The Joys of Motherhood

Most days I LOVE being a mom. I've got three boys, two of them with ADHD, and the third one probably has a touch of OCD, and I swear, if things aren't just EXACTLY as he wants them to be, this child can throw a tantrum like no other. Children are a challenge and a blessing, all wrapped up in really cute packages!

So when I came across this YouTube Video on another blog, I just HAD to share it! I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! I love being a mother, but this made me laugh!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

We're not actually celebrating Thanksgiving today, but on Saturday with my extended family, but I still wanted to wish all of you a VERY Happy Thanksgiving, and also to share with you some of the things I'm thankful for this year.

1. I'm thankful for my family. They make me laugh, then even make me cry, but I love them with everything in me. Today is actually Tanner's Birthday, and Sunday is Ashton's Birthday. They're turning 5 and 4 (respectively). So we're having a Birthday Party in the middle of our Thanksgiving Celebration this weekend!

2. I love my husband. David keeps me sane. He made me a promise on our wedding day, just over eight years ago, that he'd make me laugh every day. And he has. He has the best sense of humor, and always keeps me on my toes. He gives me a shoulder to cry on when I need one, a good laugh (which is ALWAYS needed!), and supports me in every single way.

3. I'm thankful for my health. I know it sounds cliche, but I am. One of my friend's mom is struggling to simply survive. Watching what my friend is going through is killing me. I'm healthy and my family is healthy. It's definitely something to celebrate and be grateful for.

4. I'm thankful for my addictions. LOL! I couldn't resist. My addictions have created two wonderful businesses that stress me out, but also bring me so much joy. Not only do I have a constant creative outlet, I've also had the joy of meeting so many wonderful people by attending all these wonderful online support groups (CandleTech, LP&S, and the many many others I've joined). So I stand up, and proudly say, "Hi, I'm Lindsay, and I have an addiction. An addiction to anything that smells good and everything emollient. I'm obsessed with Essential Oils, and my Fragance Oil Cupboard is definitely overflowing. My collection of oils and butters continually grows (which reminds me that I'm out of Olive Oil.... again). It's overtaken my life, my dreams, my home. But I have no intention of stopping."

5. I'm thankful for all of you. It's been an unbelievable first year. I've gotten to know many of you over this year, and many of you have become friends as well. I'm looking forward to many more years together!

Okay, now back to your regularly scheduled Turkey Dinners! Eat some for me! I have to wait till Saturday....

When it Rains it Pours....

Sigh.... I hate that saying. Mostly because it's all too true. We seemed to have the weekend from Hell. David (hubby) fractured his wrist at work. So I've been shuttling him to the doctor, mandatory drug tests (because it happened at work), and everything else, because he's so doped up on Oxycodone that it's illegal for him to drive.

Then the monster cold from October that FINALLY went away after Halloween is looking to make a comeback. And I've misplaced my bottle of Eucalyptus EO. I do not see any clear breathing any time soon. Sigh....

And to top it all off, I caught my 7 year old stealing money from my wallet. For some reason he just doesn't get why it's wrong. I tried to explain that he could go to jail for stealing. His response, "But Mom, we don't know where the jail is!". So while shuttling David around (with all three kids, no less), I pointed out the city jail to him as we drove by. If he steals again, I'm gonna ask to take him on a 'fun little tour' of the Lehi City Police Station and Jail. If the Fear of Mom won't cure it, then the Fear of the System will.

Yeah, it's been a fun weekend....

So I figured what a better way to relax than to spend the day soaping. Get my creative juices recharged, relax, and just have fun playing. I had some custom soaps on my list of things to do. Apparently the soap gremlins took up resident in my house this weekend as well. All the soaps are still good, just not quite exactly what I had envisioned. One of those cases where my perfectionism simply needs to be told to shove it and be quiet. But I stopped early, just in case. I'll try again tomorrow.

Oh, I finally took some pictures of the Lavender Soap I made recently! Now just to remind you, I HATE HATE HATE the smell of Lavender. It's just not my thing AT ALL. But my customers love it, so I make it. Now I haven't been able to smell anything for about 3 days. So I figured this would be a good time to take the necessary pictures of these nasty stinky soaps.

I CAN SMELL THEM!!!!

Do you know how totally unfair that is? I haven't been able to smell anything for days, but I can smell the one thing I DON'T want to smell.

Does anyone want to borrow some really cute and energetic boys for a couple days, weeks, years??? I wish I could bottle their energy (as they run around the living room wrestling). Sigh... I need to go fix dinner now before they mutiny on me.... Oops, too late! Here it comes! "Mom, what's for dinner? Mom, I'm hungry."

So..... How was your weekend??? LOL!

Spooks & Hauntings

I just had to share, cuz they're so cute! We had a blast this Halloween. I'm late in getting the pictures uploaded, but weekends around here are always crazy!

Aeddon went dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow. He's ALWAYS loved Pirates of the Caribbean, so this was a perfect find for him this year (especially with the no mask rules at school).

Tanner and Ashton, well, they're both obsessed with Spiderman this year (they teach everyone the exact position to hold their hands to be able to spray their webs). So we had Good Spiderman (Ashton), and Bad Spiderman (Tanner). They loved it, and that's what was important! LOL!


And my husband, David, bless his heart.... He LOVES Halloween. It's his favorite holiday, hands down. He had way too much fun scaring all the kids in Aeddon's class when he went in to help out with the class party!

We had perfect weather for trick or treating. Cool, but not cold, and the perfect hint of fall in the air. We got together with my family, which is quite the group! Seven kids and nine adults.... with half the adults acting like kids! I love my brothers! We piled the younger kids into a wagon to haul them around the neighborhood. And my brothers had WAY too much fun laughing at Ashton, who was definitely not graceful in all his excitement when he was climbing in and out of the wagon.

I hope you all had as much fun this Halloween as we did!

Lavender.... Lots and Lots of Lavender

Which admittedly is NOT a good thing for me. I'm one of those weird ones who can't stand the smell of Lavender. HOWEVER, because several of you have repeatedly asked for either a Lavender Soap, or for me to get my butt in gear and get the Baby's Soap (castile with a hint of Lavender) back in stock, I poured Lavender today. Lots and Lots of Lavender, so hopefully I won't have to pour anymore for a little while! LOL! No insulted is intended towards those who like it. I just am one of those who don't. As soon as the soap has 'solidified' enough in my molds to move them, I'm going to hide them in my son's closet, so hopefully I won't have to smell them again for a little while. Till then, I've got three candles burning on my desk!

Lindsay

It Snowed!

There simply is something magical about the first snow. It's beautiful, gorgeous, and utterly amazing. We got four inches Saturday night, and I'm so sad that I wasn't able to take a picture of it. My camera's disk suddenly started spitting out error messages. Can't format, initialize, nothing... And when I went to order more.... they've been discontinued. Sigh.... We were planning on getting a new camera with our tax return, but I've got MONTHS till then, with several major holidays in the meantime.

But the snow we had, even though it melted ridiculously fast, was absolutely beautiful! I love winter!

Lip Balm Picture Tutorial

Since we have our flavor oils on sale this week, I thought I'd share some tips I've learned about pouring lip balms over the years. I've poured probably a couple hundred thousand lip balms over the last couple of years. I've learned a few tricks and tips over the years to make it go quickly and smoothly.

First, here are the tools of the trade.

1. Scale - Unless you're using one of our Lip Balm Kits, this is essential. I use the larger scale to measure my base. The smaller scale is to measure my flavor oil. You can measure in milliliters if you don't have a microscale. They're wonderful tools though! I definitely recommend all formulators get one. I got mine, a JS-50X, from Jenn at LotionCrafter.
2. Lip Balm Base - use ours or make your own.
3. Flavor Oil - again, use ours, or someone else. Just make sure you use the amount recommended by your supplier.
4. Lip Balm Tubes - Lots of options out there, from the standard white 0.15oz tubes, to naturals, to slim lines. Have fun, and go with what you love!
5. Candle Warmer - It's not completely essential, but it will definitely help. I'll explain more a little later.
6. Canning Jar - I prefer the pint size, but you can use the quart size. I just don't like fishing my pipettes out of the larger jar.
7. Disposable Pipettes
8. Labels - I print mine on clear 1.8"x1.8" laser labels from Online Labels. I LOVE THEM! But for years I printed them on full sized sheets and cut them out with my paper cutter.

Recommended Tools

9. Pouring Tray - I got mine from MMS and LOVE it! When I'm pouring lots of the same lip balm, you'll never find me without one of these! Pour 50 tubes in half the time! It's a great tool, and they have a link to their own picture tutorial for using these trays. Okay, so you have all the tools that you need. Now what?

STEP ONE: Melt Your Base
It's best to do this over a double boiler to ensure that you don't get your oils too hot. This melts it slowly and at a more controlled heat than you'd get if you put it over direct heat. Once your base is fully melted, you're ready to move onto step two.

STEP TWO: Measure out your Base
Place the clean canning jar on the scale, and tare it out to zero. Then pour your lip balm base into the jar. Unless your jar is already warm, your base will begin to solidify against the edges. By placing your empty canning jar on the candle warmer BEFORE you pour your base in it, you'll help prevent this solidifying. Also, here's why I strongly suggest you pull out your candle warmers for making lip balms. If you keep your jar of melted base on the warm while you're pouring, it will stay liquid until you're done.

STEP THREE: Add Flavor Oil
So you now have your base measured out. Now you need to add your flavor oil. Since ours are used at a max of 1%, I'm going to use that for our math. (I know, M-A-T-H... it's a four letter word. Unfortunately, it's a necessary evil. If you really don't want to worry about calculating it, go check out our Lip Balm Kits. Everything is pre-measured, even the flavor oils!) I'm going to go with a smaller amount, just because if you're just starting out with lip balms, you're probably not making 100 lip balms. So we'll start with 2 oz of base. At 1%, you're going to want to use 0.02 oz of flavor oil. (math - 2 x 0.01 = 0.02) I know, I know. It's a very tiny amount. That's why I recommend one of those MicroScales. It makes measuring tiny amounts like this an absolute breeze! But we're going to assume you don't have one of these, and we need to do it by volume. Most disposable pipettes have milliliter markings on them. USE THEM. But we've got our measurement in ounces, not milliliters. Again, I am in love with Google. Open up a Google search page, and type in "0.02 oz to ml", and hit Search. And voila....

0.02 US fluid ounces = 0.591470594 ml

This shows up. I love it when someone else does the math for me. As you can see, it's a PORTION of a milliliter. That's barely even the tip of the pipette. Just try to be as accurate as you can. Larger batches will give you better accuracy.

STEP FOUR: Pouring
This is the time consuming part. And there are a million different methods out there. Some recommend syringes and other dispensers that are larger. I've always preferred the pipettes. They're cheap, disposable, I don't have to worry about it gunking up on me, or cleaning it out afterwards. I just grab a new one. For me, it's just part of my overhead costs. Because of the candle warmer though, I usually only use one or two pipettes for any size batch I want to make. 10, 100, or more. (although if I'm making that many, I now use my trays!)

Now here is the biggest tip I can give you when it comes to pouring lip balms. It's like a candle. You're going to have a sink hole form as it cools. So you're going to have two pours. The initial fill, and then an over pour. On your first pour, fill it to just below the top edge.

Here's what the sink hole looks like after it's cooled somewhat.









Now we're going back to elementary science class. (I am SO mean! First MATH and now SCIENCE!) We're going to use surface tension to create the tops of your lip balms. Remember filling a glass with water all the way to the brim, then slowly adding drop by drop more. It formed a dome above the rim of the glass. In the water experiment, you added more and more until that surface tension broke. We're going to add warm lip balm solution until we get that dome, but we don't want to break that surface. I'm sure some of you will want to know why we can't just overfill it like this the first time, and prevent the sink hole. I wish we could, but it just doesn't work. Even tubes poured with the trays, which have a larger overfill than these tubes will have, still require a 2nd pour due to the sink holes. Hopefully from this picture you can see what the over pour looks like though.

STEP FIVE: Cooling
Now it's just waiting for it to be cool enough to cap. Keep kids, pets, and husbands out of the way until they're done. Don't stick them in the freezer, it can cause them to fractionate. The fridge is okay, but they really don't take that long on their own. Once it's opaque and not too warm to the touch, go ahead and cap them.

STEP SIX: Labeling
I can't help with creating the labels, but this part is simply applying them. If you want to shrink wrap them, I recommend the wraps from Kangaroo Blue. They have the perforation around the cap so the rest stays on and protects your label. If you're planning on selling these in stores or any place where you don't have complete control over who's touching them (or opening them, trying them, contaminating them), then I highly recommend shrink wrapping them.

STEP SEVEN: Sell Sell Sell!!!
Now get out there and sell these like hot cakes! They're a year round best seller for us! If you have any tips or tricks of your own, I'd love to hear them! Just add them to our comments section so you can share with everyone!

Lindsay Goodwin
http://www.soapersworkshop.com/