Yay for Labor Day!!!

Gotta love the chance to have an extra day off :) We are off to go camping near Packwood...if you can call hauling a trailer loaded with food, clothes, down comforter, and ALL the things two puppies could ever want for the weekend, camping!? Anyways, it should be fun, we haven't actually used it yet this year! There is a big annual flea market-ish thing that they have in Packwood, complete with food vendors and all those yummy things.
So, no new soap for the near future. Well, that's not the real reason, I had most of yesterday to do as I pleased, so it pleased me to nap and be lazy :) I made a second batch of Salt Bar's, which I will now refer to the devil's soap! I don't have much patience when it comes to most things, and so when my second carefully prepared and slightly tweaked batch crumbled when cut I got somewhat discouraged. My mom said "keep trying honey, you'll get it right", I said (what's the sound of sticking out your tongue?). Maybe I'll give it a few more goes, it didn't really crumble THAT badly, and the slivers that I tested seemed to be pretty cool....

Salt Bar!!!

My first batch!!! The bars are kinda small, and a few of them cracked, but what the hell! It worked!? They set up REALLY fast, less then an hour, and I may have waited a tad too long (hence the crumbling), but I'm SOOOOO excited to try them out... Common sense would say that 75% coconut oil and 18oz of salt would dry your skin out and make you sad, but everything I've been reading about these little beauties says that they are WONDERFUL to use :) And who really listens to common sense anyways? Rich, lotiony lather, and smooth, sexy skin... crossing my fingers.... 4 weeks is a long time to wait for sexy skin.
They kinda look like tapioca pudding, and they smell really fresh and clean, hope I can start adding them to my soap family!
OK, I haven't really been doing much lately, except waiting for the chance to make these salt bars. I have finished my first re-batch of soap, apparently Papaya FO does a little number on CP soap. I'll but some pics up of those when they're cut. I got to add coconut milk to those, so maybe that was just fate stepping in? It was a fun little experiment, but for futures sake, I hope that most of the others come out lovely the first time :)

Left: Kitchen Koffee Bar, made with coffee grounds and coffee to help get rid of cooking related smellies; Right: Bath Time Bar, made with yogurt, almond, honey and oatmeal :); Center: Soymilk, with Chamomile, Lavender and Oatmeal...

Left: Yogurt Bar with French Green Clay; Top: Grapefruit Bar, made with Goats Milk, Grapefruit rind, with Copper Mica swirls; Bottom: Cardamom Spice Bar made with yogurt.

So, there you have it to date. Most of my pretty little soap friends that I've managed to not mess up :) I made a few more batches today, especially love the one with ground peppermint and rose, but I'll put those pics up when they are ready.....

I've been having a lot of fun creating these soaps, even the one's I've completely messed up! Such as the one I tried with a nice Merlot (turned out looking like head cheese), and the one I actually used a recipe I found online for a Banana Soap. EEEWWWW! I was gifted with a river of lye and banana mush when I cut it open. haha Since then, I've been cutting back on the food sources for my soap.

So off I go to attempt my first rebatch... I hope all turns out well, I scented it with Papaya and I REALLY want to use it :)

Here I Go!

I am a blogging newbie... but I've recently been checking out several others due to my recent obsession with CP soaping, and my inevitable oopses.
So, I guess this is what I'm supposed to be doing? Writing about what's going on with my life... well, not a whole lot at this time, just trying to come up with the perfect recipe for soap, going to work, and attending all those end of summer BBQ's :)
I recently went on a month long road trip with my boyfriend. We left from Olympia, Wa and headed East to Niagra Falls (hence the header pic), then down the East Coast to Florida, West thru Texas, then up towards home again. It was an awesome adventure, we traveled close to 9000 miles, and we got to see more then some see in a lifetime in a month. But I am happy to be back at home, in my own environment close to my family and friends...