Handmade by Me Thursday Blog Hop

I've joined in a Thursday Blog Hop hosted by Handmade by Me forum which you can find here and I was introduced to it by Carolee Crafts.  So, if you'd like to join, just click on the Carolee Crafts link and join in!

I've been a little busy this weekend making videos!

I've been a little busy this weekend making videos .. I've not made one in a while and just felt like showing people how I made my soaps.  I got a great response from the making of Adam & Eve video that I did another two today, both cutting soaps ... Black Raspberry Vanilla and the Adam & Eve shown in the previous video. 

So, here you go, for your viewing pleasure, two new videos:

Cutting Black Raspberry Vanilla:



Cutting Adam & Eve: 



Hope you enjoy!!!

New Video - The Making of a Soap

Well, I've run out of a few of my most popular soaps so have been working too get them made and cured before people start shouting at me!

Last night, I did a remake of our very popular Adam & Eve soap, a black and white, Vanilla Anise fragranced soap (this is a DIVINE fragrance) and Titch and I decided to video the whole process. 

There are a few technical issues in the video... for one, the video was in 3 parts originally, the first part was silent for some reason (I have no idea why I didn't speak), but I managed to get them all together.  Then I left a spoon in one of my jugs and promptly poured a ton of soap on it (d'oh!) and then the video cut off again. 

But, no matter, it's a good video (I think) so I wanted to show it to you.  I'm embedding the video itself but I think that doesn't show up on the email subscription so I'm including the link too.

Enjoy!!

http://youtu.be/fpTwxwK849k

Snow Angel

I just wanted to show you the last of my Christmas themed soaps - well, actually they're more Autumn/Winter because I didn't want to do any Christmas specific soaps (the ones you might be left with once 25 December is history, you know what I mean?). 

So here is Snow Angel ... she was a real pain to make to be honest.  This fragrance acted up big time on me and riced and heated up so I managed to stick blend it into submission.  I had plopped some into my pre mixed titanium dioxide so that ended up in it and I stick blended the life out of it (or into it, maybe?) and poured it quickly into my waiting mould.

For the first time, I put a soap into the freezer - I just knew the fridge wasn't going to be cold enough to cool it sufficiently to stop it gelling.  I left it in the freezer for the full day, popped it into the fridge overnight and then left it out, demoulded for 24 hours before cutting. 

She actually worked out really well and I love her! She's got a love dusting of icy glistening glitter and she smells just wonderful.  The fragrance is  is a warm Winters blend of Mistletoe, Pink Pepper, Cardamom, Frankincense, Clove, Patchouli & Amber - it's beautiful, simple and yet complex at the same time.

So, here is my Snow Angel .. enjoy!

Hope you enjoy the images - this will be online from mid November at http://www.iamhandmade.com/. 

Winters Day

As some of you will know, I've been showing off my new Christmas soaps on Facebook.  The last post showed you our Very Merry Berry which has been a huge hit with almost half the batch now on pre-order lists!

Today I'm featuring Winters Day - this is a polar white and ice blue soap, made with our own blend of Sweet Almond, Golden Olive and Avocado Oils with lashings of creamy Cocoa Butter.  It's coloured with titanium dioxide for the white and a small amount of pearl blue mica.  It's all dusted with an icy glisten of cosmetic glitter.

The fragrance is described as a crisp Winter blend of mild Menthol, Pine, Spruce, Eucalyptus, Lavender & Cedarwood ... it's a really lovely fragrance, clean and clear.  With the menthol and eucalyptus, I thought it might smell somewhat like a flu fighter but nope, it's smoothe and fresh and just so lovely. 

So, for your viewing pleasure, here is our Winters Day soap - it will be fully cured by mid November and on the site then.

Really hope you like this soap - drop me a line if you have any comments or queries and don't forget to check out our new website at http://www.iamhandmade.com/.

Very Merry Berry

Here's a look at my new Christmas soap (added to Fig & Brown Sugar and Winter Orange Spice) .. she's called Very Merry Berry and she's made with Sweet Almond Oil, Golden Olive Oil, Avocado Oil and lashings of Cocoa Butter.  She's coloured with vibrant berry colours - purple and reddish pink, alongside polar white and she has a generous dusting of icy glistening glitter on top.

Her fragrance is a juicy blend of Raspberry, Cranberry and Orange and oh my goodness, does she smell good!! Sooo delicious!

She's off to cure for the next 6 weeks and will be ready by mid November... if you'd like to pre-order, you can drop me an email at info@iamhandmade.com and I'll put one by for you; be quick though, because there are pre-orders already in for her (and that's without any pictures!). 

So, I invite you to ogle her, Very Merry Berry:

Hope you like them!

Celine @ http://www.iamhandmade.com/

New Website!

Hi everyone, sorry it's been quiet here again for the last while.  I've been mega busy with work and also working on a new website design.  But, thankfully, I can now announce that the new site is up and running!

It's been a LOT of work - you keep thinking of new things that you need to do, or small changes and it seems never ending.  I doubt it's ever really finished of course.  I moved from my old provider because they just weren't giving me the facilities I needed and I have to say I'm delighted with the new provider ... fab new features, great order management and some lovely new features such as being able to offer discount codes etc. 

So, apologies for my lack of posts ... here's a screenshot of the front page but, please, do have a look at the site and tell me what you think.  Oh and if you see anything that I need to change, drop me a line here ... it's great to have new eyes looking at the thing I've been working on for so long!

Hope you like the new site ... click on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ and see what you think.