When I woke up this morning, I reached for my phone (and my glasses – not sure when exactly THAT became a prerequisite for reading my phone screen but it’s now automatic – arghhh) and checked my Twitter feed. At 6.30am I had no idea that such a thing as Blogtober even existed but by 6.45, I was doing it.
The Blogtober Challenge is all about blogging every day, for a month. You may know that I recently committed to update the blog more often but I’m still struggling to do so, mostly due to time constraints. So how on earth I think I’m going to do this, I’m not really sure, but hey that’s what a challenge is all about eh?!
As far as I can tell, many, if not most, bloggers out there are following a set list of prompts for each day of October, but I didn’t want to be quite so constrained, so I’ve created my own list of potential blog post topics. So as well as the usual soapy stuff I’ll also be writing about more personal topics and day-to-day life. They may not be long posts (in fact, they’re very unlikely to be!) but If nothing else, you’ll get to know a little more about the person behind The Soap Mine!
If there’s anything particular from this list of topics that you’d absolutely like me to write about, please let me know in the comments below and I’ll be happy to oblige.
Goals for October
Soapy (and related) stuff
My (non-soapy) daytime job
How/why I started making soap
Where I live
World Smile Day – things that make me smile
Weekly wrap-ups
If I could go anywhere in the world…
A day in my life
Instagram tips
Favourite IGers
Recently read, currently reading, want to read…
Favourite recipes
Book reviews
Pet peeves
My garden
Other crafts
My pinterest obsession
Anyone else committed to doing this or done it before? Please do share any tips, ideas or advice you may have (and leave a link so that I can follow you too)
I’m finding it hard to believe that it’s been a whole year since I last shared one of these. It’s been a busy year, and I’ve posted less often than I’d hoped I would, nevertheless, I managed 50% more posts in 2015 than in 2014 – onwards and upwards 😀
In 2016 I aim to post yet more often. The more observant among you may have noticed a change to the blog tagline to ‘A Soaping Life’. I want to broaden the range of posts, just a little, to give me the opportunity to post more than simply what soaps I’ve made that day and/or week. I’m not sure exactly yet what direction this will take me, but I’m looking forward to exploring my options.
Lastly, I’m really grateful to those of you who take the time to read and comment on my posts – thank you! I didn’t do enough during 2015 to find the time to reciprocate, but I will endeavour to try harder in 2016!
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 11,000 times in 2015. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 4 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
In my last post I gave a little hint of what was to come in the two subsequent posts, so here, without further ado, is (the first half of) what was shared in the 2015 International Soap Swap.
Six out of the twelve participants are based in Europe, and they are the ones I’m showcasing in this post. We had one soapmaker from Ireland, one from Austria, one from Germany and three (including myself) from the UK.
First up were these bars from Celine of i am handmade If you’re a soapmaker, or a fan of handmade soaps, you may well be familiar with her gorgeous work. I was incredibly lucky that Celine sent an extra bar as a little thank you to me for hosting, and these were the two that I ended up with:
I am Handmade Love + Kisses and Cottontail
And here they are unboxed:
Love + Kisses / Cottontail
I chose not to use a single bar until I knew all the participants had received their soapy packages, but as soon as that happy moment arrived, the first one I opened was Celine’s Love + Kisses:
Love + Kisses in use
I didn’t think I was making a conscious decision when I picked up one of Celine’s first, but I’ve been a fan of hers for a long time – more or less since I first started to make soap – so perhaps subconsciously I was draw to them.
Love + Kisses is divine to use. It’s super hard, creates a lusciously abundant lather, and the fruity fragrance lingers softly on the skin. I can’t wait to start the second bar 😀
You can buy Celine’s via her website or checkout her FB page If you enjoy watching soapmaking videos (and there are an awful lot of us that do :-)) then you should definitely check out Celine’s Youtube channel.
Next up is this beauty from Vinvela, of Dandelion Seifee:
Amber-Lemon by Dandelion Seifee
Vinvela really is an absolute master of swirls, and creates beautiful, fine patterns that I can only dream of. This bar is scented with a blend of amber and lemon which give a deep and complex fragrance which is also refreshing and bright. It’s SO lovely.
She also creates her own packaging – how cute is this? The soap nestles perfectly within the box, and the box is surrounded by the colourful outer band which details the fragrance, ingredients etc.
Dandelion Seifee packaging
If you’d like to see more of Vinvela’s skillful soapmaking, just take a look at her blog here
The third soap I received from my European colleagues was ‘Bite Me’ from Wendy of Heavenly Bubbles in the UK.
Heavenly Bubbles
I just love this packaging. There’s often a compromise between protecting the soap while ensuring that the design can be seen and the fragrance experienced, but Wendy appears to have achieved the perfect balance here.
Bite Me – Heavenly Bubbles
Bite Me is part of the Heavenly Bubbles luxury silk collection, and the fragrance is delicious. It’s described as citrus, berries and cherries on a vanilla base and to me it’s a sophisticated, grown up twist on cherryade. Finding a true red colour for soap is a bit of a holy grail for soapmakers, but Wendy has cracked it in this bar. Topped with a fine sprinkling of glitter and a perfect little cherry on each bar, it’s clear that a lot of thought has gone into the design of Bite Me. I love it!
Coincidentally, our second British soapmaker is also a Wendy. Wendy Jones runs Soapy Jones, a handmade soap company based in the Midlands. She created this fabulously appropriate packaging for our international soap swap:
Soapy Jones
It’s just perfect, even down to that postage stamp on there!
The soap inside continued the theme – take a look at this amazing landscape (or, more correctly I think, seascape soap)
Soapy Jones Seascape
I LOVE the creativity that’s gone into the design. Unless you’ve ever tried to create a landscape soap you probably don’t know how difficult it is to do, and how much skill is involved it getting it just right like this. The fragrance, a fresh green scent called Earl Grey & Cucumber, is the perfect complement to the design.
You can find Soapy Jones on Facebook, follow her on Twitter and Instagram, and take a peek at more of her beautiful creations on her website
The fifth European participant was Zacil of Soap & Soap based in Germany. Zacil doesn’t currently sell her bars so I consider myself very lucky to have had this opportunity to try her soap. And not just one bar. Oh no. Zacil was incredibly generous and sent me FOUR to try. This was the bar that all participants received:
Soap & Soap
Each bar’s packaging was handcrafted and personalised with each participant’s name, and was really well designed to protect the soap whilst allowing a tantalising glimpse of what was within. Here it is unwrapped:
Soap & Soap
Just look at those amazing colours and swirls! This bar was made with some really interesting ingredients including Babassu, Argan and Cottonseed oils which I’ve not used in soapmaking. There were also one ingredient of which I’ve never even HEARD before – Konjak flour. Turns out it’s a starchy flour popular in Asia. I can’t wait to try this bar out for myself!
The three other bars which Zacil sent me are pictured below, named, from left to right, Midori cocktail, a fruity melony fragrance (with a dinky little soap fruit on top), Juicy Hearts (the colours are amazing) and Century, which has white wine listed as an additive.
Soap & Soap Extra bars
You can see more of Zacil’s work on here on her Facebook page
The last participant from Europe was of course myself. Now, I’ve wittered on enough on this blog about my own soaps, so I’ll keep it very brief here – these were the two bars that I sent out for the swap – each participant received one or the other of these:
This Summer I was lucky enough to host an international soap swap between myself and eleven amazingly talented soaping friends from Europe, America & Canada. There was only rule: Each participant was to send me eleven full sized bar of their soap by 31st July, together with their postal address for the return package.
Once I had received all eleven packages (and boy was that like Christmas!!) I created twelve piles of soap – one for each participant including myself – consisting of one soap from each package (omitting each participants OWN soap of course) and one of mine. I then boxed up all the piles of soapy goodness and sent them back out to their rightful owners.
Given all the things that could have gone wrong, it all went remarkably smoothly. We had a bit of a delay as one box was a few weeks late arriving (despite being posted in PLENTY of time by the participant – it took almost 8 weeks to get from North America to the UK!) but the return packages all (bar one) arrived at their various destinations in good time, and even the last one arrived within 10 days.
The only down side really was the postage costs. The parcels weighed approximately 1.7kg each, so international postage both ways was never going to be cheap. Once I’d packaged up the individual boxes I weighed them at home, and used the Royal Mail website to try to ascertain what the cost was going to be to send out each parcel. Each participant then paid me via Paypal what I had estimated the cost to be. As it turned out, each and every parcel turned out to be marginally cheaper to post than the website quoted, but it was a simple task to refund each participant the difference.
And now to the fun bit. There were 6 participants from Europe (including myself) and 6 from the USA and Canada. Rather than have one crazy long post, I’m going to post a few pictures here of MY Christmas in July – when the soapy packages arrived. In Post 2 I’ll share my European haul in much more detail, and in Post 3 I’ll do the same with the loveliness from our friends over the pond.
In case you missed my earlier teaser, here’s the full line up in all its glory:
International Soap Swap 2015
If you are remotely a fan of handmade soap, or even just like surprises, you’ll have some idea of the excitement I felt each time the postman handed me one of these parcels. Do bear in mind these are just teasers for the main events coming in the next two posts!
First to arrive was this package from Pam of By The Sea Soaps in the US:
By The Sea Soaps
and she was so kind to put together a special goody bag for me as a thank you for hosting the swap:
Goody Bag from Pam
After that I’ve kind of lost track of what arrived when, so these next nine packages are in no particular order:
From Vinvela Ebony of dandelion SeiFee in Austria:
dandelion SeiFee
From Wendy of Soapy Jones, UK:
Soapy Jones
From Barbara of Moon Goddess Garden, US:
Moon Goddess Garden
From Melinda of Melinda’s Naturals, US:
Melinda’s Naturals
From Celine of i am handmade, Ireland:
i am handmade
From Wendy of Heavenly Bubbles, UK:
Heavenly Bubbles
From Zacil of Soap & Soap in Germany:
Soap & Soap
From Emily of Shieh Design Studio, US:
Shieh Design Studio
From Zahida of Handmade in Florida, US:
Handmade in Florida
And finally, an admission and apology – there was one parcel that, in my HUGE excitement, I forgot to photograph whilst still in its outer box. So, even more of a tease here from Louise, of Soga Artisan Soaperie, in Canada: (There will, of course, be pictures when I cover them individually in Post 3, and you can find them here if you can’t wait that long)
Soga Artisan Soaperie
Don’t, whatever you do, miss the next two posts. There will be naked bars 😀
Thank you so much to everyone who came up with wonderfully inventive names for my new soap, both here and on my Facebook page. It’s taken me a couple of hours of deliberation, but we have a winner. Now this is a little convoluted, so bear with me!
I was looking for a name that reflected both the fragrance (pink grapefruit, kumquat, orange and cranberry mingled with gardenia, jasmine, and freesia) AND the design, and I wasn’t entirely sure that any of the suggested names quite hit the mark. However, three people made suggestions that led me to come up with the name I’ve finally gone with. Firstly, two people (Soap N’ Stilettos & Ewenique) suggested names that included the word ‘Sunrise’ which I think nicely reflects the design. I also wanted to convey something of the fragrance, albeit indirectly, and Gunilla Stoll (who suggested Tuscan Summergarden) gave me the idea of including a place known the world over for growing citrus fruit (especially grapefruit and kumquat – happy days!) Florida.
I used Random.org to choose a winner from the three entrants above – numbering them 1 – 3 in the order in which they posted on the blog post, and the winner was… *drumroll* Soaps ‘N Stilettos! Congratulations!! DM your postal address to my FB page here and I’ll send your soap out asap!
And finally, introducing: Florida Sunrise. Available now!
Florida Sunrise
Thank you once again to everyone who took the time to enter – I really do appreciate it! Keep an eye out for more giveaways coming soon.
In my last post (so much longer ago than I realised – life is busy :-D) I shared a picture of an as yet unnamed soap in the mould. Well, here it is, cut, fully cured, and STILL nameless – please help me name it!
Name me – please!!
The fragrance is described as pink grapefruit, kumquat, orange and cranberry mingled with gardenia, jasmine, and freesia. To me it’s mostly citrussy – there’s a hint of background florals but the citrus notes are definitely dominant. It’s coloured with titanium dioxide and yellow and tangerine micas.
I’m offering a free bar to the person who comes up with the name that I eventually choose, and you can either enter below in the comments field or on the competition post on my facebook page here. It’s open to anyone, wherever you are in the world – I’ll cover postage costs too. So don’t be shy – I know you’re a creative lot!!
PS – the winning name will be chosen on Easter Monday, 6th April, after 9pm UK time.
The last few weeks have been full-on soapmaking to restock the shelves depleted by the pre-Christmas rush. I only have two loaf moulds, and can only soap in the evenings once the little Miners are asleep, so it’s a fairly long drawn out process involving nightly soapmaking (what a shame :-D!) but I’m getting there.
This is Parisian Flora. A drop swirl fragranced with a blend of Lavender, Ylang Ylang and Rose Geranium essential oils, and coloured with titanium dioxide and micas.
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys kindly prepared a 2014 annual report for my blog, and it made for quite an interesting read (for me anyway :-D)
I was quite surprised at how few posts I’d written last year, though moving out of our home, into temporary accommodation for 6 months, and then into our new place did place restrictions on the amount of time I had to soap, and hence write about it, so it figures. I’m planning on posting a lot more often in 2015!
Despite the low number of posts during 2014, I’m really pleased to have had over 8,000 views, though not at all surprised at where the most traffic came from. Very nice to see a summary of the most prolific commenters too (thank you so much ladies :-D). I love getting feedback, and it’s another of my blogging goals this year to stop by, say hi, and generally comment on other people’s blogs even more often than I already do. If I’ve not already discovered your blog, please feel free to leave a link in the comments below and I’ll check you out!
Thanks for reading – back soon 😀
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 8,300 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 3 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Just checking in quickly to wish you all a very Happy New Year, and to say thanks for reading during 2014!
I’ve got a lot of plans for 2015, not least of which is to try to blog more regularly, so I look forward to sharing more soapy adventures with you over the next 12 months.
Well, I said I wouldn’t leave it so long next time and I’ve been as good as my word – only a month has passed since I last posted and I’ve awarded myself an end of term grade of C- for consistency. I think that’s usually considered a ‘Must Do Better’ grade 😀
I’ve not been idle though. The Soap Mine soaps are now being stocked in THREE retail outlets, and I’ve got my eye on another. I’ve also been accepted to sell at a local monthly craft fair – the first of which is in just over 2 weeks time. Soooo, I’ve been soaping like a demon. Originally it was to make sure I had enough for the launch of the website (and before you ask – nope!) but now I also need to make sure I’ve got enough for the three shops and the market – eeek! I’m finding it quite hard to plan how many bars to make, given that I always work with a 6 week cure time, and I have no idea when, or how much, the retailers will reorder. I suppose it’s not ‘Best Practice’ business-wise to work in such a way, but all three retailers are quite small concerns, and it would be difficult to get them to commit to taking, say, a set number of bars a month, until they’ve at least got some idea of how well (or otherwise!) they sell.
So, as the title says, my Soap Mountain is growing! My poor mum’s dining room (nope, we’ve not moved either!) has become a soapy storage area, and I’m constantly on the lookout for more storage crates, boxes and anything suitable I can get my hands on.
Anyway, these are some I made a few weeks back – I’ve got a lot more to share once I get round to photographing them!
Blackjack:
Blackjack – Aniseed & Spearmint EOs
Chocolate:
Chocolate FO ITP Swirl
Orange & Ylang Ylang EOs:
(I’m struggling to come up with a name for the one so if anyone has any ideas I’d appreciate suggestions)
Orange & Ylang Ylang EOs
Serenity:
Notice the similarity between this one and Blackjack above? My mistake – I didn’t expect the darker blue in this one to be quite so dark, so the two bars are more alike than I wanted them to be.
Bergamot, Patchouli, Red Mandarin and Ylang Ylang EOs
Finally, just because I love it – a mica swirl on the top of my last batch of Luscious Lavender. Cut pictures to follow – eventually 😀
Lavender Mica Swirl
Thanks for checking in – especially those of you whose blogs I’ve not had the chance to catch up on for what feels the longest time – I’ll get back to you soon I promise!
We recently had some very exciting news – it’s not soap related, but it will (sadly) impact on my soapmaking for the next couple of months.
Although we live in the north of England, my husband and I are both Welsh, and have always said that we would move back there eventually. The one thing preventing us from doing so was the lack of available work in rural Wales where we wanted to live, but against all odds it’s happened. My husband got a new job, and we’re going home!!
It’s all very exciting – the new job starts on the 1st March, so we have a bit of time, but once Christmas and New Year are out of the way it’ll soon come round. So the house is on the market, and we’ve just spent the weekend looking for a new home (preferably one with a dedicated soaping area – woop!)
Anyway, the upshot is there’s an awful lot to do between now and then, so I’ve decided to put the soaping on the back burner for a couple of months and focus on the big move.
In the meantime please don’t go away – I’ll be updating on relocation progress on this site, (no doubt whinging about missing making soap lol) and will also share some of the wonderful soapy blogs that I’ve grown to love over the past year.
I do however have a couple more recent makes to share with you – coming very soon 🙂
Back in August, amid all the buzz heralding the release of Soap Crafting by Anne-Marie Faiola (aka The Soap Queen), I entered a prize draw posted by the lovely Cee on her Oil & Butter blog.
A number of soapy bloggers had been asked to review the book and make a soap using one of the recipes/methods therein. They were also given an extra copy of the book to give away to one of their (US based) readers. As part of her review, Cee made a loaf of Alkanet Root & Fennel soap from the book and all we, the readers, had to do to enter the draw was to comment on the post about essential oil blends and/or natural colourants, and names would be drawn out of a hat (so to speak). Now, not being in the US, I knew I wouldn’t be getting my mits on a copy of that coveted book, but Cee wasn’t about to forget her international readers, oh no :). As well as giving away a copy of the book, Cee was generously giving away a bar of that very soap to one of her lucky international readers.
And that reader was me! Cee sent me message via Facebook to say I’d won, and I did a happy dance. On the 5th September Cee sent me another message to say it had been sent. Oooh I was excited… My husband didn’t quite get it. ‘You’ve won soap? We don’t have enough soap already?’ while pointedly looking at the boxes in the airing cupboard / attic / wardrobe / under the bed… Hahahahah… But yes, I was excited 🙂
The weeks passed, and then some more weeks passed. Finally, on 5th November (yep, two whole months in transit!!) Cee’s beautiful soap arrived, and here it is in all its gorgeousness:
It’s wonderful to use – silky smooth, abundantly bubbly and smells divine. And just look at that piping on the top *swoon*. It’s fragranced with Fennel, Lavender, Grapefruit and Patchouli essential oils and coloured with Alkanet root. A full tutorial can be found on Cee’s blog here. (Do also check out her amazing gingerbread house made of soap – stunning stuff!)
Thank you once again Cee for sending it all this way – I love it!
PS – I did finally get my own copy of the book when it was released here in the UK, and it’s great – but that’s another post :0)
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