siberia

They look great! No way those are your first batch! Were they really soft when you unmolded? Sometimes I find that with certain CP recipes patience can be a virtue. I think that some of the more mild/luxurious soaps require extra sitting time in the mold.

Pink Sugar should really be called Brown Sugar. :laugh2:All of the heavy vanilla FO's go brown. I've even seen some that go completely black after 6 months.

Very nice! I wish I could smell them!

Very pretty!!

Thanks for the nice comments! It really is a nice butter/cream. The texture is so light and fluffy, even with the Shea. I would not recommend facial usage for those with oily skin. Only those of us with dry/normal skin or those of us that use AHA's, Retinoids (Vit A's), peels, etc.

I purchased my Coenzyme Q10 from Lotioncrafter. Great price and excellent service.

Have a super weekend everyone!!

I think I broke The Dish today. I posted this recipe there and as soon as I pressed submit, the board went down. :tiptoe: Anyway, here goes...let's hope I don't break this board.

I thought I would share one of my favorite recipes. I like to use this after a facial peel and also use it as a part of my Retinoid treatments. It really helps to calm my skin down after the aforementioned treatments. It's also great in the dry winter months and in the case of overexposure to wind, sun, cold, etc.

Shemu Healing

68% Shea Butter

19% Emu Oil

9% Rosehip Oil

1% Coenzyme Q10

2% Allantoin

1% EO Blend

Directions:

Whip Shea butter with whisk attachment of stand mixer until fluffy. Slowly drizzle oils while whisking. Add Allantoin in a slow and measured manner. Whip until Allantoin is fully incorporated. Lower speed of mixer and add CoQ10 making sure it is fully incorporated. Finally, add EO if desired.

Notes:

Shea Butter: moisturizing, naturally occurring vitamins A, D & E.

Allantoin: stimulates healthy tissue formation; skin protectant and dryness relief. There is an added tactile benefit in that it cuts the greasy feel of the shea butter.

Emu: trans-dermal properties, moisturizing, soothing.

CoQ10: vitamin-like antioxidant free radical scavenger.

Rosehip Oil: essential fatty acids; source of topical trans-retinoic acid (Vit A)

I would take care in choosing what type of fragrance product is used in this formula. I like to use an EO blend consisting of MMS Natural Vanilla Oil (FCO infused with 35-fold vanilla) and lavender at a ratio of 8:1.

I like to run my Allantoin through a sifter (two to three times) to make sure that it is free flowing and will easily incorporate.

Welcome to CT! Now those are cool candles! I can't wait to see more of your work.

Lotioncrafter has two great recipes for massage oil located in the formulary section. I love Abyssinian Oil in my massage oils.

Gorgeous!!!

Lin, that is so beautiful! What talent you have!!

Your candles are fabulous!!!

Our palm wax is straight from Malaysia and has no additives since it doesn't come through any of the US processors. Stearic, and sometimes we add some votive soy, has to be added for release purposes. If you 2nd pour when the candle has cooled too much - it can cause the palm to expand and not release from the mold. We haven't seen this on the votives but certainly on the pillars. The votives tend to be a shrinkage issue which the stearic will help. This is excellent palm and we moved to it after IGI bought Astorlite and we could no longer get Astorlite's palm wax. We are here to help her, and anyone else that experiences issues with any of our products. We have used this wax inside out and know how it works so feel free to come to us for assistance if needed. Once you get this down, these are beautiful and well worth learning. I know some companies had a large stock of the Astorlite palm but the last time we talked to Astorlite - they had only about 33K lbs of the palm we were using and they said it wouldn't be made anymore (and it did fly out of the molds). It's the reason we went and found this palm. Long story - sorry

Thanks

I hope you didn't take my post as a slam towards you, your company or your palm wax. Definitely not my intention.

I've heard of people having the same aforementioned problem with Astorlite palm. I don't nor have I ever used their palm wax.

I was simply commenting on my experience with the particular palm wax that I use. I make palm pillars and votives as well as containers. They have always slipped out of the mold with ease. Sometimes a bit too much because I have unmolded candles thinking they were set when in fact the center of the candle was still in a liquid state. lol

Again, I hope you did not take offense to my post. I was just adding my palm wax experience to the mix.

How weird is that?!?! I've worked with palm wax for several years (not Greenleaf) and have never had a problem with mold release. In fact, as soon as they are cooled, they fly out of the molds. Also, I never use stearic in palm applications. I hope you get it figured out!

Simply perfect!!

Well, this shouldn't be too hard to figure out. Can you list the ingredients of the commercial product you are trying to duplicate?

Great labels!

Gorgeous!! All of the sudden I am now craving fudge.

A couple of options come to mind but it would be helpful to know what you will be using this thickened cyclo for. IOW, I wouldn't want to recommend something that is not safe around the eye area if you are formulating an eye serum.

Hey! *wave* Are you using the liquid or powder form of germall plus?

A great resource for cream soaps is the CreamSoap group on Yahoo groups. You can join the group and then look in the files section. The instructions for the last online class are there under "Pumpkin Cream Soap step by step". Lots of pics too!

Stunning Donita!!! Congrats on the gallery invite!

OMG!! I thought I was losing my mind with the fish smell. I made a batch of lotion the other day and scented half with an EO blend and the other half with a body-safe cucumber melon FO. I used cuc-melon the next day and my goodness the fishy smell would knock you over. lol

Shea oil is one of those products that you really have to shop around on. The price variances are astounding. Snowdrift Farm has it for $8.95 for 16 oz. , $15.00 for 32 oz.

I swear I spend about an hour every three weeks to update my supply pricing. It's worth the effort in that it saves me a ton of money.

My slowest tracer is 100% olive with a moderate water discount.

NaturalPerfumery on Yahoo Groups is a great place to learn about natural perfume made with botanical essences.

I do want to add that I'm betting it would probably work out a bit nicer if I had used the red palm as a superfatted swirl or diluted the color a bit with regular palm.