kandlekrazy

Right now everyone is shipping slow due to the Covid19 virus. I don't recall them being that bad in the past. I do believe they have a 3-5 day processing time but if you don't hear in 5 days I would reach out by call or email.

Great colors on this one. Looks like the ocean.

I had a problem with this scent but only certain suppliers and now I don't know which since I haven't made soap in a looonnng time. I am going to get back into it when I can get out and see the Oregon area suppliers.

This is amazing, but then all of your soaps are amazing! I keep forgetting to look here for pics is why I'm so late to post.

Beautiful!

Fun summer soap!

I think much of your answer lies in where will you sell and what kind of turn out? I would go to all the shows and markets around (even if that isn't where you'll sell) and ask them what their best sellers are. This is how I learned that it differs tremendously on area. As I moved, things changed drastically. I went from Orange County in So Cal to a much more rural beach town in the central coast of Cal and suddenly everyone wanted scents I did not have and I changed and carried way less scents. Now I'm in OR and I noticed in shops here that the scents sold are different again. I probably had at least 100 scents, not that I used them all but I had them and I created mixers with some so that I had my own special scents they couldn't buy at big box stores.

When testing hot throw you really need different rooms where you can close a door or the strong throwing candles may overpower and you won't smell anything else. I used bedrooms where I could close the doors. I even used a large bathroom sometimes. Once you know how the throw is, then you can intermingle the candles if you wanted in an area just to see how the wick performs (but I must say, I've had a good HT go down to almost no HT as the candle progressed because of a wick and you won't catch that). The other thing I did was to train a few people on what to look for and gave them test sheets to fill out, these were trusted friends and family members and in the beginning I tested same batch & same scent just to see how our notes compared.

I know the mfg says cure time 2-3 days, but put a few aside for about 10 days and test it. I found that the longer cure times (I did 2 weeks for most tests) gave me a better hot throw without having a wick that burned so hot.

Ya I would test 3 htp41's or 3 htp52's

Mostly I've used them for weddings so ribbon and a small flower hot glued in place. But I did have a Monkey themed coffee shop where I hand painted a monkey on the tin until I got smart and found a super cute puffy sticker. Painted a bunch black and put multi colored polka dots on them. You can spray paint outside, hand paint something on them, use stencils or stickers if not too artsy. I even chalk painted some and then sanded a bit to give me that shabby chic look or old look for you guys, lol. Possibilities are pretty endless as long as it will stay on the tin. Chalk paint is really the best, no prep other than an alcohol wipe and voila a tranformed tin.

Just kill me now!!

No but please tell me it's not time for Christmas scents! 🤪

Not sure about TN, but in CA I just looked on Craigslist when I needed a workshop. We lucked out and found a house that had a downstairs studio apt and we moved us and my workshop. Insurance was killer high here if I didn't operate in my home, so this worked for us.

I've had trouble with a few. If you pop them in the freezer for 5 mins before unmolding they should come out clean. Sometimes there is a residue in the mold itself so be sure to wash them thoroughly when new with hot water and Dawn detergent.

I had problems with tealight if the dish is close to the flame, like the little coffee cup/tea cup warmers. Also customers won't trim that wick! The scent would smell burnt or it would burn off really quickly. Same thing with the hot plate warmers, they just got too hot. I like the light bulb the best, but you still have to watch how hot they get and use the smallest watt needed to throw the scent.

Mica is not good in soy wax. Get a wax dye, preferably liquid.

Many are safe, typically the supplier will indicate "skin safe" or something like that. Sometimes it will say candles/incense only. With the new laws around phthalate, more are skin safe than before.

Just wanted to add that as long as the bigger container is airtight you shouldn't have issues in muslin. What may happen is the exterior of the soap loses the scent but as soon as you use it once you can smell it again. It's same with CP soap if the exterior gets faint. Wrapping or shrink wrapping seems to be best for keeping off dust and keeping in scent as long as you use a plastic that doesn't suck the scent out.

It used to be stated back when I was buying from BA. If you can get what you want to try from Chemistry Store great, otherwise I'd give BA a call. I only bought from them when I needed a couple otherwise I did Lebermuth directly.

1 oz per 1 lb of wax is a 6% fragrance load. Check to see what your wax will hold, maybe that wax needs more?

I'd just like to add that because your teacups are beautiful and colorful, I would not dye the wax at all. The creamy color would look great. If you want to color soy in the clear jars, I would recommend using liquid dye made for candles. It's by far the easiest to incorporate into wax. The chips works as well but it takes some prep of the chip and lots of stirring or you end up with specks.

I've used many Lebermuth fo's, they are qualtiy. I can't say I was disappointed in any as far as performance. I probably would say Bay Rum is my favorite. I think you can also get them at Bulk Apothecary and not have minimums.

I like the round cotton core wicks with C3, the self-trimming will work as well if you twist the wick. HTP's I always got huge mushrooms except in tins they did ok, probably because I'd wick down in tins.

Sorry, I've been on vacation so haven't looked here. Way back someone told me to try tempering to see if I got smoother results as the candle burned and I did so I continued to do it. What I do is when I finish making my candles for the day I refill my melter and melt it all to 200 before I turn the melter off. When I'm ready to use again I remelt the pot. Sometimes the remelt happens in the same day and sometimes not for a week, doesn't seem to make a difference.