Kicking dirt's ass one soap at a time...

5 reasons I love making soap...

2009-02-18T13:25:00.004-05:00

1. You can control the ingredients/recipe and make it perfect for your skin type!
2. You can really play with the artistic aspects of it... long live oxides and micas!
3. It makes the PERFECT gift for loved ones... or people you don't even know well.
4. The fragrance - smelling your fav scent in soap makes bath-time soooo enjoyable.
5. It really makes the bathroom look nice for when guests come over.

Our new soap on Etsy - Bora Bora! :

Had the BEST day in NYC!

2009-02-16T22:36:00.002-05:00

First of all... I listed a "Buy 3, get the 4th half off" deal on Etsy!!

Check it out!

And... how was the day? It was great!

I went to NYC with my mom and my husband Jon, and we went to the Met Museum for 4 hours... yesterday we went for 2 hours.

See, we're doing this scavenger hunt on Wikipedia Loves Art - they give you a list of 50 things (5 categories, 10 subcategories) and you have to find pieces that match with them... you can do as many as you want under each subcategory, but you HAVE to take 2 pictures of it:

1. Clear shot of it
2. Shot with a index card with identifying info on it, next to the piece

We did Greek and Roman, 1/2 of Medieval, and all of African/Oceania. Next weekend we're coming back and doing the rest of Medieval, all of Arms & Armour, Etruscan (finishing up G&R), and "valentines" themes. :)

It was soooooo much fun. And do you know what the prize is if you win the Met hunt? You get to walk around the Walker Evans exhibit with a curator from the Met - OMG can you imagine? I would DIE to be a curator there one day (my dream job), and I'd actually get to MEET a curator from there. I want to win, I want to win, I want to win!

So we have 100 pieces so far (200 photos), and we're aiming for 200 pieces total. We have to compete with groups up to 10 people, so I want to make our time at the Met really count!

I'm not usually competetive at all... but I want to WIN this! :D Wish me luck!

Happy Valentine's Day!

2009-02-14T12:48:00.003-05:00

Hubby gave me a dozen roses today, and is taking me to Makeda (Ethiopian food in New Brunswick, NJ) tonight! YUMYUM!

I just listed 2 new soaps on Etsy:

SCROLL (redesigned)... smells like birch and different woods.

MAMBO (new soap - using a fragrance Jon made at work!)... smells like papaya and mango!

Check them out here!

Have a fantastic Valentine's Day, everyone! I'll be soaping plumeria (another one of Jon's fragrances)! :)

Well, hello, Georgia!

2009-02-13T12:56:00.003-05:00

Last night, I listed a restock batch of Georgia O'Keefe soaps - they can be found here.

Here are some photos of it:

It smells so pretty... it's a blend of passionfruit (yum!) and mimosa (pretty!). lol...

When all of the soaps have cured, we're going to be offering sampler packs with 1/4 oz bars - 6 for $2. Good idea?

I . AM . BACK !

2009-02-12T16:36:00.002-05:00

I have been the BIGGEST slacker with this blog. I mean 6 months??

But with the discovery (well, my discovery) of Twitter recently, and the Facebook group for our soaps, I am BACK with a vengeance! lol

So follow me as I blog about:
1. Soaps - of course! Lots of pics and updates!
2. My internship and all of its ups and downs
3. News that I get from my Twitter sources
4. Etsy sellers that I love

Are we back on board?? Yesssssss! lol :)

My PurrWorshiper shop is back up on Etsy!

2008-08-27T17:41:00.004-04:00

Here it is!

I've included new graphics, printed on 4" x 6" glossy paper. I'm really excited about it :)

Some of my fav:

Basically, I take a photograph (usually it's of myself, another person, or a cat, but sometimes sculpture too) and manipulate it digitally to turn it into a pop art/graphic novel kind of thing.

Please let me know what you think! :)

2008-08-22T22:48:00.003-04:00

Left: Virgo ... Right: Zen

Left: Vesuvius ... Right: Film Noir

Left: Aurora (redesigned) ... Right: Deluge

Not named yet... smells like maple sugar and violets

Yule (our Christmas soap)

We've been soaping up a storm... all I dream about is SOAP!

Romulus (our cat) is right now trying to drink Jon's beer... he LOVES beer. Can't get enough of licking the rim of the bottle. Lush.

What else, what else? I saw some sugar-free marshmallows on Etsy here and they look mighty good. I hope they toast well... I guess I'll have to order them to find out! (Stay tuned!)

Soaps for a holiday craft fair

2008-08-16T16:44:00.006-04:00

We're taking a momentary break from Etsy, but we'll be back up VERY soon. I want to get some stuff up this weekend actually.

Also, we're doing a craft fair in September... if you're in the Millburn, NJ area on September 28, 2008, please stop by and see us! Here are some new soaps for the fair:

Soho:

Argyle:

Vesuvius:

Film Noir (redesigned):

Deluge:

Zen:

Blasphemy:

Frenzy:

Cut pictures on some of them will be coming as soon as they're hard enough to cut!

- Mary

Scrub-a-dub-dub

2008-05-15T16:00:00.002-04:00

We made a foaming sugar scrub last night, scented passionfruit mimosa (the same scent as our Georgia O'Keefe soap) and I kinda sorta wanted to eat it. But I didn't. But I wanted to. It's been a while since we've made scrubs... I used to make them constantly. I was a total scrub ho, and even sent scrubs to three swaps I was in (a different recipe each time). Why do I love using scrubs so much?

1. they make my skin ohhhhh sooooo soft
2. they get rid of dry, flaky skin
3. they're luxurious... I feel like I'm truly pampering myself when I use one.

So we went back to a tried-and-true recipe that we'd used before, and I forgot how much I liked it... making it and using it. Maybe I'll do some R&D on this recipe and offer scrubs in my shop in the future. Jon also wants to play around with perfume at home (at work, he has particular fragrance projects he has to do, but he really wants to just play), but the raw materials are kind of expensive. But we can play around with single note FOs and EOs and make some fragrances of our own!

That's about it for today... to recap: Mary shouldn't be allowed near yummy-smelling scrubs when she's hungry because they make her want sweets. Bad scrub, bad.

You know what?.....

2008-05-12T16:06:00.003-04:00

I think I AM going to graduate school after all.

Yesterday Jon and I took my mom to NYC and we went to the Met to look at some modern art. I took my modern art class in summer 2005 and I was sure that I'd forgotten everything, but a lot of it came back to me! I was worried my memory would suck, but I surprised myself. And I had a blast analyzing the art... it made me really miss undergrad school, where I got to learn about it every day. Museum-going is so much more fun when you've already learned about a particular artist, piece, or period... it's like you have a backstage pass into the artist's mindset or the historical period.

I don't know WHEN I'm going back to school... but I've made up my mind that I WILL go back. I really miss school... I know I'm a huge art history nerd, but I loved it. :) I have no idea what period I'd do though... I really enjoy art in situ (where it was originally located) and cool architecture so I'm leaning towards the British Isles circa the Middle Ages or the Renaissance. But we shall see!

A new soapie (made a few days ago, but I forgot to post it):

It smells like mango and cream... very yummy! Tonight I think we're going to make some salt bars... it's been a while so I hope it goes well!

My resolution is to update this blog as often as possible, so check back soon! :)

Mary

Shimmy shimmy soap

2008-05-03T22:05:00.004-04:00

Some recent soaps!

I think we're naming this one "Glitz" or "Glitter" or something along those lines. It smells like watermelon, strawberry, and cool fresh aloe. Very very yummy. I haven't listed any herringbone soaps yet, so I went with that design for this soap. The bottom is purple.

This one smells like lime, pear, and apple (maybe blackberry too) in a slushie. I'm really digging this scent in a major way. I decided to go retro in the design, because it's a bright, poppy scent. The bottom is pale pink.

Lavender... because we don't have a lavender soap yet! This is the most floral lavender fragrance I've ever smelled... usually I don't care much for lavender EO or FO because they're kind of camphorous, but I really love this one. I tried to make the design look like lavender stalks... not sure if I was successful or not. :/ The lavender and the white are too close in shade, I like a stronger contrast usually. We'll see how it looks cut. The bottom is light blue.

Soaps on the curing rack

2008-04-14T12:59:00.003-04:00

Soaps on the curing rack:

Bora Bora - I still don't have a cut picture of it, only this wet pic. The bottom is a bright magenta/violet and the scent is a complex tropical fruit/sweet floral (smells somewhat like Victoria's Secret Love Spell).

Mendhi - bottom is deep blue and the scent is Nag Champa (earthy, sweet resin, spicy incense, and sandalwood). I was going for a henna-inspired look on the top. I need to get cut pics of this one too... I'm good at getting wet pics, but I drop the ball when it comes to getting cut pics (until it's time for Etsy photos).

We went to MOMA this weekend! Very very inspirational! Esp. when it came to colour. I hope that we can kind of incorporate some of that into our soaps. :)

Curing soaperoonies

2008-04-09T17:48:00.008-04:00

Over the past few weeks, we went on a soaping frenzy to end all soaping frenzies. Okay, maybe not to end ALL soaping frenzies. I hope to beat this soaping frenzy with another one down the road. :P So these are the soaps that will be showing up in our Etsy shop over the next couple of weeks, starting this weekend.

(Sorry for the so-so photos, there will be better ones when they're up on Etsy!)

#1: Using a pinwheel design... "Flutter". Smells like a spring bouquet of flowers - very fresh and lady-like, but not old ladyish/perfumey at all! Jon likes the smell of this one and he's not usually the biggest floral fan in the house.

#2: "Stiletto"... so named for its amber spice scent. ME-OW!!! I had a lot of fun with this scent... it's right up my alley! ;)

#3: Not named yet, but inspired by Monet's Waterlilies... these will be guest soaps and sold in sets of 4. Smells like a fresh waterfall blended with a watery floral... this could be a winning floral for guys as well as gals!

#4: "Sonnet"... a blend of rose, amber, peony, and mandarin. Very very pretty scent. This is a redesign of a soap we did before with the same scent that sold out (it's basically the same pattern, but with a layer this time).

#5: Not named yet... smells like a foamy freshwater cascade... it reminds me of Buttermilk Falls, NJ (a trail we used to hike at with a GORGEOUS waterfall that you could climb right up against). I kept that falling water image in mind when I did the swirl.

#6: Not named yet... smells like cucumber and melon, blended with honeysuckle, cotton, and flowers and fresh air. Very complex scent - not a standard cucumber melon at all. But we went with the cucumber melon colours (peachy orange and mint green) for the swirl.

Maybe this weekend we'll go to the Met Museum or MOMA (and bring a camera) and pick up some inspiration for some more soaps. And of course... blog about it! :) I really need to get better about blogging!

- Mary

A path of blossoms... and Satsuma Orange

2008-02-02T03:01:00.001-05:00

(Why do the pictures in Blogger look so dull when I post them? The pictures are vibrant until I upload them... I may start just giving links to my Photobucket instead - click on the links for better photos).

This is the reincarnated soap of one that died (Jon dropped the lid in it after I was all done - he was VERY upset and convinced me to try again immediately so I wouldn't have time to be afraid to do it). So this is the reincarnated one. It's supposed to look like leaves and cherry blossom-type blossoms. Today it looks about the same, but there are some raised-up lines in a couple of areas. The bottom layer is pink - approx. the same colour as the pink blossoms, maybe a little darker. You can see the "dead" soap in the background. I have to admit that after it was ruined, I said "screw it" and squirted the remainder of the swirl soap on top of it, to use it up. So that's why it's an explosion of white and pink

Full wet pic

This one we did tonight ... after a very long, bad day, I was happy to do a simple swirl. It is scented with SW Satsuma Guava and SW California Orange. It smells DELICIOUS and (like I expected) the fragrances reversed trace so I'm glad it wasn't a layer. It's a 20% SF recipe with coconut, mango, shea, and jojoba - just for fun. And Jon came up with the design for this one (I swirled it, but the design was totally his)... I really love the creative ideas he comes up with! :) Next time I might do the black a little thicker so that it isn't as wispy... one part was thicker and I really liked how that bit came out. I hope this one does well overnight - I'm not insulating it because I would be highly surprised if it tries to gel... I may have to bite my tongue though, you never know! I saw a few VERY tiny air bubbles on the top, but I actually didn't freak (big step for me, lol)... we did our best to shimmy them out, and I'll worry about them later.

Full wet pic
Detail

Couple new soaps

2008-01-29T23:47:00.002-05:00

Back to basics tonight (after a string of failed batches): a tuxedo swirl. I haven't done one in ages so I was pretty nervous about how my line and swirl would come out. It's scented with a fruity upscale scent with definite apple in there - I'm naming it Soho... the bottom is white with gold mica, the top is turquoise and magenta with a black/gold stripe. I'm happy with how it turned out... the turquoise could have been darker (less aqua), but that's okay - it actually looks a bit darker IRL than in the photos. I'm having the worst time getting colours right when I take photos... I guess I'll start tinkering in Photoshop to try to match the real colours.

Let's see how it looks in the morning... crossing my fingers!
I hope you can see the gold in the bottom and the stripe tomorrow when it's dry.

(the pics look kind of odd in this format - please click to see them larger/clearer)

And also a soap inspired by Pollock (with very different colours). It's scented with Bay Rum. I'm pretty happy with this one too... the blue is a bit duller IRL (strange mix of TD + blue UM so I'm not sure I could duplicate that colour). I ensured gel it so... no partial gel! YAY! lol

Mondrian gone wrong.

2008-01-23T20:24:00.001-05:00

What is up with soaps not working out lately? ARGHH.

So I looked at the Mondrian soap when it was done and I thought that it was just ash... wrong. It partial gelled... big-time. The FO was running really hot so I put it in the garage so that it wouldn't gel when I should have just left it inside and gone with the gel. The other problem was that the lines weren't quite right, the colours weren't in every bar, the bars were WAY too big (8 oz each - but I can trim them from the bottom, so no biggie), and I didn't do the best job shaving off the top (I really need a good planer). Oh and I don't like the scent combination!

I'm not happy at all with it. I'm just disappointed because I was so pleased with it when it was wet. I know I need to just chill and say, "Lessons learned" and go on, but it's really irking me. Why do I obsess so badly over these things? Oh well... at least I know that with a few modifications, it IS possible to translate the Mondrian aesthetic to soap. When I get up the nerve to do so, I'm going to try it again with these things in mind.

Anyway... here it is in all its partial gel-ness... it looks a bit better in person, but not much, lol.

Tonight's failure/lesson learned

2008-01-22T01:23:00.001-05:00

Okay I can't call it an absolute failure. But what was in my head didn't come out properly. And that irks me to no end. Today's lessons:

1. If you have a hot FO (such as Green Irish Tweed), do not try to (A) swirl into it or (B) put very thin stripes in it... as those stripes will heat/thicken up and make you cry when it's time to swirl them.

2. If you drip a bit of soap outside your swirling area, do not attempt to make the rest of the batch match... cut out that piece and discard later. You know it's wrong to make more drips... so why are you doing it? STOP doing it... for the love of all things good - just STOP! Leave it alooone!

I'm going to try this one again as soon as I get some more Green Irish Tweed. And modify the design slightly (but still do spirals). I think it'll work... I hope it'll work.

Looks okay from a distance (I was going for a fade so I used 5 colours... 9 stripes in all... so no wonder everything set up - I was taking FOREVER!). The bottom is yellow/gold mica and is a lot more sparkly in the light.

But close-up, you can see where it got crappy... I maybe have 2 good spirals in the whole thing:

I'm kind of wincing at the fact that I'm posting these for the world to see, but I promised myself that I'd post the good, the mean, and the just plain fugly so that I can use this blog to remember what I've learned along the way. *sigh*

Recent soaps

2008-01-21T23:16:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the crappy photos... they looked better on my computer and when I uploaded them, everything went crazy.

Film Noir:

Mondrian:

Some older soaps within the following album:
My Photobucket Soap Album