Etsy Seller Spotlight - Jennie's Home Made Goods

I purchased a cat nip filled cat toy from Jennies. My cats are pretty picky about EVERYTHING, but I thought I would take a chance here since the lil pup always seems to get surprises and toys all the time. So I threw it on their bed.....

Hmmm...what is this?????

Charlie is the first to claim it....

Yum!

Simon says "my turn!"

Smells soooo good!!

Tastes good too....

Awww, I think Simon is in love!!

Charlie....

Hogging the water dish again. Mr Bills patiently waiting...again. :)

Diary of a Pumpkin Soap

We make pumpkin soap only once a year, in the Fall. It is a warm and yummy scent perfect for the season. We use real pumpkin puree and then add a pumpkin scent that makes it smell good enough to eat. (but we wouldnt recommend that!)

Pumpkin tends to make the soap heat very fast and quite hot, so it is one of the few soaps I do not insulate. After a couple hours I realized that maybe this soap is not going to go through the gel phase after all....but I made that thought to soon and within a matter of minutes this baby heated right on up and went into full gel....


The dark spot in the middle is the gel phase turning the soap translucent....

And soon the entire log is in full gel.

And in the morning we find it cooled off and back to its original look....

And here is our finished product....Pumpkin soap with a line of cocoa sprinkled in.

Spotlight on Neem Oil

Neem oil is a vegetable oil that is pressed from the Neem tree, which is an evergreen prevalent to the Indian subcontinent.

Raw Neem oil is well-known for its strong unpleasant odor, but aside from that it does have many positive attributes. Not only is it known to relieve and soothe dry and irritated skin, but it is also known to be antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal and insecticidal.

Neem oil is great for use on acne, eczema and psoriasis. It isn’t a miracle remedy, but has shown to be very helpful with noted results. In addition, it is high in vitamin E giving it moisturizing qualities.

So how does Luster Canyon use it? We use it in one of our facial bar soaps, adding tea tree essential oil and activated charcoal to further compliment the bar.

To purchase a bar you can find them in our store in Prescott or online in our Etsy Shop.

A Dragonfly?

When I let the lil pup in last night a moth flew in....or so I thought...just look what flew in...


...and is flying about tormenting the furbabies....
(I love it when Charlie does his chattering)

No worries though, with the help of a box and a sheet of paper, the dragonfly was safely caught and returned outside where he belongs.

Jumbo Lip Balms Coming Soon

Now here is a gift for your favorite lip balmaholic!! Jumbo lip balms that are 3 times the size of our normal lip balms.

They contain over a half ounce of moisture for your lips...and well they just make me giggle! Plus they take me back to when I was a kid and had that jumbo bonnie bell soda flavored lip balm necklace...you know you remember those!

Our lips balms are made from scratch and contain avocado oil, cocoa butter and jojoba oil and feel wonderful on your lips.

They will sell for $5 each and I think they will make fabulous stocking stuffers.

Look for them to be listed soon.

ORANGE??? What Happened to my Pink??!!

Sometimes when you cut a log of soap you get little surprises...sometimes wanted, other times not.

Like this fabulously unplanned, perfectly defined, crescent moon floating in my heart instead of the usual planned swirly blobs....this is cool!

Cutting my planned gorgeous shade of pink soap to find orange.....sooooo not cool!!!

But hey in soapmaking land this happens. I was going to use pink clay but opted for my pink mica instead. I went a little light on the coloring, and my first thought was it too light to withstand the high heat gel phase, so it morphed into orange....but what I am sure happened is my sample raspberry mica pack was mislabeled and is actually strawberry pop mica, which is known to morph to orange. It is still a pretty soap, but not quite the look I wanted for my egyptian geranium essential oil soap.

I tried a couple of new (to me) techniques. One is the spoon swirl....Baby Girl and I hand spooned each glop here. Takes a bit of time, and I obviously need more practice. Also I did my first soap curls and added on top because I love this look for florals.

All in all I think the soap looks great, and of course it smells wonderful....not quite what I was going for but the beauty of soaping is the buyer doesnt know what my intentions are, just that they ended up with a fabulous bar of soap. :)