This Weeks Soap Pot

Whats cookin'?? What have we been up to lately? Mostly just soap making.

Here is our Cucumber Cantaloupe and Prickly Pear...

...and here is our Dragon's Blood and Gardenia...

I have a lot to get made to finish stocking up in preparation for the Holidays...and we have a new line of soaps in the works, so be on the lookout for that. :)

Slice of Hope Fundraiser

This past weekend we participated in a local event put on by our favorite pizza place...Acme Pizza. The event was to raise money for the Pink Heals funds, which helps local women with women related cancers. You couldn't have asked for a more perfect day weather wise. I have to say in all the shows we have done this has to have been the best day for temperature and no wind. Here is our set up...

Jenn (our special needs family member we have custody of) wanted to come and spend the day with me, she loves people and is super social, and she really enjoyed seeing the giant pizza...

Here is our oldest daughter in her booth of Enchanted Waxworks, and she also does face painting....

And to complete the day, here is my grandson who works for Acme Pizza...and he knows how to jump right in to the spirit of things...he bleached a pair of jeans and then dyed them pink...

It was a great day and I hope they received a nice amount of money for the Pink Heals foundation.

Boo Berry Cereal...

...was my absolute fave growing up (along with Lucky Charms). I don't remember if it was always available years ago, but now it is only sold at this time of year...and yes at 43 years of age...it is still a seasonal MUST HAVE! lol

So each October I treat myself to one box...brings back fond memories! :)

What was your favorite childhood cereal?

Care Package for our Son

I have a show next weekend that I have been busy gathering items to take, so my kitchen table becomes my organization spot so I can see what I want to take and also to hopefully not forget anything. Here I have my piles started....

I need to print my signs and fill in the holes of stock needed to take, but this is a good jump on it for me. 

Then I pushed everything back to begin another sorted pile. Our son has deployed again, this time to Afghanistan. So we have filled a box of needed items...and some not so needed items...

The needed items would be the electric blanket, it is quite cold where he is...the not so needed...yeah all that pile of yummy junk food!! You might be thinking wow that looks like a lot of stuff, and it is...for 2 reasons. 

One is this time there is no PX where he is stationed, no where for him to go get anything, so the soldiers rely on us for their comfort items. Sure the military keeps them fed and housed, but comfort items are so dearly loved at these times.

Second there is so much here because I am packing 2 boxes. Sadly one of his guys is unmarried and has not received one single piece of mail...well we cannot allow this to continue, so along with some great friends some needed items such as bath towels, bed sheets and toiletries...along with some yummy snacks will be heading his way soon!

We are grateful for their service and very proud of our son, sending a box of goodies a couple times a month to him and his guys is the very least we can do.

Punkin Patch

Playing around with a scent I have had on hand, Aroma Haven's Sweet Pumpkin. I knew it would brown so I divided the batch into 4  seperate cups...

• one with just fragrance
• one with fragrance and vanilla stabilizer to cut down on the browning
• one with no fragrance and orange mica
• and lastly one with no fragrance and green mica

all to represent the Fall colors of a punkin patch.... 

Now just where is my punkin orange other than that one lil corner??!! 

and why did the green come out so strong?? 

and where is my deep brown from the full on fragrance oil other than the outside edges??

Ah the joys of soaping...just never know what you are going to get!! Colors may not be what I wanted...but it smells yummy enough to eat!! :)

Finally Got a Keurig!!

We finally caved and bought a Keurig. I haven't been very interested in getting one...well because I am cheap. Not only is the unit itself more than I would like to pay for a coffee maker, but then the individual cups was an expense I didn't care to have. But we found one at a great price with a nice rebate...so ok...BUT...The Hubs made it very clear his percolator STAYED! But of course, it makes a fabulous pot of coffee and on the weekends with everyone around we like a full pot...but during the busy workweek, I think it is going to be nice to just make one fast cup of coffee...

...and fast it is! Wow does it fill the cup fast!

Now for what I don't like. It has five cup settings...this is the middle setting which doesn't quite fill the cup. This is fine for us who use creamer...but The Hubs is going to get gyped by not getting a full cup...is this something that can be adjusted?? The next setting up fills a larger mug we have to the very brim! No room for creamer on that size!

Now for what I like...The "My K cup". This appeals to the frugal me...I can use our own coffee!!! I have heard from others and read online it doesnt work and you get grounds in your cup...one coffee scoop was perfect and I had not one single ground in my cup...just a great cup of coffee!

So I think it is going to be used quite a bit...just need to figure out if the water flow can be adjusted for the cup sizes to actually fill the cup.

What is your favorite brand/flavor to drink?

New Housing...

...for the furbabies!

What to do with such a fun box? 

Cut a hole and see what the cats do...sure enough it wasn't on the ground 30 seconds...

Taking Turns....so funny though such a long box and they sit by the "door".

Uh-oh...someone got the boot!

Avocado Oil with Sea Clay Facial Soap

As I said in a post earlier this week, I was straightening up my fragrance oil shelf...it is easy to lose track of what you have...and I came across a bottle of geranium essential oil...hmmm what did I buy this for...and how can I use it. Then I had a "AHA" moment. I recently bought sea clay and I remembered that there was a a tutorial on the Soap Queen's Blog for a facial bar...that uses geranium essential oil....so now I get to use 2 of my "impulse buy" products into one project, SCORE!
So I wrote down the posted recipe and changed some stuff around...a lil less of this oil, a lil more of that oil....and soon I was mixing and pouring....

The soap smells wonderful with the blend of Tea Tree, Lavender and Geranium essential oils...and it has a beautiful soft green hue from the sea clay.

Sea clay originated as mud created in the sea millions of years ago. It acts as a great detox and mild exfoliant.

Tea Tree essential oil is a great antiseptic, Lavender essential oil is very soothing and Geranium essential oil is great for skin problems and also lends a beautiful soft floral scent to the mix.

Look for this soap to hit both the store in Prescott and our Etsy shop in a couple weeks after its cure.

Arctic Snow

I have a lot of fragrance oil sample bottles...some are pretty small so they are good to use in melt & pour soap because you can work in smaller batches and use very little fragrance at one time. Cold process soap takes more fragrance oil at one time, even a small batch could need an ounce, and the samples are usually much smaller. 

As I was straightening my fragrance oil shelves and seeing what I have on hand I discovered that there were two 1/2 ounce sample bottles of "Fresh Snow" from Bramble Berry, and that is the perfect amount I need to use my small mold...so it was goof off time again....

Now sadly you cannot tell I used two different kinds of blue mica. I used Blueberry POP mica and neon blue mica...but it all looks the same...nonetheless...I still love what I ended up with....Arctic Snow! 

Pumpkin Thank You Cards

I love making cards and tags and last year I made these cute pumpkin cards to put in with my pumpkin soap orders. They are fun, fast and easy to make.

Everything I use is usually Stampin Up products, so I first punched out a bunch of ovals out of Tangerine card stock, and I cut some green slivers and then some chunky brown pieces for the stems.

 

 



 Not sure if you can make it out in this picture, but I took some suede brown ink and sponged the edges to give the pumpkins some shadow and depth.

 

Next I assembled the pumpkins with adhesive and added the stems.

 

To make my cards I cut some white card stock at 3 X 6 inches, and then scored in half to have a 3 X 3 card where I stamped thank you using my teeny tiny wishes stamp set and then glued my pumpkin on...voila...how cute are these!!!