Sponsorship Bio: Bodylish

Jay and Nora Schaper began Bodylish with a mall kiosk at Southdale one Christmas season. Fifteen years later, it’s a full time job and you can find their handmade bodycare line online, at farmer’s markets and at Lund’s and Byerly’s all over the Twin Cities. “I look at everything and just cheer and jump,” says Nora.

Nora’s favorite part of the business is working with all the luscious ingredients to make a new product. “It’s like making a delicious batch of cookies that you can’t wait to share with your friends,” says Nora. “I made this great recipe! Try it!” She uses all natural and eco friendly ingredients to make everything from soap to massage oils. Take the YUM Lotion bar for example, made with pink Himalayan salt, lemon, cedarwood and pink peppercorn. Delicious seems like exactly the right word.

She also loves experimenting. After reading that all the models from the famous Ford Agency swore by a weekly facial steam made with an herbal laxative, she decided to come up with a version that was more fun.  Her Bodylish version i ncludes flowers and herbs like calendula and comfrey. Just drop a tablespoon into boiling water, and cover your head with a towel while the steam works it’s magic. “It’s this amazing secret to beautiful skin,” says Nora. “It hydrates and plumps the skin and those fine lines go away. It increases circulation and clears the pores and you just have glowing skin.” She laughs that while she was testing  with her head beneath a towel, the products, her son Owen came in and wanted to know what on earth she was doing. “He said, ‘What the heck are you doing under there?’ But then of course he wanted to try it. And it made him feel all lightlheaded, which he liked.”

Both of their sons attend City of Lakes Waldorf School, but Nora says she and Jay had been part of the Waldorf community long before they had children of their own. Both of her sisters have children in Waldorf Schools in Germany and California and other dear friends attend a school in Arizona. Marcee Hansen and Nora exchanged childcare when their children were little, and now, Marcee is Liam’s teacher. “The communities were always overlapping with us somehow,” says Nora. “Everywhere I turned, there was Waldorf.”

Nora says the school is a source of inspiration for the whole family. “We are continually inspired by the school,” says Nora.” By the work the kids bring home, by the Circus, by the art. They all get the same assignment but the look of the finished pieces is so different and their personalities come through. I love watching how happy and successful the children are. And there’s lots of good food, that place is full of excellent chefs,” she says with a laugh. “We love contributing what we can to this school. It has supported our family in many ways over the years.”

Find Bodylish on Facebook  , Instagram and Twitter too! Bodylish donated a basket of goodies to our Silent Auction, so try out their amazing products and support our school at the same time!