Hi! I'm so glad you're here!

Welcome to the Essentially Alison blog! I've been pondering this for awhile and decided to make it happen! No time like the present!

What in the world are you going to share on here?

I'm so glad you asked.

Allow me to introduce myself first and then we'll dive into details.

My name is Alison and I live in Baraboo, WI. I've always considered myself a creative person. I have a pretty serious full time job and I've found crafting and creative outlets to be necessary to manage my stress. Bonus, I enjoy crafting and being creative. 

Essentially Alison started as a simple "business" Instagram page for my oils side hustle (more on that later.) My sister deserves all the credit for the name Essentially Alison. It was a play on words for the oil hustle but as time has gone on, the oils, the crafting, the sewing and now the products I want to write about are TRULY. ESSENTIALLY. ME. I am Alison. I am Essentially Alison. These products are essentially me.

Essentially Alison grew into a crafting side hustle as I bought a Cricut™ and a Janome™ sewing machine. I've taken somewhat of a pregnant pause on crafting the past few months as life has been shifting and adjusting for me. 2019 and 2020 were pretty jam packed with crafting activities, custom orders, mask making, vendor fair attending, etc and I needed a break. I am now refreshed from that break with some changes in my personal life and decided I love sharing the products I use in everyday life but may not necessarily want to post randomly about it and irritate my family/friend network on social media.

Combined with oversharing about my life generally I thought a blog post where I could give a more detailed version of my product review and and share a link for ya'll would be a good start! I do not consider myself an influencer like you see on Instagram but I would be lying if I didn't say I wouldn't mind being one! I have been HIGHLY influenced by several bloggers from the Instagram world, folks that I follow their stories, read their blogs religiously and take their word as gold for things they recommend. I find myself sharing my products often enough that I thought I would give this a try!

Blame it on TikTok.

For real. I've been inspired. 

More life details, if you care.

• Type A person
• Thrives on living in an organized space
• Loves throwing stuff away
• Enneagram 2: Helper (to a fault/my own detriment somedays)
• Learning to cohabitate with B 
• Living in a modern Victorian house
• Loving on a puppy named Lexi
• Has flat, thin hair that I'm always trying to volumize
• Believes essential oils can cure pretty much any ailment

Not Sponsored Content: A Disclaimer

Believe me when I say my Instagram following of ~300 didn't excite Instagram or Amazon into letting me have a storefront there where I could easily showcase my 2020 quarantine purchases or 2021 organizational purchases that I feel like people might care about. So, I'm sharing them on my blog as a pure suggestion. I receive no compensation from any company I mention, none of my content is sponsored but if any company WANTS to partner with me, please reach out.

All thoughts, ramblings and opinions expressed in the Essentially Alison blog posts are 100% purely my own and no one is paying me for any product review.

Yet, anyway. Hey, if I don't manifest my future, who will?

If you've made it this far in the post, you must be related to me or I bribed you. Thank you. Stayed tuned for some really fun product promotion that may or may not include TikTok's and all sorts of other fun social media tools!