Maggie

Anxious to hear what you found Sharon. I am not into making jewelry but...I used to wear those beaded toe rings in the summer. If I remember correctly the elastic strings were really narrow/small. I never had a problem with them breaking. I don't know if toe rings are still popular with young girls but about 8 years ago I remember going to the pools in our summer home communities in DE and it seemed like everyone wore toe rings.

Very pretty. Your layers look perfect.

As gorgeous as that soap is...I don't think anyone that buys it or gets it for a gift would care if the colors aren't the whole way through. That soap is too pretty to use. I would be displaying it in my main bathroom for everyone to see.

Great job...I love it. I'm an Americana person...love anything red/white/blue. Are you sure this is you first necklace...j/k. You did fantastic for your first one. No one would ever guess that the "pendant" is a bottle cap.

I used to pour in my kitchen and had wax stored in my laundry room. Our german shepherd (not the one we have now) was eating J50 wax. I called the vet and she said to make him vomit by giving him some salt. We did...he did...and was fine after that. I never did ask her if it could have been harmful to him. My X DIL asked me to make a dozen AJ'nP votives for a Christmas gift for her mother. She wrapped them along with a box of chocolate candy for her mom and put them under the tree. Their chocolate lab got into them while they were at work...ate most of the votives AND the box of candy. Dogs shouldn't have chocolate so she was scared to death that it would kill him. That was over 10 years ago and he is just as spunky as he was back then. Needless to say...she learned a lesson. DON'T put anything with an odor under the tree ahead of time.

Glad to see you are back posting your gorgerous soaps Barbara. You ALMOST have me wanting to drag out all of my CP stuff....lol. I want to play around some with more m&p that I bought a few months back...goatsmilk from CW. I had been using their shea butter m&p and love it but decided to try the goatsmilk this time. Of course my sewing has now become my obsession. I have candles to pour...lots of new fragrances to test...and soap to play with. Anyway....... I can't wait to see the cut pics of this one.

You might want to think about letting people know that whatever you decide to change Apple Jack 'n Peel to...the candles ARE AJ'nP. I have several customers that love Claire Burke's AJ'nP and KY's fragrance is as close to a dupe that I have found. Personally...I rarely change names of fragrances because people looking for a certain scent...are looking for that name when they look through your candles. I had someone come to my Christmas Open House who always burned Yank##'s Clean Cotton. My clean cotton FO was supposed to be a dupe of Yank##. As soon as she sniffed the candle she said...yepper this IS it. She ended up buying what I had and ordered more. If I had changed the name to something else...I would bet she wouldn't have thought it smelled like Yank##. People are strange....lol. I had a customer at a craft show a few years ago smell my honeysuckle candles and told me that they didn't smell like honeysuckle. LMAO! I live in the mountain and honeysuckle grows wild all over the place. I think I know what honeysuckle smells like...and my candles smell just like honeysuckle. I have a friend that buys Wisteria candles all the time because her hubby loves the flowers. I had someone else tell me that my wisteria candles didn't smell like wisteria...lol. I told her about my best friend's hubby and she said that he must NOT know what wisteria smells like. Uhhhhhh...they have wisteria vines growing in their yard.

Something that I used to do when I poured in "lidless" jars. I bought frosted template plastic sheets and used a circle cutter to make it the same size as the top of the jar. Punched a hole in it and put it down over the wick. Held in the scent well but yet people COULD smell it through the little hole. I had seen this done in a candle shop in Delaware and I stold the idea...LOL.

My opinion is...go for the Hershey Kiss on top. They look very nice the way they are but...I thinking adding the kiss would jazz it up a bit. And then when it melts you will have a nice chocolate glaze over the top of the candle.

A little late but...yepper. I bought mine at Office Max and they have several different sizes and colors. I had to use them when I had my candles in a craft shop...so much easier for the owner to keep track of what sold...just slip it off over the top of the jar instead of writing everything down. She had a specific "coding" for each vendor that we had to use on our stuff. They also come in handy when I am having a sale on discontinued jars and/or fragrances. At my Christmas Open House I have 2 rooms with my displays. One room is all regular priced and the other is all sale priced. I "work" my open house and my daughter is the cashier and grandaughter the bagger. So if I am discontinuing a fragrance poured in my Madison jars which I use all of the time...my daughter asked how she would know if it came from the regular priced or sale priced room. Good point so I just wrote the sale price on all of the tags and slipped them over the top of the jar. Made it a LOT easier for her instead of constantly interrupting me to find out what to charge.

Adorable bonnet as is your 9 month old. I would certainly add them to your etsy shop. Our local newspaper has a once a week magazine similar to Parade called American Profile. Last week they featured Wagon Train trips around the country. And of course the woman and kids were dressed appropiately. I thought to myself...I wonder WHERE they buy those clothes and bonnets. I'm sure some sew themselves but...you could be an outlet for something like that some day too.

My first tent was an EZ Up and it lasted about 7 years. I didn't waterproof it and in heavy rains at a few shows water DID drip though the top. I decided to buy a Caravan with 4 sides and it really helped with my first show after I got it. We had strong winds in the afternoon and those sides really protected everything including me. lol My hubby cut 4 pieces of PVC pipe and we filled them with sand for weights. Several vendors had damaged products because they didn't have weights and their tents blew over upsetting their tables...you could hear glass breaking. The lady across from me had the most damage...plus ALL of her brochures blew away. She immediately packed everything and left.

Truthfully...I don't mind wicking jars. I hate pouring...especially tarts. When I have to pour several dozen of the same fragrance no matter how hard I try...I always have drips everywhere or overflow the tart molds. I hate wasting that wax so...wait till it hardens and then throw it back in the pour pot and melt it with my heat gun and continue pouring. And then when pouring containers...making sure they are even. I hate looking at my display at a show and seeing uneven pouring...lol. It's not so bad pouring the shouldered jelly jars from Fillmore but...the Madison jars can be a PITA at times.

So...what did you find at JoAnns katshe? Anything good. I always seem to find some little gadget that I missed the previous time I was there. I found my Avery magnetic sheets and after looking at them...I don't think something like that would be strong enough. I tried putting 2 sheets...magnet sides...together and they didn't "stick". I forgot to tell you too that they usually have the weekly flyer in the front of the store so grab one. I've saved quite at bit of $$$ with some of the coupons. Once in a while they have one for EVERYTHING you buy...including sale items. Now I have to drive further to JoAnns. They are about 10 miles from me. I used to live about a mile from them and a more expensive locally owned fabric store. I only bought fabric there 1 time because I was with my boss's wife that was letting me sew when his construction business was slow.

The best carrot cake that I have found...was recommended by another chandler...and from Fragrance Oil Heaven. Now to remember who now carries her fragrances. Okay...found it. She sold her fragrance line to Elements. Here is the link to the page for Iced Carrot Cake. http://www.elementsbathandbody.com/Fragrance-Oil-Heaven-c-259.html

I would think you could buy sheets of magnet. I bought a box of Avery...can't think of what they call them...but they are for printing you own refrigerator magnets and are a solid sheet that you would then cut. I never used them...lol. So it would seem they have to be out there somewhere. I'm pretty sure JoAnn Fabric has the metal snap closures because the other bag pattern that I bought there says to use them for the purse I want to make...later...someday. I've never looked IN their store but I am almost sure I saw them on a JoAnn flyer/handout that the lady had given me just on Monday when I was there. They are having a sale on things you need to make bags like handles etc. I wasn't planning to go back for a while...I hope so anyway lol...so I put it in the recyle bin and of course they came today. Maybe check their website.

Thanks for the link katshe. I was checking things there a little bit last night...till the storm rolled in so shut down the computer. One of my best friends told me that if I decided to make a lot more bags...like at Christmas time...she would do it assembly line style. Sounds like that is maybe what you are doing too. That's okay as long as you are using similar fabric...I hate to have to keep changing bobbins and spools of thread. The best part of sewing is the actual sewing. lol

I had tested a couple...NG mayt have been one of them since I do order a lot from them. But I agree with sliver...At Wix End. Really strong throw in parasoy.

Oh shoot...that's the kind of stuff that happens to me. The best laid plans turn out that something goes wrong. Can't wait to see your new fabric painting. I discovered...over the weekend...that the blade on my rotary cutter was too dull. The only way it would cut fabric was running it backwards...lol. So...I checked the name on the cutter and blade size to buy replacement blades. On top of that I was designing my biscuit quilt. I am using the instructions from a quilting book but not using their fabric suggestions...mine is going to be patriotic. When I drew my design on paper I discovered I forgot to buy solid dark blue for those blocks and also miscalculated the amount of star patterned fabric. I needed an extra yard of that. So...off to JoAnn Fabric. Luckily they had enough of the star pattern fabric left. Then when I looked for the blades for my rotary cutter...they don't even sell that brand of cutter anymore. (I bought this one about 11 years ago) So I had to buy a new rotary cutter and decided to splurge on a 5 pack of blades. Man...those thing aren't cheap. The cutter was $30. and the blades were $35. I was NOT expecting to spend that much money today. LOL

I absolutely LOVE your handpainted fabric. WOW...you are very talented. I think you and I have similar taste. Even though I'm not a kid anymore I still like wild and crazy looking clothes and fabrics. BTW...my grandaughter loved her bag. She couldn't get done admiring it and thanking me. I will be anxious to see your handpainted fabric bag when it is finished.

I WAS going to say magnetic...but then looked at your gorgous blue patchwork bag and really like the button and the loop. Since I am just starting out making bags...the only one that I have made so far uses the button and loop. I've made 3 of these so far. The one for me is the one I posted a few weeks ago using the cherry fabric. The one I made my daughter...forum was being revamped so I didn't post the pic on the temp forum. Her's had butterflies on the outside fabric...colors were pink and purple with just a brown outline of a small size butterfly all over. Pretty bad when I can't remember the inside fabric...lol. The handles, top and bottom were purple with white dots. She loves it. Took it to work and all of the ladies drooled over it. Tomorrow I will be giving the bag to my oldest grandaughter who will start college at Penn State in the fall. I used 2 different Penn State fabrics and then a blue with white circles for the handles, top and bottom. It looks great. Showed it to her mother on Thursday and she said Casey will LOVE it. I bought the metal buttons that you cover with fabric for all 3...since that's what the lady that wrote the book said to do. And then of course made the yo-yo flower that is behind the button for each bag. So...after all of that...lol. I think I would find a really nice fabric that goes with each of your Sherran bags and do what I did. Yo-yo flower optional depending on the fabric...a really upscale looking bag I would forget the yo-yo. Or just use the same fabric you used for the bag and then a different color loop. I did buy a pattern at JoAnn's that has 4 styles of bags. The one that I really like uses a magnetic closure. So that will be something new for me. Of course I have 3 more of the other bags to make before I get to that. Oh...and also my Biscuit Quilt. I might be the only one out here that doesn't really like zipper bags. I have a really nice bag/purse that I bought and loved...but I stopped using it because the lining is real silky. I have no clue how it is attached to the leather...all I know is everytime I try to close it the lining gets caught in the zipper. I am having so much fun making these. Hope I don't burn out. lol

I used to dip bears but got so overwhelmed with them that I quit making them. lol Anyway...I also used a mix of paraffin and container wax. The container wax I used was from KY...she has since stopped carrying it. I did an 80/20 blend...80% container and 20% FR3035 from Candlewic.

That is very pretty soap. Definitely something that I would buy if I saw it at a craft show.

JMO but I did not like Vickey's pumpkin pie...too much spice for me. I wanted to like it...lol...since I use quite a lot of her fragrances. My favorite pumpkin pie was from Missy's who went OOB. I tested the pumpkin pie from JS and was using it...but I stopped ordering from them for reasons I won't go in to. Anyway...I ordered and tested from The Candlemaker's Store and found it was exactly like JS...and the old Missy's. You might like KY's. The throw was excellent but I wanted more pumpkin than spice and to my nose I couldn't smell the pumpkin.