As I continue to poke around through my fragrance remnants and rejects, I tripped across a duplicate of Pink Sugar. So many of my fellow soapmakers have used it and love it, talking about what a great seller it is for them. I took one whiff, and deemed it way too sweet for my personal taste, but I don’t love everything I make, and neither do my customers. Everyone has their own preferences, so, with that in mind, I went ahead and soaped it.
Sweet and pink, Pretty in Pink emerged as the ultimate feminine treat. Perfectly suitable for both big and little girls alike, the scent is a blend of cotton candy, lemon drops, caramel, and raspberries with base notes of warm musk. What a lovely combination! Tart and sweet, cool and warm, light and heavy. It all comes together in a beautifully blended whole.
Pretty In Pink soap is all feminine bathing enjoyment
Don’t you just LOVE that? I expected this soap to turn chocolate brown where it wasn’t pink or white, and instead it stayed a creamy tan. The pink swirls are bright and sparkly from mica, and the top is a blend of my own liquid soap and melt & pour base, whipped with mica and topped with Himalayan pink salt. The soap itself is a total skin treat containing rich coconut milk for a creamy, silky lather that will leave your skin feeling soft and supple, never tight and dry. (I pilfered a bar for my own shower, so I know first-hand just how awesome this soap is.) While this fragrance will likely never become a personal favorite of mine, I do enjoy how the scent mellowed and warmed in the soapmaking process; the musk came out more. You can pick up your own bar of this special edition soap by clicking here, but quantities are very limited.
What sorts of scents do you like to use? Would you use something so feminine, or do you prefer a different genre of fragrance?
This is the coolest, most prettiest soap I have in this house. It has a flaming swirl that could probably take your breath away. My Mom, my sister and I made this. My Mom makes the soap. My sister stirs the colors into the oil, and I stir the colors into the soap and I hold the funnel. This was so cool to make and plenty cool to design. Mom wanted to leave the blue and gold. I wanted a swirl, so I suggested to do a tiny swirl in the center but just to the edge of the blue and gold. The funnel holding is not so fun because it gets boring. Here is a picture of the soap.
The center of our amazing Patchouli swirl.
I am also including a picture of what the funnel looks like, too. Isn’t it beautiful? That is what it looked like when we got done pouring all of the soap into the mould.
The funnel after we finish pouring all the colors for this soap.
Just gotta soap. That’s my personal justification for making a new soap out of a fragrance that simply doesn’t rock my world when I have a whole slew of “must-makes” on my dry-erase board. Sure, sometimes I get tired of soaping the same ol’ things, so I succumb to the urge to whip up something different and fun. From that urge came my newest special edition soap, Pink Sugar. This delightfully, totally girly soap is bathing bliss with a blend of some of the greatest soapmaking oils and lusciously rich coconut milk. I topped it with sparkly soap frosting and Himalayan pink salt.
My Pink Sugar Soap freshly poured into the mould
This is that same wonderful girly goodness sliced. Unfortunately, some of the salt fell off, but the inside is so pretty. I expect the white parts to turn very brown because of the vanillin content in the fragrance, which will leave me with a brown and sparkly, hot pink swirled soap. How pretty will that be!
Eight delightful little bars of Pink Sugar Soap
These will be all ready for your blissful bathing enjoyment in around three weeks. I bet you know someone who would appreciate such a girly, fun soap.
Take a look at this picture. The grass in the foreground was cut by a so-called “professional” lawn mower company. The grass in the background (up to the driveway and just beyond it), my husband cut. The “professionally cut” lawn is scalped – cut way too short – and was cut wet. I took this picture 4 days after it was mowed, and it’d rained some in the interim. By contrast, Peter (aka “swirl god”) mowed our yard, cutting it wet (it just hadn’t had a chance to dry out between showers), but mowing it with a 20″ push mower and high. The “professional” service uses a heavy-duty, top-of-the-line riding mower, has the big trailer, nice truck, and so forth.
The point I’m making is, not everyone who presents themselves as a professional knows what they’re doing. My husband is a true professional lawn care expert, knowing both the chemical care needs of various types of grasses and the best way to maintain those lawns. The company who butchered our neighbor’s lawn has demonstrated repeated ignorance of lawn care.
I see this same behavior in my industry. There are hundreds of great soapmakers out there. There are dozens of fabulous cosmetic manufacturers I know. Then there are the rest. They’ll claim their lotions are “all natural” and “preservative free,” not realizing the safety value of preservatives in lotions. That always leads me to wonder, Are they ignorant of good manufacturing practices, or are they intentionally mislabeling? Some soapmakers will say they make their own soap and do so without lye. That’s pretty much impossible, because without lye, there’s no soap – not the real stuff, anyway.
I’ve seen other soapmakers claim their soaps as “all natural” and “fragranced with essential oils.” Yet, they leave me wondering, Just which part of the gingerbread cookie do you have to press or distill to get the essential oil out? So-called “professionals” from all fields – not just lawn care and cosmetic and soap manufacturing – drive their businesses on their own ignorance and that of their customers. The part that really bothers me, though, is that these business owners or employees can cause some significant harm and expense for the people they deceive and who are ignorant enough or gullible enough to believe them.
Having business cards doesn’t make one a professional at anything, any more than wearing a choir robe means one can sing. Professional people exhibit certain characteristics.
True professionals start at a place of knowledge. Those of us who have been in the business for a long time know that it takes a lot of time and hard work to become an overnight success. Before we start, though, we learn as much as possible about our business fields.
True professionals never stop learning. Whether it’s books, forums, peers, videos, seminars or conferences, professionals always look for what more they can learn.
True professionals accept feedback graciously and seek to learn from it. Being defensive helps no one, and certainly does not keep customers.
True professionals work with integrity. Whether it’s a mislabeled soap or shooting weed and grass clippings onto a neighbor’s yard, accepting responsibility for sub-standard work only makes one look better.
True professionals realize that appearances don’t matter as much as quality work. I see lawn care companies in old trucks and open trailers do exceptionally good jobs on lawns. I mean, every. Blade. Of grass. Is. The same. Height. I watched one guy, and was just waiting for him to get out the ruler and scissors. Yet, the guy who cut the lawn above has jazzy equipment but doesn’t know his stuff. A soap company can look charming and adorable on social media, but doesn’t know correct labeling or the difference between fragrance oils and essential oils. In absolutely every facet of life, the inside needs to match the outside.
What other characteristics do you see in companies or businesses that strike you as being truly professional-grade?
