Category Archives: Bath Products (non-soap)
My new business perspective
Coming back
I made a decision on Black Friday. No matter what is going on with my help, and how much help I have to ask for in order to accomplish it, I’m going to end the hiatus and get back to making products to pamper and hopefully help others.
I have to admit, it’s overwhelming. The government has a lot of rules and I’ll have to redo every recipe that I have, if I want to continue any of my previous creations, since the guidelines have changed. Also, L and I had to have a real heart to heart discussion about the financial aspect. It’s no secret that I’ve always been in the red. I create products in an area that prefers to spend the same amount for a bulk package down at Walmart or the like. And my health isn’t well enough to try enticing customers at the Farmer’s Market when it’s in season. Not to mention that my time off meant that most of my ingredients expired, so I would need to replace anything I really wanted to focus on at the beginning. My therapist has been encouraging this for a while and after a lot of deliberation, we decided to invest in starting my crafting back up.
Thank goodness for online sales on Black Friday! I would have spent three times as much just to get my base ingredients replaced. It was still expensive, but it also helped me evaluate what I truly want to do with this little business of mine. I want to create. I want to be whimsical, gory, unpredictable, and sometimes a bit cheesy, nerdy, or girly. I want to make some products for kids to enjoy, so I got bubblegum and fruity scents for them. I got some *ahem* downright sexy scents (in my opinion at least) to help make more of a male and unisex friendly line. And I got some dessert and sweet fruit scents because I really want to play with making dessert-type soaps that you can just lose yourself in when you’ve had a tough day. A candlelit bath or shower, delicious scents swirling around you, and maybe your day will get just a bit better. I’ll continue to make my tongue-in-cheek monster line creations too, though, because they’re just plain fun.
I also got some micas and glitters that I can’t wait to experiment with! Unfortunately, during my hiatus suspension soap base was discontinued even with other wholesalers, so I get to learn how to suspend particles the harder way. Since it requires a lot of science and getting temperatures right, L got me a laser temperature gauge to hopefully help ease the learning curve a bit (candy thermometers just don’t cut it for me for some reason).
I decided to start small and be entirely selfish with creating just what I like to create with scents I prefer, instead of trying to get my previous decent selling products back up, since I never came out even anyway. This is going to be my creative platform instead of trying to be my money making supplement, so I realized I can do whatever I want. That was strangely a concept I never really had soak in before and it is so exciting now to get back to trying new things, and even revisiting a few others that I really liked or were really beneficial products in theory, like the goat’s milk lotion and products made with honey.
I have always struggled with asking for help, even as my illness progressed, but thankfully my therapist has finally gotten through my thick skull that it’s not a weakness or a limitation to be angry about. It just something different to accommodate new needs. I basically just needed to get over myself and my fierce desire to prove to myself that I could still do things I did before my illness became so prominent. Isn’t that a funny thought? Sometimes you have to get out of your own way in order to get where you need to go. 🙂 However, I’ve all ready set up some help and will ask for help from others if needed. I truly want to make my eclectic creations again.
I’ll have to wait until I get over whatever bug I’ll inevitably catch due to the holidays, but then I’ll slowly start to go through my supplies, dispose of outdated items and organize what’s left or newly purchased, and then redo recipes I want to play with again. And I need to change up my website. I’ve all ready changed my payment system back to PayPal, although I’ll be doing some test runs with that to make sure all goes well, and make some decisions on going more retail or keeping the site more informative, so I have the ability to work directly with the customer to make sure they get what they really want or need. I’m really not sure about having an impersonal online store where you just select how many you want of some item, click a few buttons, and move on. I kind of think the extra involvement and ability to answer questions or help guide customers is what sets me apart from the big boys.
So, look for some changes coming to the site (how long has that under construction sign been up on my site now? Lol), some possible grumbles about how stupid I think it is for some of the regulations and limitations the government imposes even on crafters instead of actual businesses, and hopefully with another month at least a few WIPs (work in progress, in case you’re not familiar with that one, which will probably be an acronym I’ll toss around a lot in later posts). *grin* And expect some shiny shinies. *laugh* My biggest inspiration while shopping were the metallic-like micas and glitters. Once I get that suspension technique down, I’ll be letting my girly side out to play, which doesn’t often happen.
No bath bombs though. I’ll let Lush dominate that area and worry about staining skin and bathtubs. *laugh* If you’d have some ideas nor product names you’d like to have me see if I can use, please don’t hesitate to comment or email me! I can always use more inspiration!
Anyway, that’s my happy little update. If you celebrate them, I wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a happy, and safe, New Year’s! 🙂
I forgot the pictures. Buh.
I was looking at my phone’s camera roll when I realized I forgot to post the pictures of the massive restocking I had to do, with a few new items and some gift discontinued items from my wholesaler. So, a little late but better than never. *grin*
Yep, I told you that leaving a mixing shot glass of beer on your counter in order to go flat can look very…unsettling. *laugh*
Look at the awesome molds!! Two sizes of loaves, with the wood one having a removable silicone insert and a little less volume than the red one. Two special adoption puzzle piece molds and two four-leaf clover molds that are actually pretty deep (since I have a hard time resisting anything in the realm of Celtic *grin*). These were pure additions and not replacements, except for the loaves, since my previous two weren’t overly good.
That’s one really full, heavy box!
I still look at the unpacked pictures in awe. It’s just a tiny bit less than when I first decided to start this adventure! The red thing in the left bottom corner is even a tiny square embeds mold, so all of them are even and none are wonky because I can draw or cut a straight line at all. *laugh*
This is the awesome fragrance blending wheel I got to help with making my custom blends. I’m used to just winging it and seeing if the proportions were right, for the upper, sometimes middle, and lower noted in a scent. Except for a few products, most are actually blends I’ve worked on. This takes all of the guesswork, luck, and grossly smelling batches out of the equation. It gives a range of what to use for each set of notes and on the back it has ratios, so you can create blends so much easier. There are also blender sticks in the haul to go with it, where I do sticks of scent per the ratio, hold them in a clothespin, and get an idea while wafting the scent if you’d like to change up the ratio, without losing more than a few drops of scent. Brilliant!!
I’m super excited about these spout bags. The darker bottom is actually the base that opens up so that the container can stand. This should allow me to ship some lotions and bubble washes at a lower price, since I won’t have to need big enough boxes for big jars or cylinders. *happy dance* Bonus, it’ll look awesome for some “Vamp tears” or something monster related! A vibrant red spouted pouch would make a wacky and wonderful stocking stuffer in my opinion, for the right type of person.
And lastly, explanation before picture just to hype it up for a few seconds, although this is just batch 1 and I need to work with the recipe a bit more…
Zombie Ale!! My first time soaping with a non-cosmetic ingredient (beer), actually turned out and looks pretty good, I think. In first testing the only scent left behind was apples, so I’ll do a second test on this batch, and then, if still just apples, time to play with more beer with bigger molds. I’m still digging the “head” I managed to get on the ale soaps with adding beer to soap and using a frothing mixer. I’m really loving the appearance.
I’m on batch 2 of the adoption soaps, along with a couple others, so pictures of those to come once I remember. 🙂
Slowly Sudsing
I sorely underestimated how much effort it would take to get my business supplies re-organized and also sort through to find all of the expired ingredients. My oh my was that an eye-watering exercise. I honestly never knew that scents could seem to ferment. *laugh* It is really nice to have an organized cabinet with a complete inventory list of what I have (I finally got smart enough to do that *rolling eyes*), and I’m about to receive an order of supplies of my best FOs to get the ball rolling again.
In the meantime I’ve worked on the basics on some new recipes and am super excited to try a few out. I’ve also been working on trying to figure out photo props and backgrounds for certain items, like Swamp Slime. I’m not the kind of girl that has a high “ick” factor when it comes to touching things, so I don’t have gooey and gross things laying around. I’m debating using some samples of shampoo that L will be testing for me, dyeing them neon green, and pouring some on my soap cutting mat around the finished product (or product up on a shot glass out of the much LOL), so I know I have a sterile base and he won’t care if I scoop it back up and bottle it for him. I also can’t decide on what scent to use for “spray the bitch away”. L came up with some fun ideas, but they were stinky, and I just don’t think that’s a real selling point unless it’s being given to the offender. *cracking up* I’m think of maybe something refreshing, like a light fruity scent, to cleanse the air of her existence. *grin* I was a little concerned at first with that duplicating a concept I had for toilet spray (you know, the spray before you go type), but then I realized having one recipe that could work for two products wasn’t actually a bad thing. Very practical, for once.
After sanitizing every item I actually got up some energy to make a gift and prepare ingredients to soap while I’m up overnight. I’m working on a base recipe for a conditioning shampoo, so I can offer a combo of products all in the same scent (took me long enough, right?! *laugh*). So batch 1 is a gift and so far the product itself is holding up well, but I need to see how it is in action, and I can’t condition my hair unless I want to look like I have Kid Rock’s locks within a few hours. Meh. *grin* As to the soap, I have everything ready to go, except I had to wait for some beer to go flat. So hard not to call a party foul on myself and super hard not to take a sip, but it’s my last day on my antibiotics, so I have behaved. Just a note, a shot glass of beer going flat looks a lot like a small urine sample that got left on your kitchen counter. It is…unsettling. *grin* This will be my first time soaping with a liquid ingredient outside of the soap ingredients, like glycerin, so we shall see how batch 1 of Zombie Stout soap comes out. *nervous smile* ‘Cause, you know, it’ll either go just fine or be a spectacular disaster, since that’s the way I work. I thought of doing a swirl soap, but I think I’m going to mostly do a naturally beer-gold base and then a separate layer of white fake foam head, although it make just end up being blobbed around into waves with a knife instead of aerating the soap, since the I’m nervous enough about the addition of liquid to the soap. And, if I feel up to it after that, a few special soaps that are near and dear to me right now that I’ll share with pics when I can get to them. Setting a backdrop for the pic will be the easy part of the Zombie Stout, if it works, since making product requires shot glasses and the like. Nothing gruesome for this one, but lots of fun, gruesome ones to come, I assure you. Mawahahaha. 😉
Back in the Suds
I’m going to be back in the suds, baby! *grin* I couldn’t resist. I’ve been thinking a lot in the past couple of months how “I should go make a batch of soaps and then do the dusting afterward” and such, but a lot of my fragrances had gone out of date, so I couldn’t. I kept saying to L that “maybe once we get Kiddo and if she wants to make stuff, I can get some supplies and resurrect the business”. It shouldn’t take the adoption when there’s all ready some motivation and I have pages of ideas I’ve been writing down all of this time. I’m going about it very differently this time. I replaced the most popular scents, added a couple new ones and an educational set on helping to make your own blends to get more miles out of your milliliters, and some packaging materials. If I actually get business, I’ll keep replacing and slowly expand back out. I think I just gave way too many options the first time that it got overwhelming. Regardless, it’s all going to be heading down a new path, just like me. *smile*
I’m definitely in more of a theme frame of mind. I really want to expand the Monster Line and am so excited about some of the new products to work on! I don’t want to share too much in case something doesn’t work and I hope to generate a little interest/excitement. I will let you in on what a few of my mental hamsters have been spinning around on…”Transylvania Tickle”, “–unknown– Morsels” (still fiddling with it), “Gargoyle Dust”, “Rotten Bakery”, “Dreadful Delights Pie”, “Bullfrog Slime” or “Zombie Boogers”, “Spray the Bitch Away” (excuse the curse word, but I think that’ll be the selling point *laugh*), “Zombie Stout” (that might be a bit beyond my ability, but I’m going to give it a lot of effort, especially since it actually smells like popping the top off a cold one on a hot day with bright, summery notes), and maybe a few other Zombie themed items. It’d be pretty fun to get wild and see if I can get some yellow swirls into some black soap without them blending. The line will be a mixture of adult and kid friendly items, so I’m thinking of making little starter combo packs with some “Monsters Away” spray and whichever green liquid hand wash I end up with (that’s the slime vs boogers debate *laugh*). I want to do a few areas, like more feminine based humor such as the spray and a few crimson type items, plus I’ll probably add the Love Bites over in that section. A fun Christmas gift would be a combo of the monster “sweets” soaps, zombie items, and vampire items.
I’m still debating some names for standard family friendly items and what I’ll use some of my top scents, like Fruity Patootie and Bubblegum, in other types of molds. Although I’m not as excited about it, I’d really like to work on some male-friendly items that they would even consider buying for themselves, although I think I won’t hold my breath for that. *grin*
I also need to come up with what would work well as slices from a loaf mold, with layers or embeds in it. I’m not sure if I’m going Monster or standard. I definitely think sticking to mostly Monster items or somehow making all of the products into the Monster theme would make me stand out. I might have to make a fantasy line to it too, if I do that though, because I really want to use “Naughty Elf Oil” for a body/shaving oil with fun holiday notes. *laugh* I don’t know why, but I’m obsessed with that one. Maybe because a favorite book series right now is about a Winter Elf.
Any which way, I appreciate any ideas and feedback, if you have any. I also need to get my thesaurus out (hello Alexa) and come up with less discouraging names for things like biohazard, deadly, and such. I’m also toying with the idea of sending some of the Monster products to the Irish YouTube show “Sharuf”, in honor of Rufus being a monster puppet, and the host usually is amazing about sharing the information about the person who sent items for them. Ironically the viewers are mostly American, so it could get me some good national exposure.
So, cross your fingers please that I can get in there once the products arrive and get back to creating. It’s part of my “bringing Wednesday back” challenge to myself (see the Wednesday post on July 15th, if you missed that). I’m tired of the infection, and the antibiotic that is kicking as hard as the infection, and hope I’m getting close to being active, since I have been trying to do a little bit each day even if it’s just to change (Spoonies will totally understand how that is an accomplishment sometimes). Although my life will be all about the beautiful blessing we adopt, once that ever happens, I really need to get back in touch with the rest of me first, and a clock might actually be ticking to get this done soon. *big grin with crossed fingers* Hopefully Zombie Boogers wouldn’t keep Kiddo from learning how to make product…that’s a chemistry tie in project, but I do worry that my morbid humor is going to keep people away (although few ever bought the regular stuff anyway, so I’m kind of focusing more on fun this time).
And now a little nerd humor to close this one… 🙂
Day Two – The Monster Product Line
As you may remember from last year I made some Monster Duck soaps as well as some Zombie Bait brain soaps. A bit gory to some, mostly just funny and interesting to most people, and really interesting to work on creating. While I was quiet on here I thought a lot about those products and about how proud of them I am (yep, I’m mixing tenses, because I’m still incredibly proud of those little beauties and the fun photo shoots!). I came up with several ideas of products to add in the same realm, so I decided to make an actual line for these kinds of products and allow my creativity to have full reign.
A few ideas I had to throw out because they’re were too gross even for my macabre and sarcastic sense of humor, and then a few just weren’t logical enough for me to tolerate. Which seems ironic to most people I tell that to, since it’s all about implausible things anyway. I have no idea why, but some things have to be logical to me. For example, I thought about making “Grandma’s Roadkill Pie” soap slices. At first I thought of just embedding a bunch of different colored soap cubes and chunks of brain soaps, etc., but then I thought about how that would be more like a pot pie for the roadkill embeds to fit in, and all I could picture was how that first crack with your fork of the pot pie always makes the contents pour out almost like a stew inside of a crust. That just did not work for me with having a pie slice mold and I became obsessed with how it wouldn’t be logical for the roadkill to stay in pie form. *cracking up* As a result I went a little further down the rabbit hole and want to try formulating a “Dreadful Delights Cake” instead. It can have things like goblin syrup, eye of bat, rotten pumpkin, and swamp scum in my small bundt cake molds. Just like with a regular cake you have liquids and then your flour gives it a binding, cake-like texture. I don’t have any good excuses for why that is so much more logical and reasonable to me, but my brain works in mysterious ways and that’s where it settled. *grin*
I also came up with some other concepts to play with and hopefully make some successful formulas for. I’d like to do a Vampire-themed soap that’s black and red. I haven’t decided if I want to swirl the colors in guest rounds or if I want to try a new technique I watched a tutorial about where you make a loaf of soap with straws making open holes through the soap that can then be filled by another color of soap and it makes a complete stripe of that color. I could either make it look like bloody veins where a vampire’s fangs had fed, maybe even with those cheesy fake vampire teeth stuck into the soap. Who knows where this concept will take me. *laugh* I also want to actually make a product I thought of ages ago called Vampire Tears, which will be a red bubble wash. I’m debating Vampire Ashes as a name for some bath salts, too, but my mind battles over which genre of vampire lore I’d go with – some depict the ashes as grey ash whereas some (albeit mostly B movies) show it as a reddish substance, which would definitely be more attractive than soaking in grey bath water. *grin* I have the same problem with the name/idea of “Gargoyle Dust” salts due to the whole dirty water look. It might work for a new formulation of the mechanic soap that’s less abrasive. Rotten Sweets will probably be mini bundt cakes in chocolate for the cake and either cherry or strawberry FO drizzled over as blood or some other gore. I think I’ll let the drizzle be an unshaped pour, too, instead of having shaped pooling at the base like I did for the brains and ducks. Partially because shaping hot soap really hurts and I try to limit how often I purposely do stupid things to myself. *laugh*
A few other product names I am playing with and need to develop some product concepts for are “Deathly Morsels”, “Devilish Delights”, “Swamp Ooze” (or Scum) for a bubble wash probably, “Zombie Stout” (a colored bubble wash using the Ale FO and it even calls for using stale beer in it that theoretically has the liquor part burn off during the heating phase – that’ll be an interesting experiment I suspect!), and some version of a Zombie Repellent, although I need a different name for that, since I found an actual soap made by a crafter named that, so I need to play with the name because I’m not giving up on that one because I love the concept. I’m also wondering if a “virus” or “zombie” combo would be of interest to customers. I personally would be incredibly amused to get a basket with that type of theme, but, then again, I’m not the normal kind of girl, as we know. *laugh* I’m also debating if Zombie Boogers bath salts or bubble wash is too gross or just gross enough that it would really appeal to kids, and in honor of the pride of Kansas, I want to make a product named “Melted Witch”. *grin* The great thing with the monster line is that I can have all of these wild things and use any scent that I fancy, instead of actually trying to make a logical connection, like if it’s red people expect a red fruit or a rose scent, etc. Monsters are a free zone of creativity. Mawahahaha
I’d love to hear any of your ideas or even creative criticisms if you have some. Do you have a name that you think would make a fun addition? Have any ideas of tweaks on the names I’m toying with? Or even what kind of product to match to some of these names maybe? I think it would be a lot of fun to try to make some products inspired by readers, so please bring them on…*in a fake, deep, creepy voice* if you dare…
😉
One of Those Days
Don’t you hate when you have one of those days where everything goes wrong and there isn’t even a happy accident to make it worthwhile? Lol. My day was I Love Lucy worthy when I tried to make some product. *rolling eyes*
First, my foot has been really bothering me, so I tried to do some of the prep work while sitting, and when I cut some of the glycerin soap base I almost sent it flying across the kitchen. I ripped a hole in the wax paper, nearly dumped my FO and vanilla stabilizer mixture, and almost overflowed my measuring cup.
It has to get better, right? Nope. *laugh* I have a sample of Matte Burgundy pigment, which looked like the perfect red for Red Velvet Cake Soap, so I mixed the powder into some glycerin and it looked gorgeous. Added it to the soap and it turned lavender. Huh?! So I added more thinking it was so light that it wasn’t showing the real color and it just became an even richer shade of lavender. It was pretty, but not when representing a cake. lol. Added some yellow to bring out a muddy tone, but fourteen drops of yellow didn’t change it a bit. Holy smokes! I don’t think I’ve ever added that many drops of dye to a soap before and here I was adding it on top of a whole milliliter’s worth of burgundy dye! Somewhere around 8 drops of brown oxide made it a little darker, but not a big change. Finally I cut some slices from my strong and deep Americana Red color bar (which is basically a chunk of super strongly colored soap that you usually shave a tiny bit off of to color your soap) and finally after four small chunks of Americana the soap actually turned an acceptable reddish brown. *cracking up* I literally lost track of how much dye went into this soap and have no way to accurately figure up the cost, let alone recreate this color. I started to pour the first halves of the soap slices (I’m going to put a “filling” between layers and then pipe “frosting” on top) and my hand decided to do its own thing, and I poured soap down the side of one of the mold cavities. A little hard to have layers when there’s a smear of soap down the side, so I tried to clean it off. Buh me. It’s a silicone mold, so of course the cavity moved around when I tried to scrape the upper side, which resulted in me totally wrinkling up that slice of soap. *shaking head* I got disgruntled about that and then it suddenly dawned on me that I can’t duplicate this color, so I can’t do a second pour to finish these after pouring the filling layer. I’ll have to use half of the other first pours to make layers now. Dude, seriously?! Fine. I set the mold aside and I’ll deal with them some time after they set. Maybe my luck will improve by then.
Since things weren’t going so well I figured I’d switch to an easy peasy pour. Just add some stabilized Buttercream FO to white glycerin base, and pour some ornament soaps to hand paint later. They turned peach for some reason. I’m not joking. I expected a little discoloration from the vanilla, but I’ve never had it become so noticeable. My mom was here helping so I asked her if it was too weird to use for ornaments, but she assured me they would be pretty with this color. I then overpoured one cavity so bad it went all over my stove top. Lol. I still have no idea how either. One moment it didn’t have enough to fill the top of the cavity and quicker than the blink of an eye I had soap pouring over the side of the mold. I wasted probably one whole soap’s worth.
I figured I’d try one more batch of soap that can’t go wrong (at least to my knowledge so far). Mechanic’s Soap. I pulled up soap recipes on my laptop and I couldn’t find over half of the soap recipes. I checked Overdrive and they’re not there either. Biscuits and gravy!! (Apparently a bunch of files were on a flash drive for me to transfer from the desktop to my laptop, but with my lovely memory issues I had managed to forget this key bit of information. This has since been remedied. *grin*) I pulled up the mechanic scrub which has some of the same ingredients, to refresh my memory, and after seeing apricot seeds and ground flax in the scrub recipe I started doubting that I’d get the soap version right, so I decided to go ahead and make the scrub, since I needed some anyway and actually had the recipe. Lo and behold I don’t have any pumice. *cracking up* I had put a note to myself in my grocery app to order more when I next ordered from my wholesaler, but I’ve been really well behaved and haven’t ordered from them in a long time, so I never got it and hadn’t seen that reminder for a long time. After sounding like Muttley from the Dastardly and Muttley cartoons I scrapped that and decided to try to save the work session, since it was one of the few times I had help, and decided to make some Sleepy Time and Monsters Away sprays.
In those missing files were the recipes for those sprays, but hey, no big deal. I know the scents that go into at least one, so I thought all was good. However, the spray base is a concentrated formula that has to be reconstituted, and I couldn’t remember the ratio. I got on the wholesaler’s website to find out that it was discontinued and they had removed the product directions, of course. I was about in tears at this point. *laugh* After some searching I found my binder of printouts from the wholesaler’s site of the MSDS files, which also included instructions. I finally found the sheet for the multispray base thankfully, but at that point I was so discombobulated that I knew I wouldn’t get the recipes right, and plus I was having a debate over should I even make more product to sell when I probably can’t recreate them later if they sell out. (After I sat for awhile I decided that I still will, but more about that later.)
I decided to move on to some bubble washes. Mom was here to help, so I figured I’d put her at the stove heating the base, to keep me from starting a fire somehow or something, with this streak I was having. Then I discovered that I only had a few ounces of base left. Mom and I talked it over and decided we would try to go to the store in Topeka in a few days (one of the few ingredients I can get in this state instead of online), and I figured I’d check their price on their website before I could forget, so we could figure up how many to get/how much I could afford. It too was discontinued. *shaking head* Wrap it up, no more filming today Folks. *laugh*
After Mom left and I finished putting ingredients and equipment away I did some research on my wholesaler’s site. Thankfully they have an all purpose body spray base that is also safe on linens, so it’ll replace the discontinued multipurpose spray, which makes me confident that I should be able to keep making my kid sprays. I also found a well rated bubble wash base that will hopefully be as good as the one I (and customers) have loved. I also ordered the low supplies and got a free sample of black glitter. Finally something went right. *grin*
It helped my mood to discover that the soap cake slices have turned out a usable color and Larry has a four day “weekend”, so hopefully he can use that steady hand of his to cut off the edges that bled on several of the ornament soaps. See, I think that although the cake soaps are more of a brownie batter color than Red Velvet, that it’ll work. Just might be a “Chocolate Layer Cake Soap Slice” instead. *laugh*
Since I’m not truly convinced that my luck has changed, I don’t trust myself with an Xacto knife and will leave that to Larry. *cracking up* I don’t want to try to host Thanksgiving with a cast or stitches. So I’ve decided to let the fire burn out in the woodstove early in order to avoid burns or catching the carpet (or my hair) on fire and I’m just going to re watch some Quack Pack on DWTS. *grin* It’s probably safer for everyone if I just recline with Bo and watch Sadie. Redneck pride, baby!
I hope my misadventures in crafting has lifted some spirits and that you have some awesome luck this fine Tuesday. I think I’ll just wait until afternoon to test my luck again, so maybe I’ll sleep in really late. 😉
Mint Cocoa FTW
I’m finally back to making some product! *happy dance* My mom came over and helped me make lotions for the first time. One sign that it’s been too long since I’ve been able to make lotions: I forgot how exhausting it is. *grin* Even with help that cut my time in half I felt like I had ran a marathon. I wanted to keep going and make some soaps, too, but my body developed a really strong dialogue with my brain that reminded me that I’m supposed to take a break for the same amount of time I’ve worked. *laugh* I’m so glad I was able to get over being on bedrest and start working again. (Note: in case you’re not up on acronyms FTW is “for the win”.)
First I worked on lotions to fill part of an order, then on some my mom’s asked for, and even had the umph to get a few jars done to start stocking my shelves. Booyah! While working on them I couldn’t find a few of my recipes on my laptop or the cloud, so I ended up having to write a new recipe for Mint Cocoa Goat’s Milk V2 lotion and boy howdy did it turn out awesome!! Like that first moment you lay back in a luxurious bath happy sigh awesome. I did four 1 oz samples in the mint cocoa that I need to figure up prices for and post, because this version is a total keeper (and is going into the cloud so that it never gets lost! Lol). I use Fudge Brownie FO most anytime that I’m going for a chocolaty scent profile, but now I have a straight up Chocolate FO that I tried in the new version, and it is perfect! I’m actually really glad that there are a few documents floating in one of the computers somewhere it’s not supposed to be. *grin*
My legs are still killing me hours later, but my skin is almost crawling from being so excited to start making soaps next, as soon as I’m able to be up for a bit. I even found and pulled out the cute holiday baskets and boxes to hopefully make (and sell this time! Lol) a few combos. And maybe started writing a new list of ideas that I want to try. *starts whistling innocently while pushing my notebook under the edge of the couch so no one sees it’s the fifth list* Yeah, my brain and artistic side are both very happy again. *grin*
Just a little shot to show off. There are four 4 oz jars and four 1 oz jars of Mint Cocoa GMV2, one 4 oz Dreamsicle GMV2, two 4 oz jars of On a (Pumpkin) Roll GMV2, and one super refreshing 4 oz jar of Lime Margaritas, Anyone? GMV2. Look at all my lovely little creations.
I can’t be any happier over these. With the help I didn’t have to run back and forth, my lotion base never “broke” from my being unable to make it back in time while making a few jars of product, and my kitchen didn’t look like a war zone. I still ended up wearing some and managed to splatter enough onto the controls on my stove that it has a Baywatch sheen in case it wants to start flirting with the microwave. *overly dramatic sigh* You can’t take the disaster zone out of this girl, no matter what, apparently. Lol. At least I didn’t get burned, slip, or get lotion in the eye, so full success in my book. *grin*
Anyway, I just had to share my excitement and successes. Hopefully I’ll be sharing pics of some Red Velvet Cake Slice soaps, mechanic soaps, and a few stocking stuffer friendly soaps in the next couple of days. I’m eyeing an ornament mold that might even let me do a little painting on some soaps, too. Feel free to cross your fingers for me. (Just don’t do your toes because I’ve proven that doing that is pretty unlucky, since it will usually make you fall. Leave the falling to a pro like me. *wink*) I hope you’re having a wonderful weekend and welcome to the new blog followers! I’m really excited that you’re joining in my insanity, er journey. 😉
Fizzy Salts
I have had a rough time lately, so I decided to experiment and see if I could come up with a few formulas that might help.
First I made a small batch of lotion loaded with essential oils that are thought to be anti-inflammatories, like Cinnamon Leaf and Fir Needle, with some extracts of Evening Primrose and Chamomile. To cut some of the funk from such an odd combination, since I wasn’t blending for scents, I added a little Honeysuckle Hollow FO. It sounds weird, but I swear it seems to have helped two bruises heal faster. I’ve had one for a couple of weeks now and it didn’t want to leave that gross yellow hue. Within two days of use it’s almost completely gone. I’m a pretty skeptical person, so I am leaning more toward it being a coincidence, but so far it’s helped with some of my skin irritation. If things are impressive, I hope to have it as the first product geared for people with sensitivities and inflammation, like Fibro.
Following the lotion I decided to mix my desire to try some anti-inflammatories with a new recipe I found via Pinterest for fizzy bath salts. The picture at the beginning of the post is the final result that is now residing beside my bathtub. It started out with some Epsom Salts, Citric Acid, and Baking Soda.
Then I added a few essential oils with Wintergreen as the dominant note.
Next I decided that fractionated coconut oil would fit my interests the most and then I got to blend them all together. A whisk can work decently, but I think that gloved hands break clumps and blend salts better (plus it’s kind of fun *grin*).
I wasn’t so sure if the blend would actually fizz, since it was the first time I’d ever tried any fizzy salts recipes, so I went small scale first.
I admit, I had fun. *laugh* Sometimes it is so easy to justify pampering myself since I need to test new items and don’t have many people nearby to test things when I’m antsy. (Hmmm, maybe there’s a little more to my experimenting than just a desire to keep challenging myself. *grin*) I went full scale that night and although it doesn’t fizz very long (not even as long as Alka Seltzer), it was a neat sensation. I’m super, super sensitive (part of the whole Fibro thing), so it was kind of ticklish. The combination of the ingredients, the light tickling, warm water, and a little Ballykissangel playing from across the room (I’m a little obsessed with listening to accents. Don’t judge. *grin*) I was so relaxed. The coconut oil made my skin so soft and as silky as it can be with a foot of snow outside my window, too. The only thing that concerned me was that I had a tingling sensation the entire time. I’m not sure if that’s my sensitivities or a normal thing, so there’ll be a few people testing it.
All in all I’m so happy with my experiments. I have a lot more testing before I can consider selling, especially on the salts, but it’s pretty encouraging. It is so uplifting that I might not just help people take a moment away from the hustle and bustle and pamper themselves, but I might actually help others struggling on the same journey find a little relief. The lousy few days and nights were definitely worth it for the inspiration alone.
I have some jars waiting for me to go all Crafty Cathy on, so pamper on. 🙂
Inspiration
If you have looked at my recent Pinterest activity (if you didn’t know I was on there, then it’s easy to find me by searching for Georgia Cornelison for the pinner), then you know that I’ve been playing with ideas for some themed combos/baskets. One that I love thinking about is a monster themed basket. Most of the items can be standard products with little twists, much like the Redneck options, but with a decidedly more…morbid twist. *grin*
One such item that keeps rattling around in my mind is a bubble bath – er, blood bath. *laugh* I saw a pin for a container of red bubble bath that resembled a bag of blood/plasma. I can’t tell you how excited the Poe-loving side of me is over that idea. With this rattling around while I looked over the end of year sale my wholesaler had yesterday I ended up buying a set of zipper bags. They hold around 2 ounces and even stand on their own! How cool is that?! Anyway, most mention using it for samples of bath salts, which I will definitely be trying too, but I want to see if a little “blood bath” will work in the bag. Check this out:
Although I’m trying to decide which zombie and Frankenstein items to narrow in on (so many ideas!!), I decided to also splurge and get the really nice mold for Popsicle soaps. Look at this little guy:
It was a bit more than I usually want to spend on materials I can’t really justify as necessities, but it’s silicone and guaranteed to work for soaps. I loved the failed Popsicle soaps I made before the holidays and knew I really wanted some good Popsicle soaps all year around. I saw some really wicked (oh man, I almost went to the “wicked cool”, so you know I’m getting all wound up about this) Popsicle soaps that were in Halloween colors and they embedded toy spiders in the ends. Wow!! How awesome would a play on that look in that Monster combo?! I’ve thought of doing some Frank colored ones or some toxic yellow ones. *grin* There are SO many options!
As you can tell, I’m having a lot of fun looking at the brilliance and creativity of others, and in thinking of what possibilities would work for me. I am so excited. *smile* I’m still looking into trademark issues for other theme ideas, but I am pretty set on a few things. I want a zombie repellent soap, a blood bath, and a demented Popsicle soap, bare minimum. Isn’t it fun to think of all of the options?
Anyway, I don’t want to keep you reading if you’re still suffering the after effects of a late night. I hope you’re enjoying your New Year and have a wonderful rest of the week!
Georgia's Pampering 