I'm still here!

Sorry I haven't done much blogging recently, I feel like I've been so busy lately!

The chocolate mint soaps are curing quite nicely. The green has really darkened up and the two greens have blended into the same color. As soon as we get some decent enough light around here I'll get some more pictures of them, it's been dismal & raining.

I made some Christmas Tree scented soaps the other day. They smell so great! I did a red & green swirl but I think I did it backwards. Red is the prominent color instead of green. The red I have is brick red so unfortunately it almost has a brown hue to it.. I think they'll be ok though. I'm certainly going to put them out in the kids/guest bathroom for the month of  December :)

I also made my first batch of 100% Castile soap the other day! I didn't add any color or fragrance to it so it's 100% natural and the bars turned out a beautiful white. I'd been wanting to make a soap that sensitive skin users as well as children could use and Castile kept coming up as the recommendation. According to an article I found at Livestrong.com-  Castile Soap is often recommended for people with sensitive skin and those suffering from eczema, or other skin disorders.

That's all for tonight, I hope everyone has a fun and safe Halloween tomorrow!

New blog url!

Welcome!!

All the posts and comments have been moved over from the old url (http://casimplepleasures.blogspot.com/) so you won't miss a thing! If you were "following" the blog you'll have to re-sign up.

I thought having the blog as the business name would be a lot better and easier for people to find.

Thanks for reading!

It's always a learning experience

So, the reason I haven't posted any new soap pictures lately is because my last 2 batches had some big issues!

The first one separated after I added the fragrance oil and ended up being this oily goopy mess.. it smelled great but there seemed to be no saving it so I ended up throwing it away.

This last batch ended up being way too soft. I let it sit in the mold for about a week and it still wouldn't harden up enough to come out. Maybe I should have waited to see if hardened up a bit but of course, I'm impatient and I ended up digging it out with a spoon, lol. It's not all lost though! I was able to get a couple bars out of it and the rest I'm going to let cure and I'll re-batch it at some point in the future.

I'm starting to wonder if the bottle of lye I'm using maybe got some condensation into it and that's what's affecting my soap. The next batch I make I'm going to try a different bottle and see what happens.

Tomorrow I'm going to a bbq at a friends and she has awesomely offered to let me set my stuff up there for people to check out! It'll be great to get my name out there and hopefully sell a thing or two! That reminds me, I need to print up some more business cards :)

Hope all is well with everyone, I hope to have some new soaps soon!

Chocolate Mint Soap

These turned out better looking than I thought they were going to!

The green really isn't that bad. Kinda funky in a good way actually! It's interesting how the green actually looks like two different greens.. with the darker on the top. I'm thinkin it must be the way it went through gel phase. Whatever it may be, I like it! ... and that brown! I love the brown, it's the perfect color of chocolate! I will definitely have to find more uses for it! It'll be interesting to see if or how the color changes as the bars cure.

These were made with Olive Oil, Coconut Oil, Castor Oil and Cocoa Butter and will be available approximately November 20th

Just 4 more days...

and the Salt Bars will be up for sale! I'm really looking forward to hearing feedback from everyone who tries one of these.

I made a new batch of soap last night (not salt bars), it's chocolate mint scented and the colors are brown & Green. The green didn't turn out exactly the color I wanted it to, it's more of an army green where I want a light "minty" green, lol... I guess it's gonna be a work in progress. The soap is being stubborn though and doesn't want to come out of the mold yet... I figure I'll let it stay in there one more day then throw it in the fridge for 10 or so minutes if it's still being stubborn tomorrow. I'll be sure & post pics when I get the bars cut :)

Salt Bar Success!

It's been a couple weeks since I made the Salt Bars so I had to try them out and I love them!

I've been using them on my face and body and my skin feels fantastic. It feels smooth and the color is really even on my face. No redness or irritation or dry spots... just really healthy looking skin. I must note that I always use a facial moisturizer after washing my face.

I really can't wait to let people try these to hear back the responses I get!