Before I went Paleo, I was aware that I was eating poorly. I just wasn't ready to change my lifestyle. Even before our wedding, I was enjoying my pizza and grits (we lived in Atlanta at the time). Most people really try to diet and get skinny before walking down the aisle. Clearly I was not one of them. I wasn't overweight, but I could have looked better. At least now, I get to look back on my wedding pictures and think "damn, I look good now" as opposed to "damn, I looked good then". Ok whoa, I digress. My point is this; I got on board with eating right and exercising because I was conscious of the fact that I wasn't. And then once I started those things, I thought that I was killing it with being healthy and clean. That is, until I started chatting with Liz Wolfe (cavegirleats.com) and read her Skintervention Guide.
This was the big slap in the face moment that I had been missing this whole time. Despite a clean diet, I was still willingly introducing toxic elements to my body through my skin and hair care products. Think about it - what's the point of working so hard on our diets if we ruin it by using toxic products?! I immediately got rid of all the products I owned. Now, I have crazy curly hair, acne prone face and dry skin. So as you can imagine I had quite the closet full of products. But as it turns out, going natural has actually been more beneficial to my skin and hair than I ever could have imagined! Even Peter has been somewhat on board with switching out his deodorant and hair care for my homemade products. The bottom line is that we should nourish our bodies from the outside-in with the same ingredients that we use to feed our bodies from the inside out. Hence, food for your skin. Take tallow for instance. For those of you who aren't familiar with tallow, it's basically what lard is to pigs, but for ruminants (cows, sheep, buffalo, etc). And for centuries around the world, our ancestors from various cultures have used some form of animal fat for moisturizers and general skin healers. Tallow gives the skin the nutrients it needs to heal itself. The same as fat does for our cells inside the body.
After experimenting on Peter and myself, I branched out to my friends and family. Nervous as to what they would think about my products, but excited for outside feedback. I guess you could say the experiments went well and I have since started real., a skincare line under Pete's Paleo. Ultimately, my goal here is to open people's eyes to what is happening to our bodies because of the general market skin and hair care products. I'm all for DIY and encourage you all to experiment on your own. However, if you're just not that type, check out our current product line and what we have on tap for the future! I've partnered up with Cave Girl Eats to give away a free body and lip balm. Click here to ender the give away -  before the bundle runs out!