Welcome Spring

It's spring here on the west coast, and it's this time of year that really makes me appreciate living here rather than say the prairies or back east. We're having warmer weather and the first flowers are starting to poke their heads out. That's not to say, mind you, that it's not going to go back to raining for the next 60 days after this, but so far so good.

In honour of spring, I decided to make this spring themed soap. You know why this has three molds? Because that's how many times it took me to get it semi right.

The first one turned out okay to start; I had poured the entire mold in yellow, let it set enough to take it out (actually I lie, the first one I turned it over to see how it looked and ended up with soap all over the floor and table and had to scoop up all the soap and try again), then cut out the eggshell portion, put it back in the mold and poured the egg portion. This is what came out.

It doesn't look so bad in this picture but the blue's bled into the chick. Here it just looks like bad lighting, which it is.

My second chick I thought I'd be smart and pour the blue in first. Duh! Kinda hard to cut out the chick part and keep the eye intact (not to mention it's a bad imagery). That one went straight back into making the third and final one.

Not bad, it still leaked a bit, but overall I think managed to keep the wrong coloured soap from migrating into places it shouldn't.

Either way, they both smell fantastic because I used the pomegranate and black currant FO. Nice bright, fruity scents for a bright season. Happy spring everyone!

Ugh, laundry

For only having two people in the house, we still generate a lot of dirty laundry. Mind you, I try only to do laundry every 1.5 to 2 weeks which means I end up doing 6 loads or so each time.

I had bought some laundry soap from the fantastic Carrie Garvin, but I'm running out, fast! I decided, after seeing so much of it on Pinterest, to try and make my own laundry soap. Seeing how I have discarded, ugly or otherwise unsellable soaps, it's a good way to use them up right?

So I've bought all my ingredients finally (do you know how difficult it is to find Borax and washing soda here?) and hope to make the laundry soap this weekend. That's not to say I'm not going to buy Carrie's soaps again because I love the smells and Cambridge Rum is not a scent I'd ever be able to make.

This is the one time I'm glad I still have a top loader washing machine because if my soap makes too much lather, well at least gravity will hopefully keep it all in the machine.

Area 51 in Vancouver?

I wish I could have the X-Files music playing in the background right now but I'm sure it'd be breaking all sorts of copyright rules. In my post last week, I had included a link to a 3-D soap tutorial by Brambleberry and then it hit me, I have some 3-D soap moulds!

I was lazy and tried to pour his eyes (that sounds weird doesn't it?) instead of using a syringe or dropper, hence why they're a little outside of the lines. Once I perfect it, I'm going to make the eyes with silver glitter to give him that more ethereal look. Hubby likes it because it fits in his hand well. I'll have to make more for the next craft fair I attend and put it next to my spaceship gift box. This one was fun, and the picture makes him look menacing, which is what we think of those little green men anyway right?

Thanks for stopping in and have a great weekend!

I'm fine

Someone once told me what fine stands for (and if you're of a more delicate constitution, please skip the rest of this paragraph and move onto the next paragraph, or watch this video in the meanwhile

F.I.N.E stands for f***ed up, insecure, neurotic and exhausted. The person who told me this was a family doctor, so the next time you go see your doctor, remember, he or she does have a sense of humour.

I've mostly been the E in fine which is why I didn't post last week. However, as I was doing some filing in the office and disliking every minute of it, I thought about how much I enjoyed soaping but haven't had the energy to do it. So I decided to start up again. I made this dragonfly soap previously but the dragonfly didn't show up as much as I'd like.

This is the first one I made. The green dragonfly doesn't show up as well against the background of green. I guess in real life, the dragonfly would want to blend in somewhat, so it's not such easy pickings for the birds. For me though, I want to make the dragonfly the star of the soap, so I tried this.

Blue lab colour dragonfly in MP clear with low sweat white with green oxide and a touch of energy FO

I'll probably try again with a more purply dragonfly just to make it stand out more, and with some glitter to make the dragonfly more iridescent.