Hi Katherine!

Plaster for fresco consists of 5 parts of lime putty and 8 parts of fine river sand.

We have several topics in the Cafe of fresco plaster and how to,
please read them - look for Gary's posts, especialy on how to prepare lime putty from regular hydrated lime.

What gets you confused is the word "fresco" in the adwertisings.
They just use it as a "hot" word. At the moment NONE of the merchants in US big or small has anything for fresco, they might have basic ingredients though but they would have no idea on how to use them for fresco.

Basic ingredients

river sand (sea sand has salts - bad)
lime putty (slaked quick lime)
natural pigments (oxhides and mineral pigments only)
water
brushes
walls or panels
trowels
You

Post your questions we will be glad to answer!

concider taking our workshop
http://www.truefresco.com/workshop