leashaann

Plain white elmers glue should work too. I use it instead of modge podge.

I ordered lye from them and was pleased with service. They offered to ship DHL instead of way over priced UPS.

IF you melt the wax, the water will stay on bottom. I freaked out over water in a new box of wax that I bought and got tons of advice on hear. Some said boil it out but that was time consuming. I just melted it in my pot and carefully poured the wax out, leaving the water at the bottom of the pot.

My friend has a pretty nasty spider bite that is responding to EO's. The doc quoted $120 just to walk through the door. So a friend of hers recommended EO's so she figured why not just try it.

I want to add that "wicked" is a regional slang also. I'm in Texas and in my 30's and only know it because my good friend from New England says it.

Wow! Your first batch looked great. I've only made two so far. The first looked okay but it was plain castille with no FO or EO's incase it was a complete failure. I made my second using a more complicated recipe and I used lemongrass essential oil with chamomille flowers. I poured it in a tube shaped mold and it came out looking EXACTLY like a banana and was about as soft as one. lol.

I'm learning this. I actually found a lot of mistakes in the water calculations in one of my books. I followed her directions for calculating and a few of her recipes were off. She may have adjusted intentionally but there was no explanation. I returned that one to the library.

I did a search on the topic but didn't find much. I'm just starting my soap making career and I've read a few books and made a few batches of HP soap. The book I'm currently reading teaches making cp soap but the author makes basic soaps and then mills them. She adds the fragrance, color etc in the milling process. My question is does anyone know any advantages / disadvantages to this? I know one downfall would be the extra curing time after milling it. Benifit would be that more of the FO / EO would last.

Tell them no, it doesn't work like regular soap, you have to turn around three times and then touch your toes before rinsing it off.

In my opinion, the lather makes it easier to spread the soap out over your body or through your hair. For example, I won't buy paul mitchell shampoo because it doesn't lather and I have a hard time getting it dispersed through my hair.

I'd pay 200 for a pair of jeans if they made me look like I had a butt.

I took a pound of wax and colored it a primary color (red for example). Then I started adding a drop at a time of another color ( Green to make rose and eventually, with enough green, brown.) , poured a sample into a condiment cup and labeled it and added some more color, poured a sample, labeled it and so on. it was time consuming but I have a sample of every color I could ever need.

I personally just like rustics more so, of course, I'm voting for the rustic. I don't think that you need to add more. I think the simplicity is nice.

Okay. This is just my uneducated guess. I doubt that insects perceive fragrance the way we do so I suspect it isn't so much the fragrance that runs them off. I would think it's a chemical or something in the EO that does the trick. To us a fragrance oil may smell like its essential oil counterpart but be much different to bugs.

Generally, I LOVE Natures Garden. My fav is Lick Me All Over. Someone mentioned that it was floral but I smell mostly rasberry. (I'm a floral fan though) They sent me a free "sexy as sin" soap sample and I had to throw it in the back of my truck on my way home from my mailbox store b/c it was giving me a horrible headache. Funny how scents can be perceived so differently by different people. I liked their Margarita but it wasn't authentic; too limey. I used it to make Sangarita. In all, I love NG. I just wish they were closer to me b/c it's just really expensive and slow to ship all the way cross country.

I really want to make one of those lime helmets like Scented has. I think my cat would really like it.

That's too funny. I know that I can't let her have/buy anymore. I probably wouldn't care if she didn't have a three year old daughter. I'll just have to be brave and tell her no. (i'm a people pleaser and have trouble saying no) Seems like she would have learned.

I was using hot glue and was having problems with the wick coming up. I like to pull the wick real snug and about one out of ten would pop up. I started using the GE Silicone II and love it. Only down side is that you have to wait a while before pouring. I wait about 3-4 hours.

I have a friend who refuses to trim the wicks in candles. She says she shouldn't have to. I learned this when a candle in a tin caught on fire in her bathroom (It wasn't one of my candles) I can't believe how stupid that is. I don't think that I'll ever be comfortable giving or selling her a candle again. I learned this right after I gave her about five of them.

Was it leather scented. lol

It was J223 and I was able to work around it. Hopefully it won't be too common b/c it does slow the process way down. Thanks again to everyone who offered advice. I just needed to vent a little. I melted the wax in my presto and poured it out, leaving the water on the bottom in the pot. Worked much faster than boiling it out.

I completely understand your frustration. I'm not sure how some companies stay in business.

Has anyone considered a co-op for these jars?

For the first year that I was making candles, I didn't know this board existed. After I "discovered" it, I visited on occassion but only recently really started posting and utilizing the information here. It's a great place to start. The moral to my story is that recently I did a few searches on "the best container wax" and realized that the wax one person may love and have tons of success with may turn out to be my worst nightmare. I've finally found one that I think I can live happily ever after with but only time will tell. I suggest that you search the board, come up with a list of viable candidates and then start trying them. It helps if you can find a supplier close enough that you can save on shipping but from my experience sometimes it's worth having it shipped because there are some suppliers out there that just don't understand customer service. And a word of warning: There is a strange species of bug out there and once it bites you, it will be very hard to stop buying fragrance oils etc. Just stay strong and maybe those teachers christmas presents will only cost a few hundred dollars.