Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone has a great Christmas season filled with lots of family and friends.

Check out my salt bar tutorial

Wholesale Supplies Plus recently blogged about Ladybug Soapworks. I provided a salt bar tutorial for them to use on their website. Check it out here. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

Yummy Apple Pie

I have some apple pie scented soap in my oven! I like to put all my soap into the oven at 170F for 2 hours and then leave it in the oven overnight. It helps force my soap into gel stage and speeds up the curing process. I have been meaning to soap this scent for few weeks since I sold out of my stock, but procrastination got the best of me. Good thing this scent sells year round for me.

Cream Soap Update!

A couple weeks ago I made some Killian's Red Irish Stout and carrot cream soap. I finally have uploaded the pictures from the day I made it. It is now smooth and creamy, but still a bit too hard. I will be adding some more extracts tomorrow to loosen it up a bit. I think I will scent it with a mixture of dragon's blood, oakmoss, and sandalwood. I have been having a hard time coming up with a scent to use, so if you have any suggestions I would love to hear them. :)

This picture was taken just after adding sodium lactate, panthenol, and silk amino acids.


This next picture is at the end of the cook. Over the next day the soap will turn a creamy golden orange-brown.


Here is what the soap looks like now. It needs a bit more liquid and fragrance still, but I am very happy with how it looks.

Whipped Shea Butter

I have been working on some new products today. Since I have about 100 lb of shea butter in my soaping room and a new hand mixer, I figured why not try making some whipped shea butter. I added some apricot kernel oil to loosen up the shea along with some vitamin e. It feels great. It is so creamy that it almost feels like one is rubbing frosting on their body. I left some unscented and scented the rest of the batch with a combination of sandalwood and rose. It smells really nice and the scent has depth to it.

Soaping with the family

I just showed my dad how to make soap. He was such a good helper, maybe we will have another soaper in the family soon. We made a yummie smelling coffee scrub soap. They are great to use in the kitchen to remove scents after cutting onion and garlic. To make the soap a bit luxurious, we added some coffee butter and shea butter. Can't wait to try it out! It looked like melted cookies and cream ice cream...yum.

Killian's Carrot Cream Soap

--> I am making some Killian's Carrot Cream Soap today following the class on Yahoo's cream soap group. I am currently simmering some Killian's Red Ale to get rid of the alcohol. It smells pretty awful. I will post some pictures of my soap later today. If you don't know what cream soap is check out some of my previous posts where I made it here, here, here, and here.

Won't you be my neighbour?

This beautiful Tudor style home down the road was just listed for sale. How I wish one of my friends (hint hint) would buy it so that I could hang out in it.

2 Sketches 4 You

I love making cards, but coming up with ideas can be really difficult sometimes. I have been reading a blog called 2 Sketches 4 You for a while and thought I would share it with everyone. They put up weekly sketches for you to turn into cards. The submissions they receive are just amazing and what is even better is that they pick a winner each week and give them more scrapbooking/cardmaking materials. So go browse your heart out and get some inspirations for your own creations!

The Silver Circle Studio

Ladybug Soapworks can now be purchased at the Silver Circle Studio at 75 Main St in Putnam, CT. I just dropped off my display yesterday. It is a really lovely shop filled with all things handmade and it looked like they specialize in paintings and jewelry. They were preparing to teach a class when I got there. Check out there website here and be sure to stop by and pick up some soap. They are currently carrying 10 varieties of Ladybug Soapworks soap.

More Ladybug Soapworks Spotting

From Nature with Love is a great local supplier for me. They carry many hard to find items. They also have a great blog where they regularly describe uses for their ingredients. You should take some time to check it out. They also post lots of great recipes that I love to try out from time to time. Recently, they posted a bunch of soap pictures and included my Chai Tea soap. Check out the blog here.

Treasury!

My Chocolate espresso shea butter soap has been featured in an Etsy treasury. Check it out here and place a comment so that I have a chance of being featured on the etsy home page.

Shealoe Prebuy?

I am looking to see how much interest there is in a Shealoe prebuy. I get this stuff directly from the manufacturer and it is sold in 35lb increments. I think it will be around $6 per pound plus shipping to you. I use the Shealoe to make wonderful sugar scrubs. I love the way it leaves my skin feeling so moisturized. The ingredients are Butyrospermum parkii (shea butter), aloe barbadensis Leaf Juice, polysorbate 60, sorbitan stearate, Imidazolidinyl urea, methylparaben, propylparaben, potassium sorbate, BHT, sorbic acid. This is the same Shealoe sold at all the other suppliers only much cheaper. Let me know if this is something you would be interested in. If I can get enough people interested I will get an exact price. To give you an idea of the shipping costs, the last time I did this I was able to fit 10lb in a small flat rate priority box.
Cheers~
Sarah

Whipping up some soapy goodness!

I am trying to replenish all of my stock. First up is my redesigned Chamomile Shea soap. I have started to make my soap in larger batches and will be changing over all my soap to this new shape. This soap is made with some Chamomile infused oils and a Chamomile tea as my water. You can purchase this lovely soap at my etsy store or my main online store. This next soap is my super gentle Calendula Castile. Again this is made from both Calendula infused olive oil and a Calendula tea as the water portion. This is a very gentle unscented soap. You can purchase this lovely soap at my etsy store or my main online store.
More soapy pictures to come soon!

New Etsy Purchases!

I have been dying to get some new jewelry from Etsy. There are so many talented artists it was hard to choose what I wanted. My cheap Target bangles have started to discolor so I went on the hunt for some new bangles. Check out these beauties that I just picked up from Painted Metal. I can't wait to wear them!An added plus is that all I had to do is tell the seller how I found her store and I got these beautiful earrings for free.I also picked up a very unique necklace from Meetalls. It is copper with beautiful patina. I think I am in jewelry heaven! I love Etsy!

We have a winner!

Thanks to everyone who commented on the previous post. You were all entered to win a bag of my new laundry soap. I used random.org to randomly select a number corresponding to the order in which you commented. The lucky winner of the laundry soap is #3, Melody. Congratulations! Please send me an email at contact@ladybugsoapworks.net with your mailing address and I will ship it right out to you.
Cheers~
Sarah

Prize patrol!

Since I ignored my blog for so long, I thought I would try to make up for it with a give-away! I will be giving away a 16oz bag of my new laundry soap. Just visit my website or etsy store and comment here letting me know which item you would most like to try. This will help me to know what types interest the most people and you could win some laundry soap! A winner will randomly be selected on Friday the 17th.
Cheers~
Sarah

Finally time to relax!

Well it has been a hectic last couple months. We bought a house which was so stressful...I am so glad that the whole process is done. Then we needed to dig a koi pond for our Koi, Biggie, who outgrew his 20 gallon tank a LONG time ago. He is probably between 10-12 inches, way too big for a 20 gallon aquarium. So now he is happy in his pond and he has 4 new koi companions who are much smaller than him so they follow him around like he is the boss. I am sure he must love it! Here is a picture of the pond. I will put up a better one soon.
We have been doing a lot of yard work and I painted the kitchen and hallway. We just got some cool antique furniture for our formal living room so now we just need to furnish the sun porch.

This weekend was really fun we had a 2 day open house for family and friends to come over see the house and hang out. It was really nice to see so many people that I don't get to see that often. A lot of my family travel almost 2 hours or more to get here so I really appreciated them taking the time to come over.

On the soaping front, I have a basic set up for my soaping room, but I still want to paint the floor and walls (some areas still need walls though). I have only made a couple batches of soap since I have been in the new house, but I will have to ramp that up this weekend. My inventory is getting low. I have made a bunch of laundry soap and started selling it the CT Farm Fresh Express. They are a wonderful local food delivery service in Connecticut. I will be listing it soon on my website and etsy. I am selling 16oz and 32oz bags which is enough for 25-50 and 50-100 batches, respectively, depending on the type of washing machine you have.

I have missed you all. I will attempt to update the blog more frequently now that things at home have settled down a bit.
Cheers~
Sarah

Updated Garage Sale-Items still available 7/10/09

I am trying to purge a bunch of soaping supplies. If you see anything you would like please contact me —contact@ladybugsoapworks.net. Every effort will be made to ship the package out within 24 hours after payment is received. All orders that come in during this time will be handled in the order they were received and product will be filled accordingly. All of the items are priced as listed or best offer.
Shipping is from 06451 and I require Paypal.

Fragrance/Essential Oils
Simple Soothings: Youth Dew Amber Nude Type 8oz glass $10
Tennesse Candle Supplies: Cinnamon Cider ~16oz plastic $10 Candle Safe ONLY

Herbs
Lemon Peel powder 8oz $0.70/oz
Mint Leaf cut 6oz $0.70/oz
Raspberry Leaf 8oz $0.30/oz
Yellow Sandalwood Powder 5oz $0.70/oz
Spirulina Powder 0.8oz $3.00
Turmeric Powder 8oz $0.30/oz

Carrier Oils
Wheatgerm oil 32oz $25
Flax Seed Oil 29oz $13
Hazelnut Oil 24oz $10

Other
Smelly Jelly Crystals 1.3lb $4.50
11” unscented incense sticks 6 bundles of 100 sticks $1.50/bundle
DryFlo (2) 1lb bags available $6.50/lb

Thanks for looking!
Sarah Auclair

We got the house!

The sellers accepted our bid, so now we wait for the home inspection. Considering it was built in 1924, I am expecting him to find some problems. Hopefully, they will not be anything major. I can't wait for the home inspection. It will give us an opportunity to see the house again. I plan to take a ton of pictures and measure the rooms so we can start planing what we will need to buy. Everything has happened so fast. I can't believe that we only started looking at houses on Thursday and are already in contract on a house! So excited, yet so nervous. Ah...let's hope I can stop thinking about the house and get some sleep tonight.

Long time, no blog :(

Well and for good reason. I have been very busy finishing up my research, working on papers for publication, applying for jobs, working on my thesis, and searching for a house. Wowzers...way too much on my mind! Well Dylan and I found an awesome house today and just pit in an offer. We are so excited! We will know tomorrow if they accept or counter offer. We heard there may be another offer going in today so hopefully our offer is good enough. This house is really a gem. It is a beautiful 1920's brick Tudor style home with nice landscaping and a gorgeous slate roof. The owers have really taken such great care of this house and have upgrated the kitchen and bathrooms. I am still a bit shocked that this house was in our price range. Anyways, I have attached some pictures. Wish us luck! Hopefully, they will accept our offer, then I can start thinking about where to set up my soap lab!

Organic Oils---not worth the cost!

After looking at oil prices, it seems that organic is not in my foreseeable future. They are SO expensive. Many are over $200 for a 35lb pail...I think I will stick with conventional oil at this point which is about $50 for 35lb. Maybe when I start making lotions and other leave on products I will use organic oils in them, but for wash off products it is probably not worth it. Thanks for all you helpful comments. :)

Artfire

How many of you have checked out Artfire? I have created a LadybugSoapworks shop there. I have not uploaded any items yet, but it looks like it may be a better place to list than Etsy. I am going to be working on my shop this weekend. Click here to sign up. Right now they have about 2500 stores left that can be opened at a rate of $7 per month. No listing fees or commision fees. Pretty good deal for those who have lots of sales. After the remaining 2500 or so people sign up, the price goes to $20/month. They also have free accounts. Go check it out and if you decide to sign up, click here to give me credit for recommending you or type in LadybugSoapworks when you sign up.

Organic Oils?

I have been thinking about changing all my oils over to organic oils as I run of of my current stock. How many of you currently use organic oils in your soap and other bath/body products? What is the general preference...do you care if your soap is made from organic oils or not? This would require me to raise my prices by probably 50 cents to $1, though I will have to price everything out to make a final decision on that. I would love to hear your opinion on the use of organic oils.

Finally, since it has been sooo long since I last posted pictures I will tease you with some new items that will be listed in my store soon. The first is some Pumpkin Pie Cream Soap. This is the real stuff...real soap not the foaming bath stuff.

This is Lavender Shea soap made with lavender essential oil. I brushed the top with mica so that is has a nice sparkle.

This red hot soap is cinnamon scented.
Lavender bath oil. Made with turkey red castor oil so that your tub does not get slippery. Turkey red castor is a water soluble oil.
Patchouli roll-on perfume.

Price Drop!

I have gone through my ETSY store and decreased prices on many of my soaps. Head over there and check out the great deals!

I will soon be releasing shealoe scrubs and whipped shealoe butter, so keep your eye out at ladybugsoapworks.etsy.com and ladybugsoapworks.net for the new products! I will post some picture very soon...I promise. I know the blog has been lacking lately on pretty picture. Must find a way to get my awesome boyfriend to take some pictures for me! I have had some cinnamon and eucalyptus mint soap waiting for pictures for over 1.5 months!

Exploding Frog Soaps!

I came across these soaps on ETSY at Howards Home and just had to post about them. They are little green glycerin soap froggies that are basically filled with bath bomb materials. The bomb ingredients are dyed red to look like guts! Haha...how fun would these be for little kid bath time. I think I am going to order a couple for myself. Check them out here.

Testing out Windows Live Writer

I finally got around to replacing my OLD laptop.  This new computer is running vista, so I am trying to figure out all the new things it can do.  I just spotted the Windows live writer for blogs and thought I would test it out.  Any one else use this program to update their logs.  Do you like it?   Okay lets see if this posts!

Free Shipping!

I am trying to get more people to shop at my main website as opposed to my Etsy site. So, for a limited time when you purchase $20.00 worth of product at LadybugSoapworks.net, you will get free shipping! Enter the code "FREESHIP01" in the coupon code box during checkout.

Offer only applies within the continental United States. Offer ends January 31, 2009.