I am so trying to keep up with my blog, things have been somewhat hectic for me. Just lots to do and no time to do it. But I have been busy making soap. I just thought for today I would share some of the soap that has been made over the past week. I wanted to have more items in my artfire shop to carry over for Christmas.
Many soapers are doing their Christmas themes and I have yet to find a christmas scent that I really believe in and like. I just haven't found the one that I feel I would want to soap. I did use a few last year but I would not use them again. There are so many fragrances, and I feel I don't want to get caught up in buying brand new oils right now just for this one Holiday. Plus after the holiday, one scrambles to try and discount and sell off the holiday soaps. Losing time, and money and I just don't want to fall down that path.
I guess I can let the cat out of the bag but in April 2013, I will open my brand new website. I have thought long and hard and will keep my artfire shop so that I can move items as I see fit. So if I have items that aren't moving fast enough then I can discount the price and sell it lower on my artfire shop, this way I can get exposure from both sites.
We will still have the Three Sisters Soap name, but we are going to have all new products and packaging.
Our packaging will be greener on some items (bottles and jars are the exception). Reuseable packaging, for most soap bars. That is all I can say. My love of the girly girl colors or Shabby Chic theme is my main goal. Not only will I be bringing in my love of soaping and bath and body products, but I will also be making items to sell from my years of sewing. I am all about making items people can use on a daily basis, such a market bags made of fabric and beautiful pillows, just various items that will be made with 100 % quality quilters cotton and fully washable. That is all I want to say on this since I have so much to do before the shop opens. I am building my website right now, and with all the products I need to get established, time will be here before you know it.
I try to offer soap loaves when I have the time to make them. They are priced according to their weight. These happen to be huge, weighing in at 1 lb 10 +oz. So these will be higher in price than my 1 lb soap loaves. I didn't intend to add so much topping on top, but I had to use up my soap batch, and kind of over estimated the size of the batch I needed for this. I feel they turned out beautiful. And once cut these bars will be much bigger than the normal soap loaf, due to all the topping.
This is called: Apple Butter Pumpkin Pie and smells amazing so scroll down and look at the photos I've posted. I took these photos during late afternoon so you will see shadows in the photos.
The bottom "crust" is a scent that marries beautifully with the Apple Butter Pumpkin Pie scent, which it is called Got Milk. And this is also the scent I put of top. It is followed up with Gold Glitter. Simple but effective.
I bought a new soap mold recently. I had to order it from Japan. I love the fact that I can make single slices and all uniform. The old method of making soap cakes it was a tedious task. I love making these from scratch and building the cakes layers and the soap icing. It is so time comsuming usually done in steps and takes 2 days to complete. And when the cake is ready to cut sometimes the layers would split apart. This became a nightmare so for many reasons I don't do this method anymore. So with that said, I plan to offer an easier soap cake slice, and have various sizes to chose from. As far as soap slices go, this mold is really the way to go.
I do have the opportunity to make cake slices or pie slices and can so anywhere in between on size.
Buttery Pumpkin Pie Cake Slice:
topped with the whipped cream dollops of Got Milk.
Take a look:
As you can see these are really thick. They are over a 7+ oz bar. I would suggest that with any soap if it is hard to hold then lay it on it side like in the photo above and just simply cut the soap in half horizontally. This is what I would do if it was my bar of soap. This way you can use one piece and then have another spare piece.
I also made some over pour soaps. Which means I had enough of the soap batch to make extra bars. These are scented in Apple Cider and it smells wonderful.
Here is a Men's soap I made in Aquolina's Blue Sugar. I love this scent. You see the top of a few bars. I used Gold Glitter on the top, then realized that men may not like the glitter, but just so that you know if you are wondering, glitter will wash right off when the bar gets wet.
Here is a few bars from my over pour I only got three out of the overage.
This is a blend of Cranberry & Pineapple Orchid. Again these two scents go so well together. I only had enough for 2 bars on the overage. But they smell amazing. Scroll down to see the soap bars I made with the same scent.
The soap on the right is the bar soap I made with the Cranberry & Pineapple Orchid. The bar on the left is the over pour.
Here is a top view with the gold glitter.
More views of the soap bars.
Old Spice Scent
I just ordered this fragrance for a friend. She wants some soap made. I did my trial batch and found that the fragrance oil seized on me. Which meant I had to go get my two crock pots and do a hot process soap batch. I wasn't happy with the outcome at all. And have to admit the soap
smells really good. But I can't provide her any cold process soap. I'll just have to speak with her on this and see what to do. I personally don't like doing hot process soap. I don't like the look of it or the texture when working and molding this type of soap. But this was my only choice at the time.
Glad to have the extra.
Well this is about it for now. Just wanted to update this blog and keep the lines of communication open. I have even more soap to show but don't really have the time right now. So I will do another blog on the other soaps as soon as I get caught up. Thanks to everyone who follows my blog and I plan to keep this going and do much better with postings. Take Care hope you enjoyed my soap
ramblings. Later......Debby
