Limited Edition Holiday Soap!

I have to confess up front, I originally had four limited edition soaps planned for the holidays, but it's been quite busy and I only got two done in time. That's ok, because I'll save the other two flavors for a treat sometime next year.

What I do have is two new holiday soaps to offer:
1) 'Magi', REAL frankincense and myrrh with a bit of "gold on top, and,
2) 'Darling Clementine', sweet clementine orange and clove, the orange color comes from organic carrot juice.

As a special treat, these two soaps have had their shea butter content boosted to approximately 20%! This is an awesome soap for cold weather. Pared with our whipped shea butter, you're sure to beat old man winter and keep your skin nicely conditioned.

Our last sale of the year is approaching...it starts the day after Thanksgiving (aka "Black Friday") and runs through "Cyber Monday". The dates are November 27th through November 30th. Don't miss out on a 10% discount AND free shipping for any order over $25.00. As a internet shopper myself, I adore sales that offer free shipping. So it's my treat to you.

Happy Holidays!!

First Annual Holiday Open House!

We held our open house this past Saturday, it was a total and complete success!! Thank you to Frontier Angel loyal customers, friends, and family, for your continued patronage. We are already talking about doing another show in the spring so stay tuned.

Busy in the Workshop!

It's that time of year, the last of my restocking before the holiday rush. I'm almost ready to reveal my newest holiday soap, but not quite yet (I'm still working on packaging).

In the meantime, feast your eyes on the newest batch of 'Queen Bee'. This soap is fairly new, I launched it this past summer. It's an essential oil blend of ylang-ylang, spearmint, orange and lavender, and a bit of local honey (that's the "bee" part).

I can't wait to cut into this one!

Demos done!

We're back from the Fall Home & Garden show out at the fairgrounds. Great crowd and lots of people interested in how soap is made, standing room only! Here I am in the middle of my demo. The theme of this demo was "How to make soap with grocery store ingredients". Since the theme of the Back to Basics portion of the show was sustainable living and self sufficiency, I thought a simple soap formula was in order.

For this demo, the soap I made was vegetable shortening, olive oil and coconut oil with oatmeal and honey. I chose those oils specifically; olive oil is great for your skin, coconut I prefer to boost the lather and the vegetable shortening was chosen as a base filler, helps with the firmness of the soap. Oatmeal is soothing and honey is a humectant, so those are good choices for additives.

The only thing is, lye still needs to be mail ordered. I remember a time when it could be bought at the grocery store. It stopped being available that way a few years back, unfortunately. Anyway, the demos were fun and I love meeting everyone and answering questions. It always thrills me a bit to dispel the bad rap that real soap has gotten in the past and put to rest some untruths.

Next up is our First Annual Open House! If you live in Nevada County and wish to attend, there is a registration form available on the front page of my website. I will have my full line of soap and gift boxes for sale. And, as a special treat, I have invited a few crafting friends who do real quality work. Hope you can come!

Back 2 Basics: Soap Making Demo

Here's a chance for local folks to watch me making soap and to learn how to make it themselves! This is all part of the "Back 2 Basics" part of the Nevada County Home and Garden show. Follow this link to 'The Union' website for more information.

We will be there Saturday and Sunday, doing demos both days and also selling at our booth. New holiday soap will be available, so come by and see whats new.

More details to come!

Staying healthy...

With all the recent news about the new flu strain making it's way north, it's time be sure that we're doing all we can to keep ourselves and our families healthy.

One very simple thing to help ward of disease is to be sure that hands are washed with plain soap and water several times a day. In our house, any time we come home from shopping or playing at the park, the first order of business is to wash hands thoroughly using soap and warm water.

Some essential oils help to prevent the spread of flu type viruses. These oils can be added to a liquid natural soap or diffused in the air. We do NOT advocate using essential oils internally or applying them directly to the skin undiluted.

Tea Tree
Scientific Name: Melaleuca alternifolia
Associated Chemical Properties: Antibiotic, antiseptic, anti-infectious, anti-inflammatory, anti fungal, decongestant, expectorant, immune stimulant.

Eucalyptus
Scientific Name: Lavandula latifolia
Associated Chemical Properties: Antiseptic, antimicrobial, bactericidal, decongestant.

While we don't carry a tea tree soap (yet!), we do use eucalyptus in 'Garden Mint' and 'Yuba Wild'.

Wishing you continued health!

Soap with a smile

I love making soap...it's a satisfying creative process for me. From an idea scratched out in my note book to the final product, every phase of the process is enjoyable for me.

Every now and then, I'll get a unique image that naturally appears in my soap. This time, to my amusement, I got soap that is smiling back at me! This bar of soap made it's way to one of my local wholesale accounts...I wonder who ended up with this bar and did they notice the smile? I hope it brightened someones day as it did mine when I discovered it.