this Italian powder, Italy’s most popular personal care product.  Try a little European secret.  Dust your fresh bed linens with Borotalco when you make the bed.  Wonderfully satisfying on a warm, summer night.

HAVE FUN!

And remember-always buy good soap!

This is my Aunt Helen.  She will be 95 years old this August.  Born in N.Y.C. to Irish immigrants, she is one of 7 kids, my dad’s sister, and she is the only one left.  She lives alone in an apartment in Queens that she has called home for 40 years.

At 94 she makes her way everywhere on foot, she has never driven a car.  She walks to mass, the post office, the market, the “5 & dime” (as she still calls it) and in the nice weather she finds a bench to rest on and “chat-it-up” with the neighbors and their children.  She has never been married or had children of her own (probably why she has lived so long!).

I took this picture of her last March, Saint Patrick’s Day.  I was visiting her and we were on our way out for a walk.  It was freezing out.  We didn’t care.

My Aunt Helen loves our Victoria “Eggwhite Facial Soaps”.

It’s all she uses.  Isn’t she just beautiful?  I think she is one of the most beautiful women this earth will ever know.

- She doesn’t go to the doctor

- She walks everywhere

- She loves a little “Manhattan” cocktail

- She takes 2 aspirin (St. Joesph’s childrens aspirin) everyday…just in case.

- And, she loves our “Eggwhite Facial Soap” ….Just look at that skin!

That’s right.  One year ago this month the “black dude”, the “black guy” as lots of people here in Rhode Island called him, came to town.

It was an amazing March morning.  Rolling sky of blasting sun, then huge clusters of clouds, still chilly, but Spring was definitely in the air….

AND, SO WAS “HOPE“!

I live on an island, and by the time I got to Providence to hear the junior senator from Illinois speak - everything had changed.  The sky was flat, grey and threatening.  It just got colder and colder.  No one was prepared.

10,000 people came that day to listen to Senator Barack Obama.

HOPE.  It was all about HOPE.  Everyone hoped that they would be able to get inside the auditorium.  (Holds 5,000 people).  Everyone (another 5,000) that realized they had no chance of getting inside HOPED that the freezing hail storm we were now all the victims of, would end soon.  No one left.

People, that were prepared, shared umbrellas, covering up the stranger in the crowd standing next to them.

Obama arrived.  He was told the auditorium as maxed out and that there were another 5,000 that had been standing outside for hours, HOPING to hear him speak.  He got back in the car.

They drove him to all of us in the parking lots and on the hillsides.  He got out of the car, simple, no fanfare, no hat, no umbrella.  He spoke to all of us above the rain, and then he worked the rope.

That’s a picture of my hand and his hand one second before he grabbed me.  At 6 feet tall I could reach above everyone.  We held hands hand.  I looked him dead in the eye and for whatever reason, said “THANK YOU, BARACK”.

He looked me dead in the eye and said “NO. THANK YOU!”  Then he looked around at all of us, like nutjobs in the freezing cold, hailing rain and said:  “THANK ALL OF YOU”.

In honor of our President, President Barack Obama, we at Kala offer you:

“THE HOPE SOAP”

“BE FULL OF IT - EVERY DAY”.

Anticipating its arrival, one can’t help but feel good (despite the world being on the edge, on fire, or both!) about the resounding messages now, finally, coming from America.

“LOVE” and “HOPE”

It’s time.  Our NEW Kalastyle “Statement Soaps” are right on target.

The LOVE SOAP with its warm Moroccan Incense and patchouli extracts makes its case…“IT’S ALL YOU NEED”.

HOPE has to be one of the world’s most powerful virtues.  As Martin Luther King said: EVERYTHING GOOD STARTS WITH HOPE.

So, let’s all “BE FULL OF IT”.  With uplifting fragrance of lily pear and violet extracts, the HOPE SOAP will get you started each day filled with HOPE.

And who knows, maybe with a little LOVE and lots of HOPE there will be: PEACE - the PEACE SOAP

Here’s to 2009, Happy New Year!

The Kala family would like to wish all of you a peaceful Thanksgiving.  We are very grateful to have so many customers that enjoy our soaps and toiletries.  It is always our pleasure to service you.

This year, with things a little tight for so many people, our Kalastyle products are the perfect remedy.  Giving unique and beautiful gifts without spending a fortune is what Kalastyle is all about.

So, please check out our holiday site.  You are sure to find great gifts and stocking stuffers for everyone.

Enjoy!

Kate

“SONO FELICE!!!”  I am so happy I did not wait until last year to get a passport!  For one thing, there would be no Kalastyle products.  Without it (unless you choose to travel illegally) you can never really know first hand anything about other countries or the people of the world.

The “Sea to Shining Sea” photo, I took from the tip of the little island where I live.  That’s the Atlantic Ocean.  My island is part of the state of Rhode Island, which unfortunately, we cannot see Russia from.

“HONESTLY, WHAT DOES ANY OF THIS HAVE TO DO WITH SOAP?”

Well, I’ll tell you.

Did you know that today more European families purchase liquid soaps and gels than bars of soap?  American mass market brands sailed across the Atlantic holding hands with our fast-food chains.

I can remember the Europe before they landed.

IT IS IN THAT EUROPE THAT I HAD MY FIRST FOREIGN AFFAIRS.

The House of Valobra in Genova, Italy is where it all began.  Since 1902 the Valobra family has refused to compromise on anything in the art of soap making.  Nestled on the coast of Italy, this soapworks factory has survived everything, including a Nazi occupation during World War II.

From Signore Valobra’s vast collection of amber colored bottles of pure essential oils and raw materials to the generations of women gently hand wrapping and boxing each soap, Valobra Soaps simply offer a superior bathing experience.

Traveling in 2008, while going back in time, that’s the House of Valobra.   It is just one of the amazing places my passport has taken me.

Valobra Soaps.  Expensive?  Yes.  Worth every lira, euro, US dollar?  Absolutely.  Never giving up a family tradition?  Priceless.

The American Election 2008

What does a passport, experiencing the idea of keeping an old world family tradition alive for 106 years and the election have in common?

One candidate went to Europe to remind all Europeans of the common values we share across the Atlantic.

Another, ridiculed that connection and warned, “it is not what he took there that concerns me; it is what he brought back! Lots of ideas from Europe he’d like to see imported here.”

I am as Irish Catholic as they come.

If you don’t know what that means, I’ll tell you.  It means I like to party.  It also means my little address book in the kitchen drawer has a picture of Mary on the cover.  If you don’t know who Mary is - she’s God’s mom, even though she’s a virgin.

Sunday, at mass, I started looking around.  I stand in the back, there was a good crowd.  Watching so many different people lined up in pews I asked myself   “DO WE LOOK CATHOLIC?”

When I walk down the street do people say:  “Oh yeah, she’s a Catholic, all right!”?

HONESTLY! WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH SOAP?

Well, we Catholics believe in “The 10 Commandments” and number nine is “Thou Shalt Not Lie”.  And, lying has everything to do with soap.

Can you name any other object your mother threatened to stuff in your mouth if you lied?  Probably not.

Have you ever had your mouth washed out with soap?

I HAVE!

It is disgusting and invigorating at the same time.  And for sure, it is nothing you would want to do twice in your life.

The American Election Campaign 2008

What does a Catholic, an election and a bar of soap have to do with each other?

One can find many a mouth that needs a good scrubbing in this campaign.  My God, the stuff that comes out of them!

For mouth-washing: I recommend Kalastyle’s Tabiano Soap.  Even though our Star of David Honey Almond Soap would probably TASTE pretty good as far a soap goes, lying is serious business, and Tabiano is serious soap.

So, Tabiano, it is!

Lather up!

What a year!

At Kalastyle, we talk everyday about the future and our world. Yes, we are the “soap people”, but at the same time, we are a family business and like all families we want a safe and healthy world to live in.

So, for 2008 we offer you our Kalastyle Statement Soaps, to ponder each message as you wash up or soak in the bath with one of these new soaps. They are organic aloe vera enriched and smell “WONDERFUL”! And, don’t forget, when you shower with the Save Water Soap…invite a friend!