Great news for all our Cambridge based fans - bonbon lip balm is now available to purchase at the Urban Larder store on Mill Road.

Run by Polly Plouviez, this lovely shop specialises in stocking the most truly scrumptious goodies from the local area. Wrapped up as real little bonbons, our lip balms can now be found alongside delicious cakes, freshly made bread, local honey and handmade gifts.

To discover the delights of the Urban Larder for yourself just pop along to No 9, The Broadway, Mill Road CB1 3NA.

Ever wondered how we make our lovely lip balms? Well, unfortunately the exact details of how we make our balms is top secret classified information, so hopefully you'll be happy looking at these pretty pictures instead!

It's a tricky business making a good lip balm. From deciding what ingredients to use and to using them in the right quantities, even small changes can have a big effect on the balm texture and how it feels on your lips.

Most of the ingredients used to make bonbon lip balms come from plants (the only ingredient that doesn't is organic bees wax). These natural ingredients nourish and soothe the skin as well as being packed full of good things like vitamins and essential fatty acids.

These pictures are of a batch cooked up yesterday for club bonbon and are made with creamy shea butter, organic castor oil, organic coconut oil, organic carnauba wax, organic bees wax and natural essential oils.

So as not to spoil the surprise for lip balm club members I won't say which flavour they are. You'll just have to wait until they land on your doormat in the next couple of days!

Last week I was in the South of France where I managed to persuade my friends to stop eating cheese for a couple of hours and visit the nearby town of Grasse.  This small sunny town, perched in the hills above the French Riviera is often referred to as the perfume capital of the world, an impressive title that it has earned through its numerous perfume factories and its location in the heart of the French flower growing countryside.

Making perfume is no easy task as we discovered at our first stop, the Fragonard Factory.  First, there's the tricky business of getting the delicate aromas out of the flowers.  During the old-fashioned technique of enfleurage, flowers are individually placed onto a layer of fat which slowly absorbs the delicate fragrance of the flower.  This process is incredibly time consuming and requires a ridiculously large amount of flowers to get just a tiny amount of fragrance. Different fragrances are then blended together to create a perfume by an expert called "the nose".  There are only 50 noses in France and to become one you must train for between 3 and 8 years and be able to recognise 4,000 individual aromas!  One great thing about being a nose is that you only have to work for 4 hours a day so that you don't get overwhelmed by all the different smells.

We tried out our own nose skills in the Fragonard shop before heading over to the International Museum of Perfume.  Luckily we arrived at just as an English speaking tour was starting.  Justine, our lovely English-speaking guide first showed us fragrant plants growing on the roof terrace, before taking us through the history of perfume from ancient Egypt to the present day.  The highlight for me was seeing all the perfume bottles and labels and how they have changed through the ages.  We were also shown some gigantic bottles of perfumes that are apparently collected by the super rich. 

All in all it was a fantastic day out, well worth the break from Roquefort eating.  I would definitely recommend visiting Grasse if you are ever in the South of France.

Are you never without your trusty balm? Have you lost count of how many lip balms you own?  Or do you just consider yourself a bit of a lip balm expert?

 If you love lip balm and would like to help make bonbon balm even better we want to hear from you!  Bonbon is currently recruiting a team of lip balm experts to be on hand to give their opinions on all things lip balm - from flavours and texture to the age old question of pot vs. stick.

If you are 18 or over, based in the UK, have an email address and an interest in lip balm we'd love you to join the team.   Experts will receive fun questionnaires, samples to try and maybe even occasional surprise goodies. 

Since starting bonbon I've been seeing lips all over the place.  From bikinis to bras, sunglasses to sundresses, perhaps it's just me but they seem to be everywhere.

Though there are some really dodgy things out there, there are some very cute lip themed designs too.  Here is a selection of my hottest lip fashions for this summer. I especially like the Marc by Marc Jacobs dress and the Wildfox T-Shirt and the Tatty Devine necklace... oh dear, this could get expensive. 

Let me know which ones you like best or if you spot any other lip fashions when you are out and about.  Perhaps I'll make lip fashions a regular feature on the bonbon blog.

Free mini balms will be sent out this week!  Have you signed up to get yours?  In case you didn't know, we are offering mini versions of our strawberry, mint tingle or highly original lip balms to all our UK facebook friends (while stocks last).  Just email hello@bonbonbalm.com to let us know your address and what flavour you would like and we'll send one right along.

Bonbon has a new balm of the month - Mint Tingle.  This cool lip balm is made using community farmed peppermint oil, grown in Norfolk, just up the road from our bonbon HQ.  The peppermint plant thrives in fenland soil and produces some of the best quality oil in the UK.  This refreshing balm stimulates circulation to give you super healthy, super minty delicious lips. 

In other news, I discovered the colourful art works of Hilda Grahat at Forever is Today.  Inspired by her monochrome collections, I spent far too long arranging my own minty version for this blog post.  Let me know what you think.  Some images of Hilda's collections are below:

If you live in the UK and haven't yet tried our delicious natural lip balms yet then now's your chance. 

Bonbon is giving away mini-balm samples to our first 200 UK-based friends on Facebook.  Flavours on offer are mint tingle, strawberry and highly original (plain).  Like all our products, the mini-balms are made using the bonbon secret formula of natural plant oils to moisturise your lips and help them take care of themselves.

To get your hands on a mini-balm just visit the bonbon facebook page, click on 'like' to join our group and then send an email to hello@bonbonbalm.com stating:

1. Which flavour you would like - Mint Tingle, Strawberry or Highly Original 

2. Your name and UK address

3. Whether you like to keep your email address so we can let you know about future bonbon news and special offers

Mini-balm samples will be posted out during the first week of June.  Click here to go to the bonbon facebook page and get yours - your lips will thank you for it!

At the moment, chocolate is my favourite lip balm to make because it is made with real organic cocoa butter and it smells so lovely when it's cooking. So last week I made a big batch and filled up little eggs (left over from the Easter) to give out as free samples at Spitalfields market in London. In tow was my good friend and now official bonbon photographer, Rostam, to record the occasion.

The people I met seemed friendly, if a little bemused by my offerings of free chocolate lip balm inside purple eggs. After their initial surprise, people seemed to genuinely like the chocolate flavour and went away very happy with their new little eggs.

A big thank you to Mr Charisma and all the other people who have already purchased using the new website.

Your bonbon lip balms have now been shipped and should be with you in time for a very tasty weekend. Enjoy!

Saturday 27th March was a momentous day for me as it was my first day selling bonbon lip balms. After more than a year of mixing, melting and perfecting my recipes I took my lip balms along to Cambridge's Made-it-Market, a small craft fair for local designers and makers.

As it was such a special occasion, I had made special, limited-edition Easter egg chocolate lip balms to give away free to all of my customers.

The day got off to a slow start but then at 12.21pm I had my first sale when, quite unexpectedly, two men purchased a Pina Colada lip balm - hurray! As the afternoon wore on, more and more people visited bought more and more lip balms. The most popular flavours seemed to be Strawberry, Mandarin, Pina Colada and Mojito although most people seemed to like them all.

If you were one of the people who came along, thank you very much for stopping by at my stall and giving me your feedback. To find out about the future bonbon events visit the bonbon facebook page.