Updated Website!

I wasn't really happy with the design of my website so on the advice of someone who posts on a forum I read, I set one up with Weebly and I like it much better!

I'd love any feedback anyone has :)

I'm feeling a lot better about the new batch of Oatmeal & Honey bars. They're a lot lighter in color but now that they've had a few days, they smell just like the other batch. I'm going to let them cure a week or so before I test them out.

I'm so excited!

In the past two days I've had two separate sales in my ETSY Shop!

I put my soaps up for sale day before yesterday and I'm glad I did since both sales were for soap! Since these are my first few customers I've been throwing in a free lip balm with their purchases :)  I figure I'll do that for the first 5 or so online sales.

I'm really looking forward to my party on the 25th, it'll give people a chance to check out my stuff in person and also celebrate my birthday with me! I've been busy making extra batches of the Wake Up Soap and Ocean Breeze Bars since I have a feeling those are gonna be the favorites.

I tried to make another batch of the Oatmeal & Honey Bars but I tried them in my box which would have made a lot bigger batch and they didn't come out as great as the first batch. I did put the first batch in the oven and that may have made a difference in the smell and look. I'm gonna give them a bit to cure and see if the smell and/or color deepens and go from there. In the meantime, I'm going to dial it down and make a smaller batch to see if I can duplicate the first one. I hope I can because I love those bars!

I have in some new lip balm flavors but I haven't made new balms yet. It was super hot here last week and I didn't feel like doing much of anything except sitting in front of a fan, lol... plus, I'm not sure they would have set up very well. I'll get them made and labeled sometime in the next week so I can get pictures done and get them up for sale.

Doing some candle making tonight!

tick tock and more Wake Up Bars!

The countdown is on for my product debut! I'm going to have people over one month from tomorrow to check out all of my products and hopefully pick out some of their favorites to buy and take home with them :)

So, I've been busy trying to get my stock up. I have candles in various sizes, bath salts, lotions and of course soap!

I made these the other day, they're the Wake Up Soap but with some added color and no poppy seeds... I have one of the white bars in my shower right now and I love it!! I have a feeling these are going to be a favorite, they smell so amazing!

Plus, you have the added benefit of the essential oils I added:

Tea Tree Oil has wonderful properties that makes it a popular natural agent for curing all three types of infectious organisms: fungus, bacteria, and virus. More importantly, it is known to effectively fight a number of infections that are resistant to some antibiotics. Therefore, Tea Tree Oil is an excellent natural remedy for hundreds of bacterial and fungal skin ailments such as acne, abscess, oily skin, blisters, sun burns, athlete's foot, warts, herpes, insect bites, rashes, dandruff and other minor wounds and irritations.

Eucalyptus Oil  is considered anti-inflammatory, antispasmodic, decongestant, deodorant, antiseptic, antibacterial, stimulating, among other medicinal properties. It helps to relieve muscle pain and is great for those suffering from sprained ligaments and tendons, as well as stiff muscles and aches. Eucalyptus oil, which is stimulating, removes exhaustion and mental sluggishness and rejuvenates the spirits of the sick. It is also effective in treating stress.

Peppermint Oil  also helps to provide relief from stress, depression and mental exhaustion due to its refreshing nature. It is also effective against anxiety and restlessness.

Hope everyone has a wonderful day!!

Massage Candles

I thought this was a great idea so I just had to make some!

They're up for sale on Etsy or if you're local, please contact me by email (tranquilelements@yahoo.com) to avoid shipping charges

You simply light the candle for about 10 minutes, blow out the candle, and pour the melted skin safe wax on your skin for a wonderful treat to your skin! They're perfect for a relaxing, romantic massage or anytime you need to soothe dry skin, such as elbows, cuticles and tired feet!

These are made with Soy Wax, Cocoa Butter, Avocado Oil, Shea Butter and Lavender Essential Oil.

 The seamless 4oz aluminum tin is perfect for travel and when empty can be cleaned with hot soapy water and reused or recycled.

Skin Pampering Ingredients:

Cocoa Butter has been called the ultimate moisturizer, and has been used to keep skin soft and supple for centuries. 

Avocado Oil is a rich and extremely deep penetrating oil, rich in vitamins A, D and E, lecithin, as well as potassium - known as the youth mineral. It is also high in sterolins, which are reputed to reduce age spots reduce age spots, help heal sun damage and scars.

Shea Butter has been used to help heal burns, sores, scars, dermatitis, psoriasis, dandruff, and stretch marks. It may also help diminish wrinkles by moisturizing the skin, promoting cell renewal, and increasing circulation. Shea butter also contains cinnamic acid, a substance that helps protect the skin from harmful UV rays.

 Lavender Essential Oil has been said to remove nervous tension, relieve pain, disinfect scalp and skin, enhance blood circulation and treat respiratory problems. Lavender has the Latin name Lavare, which means “to wash”, due to its aroma that gives the feeling of a clean aroma.

Soy Wax is skin safe and the soy wax used in my candles is made using soy beans exclusively from U.S. farmers. Soy is a highly renewable resource, unlike petroleum, and helps support agricultural growth.

Introducing our Lotion Line!

I am so happy with the way these turned out!!

As always, if you are local to me an interested in any of my products please contact me directly to avoid shipping charges: tranquilelements@yahoo.com

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Here is a copy of the Etsy listing for you to see: 

Our Luxurious Lotion is non-greasy & fast absorbing, yet leaves your skin feeling unbelievably soft & smooth!

Our lotions are packed with moisturizing natural ingredients such as Cocoa Butter, Shea Butter, Vitamin E and Botanicals!

We have 5 delicious scents available-

Black Raspberry Vanilla- This is an enticing, mix of sweetened berries with a warm, creamy vanilla.. When I close my eyes and smell it I can almost see a bowl of berries & cream!

Orange Dreamsicle- If you've ever had an Orange Creamsicle this lotion smells just like that! It's a wonderful blend of fresh orange juice and creamy vanilla... smells good enough to eat!

Lavender-Vanilla- The name says it all... The combination of smooth vanilla and relaxing lavender help make this a must have!

Yuzu- People often refer to Yuzu as Japanese Grapefruit. It has a fresh and sparkling citrus smell that everyone I encounter just loves!

Intoxicating- This fragrance is often called Love Spell. I call it Intoxicating for the effect it has on people.. I'll let you fill in the blanks on that! It has dazzling top notes of grapefruit, orange and fresh ozone. Mid notes include melon, apple and kiwi. Nuances of jasmine at the base.

Ingredients: Water, Propylene Glycol, Glycerin, Glycol Stearate, Stearic Acid, Cetyl Alcohol, Aloe Barbadensis (Aloe) Leaf Juice, Isopropyl Palmitate, Theobroma Cacao (Cocoa) Seed Butter, Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea Butter) Fruit, Dimethicone, Triethanolamine, Tocopherol Acetate (Vitamin E), Honey Extract, Citrus Medica Limonum (Lemon) Extract, Foeniculum Vulgare (Fennel) Extract, Salvia Officinalis (Sage) Extract, Achillea Millefolium (Yarrow) Extract, Buxus Chinensis (Jojoba) Extract, Methylparaben, Propylparaben, DMDM Hydantoin, Fragrance

Lotions coming tomorrow!!!

I'm just finishing up the labels and they should be ready to go tomorrow!

I have 5 amazing scents I'm offering (for now) and you won't be disappointed!

Check back tomorrow for pictures and the list of fragrances!

Add these to my list of favorites

I can't wait to try these out!

I stepped outside the box just a toe to try out a couple things I'd been wondering about. I substituted a bit of the water for this recipe with some Aloe Vera Gel added it at trace,  I also added beeswax to the recipe cause rumor is it helps to make a harder bar.

Then, I added this refreshing, invigorating, stimulating blend of tea tree, eucalyptus and peppermint essential oils. Not to mention, I added a bit of poppy seeds for some exfoliation. I almost want to call these Wake Up Soap. I can't wait to see what these are like in the shower.

These have no added color to them and in my opinion look just beautiful white with the poppy seeds sprinkled in.

I'll give them a week to cure a bit before I take them for a test run and let you know how it went!

Lemongrass & Lavender

These bars smell so fresh!

This was my first use of Essential Oils and it turned out great! The combination of the Lemongrass EO and Lavender EO was a great choice I think. The Lemongrass is the stronger scent but the Lavender creeps in there at the end for a calming effect. I will definitely be using the combination again in the future.

The colors didn't do exactly what I wanted them to (yes, I know they're probably not the most perfect match for the fragrance, lol) I was originally going to try and do some swirls but I let the batch get too far into trace and wasn't able to. I still think they turned out pretty :)

I've already tried using a piece I sliced off and so far they have great lather and don't dry my skin out. They were made with olive oil, coconut oil, palm oil, avocado oil, castor oil & jojoba oil.

I used the Oatmeal & Honey Bars for the first time this morning to wash my face in the shower and so far so good. No irritation or break outs, I'm going to continue to use it every morning to see if my skin dries out at all. Granted, I do use a moisturizer on my face after I get out of the shower but who doesn't?

I'll keep you updated!

Candles

Made my first candles yesterday. I was really pleased with the way they came out, the tops are really smooth with no holes. I still need to wait a bit before I can burn it to test the wick, scent throw and burn time on the larger ones. I'm burning a tealight right now and so far so good! It smells great!

As soon as I'm able to test them and if everything turns out ok, I'll put them up for sale. The scents I have are White Tea & Ginger, Cinnamon Stick, Pumpkin Pie, Gingerbread, Mulberry, Red Wine and Lavender

I'm super excited about these, I love candles!

Essential Oils

I'm taking the plunge into using Essential Oils tonight.

I ordered a handful from a couple different websites the other day and one of the shipments arrived today so I'm anxious to try them out! I've been reading up on them quite a bit and some of these oils have amazing properties.

I thought this was a great definition:

Essential oils, known as nature’s living energy, are the natural, aromatic volatile liquids found in shrubs, flowers, trees, roots, bushes, and seeds. The distinctive components in essential oils defend plants against insects, environmental conditions, and disease. They are also vital for a plant to grow, live, evolve, and adapt to its surroundings. Essential oils are extracted from aromatic plant sources via steam distillation, and are highly concentrated and far more potent than dry herbs.

While essential oils often have a pleasant aroma, their chemical makeup is complex and their benefits vast—which makes them much more than something that simply smells good.
Historically, essential oils have played a prominent role in everyday life. With more than 200 references to aromatics, incense, and ointments throughout the Bible, essential oils are said to be used for anointing and healing the sick. Today, essential oils are used for aromatherapy, massage therapy, emotional health, personal care, nutritional supplements, household solutions, and much more.

So I'm trying to come up with the perfect blend of scents that will please and intrigue customers. Wish me luck!

Last night I also tried a new shave bar recipe and I'll post the results of that in about a week, after the bars have had some time to cure.

 Last but not least!

Tomorrow my new lip balm tubes and the rest of the new flavors should be here so I'll be hard at working making up some new balms to sell!

So keep an eye on my Etsy Shop for those, or if you live near me, contact me directly so I can wave the shipping costs and we can arrange for a pick up.

Now this is an awesome idea!

While reading forums yesterday I ran across a post about an organization called Clean the World. Here's what the front page of their site says:

Clean the World recycles soap and saves lives.

Every day in North America, thousands of hotels discard millions of pounds of soap and shampoo. These products often end up in already overflowing landfills and contaminate fragile groundwater systems.
Impoverished people around the world die every day from acute respiratory infection and diarrheal disease because they have no soap. The death toll is staggering. Each year more than five million lives are lost to these diseases with the majority of deaths being among children less than five years old. Studies have shown that simple hand washing substantially reduces the spread of these diseases. Unfortunately, the essential items for proper hand washing are unobtainable for millions of people worldwide.

Clean the World gets soap to people who really need it.

In an effort to prevent these needless deaths from occurring, Clean the World distributes recycled soap products, along with appropriate educational materials, to impoverished countries worldwide, and to domestic homeless shelters.

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It never would have crossed my mind that there was a use for all those extra soaps most of us have laying around but here it is! All it will cost you is the postage to send your soaps but I think that's a fair price to help save lives. Not to mention, it keeps these items out of our landfills. If you live in Orlando, Huston or Atlanta you can actually go and volunteer at their center.

If you're interested, the address to send your extra soap to is:


Clean the World
8026 Sunport Dr, Ste 306
Orlando, FL 32809-8108

Oatmeal & Honey Bars

I'm in love with the way these smell!!

I didn't add fragrance to them and I'm glad I didn't. The smell of both the oatmeal and honey really comes through and they smell wonderful. Same thing with color, I didn't add anything to them. I'm thinking possibly the honey helped add to the color of the bars, maybe the oatmeal also.

I'm going to be anxious to test these since I'm hoping they'll be a nice facial bar. I'm sensitive to a lot of cleaners and such on my face so I'll be a good test subject. It would be great to not have to spend a ton of money on facial cleansers anymore and to have that product be all natural is just icing on the cake!

Now, my question to whoever is even reading this, lol... would you consider purchasing and using a bar that looks like this? Is it aesthetically pleasing? What could I do to make it better if you don't find it so? Any input is welcome, both positive and negative. I want to come up with products that people "want" to buy and use... otherwise "Huston, we have a problem" ;)

oh, one thing I did notice... I didn't make them with oatmeal on the top but I put a bit on there for the picture, I think next time I may put oatmeal on the top, I like the look of it.

Hope everyone enjoyed their weekend!

A better picture

Here's a better picture of the Yuzu bars, you can see the green a lot better.. I think if I'm going to take pictures outside I need to do it when the sun is out so the colors show up more :)