Kaylors Kreations

I bet the colored sand used for those sand projects would work, you know with the layers of colors in a bottle - the name escapes me, but its one of those things kids do at summer camps. My Hobby Lobby carries all sorts of colors of it, from your basic sand colors to neon and primary colors. The texture is small grained and I'm sure it would likely work very well - plus you wouldn't have to color it! http://www.craftsetc.com/store/department.aspx?dep=50&cat=38&subcat=5

I'm with Carrie, I don't like my balms sweetened, usually (got one in a swap in a Root Beer flavor and its touch of sweet rules!). I don't sweeten my balms and have never had anyone ask for them to be sweet. I don't label them as 'flavored' specifically, and do explain that balms that seem to be flavored are just sweetened, and the brain attaches actual flavor to the product because the mouth tastes the sweet (or tart depending on the fragrance). I don't sweeten for the same reason as Carrie, too... Sweet means lip licking which means they wear off the balm faster and end up with the same dry lips they had before.

I use sunflower oil in all my recipes except my bastille bars and salt bars. I love it and currently feel stuck cause I am out of my supply of it for now. Though be sure to use the high oleic variety as the regular kind can be prone to DOS

If steady 15mph winds are considered a breeze.. knock me down with a feather.. and thats just a starting point here in the Big Country. But I have to agree the weather is nice most of the time. Though we were a little disappointed this last winter without even a tiny flake of snow. Abilene is smack dab in the center of the sate so you can't get more central that where I am. You couldn't pay me to live in the Dallas Metroplex or the Houston area. Though I'm sure being in San Antonio wouldn't bother me too much. And gals.. I hate to say it but there's really no difference between a 'dry' heat or otherwise.. if its effin hot, its effin hot . Only real factor is either your sweating because of the humidity or your dehydrating becuase the sweat is just evapping on and your in trouble n don't know it. (I've lived in Tucson, and Now TX and grew up in Ft.Lauderdale/Miami and NYC... ask me how I know). The thing with people from the East coming out and having allergies they never had before in AZ is more than likely due to the plants native to AZ and even here in TX that people that have lived elsewhere have never been exposed to causing the allergies, not really so much with the different climate. As for being craft friendly, maybe elsewhere, but not so much here in Abilene, we only have a few craft shows blow through in the fall and all of them are juried or one of those commercial traveling markets... I've been working with the services squadron here on the base, and we're making some headway in planning some craft friendly markets, like maybe introducing a winter market just arount Turkey Day and their looking at planning a second Shoppin' in the Park near the fall once the weather turns. But aside from those few events, we do have a farmer's market in the downtown area I'm trying to get hold of someone to find out about getting a spot and then there's the Crafter's Marketplace... $40/mo rent for a 5x5' station, they take the sales and worry about sales tax and the like then pay you whats left, after they take the rent - and if you have no sales you pay oop and can't leave unless the 1yr contract you signed is up. Thing is I NEVER see anyone IN the place, its in a location I pass quite frequently and at various times of the day.

And I'm now the proud vendor of 4 less bars! Everyone was going nutty for them at market today. Even from customers that didn't buy a bar but did sniff it, the most common remark was that it had a cool top txture and that it smelled like a fancy Starbucks coffee. People liked the idea of the salt bar (seems handmade is just not that common in these parts and once it was explaind the idea was loved) and it looks like it might be a strong item for me, so once I pick up some more lye, some more bars will be on their way!

my dad is a bungee freak, and being full time in an RV, theres always a million uses for them, but not a lot of space to stow 'em. He's picked up a couple of those tube mailers in a heavier weight cardboard and cut them to different lengths for the bungees. He then strings them from one end to the other on the inside and out, they stay straight and untangled and he can just grab a tube for the length he needs and have as many cords as he needs in that length. The tubes also stack pretty neatly in the stowage bns too.

I love my lotion bars! And veryone that tries em loves em too. I do use micas to color them, so everything is color coordinatd and easy to spot the same scent through my whole line, from bar soap to lotion to solid bubble bath... This looks like a yummy formula, though I'm not a fan of the dragyness that BW gives me. I formulated my bars with soy and used candellila to make up for the softness ofthe soy and softer butters I prefer to use, aloe and avocado. Though I do wish I could find an uncolored candellila or might consider trying carnuba, though I'm not sure what kind of skin feel that would give me. I don't find it very greasy or hard to apply except for the tube I leave in the car during the winter. Being in central TX, i haven't had to many problems with melting at this point, but then I haven't done many outdoor shows to have to deal with it and will see how things go this weekend at the FM.

I finally got the bug in my bonnet and HAD to try my hand at Salt bars. Since I OHP my soaps, I wasn't sure whether or not to add the salt before or after the cook and quickly learned how I need to do it. For the first batch, I added the salt at trace and put it in the oven to cook. I had a little oil separation, which happens sometimes. And by the time Zap was gone, It had turned into what looked like a pot of cottage cheese minus the whey. Not Pretty at all. My next batch I decided to cook my bater then add the salt after the cook. I used coffee for my water and scented with NG Cafe Caramel... YUMMY!!

I have a single recipe I use, but with 2 versions like Lorrie, one veggie and the other lard. Although I do like to play with other recipes, I usually do them on a small and special basis. Once I found a recipe I liked, I shared bars with my family and got plenty of feedback, since noone in my fam is shy about giving an opinion, asked for or not. I teaked and messed with the recipe until pretty much most of my fam agreed that it was a good bar and had no real complaints. I love my fam as a test bed because of the variety of ages and types of skin, from older sun damaged to older and ethnic skin to even some of the youngest and most sensitive in my group, including my super sensitive eczemic skin.

I LOVE The Sage, Its one of my primary suppliers. I've had super great results with their butters and oils and love their super fast shipping. I wish I could afford one of everything in all honesty, but since that ain't gonna happen anytime soon, I'll just keep going back for it a lil at a time.

I use slightly ground oatmeal and poppy seeds in my super-scrubby soap. for my just a hair over 2lb batches, a half cup of oats and 2tsp of poppy. My hubby isn't a huge fan of MY soap, but since I got him to try my gardener's bar. he's completely stopped using the fast orange to scrub up with at the sink, he says it cleans the oil better. YAY!!

wouldn't be the first time I've heard of someone selling fresh out the mold CP soap. When we were traveling this summer, there was a lady at one of the military exchanges selling some. She spent 5 minutes trying to sell me on it, till I told her I make my own then she insulted me because I said I would never consider selling uncured soap.

I've seen them at Sephora too, apparently they sell extremely well. They can do some wicked looking stuff with them.. like Cheeta spots and rockin' stars. Would be interesting to try sometime.

Thanks all... I guess I got a lil good karma for doing something about that bunch of nasty fairies who have likely been hanging out since we got home just waiting to cause havoc. If my luck holds, I'll soon be bursting at the seams with delicious soapies!

Just loverly. Parchment is such a love/hate material most of the time. Though you seem to have managed it just wonderfully.

So after a long relaxing summer.. I'm back on the soaping wagon.. after finally shooing the fairies out of the kitchen, I've gotten a few good batches done. First up are facial bars with Bentonite clay and a simple itp swirl with some Grape POP color. Always nice to have something pretty sitting by the sink! Next is NGs Sun Moon and Stars. More POP here, blue with a touch of black and a heaping serving of ultra-fine glitter for some sparkling stars. And finally inspired by quiet girls recipe, with added sheabutter, Dr. Feel Good, with its blue base and green itp swirl. I love this soap and recipe!! So many bubbles!!

ok.. now I have to ask... when y'all say you lined your mold with the silicon baking sheets or funky foam, what do these liners look like? I just can't figure it.. i wanna say i see something like a rectangle with long ends n sides, kinda like if you took a shoe box and cut along the standing corners n flattened it out.. am I right? is this what y'all r doing? I don't mind lining with freezer paper, but would be willing to try something new if it saves me a lil time. TIA gals

I use my normal formulation tweaked just a bit, to use less coconut oil, cuts down on the cocoate flavor.. ICK. I use a clay in with it, kinda like my shaving soap, but not as strong. Because i pour it into a round mold like my shaving, i marble it with some purple or pink, what ever im in the mood for that day. So far no complaints from anyone that's used it

I know this is an old thread, but how similar is SoS's Stetson?

I absolutely love NGs Candy Corn, n so do my customers, i sell out every time i offer it in any candles. I want to try the black licorice, but haven't needed to place an order recently, so haven't had a chance.

love the idea of the olive branch soap, but you should offer the discount to anyone with a mil ID, not everyone has someone deployed to Iraq, our guys are also in Afghanistan, Quatar, Korea and many other places. You might also consider finding a group that does support stuff for the troops overseas and donate 20% of the non-discounted sales to them, they always need help. I have to agree with the gals, take more than you need... too much is usually enough.

I've never bought a journal in a store... funny thing to say, though I have gotten them as gifts once in a great while. I usually make my own, they're easy as pie and fun to boot, though they take me about 30mins to do for even a small simple one.One of my girlfriends absolutely loves them and I end up making several a year for her to give as gifts. But I thought I would share some of my recent ones. I learned how to do the binding in an art class in middle school and have been at it ever since. These are 5.5x8.5 in size and have 50 sheets inside them.

My walmart doesn't carry it anymore, it didn't sell so they pulled it, replaced the space with these awesome 2 1/2gallon bags. I get mine at our Albertson's since among the groceries that carry it, they have the best price. And yup its a giant roll of Reynold's Brand for like 4$ or so

I finally got around to taking some new pictures of my stuff today, including my Gardener's Soaps.. My hubby who is an ardent Fast Orange user absolutely loves his bar that I gave him to try... I see many more batches of this in my future. Guess that means I'm going to have to pick up some 'guy' scents, since he isn't to into my 'perfumy' or food scents... he's such an enabler...:highfive: I scented it with what i'm calling cranberry green tea, a 30/70 blend of cranberry relish and green tea FOs... OMG its smells sooooo good . I ground up some rolled oats and tossed in some poppy seeds, and used a touch of cocoa powder to give it some sort of color. I think they came out pretty good, loss of srcubby, but not too much.

while reading my mamasource digest this morning, One of the moms in my area was asking about coconut sensitivities, and was inundated with basically being told to either find coconut free soaps and cleansers or to buy the respective person's Arbonne. I have no experience with Arbonne so I don't know anything about their products, but I have been looking at soaps and other cleansers in the stores and have noticed that they all have either CO or Coconut derived surfactants in them. I PMed her that she might look for local handmade soap makers, as they would more than likely be happy to sell her coconut free bar soaps and LS for use with her little ones who are sensitive to it. She messaged me back having looked at my profile and asked if I could sell her some, I have no issue providing CO free bar soap but have yet to break into LS. I've peeked around and noticed most LS recipes have CO in it. Now for the question buried at the bottom... what could I replace the CO with when I decide to make LS and if I ever decide I want to sell it to this lady or anyone else.