Yikes!! It’s the first of October, and that means it’s the first day of the annual blogging challenge, Blogtober. Because I managed it last year (by the skin of my teeth), I seemed to think that I would have no problem repeating that success this year… until this week. This last week has been crazy busy, and I’m not sure how I oculd have fitted in seven (!!) blog posts as well. But more about that in the next post…
Anyhow, a few of us in the Soapmaking Bloggers Facebook Group have taken up the challenge, and will be sharing our posts using the #blogtobersoapers hashtag on social media. Keep an eye out for us – a bit of cheerleading is always welcome 😀
A lot of my posts will be soap related, but by no means all (even complete soap obsessives do other things sometimes). I have a vague idea of various topics I could waffle on about, but if I’m honest, I’ll mostly be winging it. Good grief, did I get a bump to the head?
Just a quick catch up this week. Posts have been fairly few and fair between over the last couple of weeks because I’m gearing up for Blogtober – every time I think ‘Ooh, that might make a good blog post’ I decide to save it for next month…
I was waiting for supplies to arrive last week so I only made one main batch of soap – a remake of ‘Yr Wyddfa’ (Snowdon):
Yr Wyddfa in the Mould
I’ve been trying to find a better way to create this design – this was the previous version which, while it sold really well, has, to me, more than a passing resemblance to *ahem* dog mess :-/
Yr Wyddfa
and when I saw the lovely designs created and document by Danica on her blog Seife und anderes, I realised that the sculpted layers technique might just be the way forward. There’s a great description of the technique on Danica’s blog, so I won’t go into details here (and anyway, I forgot to take any photos of the process, I was so anxious to get on with it – next time I will definitely document it better) so here’s the final result:
Yr Wyddfa / Snowdon
The colours aren’t quite right this time – the mountain needs to be more grey, and the greenery needs to be more, well, green… but I’m getting there. It’s fragranced with a blend of essential oils including rosemary, peppermint, eucalyptus, lemon and patchouli.
I also made another batch of dinosaurs and more stars for the next batches of Frosted Christmas Tree (which I still need to photograph to show you – oops!)
Star Embeds
A couple of weeks ago I ordered a selection of green mica samples from U-Makeitup and this week they arrived – a lovely collection:
Green Mica SamplesGreen Mica Samples – labelled
Oh, and the Christmas ribbons have started to arrive – I know it probably still feels a bit early but I’ve already had a wholesale order for my Christmas range for delivery by 22nd October, so there’s no time to be to complacent…
Christmas Ribbons
Thanks for reading – my next post will be the first of this year’s Blogtober posts on the 1st of the month (next Sunday – eek!)
It would appear that Autumn is well and truly here. There’s a chill in the air in the mornings, and we’re lighting the fire every evening. It’s also a reminder that Christmas is coming, and with it that big, three day Christmas Fair I’ve committed myself to at the beginning of December – eek! To that end, this week’s soapmaking was all holiday based: Double batches of Candy Cane, Frosted Christmas Tree and Warm Gingerbread:
Frosted Christmas Tree, Candy Cane & Warm Gingerbread in the mould
I’ve not taken ‘proper’ photographs of the cuts yet, but here’s a sneaky peek at the Frosted Christmas Tree:
Frosted Christmas Tree
And a quick (and rather rubbish – sorry!!) snap of the Warm Gingerbread (this is the previous weeks batch – this week’s moved even more quickly and I didn’t even attempt the drop!)
Warm Gingerbread
I had a bit of a mishap with the Candy Cane – there was a knock on the door mid-pour, and instead of ignoring it I went to answer it, thinking that the soap batter was nice and fluid and I could leave it a moment or two… There’s a lesson learnt – I was away from the soap just that little bit too long and when I came back it had thickened up too much to finish off the drop swirl, arrghhhhh….
Candy Cane Interrupted
Bath bombs are a relatively new thing for me and I’ve always found them a little tedious to make to be honest. Last Friday I made 90 of them, and I seemed to be quicker this time. I guess practice does make perfect (still need a LOT of practice though :-D) They were pretty trouble free, except for one variety, but that’s a story for another day…
Lots, and lots, of bath bombs
I also packaged up another 100 guest soaps, and bevelled a load more – there’s confetti soap on the horizon I reckon:
Soap shavings
On a personal note, the highlight of the week was earning my green belt in kickboxing on Monday night:
Green Belt!
Unfortunately I didn’t feel quite so kickass when I got to training on Wednesday night and discovered exactly what I’m going to have to do to earn my blue belt – there’s some hard work ahead of me!!
If you have a soap (or bath & body) blog, please do join our Soapmaking Bloggers facebook page (and maybe even consider taking part in Blogtober Soapers? ;-D)
I’m in the process of building a list of blog ideas to keep me going throughout this year’s Blogtober blogging bonanza. For those who don’t know, the goal of Blogtober is simply to post on your blog at least once a day during October. I did it last year and didn’t find it too difficult, but I don’t think I can re-hash all the post from last year, I need some fresh inspiration!
And this is where you come in my soap-loving readers. I’d welcome any suggestions for posts that you might have, but, more importantly, I was wondering whether you would be so kind as to throw some questions at me? Anything at all (well, kinda, lol) I thought I could then do a post answering them, and then I’ll only have to think up another 30 blog ideas… :-/
If anyone out there has their own Soap and/or Bath & Body blog and would like to join in the fun, there are a few of us in the Soaping Bloggers Facebook Group taking part, using the hashtag #BlogtoberSoapers. It’s a bit of a challenge if you don’t normally post regularly, but it really is doable, especially if you do a little prep beforehand so you have ideas to hand, and maybe even have some posts ready-written and saved for emergencies.
So pleeeaaaase post me some questions – anything you like – and I’ll answer them next month – pinky promise 😀
One of my soaps used to make me a little sad. It smelled divine (no, I know I say that about all of them, but trust me on this one…) but it just didn’t sell well. It’s fragranced with a dupe of Aquolina’s Pink Sugar perfume: think candy floss, caramel, vanilla blended with strawberry jam and musk with top notes of lemon drops and brown sugar. It really is lovely.
The high vanilla content in the fragrance oil means that it will naturally turn the soap brown, so while I use my regular drop swirl design, I only add FO to two thirds of the soap batter (one third with Titanium Dioxide, one third with no colour) and leave the pink portion fragrance free:
I became convinced that the reason it wasn’t selling was because of its name: First Kiss (so called because it’s so sweet, *groan*) It was cheesy, and the feedback was that it wasn’t something that older people would want to buy as a gift, even if they liked the scent.
I needed some help to come up with something better, so I asked the good folk of Instagram, and was lucky enough to be given load of great suggestions. The one I went with was Sugar Drops, suggested by @nightwingbeth. I liked that it still implied sweetness, and also referenced the Drop Swirl design.
So there we go – First Kiss has been relegated to history, step forward Sugar Drops.
It’s Tuesday eve, and I think I’m pushing the time limit for posting a round-up of last week, so I’m going to make this a quickie…
The main focus of the beginning of last week was ‘Back to School’, which didn’t actually happen until Tuesday, when both kids headed into school with a quick kiss and barely a look back. I gave a little jump for joy, and headed straight into the soap kitchen to make soap. Mostly restocks (double batches of Bewitched & Luscious Lavender) but also made some progress on the Christmas stock – a double batch of Warm Gingerbread which, as per the test batch, moved really quickly, but I managed to get a small drop element in there. Cut photos to come next week I hope…
Bewitched, Warm Gingerbread & Luscious Lavender
I added a little mica swirl on the top of the Warm Gingerbread, just for some added interest:
Warm Gingerbread Mica Swirls
Wednesday and Thursday I was at the (part-time) day job, but managed to find some time to start on cutting, bevelling, wrapping and labelling a big order of mini guest bars.
Mini guest bars
The rest of the week was spent doing the usual soapy stuff, including spending as much time as I could uploading info and photos to the website – I think I’m still on track to launch at the beginning of October *crosses fingers*
Friday… Friday was kind of special, and had been planned for a while. Before having children my husband and I used to do a lot of hill / mountain walking, but we’d not been to the top of a mountain for about eight years. With both kids in school, we packed a lunch and off we went. The weather wasn’t great and we got a good soaking on the way up, but the weather cleared at the summit and we were rewarded with a lovely view. We descended in sunshine and were dry before we got home. It was absolute heaven, and we’re already planning the next one…
The view from the summit 1The view from the summit 2Happy Hikers
It’s Tuesday eve, and I think I’m pushing the time limit for posting a round-up of last week, so I’m going to make this a quickie…
The main focus of the beginning of last week was ‘Back to School’, which didn’t actually happen until Tuesday, when both kids headed into school with a quick kiss and barely a look back. I gave a little jump for joy, and headed straight into the soap kitchen to make soap. Mostly restocks (double batches of Bewitched & Luscious Lavender) but also made some progress on the Christmas stock – a double batch of Warm Gingerbread which, as per the test batch, moved really quickly, but I managed to get a small drop element in there. Cut photos to come next week I hope…
Bewitched, Warm Gingerbread & Luscious Lavender
I added a little mica swirl on the top of the Warm Gingerbread, just for some added interest:
Warm Gingerbread Mica Swirls
Wednesday and Thursday I was at the (part-time) day job, but managed to find some time to start on cutting, bevelling, wrapping and labelling a big order of mini guest bars.
Mini guest bars
The rest of the week was spent doing the usual soapy stuff, including spending as much time as I could uploading info and photos to the website – I think I’m still on track to launch at the beginning of October *crosses fingers*
Friday… Friday was kind of special, and had been planned for a while. Before having children my husband and I used to do a lot of hill / mountain walking, but we’d not been to the top of a mountain for about eight years. With both kids in school, we packed a lunch and off we went. The weather wasn’t great and we got a good soaking on the way up, but the weather cleared at the summit and we were rewarded with a lovely view. We descended in sunshine and were dry before we got home. It was absolute heaven, and we’re already planning the next one…
The view from the summit 1The view from the summit 2Happy Hikers
The last week of the school holidays didn’t give me much time to devote to the business. I made some soap, wrapped a few bars and uploaded a few items to the pending website and had one, massive, disaster. But more of that later.
I didn’t make a lot of soap this week but I did make a double batch of Tutti Frutti. Here it’s in the mould, before and after the top swirl:
Tutti Frutti Pre & Post Top Swirl
And the cut. I think I tried to be a bit too clever this time. I wanted the colours to more strictly follow the order of the colours of the rainbow (so how did I get red next to green lol?) but to do that I had to be a little more ordered in the pouring. I think I prefer the more randomly poured swirl so. Apologies for the rubbish photograph…
Tutti Frutti just cut
I also learnt my lesson and made a TEST batch using a new fragrance. Warm Gingerbread FO is one I’m hoping to use for Christmas, and I planned small batch with a simple design just to see how it handles. I’m glad I did – the website testing notes said it would accelerate, and accelerate it did. This pic is immediately after the cut – the two bottom layers should turn a lot darker over the next few weeks because of the vanilla in the fragrance oil. I left the top layer fragrance free:
Warm Gingerbread Test Batch
It smells delicious, and I really want to use this FO to make a drop swirl bar for Christmas, so I’m going to have to use all the acceleration-reducing tools in my arsenal – and keep my fingers crossed!!
As I’d already made a start on the Christmas bars during the previous week, Candy Cane, Star embeds for the Christmas Tree bars, and a couple of batches of Dinosoaps, I’m confident that I’m on track time-wise.
And that disaster. Urgh… I was making more of the Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon) soap. The last version was ok, but the bars weren’t uniform enough and the mountain itself didn’t really reflect reality. I intended to use the sculping soap technique (I was recently reminded of it by the incredibly creative Danica of Seife und anderes – if you like soap blogs you really should check it out), but the soap batter riced on me in seconds. I’ve used this fragrance before (and besides, the testing notes say no acceleration) so I REALLY wasn’t being reckless.
Anyway, just for the giggles :-/ I decided to try to squish it into the mould anyway. I actually had to get my hands in there to mix in the colours and colour squishing IS now a technical term. Was there the slightest possibility that it would come out acceptably rustic looking? NO. No, no no NOPE!! The soapy gremlins were well and truly esconced in my kitchen that day lol:
A soapy disaster
No, I didn’t rebatch it. Yes, I trashed it. I know, I know, one of these days I’ll have to give rebatching a go but I don’t currently have spare a slow cooker that I could do it in, and, really, I just don’t feel the rebatching love…
Does anyone else feel like September is a bit of a fresh start? Almost like a mini New Year if you will. It’s always been the same for me, probably because it’s the start of the academic year, and therefore was often a time of change during my younger days.
Anyway, this September, things get serious for The Soap Mine. My youngest starts full time school next week, and I’ve known for a couple of years that this September will be a pivotal month for the business. Up until now I’ve had to work during the evenings and weekends, but going forward I’ll have 22 more hours a week to really grow and take this business forward. (I’ll continue to work in the Village Pre-school for 8 hours a week – on Wednesdays and Thursdays, for the time being) Having said that, it won’t actually be 22 hour MORE, as I’ve no intention of continuing to work all evenings and weekends like I’ve had to do this last couple of years. I’m taking some time back for me!
Ok, back on task. There really should be only one goal for September – get the website up and running. I’ve made a start – today I spent a couple of hours inputting text and uploading photographs – but it’s going to be quite a long process if today’s anything to go by. Many of my photos need to be re-shot too so that may take some time. Part of the website launch will involve migrating this blog onto the new site – I have no idea how that’s going work – am I likely to lose all my readers in one fell swoop or will you all somehow, magically, be redirected to the new site? We’ll see I guess :-/
But one goal’s just not going to cut it this month. I need to get the majority of my Christmas soaps made if they’re going to be cured and wrapped by the beginning of November. I also want to get back into the swing of regular blog posts too. I’ve committed to doing Blogtober again this year, but aiming for 8 – 10 during September should keep me on my toes.
So there we go. Website, Christmas soaps and blog posts. Together with the ongoing restocks, they’re the priorities for this month. What are yours?
I had an inkling August would be busy. I hadn’t planned on posting often on the blog, but abandoning it for a whole month really wasn’t on the agenda either. The kids have been on holiday of course, but the soap business doesn’t stop for the summer (if anything it is busier than any other time, bar Christmas) and I’ve been frantically juggling childcare and keeping on top of the business for the last month.
I won’t dwell on it here, but the weather during August was utter pants. Seriously, it was rubbish. I had so many plans for picnics by the river, and lazy days on the beach, but it just wasn’t going to happen. We took walks in the rain, visited castles in the drizzle, and went geocaching under stormy clouds. The kids even climbed their first (small!) mountain, and loved it. Ha! Take that, weather! We had fun anyway…
As well as keeping retailers stocked up, I’ve made 330 bars of soap during August. Not as many as I would have liked, but with BOTH (finally!!) kids back at school all day as of next Tuesday, I’ll able to get back on track fairly quickly. I’m not making any Halloween bars, so it’s restocks and Christmas soaps all the way… Candy Cane proved very popular last year, so that’s what I started with:
Candy Cane, freshly cut
I’ve also started on the star embeds for the Christmas Tree bars:
Star Embeds
And Dinosoaps are back!
Dinosoaps
It really doesn’t seem right thinking about Christmas in August but last year I got caught out when retailers wanted Christmas stock in store right after Halloween (eek!) so this year I’ll be better prepared.
Oh, and do you remember that marmalade I made back in January? I entered it into our village show a couple of weeks ago, and it only went and won first prize! I knew it tasted good but absolutely didn’t expect to win anything. These aren’t the best photos but I also won firsts for my Viennese fingers, Melting Moments and Swiss Roll plus second prizes for my Victoria Sponge and Coconut & Lime Loaf:
Village Show fun!
These are the Viennese Fingers, which get their own photo because, frankly, they were bloomin’ delicious. Excuse the wonky one – only three were entered – that wasn’t one of them! If anyone wants the recipe let me know and I’ll post it – it’ll give me a great excuse to make more!!
Viennese Fingers
It’s been a great month, but things will be getting back to normal here over the next few days and I’ll be glad to get back into a routine – the blogging schedule will be back on track – I promise!
Thanks for reading – all being well I’llbe back tomorrow with my goals for September.
Well, you can’t say I didn’t warn you – school holidays have totally messed with my blogging schedule (never mind my soaping schedule!!). This time last week I was most likely in the middle of a field playing swingball, or sitting on the beach in blazing sunshine, watching the kids building sandcastles, or eating fish & chips – the specifics don’t matter. The point is we spent a long weekend camping on the coast, in the most glorious sunshine, with no phone signal and certainly no wifi, and blogging was quite far from my mind. Our tent and the view from the front of it:
The tentThe view from the tent
We were SO lucky with the weather – the cloud you see here is just early morning cloud (took the photo just after 7am) and it soon cleared and we had three glorious days of sunshine.
I didn’t manage to make any soap during the week before we went, and I suddenly realised when we got home on the Tuesday that I had nothing to cut during my regular Wednesday night demo the following evening. So I quickly whipped up a double batch of Serenity – too quickly as it turned out…
Serenity in the Mould
Once again I soaped at too high a temperature (the lye is usually at room temp) and it set up too quickly. It’s not awful, but it’s not as I would like it.
Remember the Clarity & Welsh Rose batches I made the previous week? I did actually take some photos as promised:
Clarity (lemongrass & clary sage)
and
Welsh Rose
The rest of any child-free time I managed to wangle last week was spent wrapping soaps and bath bombs for my monthly craft fair in Porthmadog yesterday (Saturday):
Wrapping Bath Bombs
This summer special proved to be the best seller by a country mile – Traeth Craig Du (Black Rock Sands) named after our nearest beach, about 20 minutes away:
Traeth Craig Du
It has ground apricot stone in the bottom portion to represent sand, and has a gorgeous beachy / ozoney scent.
Finally I made a couple of purchases this week that I’m very excited about. Firstly, I actually bought a stand thingummy and some lenses for my iphone so that I can think about making soaping videos soon AND I also bought and downloaded Jo Haslauer’s book on colouring soap naturally.
Jo has been a real inspiration recently (check out here IG feed here) the colours she manages to achieve from infusing botanicals are incredible, and I’m really keen to give them a go. Don’t ask me when though 😀
Thanks for reading. Bear with me during these school holidays, but I’ll be back soon!!
Just popping in really quickly to say that I was honoured recently to be interviewed by the fabulously talented Bee of Sorcery Soap. Check out this link to find out what we talked about!
Erm… these weekly updates are getting later and later! The idea is to get these posted on the Sunday evening, but here I am tapping away at my keyboard late on Tuesday. Never mind, I suppose as long as I get it done before I forget what the heck I did last week it doesn’t really matter. Anyhow, last week was blessedly quiet – there was a bit of a lull between wholesale orders and I actually took a few evenings off, so in all honesty this is going to be a fairly quick update.
On Monday night I made a couple of double batches – one of ‘Delicious’ and one of ‘Oatmeal, Milk & Honey’
Delicious & OMH in the Mould
The ‘Delicious’ moved way too quickly. Entirely my fault – I had two batches of lye water – one cool, which I should have used, one still cooling, which I used in error, while it was still a bit too warm. A really silly and frustrating mistake – I wouldn’t say the whole batch is ruined but I don’t think I’ll be able to sell it at full price, which is an annoyance. I didn’t even have the heart to photograph it when I cut it, so I don’t have an image of it to share here. Maybe I’ll do a post dedicated to bloopers at some point!! I did photograph the Oatmeal, Milk & Honey though. I’ve given it a little colour make-over and swapped out the dark brown for gold – I think it better reflects the fragrance this way:
Oatmeal, Milk & Honey
I spent some time during the week wrapping etc, but in all honesty nothing of any note happened soapy-wise until Sunday evening, when I made soap again, this time two double batches of Welsh Rose and Clarity:
Welsh Rose & Clarity in the Mould
I had thought to cut these today but things have picked up again and I’ve had a few wholesale orders to put together, so hopefully I’ll get some time tomorrow morning to cut and photograph them.
This is the last week of school before the summer holidays start, and I’m really looking forward to having six weeks of fun in the sun (fingers crossed!) with my two little monkeys. It shouldn’t affect my soapmaking capacity too much, as I’ve always soaped in the evenings, but we’ve got a few extended camping weekends planned which might put a spanner in the works (and will definitely affect my blogging routine) but hey ho, I’ll try to keep on top of things 😀
Don’t forget, if you have a soap related blog, or you just like reading them, why not join our Soapmaking Bloggers Facebook Group to share your posts or find new bloggers to follow.
Ever since I started making soap, I’ve been asked why? Why do I bother making soap when it can be bought so cheaply in the supermarket? Clearly, first and foremost I love doing it. You know what they say – ‘Find a job you love and you’ll never work a day in your life’. There’s much more to it than that though. Traditionally crafted, handmade soap like mine is superior to commercially made soap in so SO many ways.
*Please note, the reasons listed below apply specifically to MY soaps – they may apply to many other handmade soaps, but I can’t speak for the ingredients in anyone else’s handmade products
It is vegan- (and therefore by definition, vegetarian-) friendly. I use no animal fats or derivatives, not even beeswax (which can be used in soap to give a harder bar). According to Vegan.com most commercial soaps contain some degree of animal fat derivatives (look for sodium tallowate or sodium lardate on the ingredients list)
I never use palm oil. Palm oil is a popular ingredient in both commercial and handmade soap (for good reason – it’s cheap, and makes great soap) However it is also extremely contentious, as palm oil production stands accused of the destruction of the South American rainforest, and of human rights violations due to the forced relocation of indigenous peoples. There are, of course, two sides to every story, and some soapmakers who do use palm oil have been able to source sustainable, ethically produced palm oil. There is also an argument that cutting out the use of palm oil completely could cause economic harm to those people who are employed within the palm oil industry. As I’ve never used it, this isn’t a concern for me. Palm oil will appear as sodium palmate on the ingredients list of a bar of soap should you wish to avoid it.
My soap is never, ever tested on animals, just (very!) willing humans.
Glycerin. GLYCERIN! Yep, I’m shouting. This is important. Glycerin is a byproduct of the soapmaking process, and is fantastic stuff. It’s a humectant, which means that it draws moisture from the air and helps lock it into your skin. It’s not technically a moisturiser, but it has moisturising properties. Commercial soapmakers almost always extract the glycerin during the production process for use elsewhere (eg lotions or nitroglycerin production). Glycerin is found naturally within every bar of traditional handmade soap and is one reason that people with sensitive skin CAN use handmade soap but can’t use commercial soap
Traditional, handmade soap is…. soap. Obvious right? Well yes, except that some commercially produced soap isn’t soap at all. It’s detergent. Take a look at the packaging on a Dove Beauty Bar. You won’t find the word ‘soap’ on the label because actually, it can’t legally be called soap. It’s a combination of various ingredients put together to create a detergent that closely resembles soap in appearance. Clearly all those ingredients have been approved for use on the skin so it’s not necessarily inherently bad, but many of those ingredients can cause skin irritation.
My soap does not contain parabens, sls/sles, phthalates. As above, these ingredients have been approved for use in skincare products, but they can cause skin irritation (and worse) to those with skin sensitivities, and many people will avoid them at all costs.
My soaps do not contain triclosan or any other antibacterial compounds. The use of triclosan in soap has been banned in the US, but is still permissible in the UK/EU. It was claimed in the US that antibacterial soaps were no more effective than regular soap and water and they could even play a part in increasing antibiotic resistance.
For many of the reasons listed above, my soaps are FAR gentler on your skin than commercially produced soap. If you are one of those people whose skin is sensitive to commercially made soap and you ‘can’t’ or ‘never’ use bar soap, please contact me via The Soap Mine FB page for a sample (UK only) – you may well find that you can use it without any of the problems that commercial soap can cause.
Your skin WILL notice the difference. Do you need to use a moisturiser after washing your hands with commercial bar or liquid soap? You probably won’t after using my soap. The generous amount of cocoa butter and shea butter in each and every bar, along with all that lovely glycerin, will ensure that your hands feel clean, soft and moisturised after every use.
My soap is made by hand, in small batches, with an awful lot of care and attention to detail. Yes, you will pay more for it than you would a bar of commercially made soap, but you know what? You absolutely get what you pay for.
There you go, 10 really good reasons why I believe my soap is better than commercially produced soaps. Try some 😀
The highlight of this last week was a Soapmaking Demonstration that I did for the lovely ladies of the Tremadog branch of the Women’s Institute last Tuesday. I made a batch of Botanica (fragranced with Lavender, Lemon & Lime essential oils) and totally forgot to take a snap of it in the mould, but did take a pic immediately post-cut:
Botanica freshly cut
I get so excited when I get the opportunity to do a demo – it’s such a pleasure to be able to witter on (in an informed manner of course 😀 ) about soap to a captive audience! I’m actually in the middle of writing a post made up of tips for giving a soapmaking demonstration, and I hope to be able to share it soon.
The next evening was spent giving my regular Wednesday soapy talk at a local hotel. It usually starts around 8.45 / 9pm, after the guests have finished diner, and I’m usually home by 10.15 (it’s less than 5 minutes drive away) I’m never sure how big an audience I’ll have – sometimes there can be up to 20, and occasionally as few as 6, but I always get interesting questions which keep me on my toes!!
On Friday I found out that I’ve been accepted as a stall holder at a huge Christmas Fair that’s held locally over three days in early December. I got quite giddy – it’s the first time I’ve applied and I’m really excited to be ‘in’. I’ll have to be so organised over the summer and early autumn to make sure I have enough stock.
I had big plans for a Friday night soaping session, but after I’d done all my prep (melting oils, mixing the lye) I dropped a rather heavy dining chair onto my left foot, and thought I’d broken a toe. The pain was excruciating, and my toe quickly swelled up to more than twice it’s size. I’d already mixed the colours for a double batch of Tutti Frutti, so I decided to take a deep breath and carry on through gritted teeth:
Tutti Frutti in the mould
Tutti Frutti freshly cut
That was enough. By this point my toe was throbbing painfully and I could barely walk so my soaping session came to an end and I was persuaded to sit down and rest.
I usually spend a large chunk of Saturday in the office, wrapping and labelling, but this week I just did a few hour in the afternoon so that Dean could go off and start dismantling a greenhouse that we’ve been lucky enough to get our hands on for free (yippee!!) The owners just want it out of their way and didn’t want anything for it. We’re so very grateful – I will certainly be taking them soap as a thank you gift. This was it before it was dissembled by the way, I’m keeping my fingers crossed that we can reassemble it without too much difficulty!!
Our new (to us) greenhouse
I didn’t break my toe – by Sunday I could walk fairly easily, and by today (Tues) it feels almost back to normal albeit still pretty black and blue.
Oh I nearly forgot – here’s a cut pic of the Luscious Lavender that I made last week (with apologies for the rubbish lighting):
Luscious Lavender
Hope you all had a great week, thanks for reading, back soon!
I need to start keeping a diary of all the business related things I’ve got up to during the week. It’s Monday today, and can I remember what I did last Monday? Erm, nope…
I do of course keep a track of each soap I make for the Product Information File (PIF) so I can tell you that last Tuesday I made two double batches of soap – Bewitched and Traeth Craig Du (Black Rock Sands)…
Bewitched & Traeth Craig Du
And I even got round to photographing one of them. It traced faster than normal (or perhaps I was less careful with the stick blender, who knows?!) so it’s more a camo pour than a drop swirl, but it’s still pretty:
Bewitched freshly cut
I had two wholesale orders go out, as well as a load of mini’s for a local guest house:
More guest soaps off to their new home
On Thursday evening I made a load of bath bombs:
Bath Bombs
Saturday was a frenzy of making… My (have I mentioned how long suffering he is??!) husband took the kids out for the day, and I made soap, yet more bath bombs, another batch of facial soap AND made my first ever batch of lip balm. The soap was a couple of double batches – Luscious Lavender and Super Scrubby Peppermint:
Luscious Lavender in the Mould
Super Scrubby Peppermint
The lip balm was incredibly quick and easy – beeswax, shea butter and avocado oil with a little honey cosmetic flavour. To be honest I think I’ll leave out the flavour next time. I deliberately added very little, but it still had a bit of a synthetic tang to me. I made six tubes worth – one for me, one for Dean, and four to go out to testers. Make sure you follow my FB page if you want to be in with a chance of being a tester in the future – I have LOADS of ideas for things I want to make, as and when I have time, and they’ll all need human testers 🙂
Finished Lip Balm
I posted a question on Facebook and Instagram to try to find out whether people prefer tubes or tins and surprisingly it’s fairly equal between the two – if and when I do finally offer these for sale it looks like I’ll have to offer both options!
I’ve got a busy week coming up – all those bath bombs I made? All but six have gone – gone! So, there’s more bath bomb making in my near future. I’m also giving a soap making demonstration to a local branch of the Women’s Institute on Tuesday, giving my regular soaping presentation on Wednesday night, and Thursday will HAVE to be spent making more core range soap. I also need to find the time somewhere to bevel, wrap and label a load of bars. Roll on September when I’ll finally be able to work on the business during the days!
I can’t be the only one who’s gobsmacked that we’re halfway through the year? The days are already getting shorter and I’ve started thinking about Christmas specials – and all this before the summer holidays officially begin 😱
At the beginning of the month I posted some goals for June – here’s how I got on…
1. Research, and make some test batches of, lip balm ✅ After a bit of research I came up with a few recipes that I wanted to try, and made up a first batch:
Lip balm freshly poured
Finished Lip Balm
I already love this one, but I’m only keeping one for myself – the rest are going out to testers. I still have a couple of recipes to try.
2. Finish making the summer specials ✅ I’m considering keeping one of them – ‘Yr Wyddfa’ – all year round as I think it’ll be pretty popular, living as we do at the foot of said mountain!
3. Create a ‘Core Range’ post for bathbombs ✅ This link is proving so handy to send out to potential stockists!
Welsh Rose Luxury Bath Bomb
4. Post at least nine times here on the blog – oh so close! Still, I posted 8 times, and if I’d got my backside into gear and posted this on Friday night like I should have, I would have hit my target.
This is the current range of bath bombs. I have two main ranges – bombs fragranced with pure essential oils only, and bombs made with fragrance oils.
There are two sizes – small & large. The small size retails at £2.00 and weighs a minimum of 80g (although in reality most are closer to 90g) and the large size retails at £3.50 and weights a minimum of 120g (but in reality most are around the 130-140g mark)
Please be aware that these are handmade items and as a result bombs won’t all be identical. Fragrances will remain constant, but designs may vary slightly from bar to bar.
I should soon be able to offer bath bombs to match every bar available in the core range of soaps, but currently the range consists of the following seven varieties:
Essential Oil Bombs
Luscious Lavender
Simply fragranced with pure Lavender essential oil, loved by all ages.
Luscious Lavender Luxury Bath Bomb
Serenity
‘The one that smells like a spa’. That’s how customers describe Serenity, and with good reason – the heady blend of Patchouli and Ylang Ylang essential oils combined with a citrus fragrance oil will have you relaxed in no time.
Clarity
Fragranced with Lemongrass and Clary Sage essential oils, Clarity is a real unisex fragrance, and one of my best sellers.
Clarity Luxury Bath Bomb
Fragrance Oil Bombs
Sugar Drops
A warm, caramel, vanilla fragrance, reminiscent of Aquolina’s Pink Sugar designer perfume.
Sugar Drops Luxury Bath Bomb
Bewitched
A fruity, floral fragrance with notes of peach, cherry blossom and white jasmine. Reminiscent of Victoria Secret’s Love Spell perfume.
Bewitched Luxury Bath Bomb
Oatmeal, Milk & Honey (OMH)
The ultimate comforting scent, OMH has strong almond notes with honey and creamy oats.
Oatmeal, Milk & Honey Luxury Bath Bomb
Welsh Rose
A classic fragrance, the luscious scent of fresh rose petals.
Or is it a Blogday? Either way, I published my first couple of posts on the 28th June 2013, Woohoo!! At that point I hadn’t made any soap since the birth of my daughter two months before, nor for a good few months before that due to day-long morning sickness and an extreme aversion to the smell of fragrance AND essential oils. (I’d had to ask my husband to put all my supplies up in the attic as even catching an accidental whiff of any of my soaps had me heading for the bathroom – urgh..)
Fast forward and that newborn is now four years old (funny that :-D) and she’ll be joining her big brother at school full time in September. That will mean much, MUCH more time for soaping and the business as a whole (including the blog!). I’m also hoping that I’ll have a bit more time for myself, and of course my poor, long suffering husband who has spent more evenings than I care to mention alone on the sofa while I focused on The Soap Mine.
I have loads of ideas for new products, blog posts and growing the business generally, so please stick with me – I hope I’ll still be here in another four years time, and I hope you’ll still be reading. Thank you all!!
Oh, here’s a little bit of soap in the mould from a couple of days ago, just because it’s pretty lol…
It’s been a crazily busy week. And it’s not letting up, hence why I’m starting to write this at two minutes to eleven at night when I really should be going to bed! It’s going to be short 😉
Monday evening saw me out at a community meeting, so I couldn’t get any soapmaking done, and then Tuesday night was kickboxing grading night.
I got my orange belt – woop!
An Orange Belfie
Wednesday night was kickboxing class followed by my weekly soaping presentation, but I did get the opportunity during the day to cut the Welsh Rose and Yr Wyddfa that I made last week:
Welsh Rose, freshly cut
Yr Wyddfa, freshly cut
Thursday night I had to spend catching up on paperwork and then finally, on Friday night, I managed to make something – a shed load of bathbombs for a wholesale order going out next week.
Luscious Lavender Luxury Bath Bomb
Oatmeal, Milk & Honey Luxury Bath Bomb
Serenity Luxury Bath Bomb
Bewitched Luxury Bath Bomb
On Saturday, Dean took the kids out for a few hours and I finally got to make some soap – two exclusive custom batches for a local retailer. I LOVE making these two. The customer chose the fragrances and concept for them both, and they’re different in design to my regular restocks so I get to do something a little more interesting.
Potters’ Soap for Glosters
Ar Lan Y Mor for Glosters
Saturday night we were invited to some friends’ house for dinner (I always try to take Saturday night off, regardless of what else is going on) and the Sunday was Fathers’ Day, so we all went out for breakfast and spent the day together.
Sunday night I made the rest of the bathbombs for the wholesale order – phew!!
Welsh Rose Luxury Bath Bomb
First Kiss Luxury Bath Bomb
Clarity Luxury Bath Bomb
Now to get them all wrapped for delivery on Friday!!
So although I’ve not been particularly productive this week, it has felt extraordinarily busy – I hope your week has been calmer. If it has, send some my way please?!
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Yikes!! It’s the first of October, and that means it’s the first day of the annual blogging challenge, Blogtober. Because I managed it last year (by the skin of my teeth), I seemed to think that I would have no problem repeating that success this year… until this week. This last week has been crazy busy, and I’m not sure how I oculd have fitted in seven (!!) blog posts as well. But more about that in the next post…
