Give Peace a Chance

Peace Handmade Soap is loaded with essential oils of Lavender, Orange and Patchouli and is oh, so pretty!   Best of all,  it’s on sale at Catiebeth.com now through Thanksgiving!  Have some peace this Christmas by shopping early.

I love to SWIRL!

My friend, Rose, gave me some Bergamot infused Olive Oil that she made herself with Bergamot grown in her garden.  How awesome!  I combined it with Lavender EO, Basil EO and Peppermint EO and am calling it “Minty Meadow”.  It smells so lovely!  I used equal parts Bergamot infused Olive Oil, Palm Oil and Coconut Oil with 5% Mango Butter.  Here it is in the mold.  Can’t wait for the unmolding!

Essential Oil Blends

As much as I love all the Christmas fragrances, my nose wants to take a break for a while. Today, I decided to pull out my essential oils to see what blends I could come up with. I’m often asked how I determine what fragrances to use in my soaps. A lot of the time, I use a pre-blended fragrance oil, but sometimes, I like to create my own blends using natural, essential oils.

I try to let nature be my guide. If it’s a scent that smells good together in nature, then it will probably smell good together in a soap. If I’m not sure what essential oils pair well together, I Google the essential oil I want to work with and find other essential oils that blend well with it. Then, I take it from there.

Essential oil is more expensive than fragrance oil, so I don’t want to mix them together without first knowing that I’ll like the result. So, I do a “smell test.” I cut a Q-Tip in half and then dip each half in an essential oil I want to use. I then place my Q-Tip halves in a zip-lock bag, label it and seal it. Over the course of a couple of days, I check on the scent. If I like the blend, then I’ll use it. If not, then I haven’t wasted much essential oil.

Right now, I’m smell testing six essential oil blends. After I choose the ones I like comes the fun part: deciding how the soap will look.

Costume Making 101

Today, I sewed my first costume! My son, Jacob, wants to be Harry Potter for Halloween, but when I saw how much Potter costumes were going for (including wand, glasses and tie), I thought I would have to nix the idea. Instead, I did some research online and found a website that showed me, step-by-step, how to sew the robe. I found a Griffindor iron-on patch, Potter glasses, wand and tie all on Amazon. I saved good money by piecing it together myself.

Out of curiousity, I googled “soap costumes” to see what would come up. Check out this adorable bath-time costume! I might have to talk one of the kids into doing this for Halloween next year! ;)

New Arrivals!

Do you remember that spearmint-colored, sparkly, swirly soap I posted a month ago?  It’s now ready and in my online shop!!  Wintergreen is a sweet, sparkly soap that smells of apples, oranges, peppermint and cloves.  It’s a bright, winter scent!  You can find it here.

 

Also new in the shop is Almond Biscotti.  It smells just like a mellowed Almond Extract.  This is a BIG bar of soap…almost 5 ounces!  It’s a pretty soap with brown, beige, pink and purples hues.  You can find it here.

More great soaps AND lotions to come!

Winter Wonderland Soap Contest!

I haven’t worked with Melt and Pour soap in a while, so I jumped at the opportunity to  enter a soap contest.  The contest is to create a “Winter Wonderland” soap and the winner receives a $100 gift certificate from Bramble Berry Soap Supplies (I buy most all of my soap supplies from them!).  I had to create the soap specifically for the contest, so I couldn’t use any of the soaps I’ve already created.  Also, I didn’t want to make a new batch of soaps just to enter one soap.  I wanted this one to be special. 

I asked myself, “What is a winter wonderland?”.  The answer…Alaska!  This time of year, the aurora borealis is on full display. I can remember quiet nights when it lit up the sky with its changing stream of colors.   The snow literally glistened beneath its glow.  I wanted to capture those sensations in my one bar of soap.

I had to tread in completely unknown territory to create this bar.  I knew I would have to work in layers to get the desired effect, so I drew each layer on three pieces of vellum.  Then I set to work creating each layer.  The first layer consisted of the trees and the aurora.  Next came the snow-covered hills.  Then, the dark night sky.  Finally, a hint of glitter on the snow to capture the reflection of the aurora on the snow.

The bar of soap weighs 3.5 oz and is scented with Peppermint eo.  Peppermint is a strong, nose-clearing scent that reminds me of the brisk, freezing cold nights in Fairbanks, Alaska when it was almost too cold to breathe.

You’ll have the chance to vote for my bar of soap to win starting November 16.  I’ll post more information about how to vote when that date gets closer!

On the Rack

I can’t wait until these Christmas soaps are ready for sale! They should be ready by the second week in November. Each scrumptious bar of soap is only $4.00. They’ll make great stocking stuffers, teacher’s gifts, hostess gifts, secret Santa gifts…you get the idea! Also, look for cute Christmas gift sets to hit the website in November. Each gift set will include a bar of soap, a 4 oz jar of lotion and a votive candle for just $15.00.

Cocoa Mint

Sweet Cranberry

Gingerbread