Flowers in/on soap and CPOP

I think this is such a cute idea and I've seen so many creative bars with flowers, oatmeal, coffee, etc... that I had to try it!

The yellow flowers on top are Calendula which is apparently a fancy name for a type of Marigold, lol.. who knew?

I used yellow and green as my color scheme, I think I'll have to do more pictures tomorrow because most of the bars have more green in them so this really isn't the best representation. (or maybe I need to take a photography class and learn how to take a good picture, lol)

These were made with Olive Oil, Coconut Oil, Almond Oil, Shea Butter, Castor Oil, Jojoba Oil and the scent is Yuzu which is an East Asian citrus fruit that just smells fabulous. Very clean and refreshing.

I made a new soap batch tonight, I'm trying to come up with a nice facial bar. I put honey and oatmeal in it and I'm anxious to see if they came out. I think they may have started to go through gel phase while I was still stirring so I stuck them in the oven to see if I could help it out a bit. This apparently has it's own fancy name.. CPOP, Cold Process Oven Process.. apparently the heat helps the bars go through gel phase. I had originally heard this cuts down on the curing time but I've been researching forums & websites and I'm not seeing anything that can confirm this so I'm not going to count on it.

New Mold!

I got this today :)

It's the 18-bar mold from Brambleberry.com and I can't wait to use it!

I think I'm going to test it with another batch of the Lavender Bars... I'm a little nervous cause it'll be the largest batch I've done yet, I think I'll be able to have more versatility with designs like swirls though... how exciting!

Test Success!

We've tested the Shaving Soap, Ocean Bars and Lavender Bars and they are all fabulous!

The shaving bars produce a great lather and leave the skin feeling smooth and moisturized, The Ocean & Lavender bars also have great lather and leave your skin feeling moisturized and smelling great!

I'm going to put the shave bars up for sale soon but I'm going to wait a bit on the Ocean & Lavender bars since they're still a bit soft.

Oh! I also created new labels for the Lip Balms, I like them more than the original packaging... they're a lot less "girly" as my boyfriend puts it, lol.

I'd love to know what you all think of them!

New Lip Balm flavors coming soon!

Very soon I will be adding Latte, Vanilla, Chocolate Orange Truffle and Mint Julep to my lip balm line.

Keep your eyes & ears open for these brand new additions!

I personally can't wait to try out the Latte :)

Need to sidetrack just for a moment...

and say Happy Birthday to my mom.

She is one of the most amazing, giving, strong, "insert all the good words here" person that I know... I can only hope that a bit of her rubbed off on me.

Thank you for always being there, being supportive and believing in me.

I love you mom

-M

Lavender Bars

These turned out better than I thought they would! Completely not what I was expecting them to look like. I thought the colors were going to mix together and they'd be mostly lavender but as you can see I was wrong by a long shot. I really like how it's simple and subtle.

The buds don't look like mouse droppings! I mean, they do if you really examine them but just by looking at the bar of soap they give it a nice textured look to it... I'll have to see how they feel when I'm able to test them.

Last but not least, the smell is so soothing... it's lavender with just a hint of vanilla to it.. very calming and relaxing...

If these pass the use test I'd definitely recommend buying them when they go up for sale!

Lavender Buds

My mom grows lavender in her yard and I absolutely love the scent so I figured I'd try to make some bars with lavender buds even though everything I've read says they don't keep their color, they actually turn brown and sometimes look like mouse droppings, lol

I made them night before last so i'll probably take them out of the mold later tonight & take pics tomorrow... I tried to do them with a lavender swirl but I added color at a really light trace so I'm afraid the color may have blended together and they'll just be a solid lavender.. either way they'll probably still be pretty as far as color goes... we'll see about those buds :)