Tutorials on soapmaking, bath fizzies, lotions and more
This project combines the beautiful swirls you can achieve easily with cold process soap and the ability to layer designs in melt & pour. You can print out these cute holiday creatures from this template on water soluble paper and layer them on your soap to give your finished soaps some whimsical character.
A goal without a plan is just a wish. – Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Look back over the last year and take stock over where you are today in your personal and professional life. Are you where you hoped you would be? Did you meet the goals you set for yourself?
My beloved treadmill desk! Such a great way to work toward my fitness goals for 2014.
My friend Carol Frazy from TheFitSchool.com has a useful exercise that she does when she coaches individuals in her running and nutrition programs. She even has downloadable sheets that you can use to make your own plans using this formula.
“Mere color, unspoiled by meaning, and unallied with definite form, can speak to the soul in a thousand different ways. ”
― Oscar Wilde
The first thing anyone sees about your soap creation is its color and shape. The thing that will intrigue a customer and get them to pick up a bar of soap is not the scent; it’s the color. From LabColors, to micas, color blocks for melt and pour and pigments, there are many options for coloring your soap. If you prefer to use natural ingredients in your soap, you can still achieve vibrant, beautiful colors using natural colorants. Natural products that impart color include clays as well as herbs and botanicals.
I hope everyone had a happy holiday filled with plenty of food, family and friends! Although Bramble Berry is still operating with a skeleton staff until January 2 (we took inventory today; fun times!), Bramble Berry will be back in full force in 2014 to get your goodies shipped out and answer all your crafty questions.
There were lots of behind the scenes sneak peeks on the blog this week. We spent Sunday filming three brand new episodes of Soap Queen TV, and on Monday we recapped our annual Salvation Army shopping trip. There was also an adorable last minute gift idea, some festive photos from Christmas and a beautiful Dream Catcher Swirl cold process recipe from our friends at Otion.
The Facebook Photo of this week takes a departure from the holiday theme. This brightly colored soap is too unique to miss.
This is a very simple swirl technique comes to us from our friends and Otion, and it yields dramatic end results. This is a great beginner cold process recipe, but it is important to keep the batter nice and thin during the entire process. That’s the key to getting nice rings of color and making the end swirl really pop.
If you’re not having a white Christmas this year, this cute little snow globe might be the next best thing. A fun decoration for your own home or a quick gift idea, our Holiday Snow Globe is a simple and customizable project that is kid friendly and easy to whip up at the last minute. For the example project we used our Penguin Erasers, but you could use any embeddable toys (how fun would a snowy unicorn or cute koala be, for example)? Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!
Lights, camera, action! The team and I spent this morning filming not one but three episodes of Soap Queen TV. We filmed a cold process recipe, a melt and pour project and finished off with three shades of lipstick. We even had time to squeeze in a helpful Soap Queen TV short (hint: it will make cleaning those oily lipstick containers a breeze!). Look for these brand new episodes coming in 2014!
All prepped and ready to go!
Hello everyone, merry (almost) Christmas! There is holiday hustle and bustle both at home and at Bramble Berry. We’re gearing up to shoot a few episodes of Soap Queen TV tomorrow before taking a small break for the holidays. Bramble Berry will be closed for Christmas and have a skeleton crew the 23rd, 26th and 27th. The warehouse also has to do inventory (Thanks IRS!) and as soon as they’re finished, will ship orders in the order they were received.
Take a break from the holiday madness and check out my favorite pins, tweets and ‘grams from the past two weeks. Happy Holidays, all!
Pins of the Week:
Can you believe Christmas is next week? These last few weeks of the year have been racing by, and I’ve been busy with end of the year festivies (taking the annual Santa photo, for example. It went over exceedingly well….).
The blog had a lot of action on it this week. Kenna of Modern Soapmaking kicked it off by sharing solid tips on how to run your own business and on finding inspiration. Make sure to read her interview to find out what she considers to be her biggest business mistake. Do you sew? Have you ever thought about sewing? Here’s an easy tutorial on making little pants for babies and toddlers. You can size them all the way down to newborn up to 4T. Curious to know what commenters called “gorgeous” and “beautiful” this week? Click on through to see the Smoky Bay Cold Process Tutorial and see how gradiants took a colorful upscaling. Over 35% of candle sales happen during the Holiday season. If you are curious about how to capitalize on that trend, read all about EcoSoya Advanced Wax here and check out the oh-so-seasonal Chai Tea Latte Candle tutorial.
Now on to the Facebook Photo of the Week! These soaps are worth their weight in gold, frankincense and myrrh.
For this sensuous soap, we may or may not have been inspired by a certain best-selling book that references multiple (or 50) shades of grey in its name. This Smoky Bay soap features clean, straight layers colored with four perfect gradients of grey. The orange in the middle provides the perfect burst of color!
This soap is scented with Indian Sandalwood Cybilla Fragrance Oil, which is remarkably strong in cold process soap. It does not discolor or accelerate trace and keeps its scent brilliantly. For a robust scent on the masculine side, this is a go-to stand by.
A talented crafter whose soapy empire seems to expand year after year, Kenna of Modern Soapmaking and the Gratitude Soapery (formally Amathia Soapworks!) is one businesswoman we sincerely admire. Kenna has been soaping for almost a decade, and in that time she has made a name for herself as someone with a meticulous eye for detail. No swirl or sparkle is ever out of place! I often draw inspiration from Kenna and her designs, and earlier this year we were pleased to feature her 100% coconut oil cold process recipe on this blog.
Earlier this month, Kenna announced the retirement of Amathia Soapworks and introduced Modern Soapmaking, which she hails as the soapmaker’s companion. Loaded with tips, tutorials and ebooks, it’s a soapmakers best friend. Not only that, she also announced her newest business outfit, Gratitude Soapery. A portion of the soapy sales go to a featured charity, as well as to programs that benefit Kenna’s local community in Kansas City, Mo. Read on to learn more about what inspires one of our industry’s most cutting-edge soapers:
Soap Queen: How long have you been soaping for and how did you get started?
I have been soaping for almost ten years now. I began soaping in 2004, with my introduction to soap making guided by a lovely local soap maker named Judy, the woman behind Sunrise Soaps. At the time, they had a shop on Main St. in Gardner, Kansas. I wandered in there one day and we hit it off.
And then there was Kathy Miller’s website. At the time, Kathy’s website was one of the very few online resources for soap making. My first batch was peppermint soap with a red clay swirl. I used common grocery store oils, from a recipe on Kathy’s website. It was poured in a $2 kitty litter pan I bought at Wal-Mart and lined with a trash bag. That batch made something ridiculous like 30-40 bars of soap, but turned out great and sparked my love affair for the craft.
Now that it’s winter time, there’s nothing better than cozying up in your favorite chair with a good book, a hot cup of tea and a richly scented candle with a softly flickering flame (and for me, that only happen during the kiddo’s nap time and I love that quiet time!). Bramble Berry offers a number of excellent waxes so you can make your own candles, and lately our favorite has been the EcoSoya Advanced Wax. It’s 100% vegetable based and sourced from soy beans grown exclusively by domestic farmers. Best of all, it has multiple uses: this wax is lip and skin safe, making it an potential replacement for beeswax in lip balm recipes.
And just like that, another week has flown by! This week we shared a simple and quick tutorial on how to make your own Cucumber Melon Deodorant using our sample of the month, Cucumber Melon Cybilla Fragrance Oil. In addition to this fresh deodorant, we also made a Fall Sherbet Cold Process soap made with pretty pastel hues.
We also explored different preservative options with a guest post by Susan Barclay-Nichols — the woman behind the fantastic Point of Interest cosmetic chemistry blog — who shared great information regarding preservatives as well as a body butter recipe in our Perfectly Preserved + Body Butter Recipe post (want more cosmetic chemistry goodies? We carry a few of Susan’s books, including Back to Basics, Lotion Making 101 and Formulating Lotions & Creams). And even though we are only halfway through December, we shared some Valentine’s Day inspiration with our Valentine’s Day Roundup. Never too early to plan your gift giving! =)
Speaking of holiday inspiration, we have loved seeing all the festive holiday soaps on our Facebook page! This week’s Facebook photo is full of holiday cheer and sparkle.
This soap ended up being a happy accident. We were originally going for a marbled scarf look (very similar to this pattern) but ended up with something quite different though equally as beautiful. We combined several dispersed micas to achieve soft pastel colors, and fragranced this soap with a blend featuring our brand new Palmerosa Essential Oil, giving it a gentle floral scent. The pouring pattern leads to an exquisite and interesting inside pattern during the cutting process. Here’s to happy accidents!
