The Power of Positive Thinking

I attended a training course today and the key concept behind it was the power of positive thought ... I had some thoughts about it on the train home. 

We all have days where we get up in the morning and think "oh no, not another day - isn't it Friday yet already?".  But how often do we think that? Once, twice a week? More? I wonder how much that negative thought affects the rest of the day - seems to make sense that, if you start the day with a negative thought, surely the rest could go downhill after that.  How about thinking "ok, another day to wake up and do lots of things, meet people, laugh, hug my husband, love life"... it's probably a bit too touchy-feely for lots of us to accept but I'm interested in trying to adjust my thinking to see how much that positivity affects my daily life. 

The theory goes that thinking positively builds confidence, improves your attitude to life, helps you cope better with the stresses and strains we encounter everyday and helps you to visualise positive outcomes - which is supposed to help you achieve your goals. 

I think I'm a pretty positive person all in all but there's always room for improvement for us all! So I'm going to work on this .... think more positively, see the good side of things more, find the silver lining! I find my soaping a hugely positive project in my life - the creativity helps me release tensions and strains and the mental thought process of designing new products really challenges me and gets those synapses sparking! Working on increasing my positive thought can only help me more.  Why not join me in this ... see how it works for you. 

Irish Blog Awards Nomination for Soaperstar!

Well... I am tickled pink, and purple, and green and red and orange and all the colours of the rainbow! Why you say? Because the blog you're reading right now has been nominated for the Irish Blog Awards 2010 in the Pop Culture Category.

I'm just delighted.. it's a long list of nominees and I might not have the best chance in the world but hey, I really am delighted to have been nominated at all.  The awards night is being held on 27 March in Galway - I imagine that judges will short list (from the long list) and then decide the winners.  So I may never get an opportunity to wear some fancy schmancy dress on the red carpet but no matter, I'm pretty happy as it is right now!

So, the next question is, should I practice my speech?!!

Fabulous new Soaps! Rain Shower & Oriental Crush

As I said in my Facebook/Twitter post, I've been a little poorly lately but I've still managed to go ahead and make two stunning new soaps... I'm really proud of these.  Both are made with our excellent quality goatsmilk and glycerine soap, which, if you're a regular reader of this blog, you'll know I'm completely in love with! I just adore them because they are so excellent for your skin - glycerine is a natural humectant... a what now? I hear you say.... it simply means that it draws moisture from the air into your skin, which means that it helps you have silkly soft skin.  As usual, I also add an Ecocert skin hydrating factor - I find this so incredible to increase your skin's moisture levels - honestly, I've made lots of soaps, some with this and some without and there is NO way on this earth that I'd make any without this in it.  As you know, I will NEVER sell anything I wouldn't use myself and I wouldn't not add this hydration factor (you know what I mean, I never said I had a degree in English!). 

First up, we have our new Rain Shower goatsmilk glycerine soap - unusually for me, it's actually quite a muted coloured soap (you know me, I do love my colours) but I had a beautifully fresh fragrance oil and had been trying to design a soap for an age that'd do it justice.  Then I thought ... pastel, muted, calm, clean, soft ... and here we have Rain Shower. 

Rain Shower - what can I say about this fragrance? To me, it's such a fresh and light scent and it reminds me of the smell of a garden straight after a rain shower - you know that clean, fresh fragrance that smells like the world's worries have been washed away and everything's all clean again?  Along with the excellent qualities of the goatsmilk and glycerine soap, we've added pure Avocado Butter - this is a very rich and moisturising butter cold pressed from the pulp of the avocado. The soap is wonderfully pastel coloured and calming with a hint of glisten provided through the used of natural mica. It has a blend of soft turquoise (THE colour of 2010) with cool green and pure creamy white and a soft glisten.  Our Rain Shower Fragrance Oil is a fresh aquatic blend of lily of the valley, gardenia, raindrops, mist & clean green countryside - so reminiscent of the fresh scent of a spring day, after a rain shower.  I think this is such a wonderfully uplifting and fresh soap - a perfect start to your day.

Then I decided to go crazy and make my next soap, Oriental Crush - this one took a minimum of 4 hours! I stopped counting after that!! Each of the soap "bubbles" is moulded seperately and have to be hand trimmed before embedding into the goatsmilk white soap.  It is really perfect for all skin types, and especially those suffering from dry skin conditions.  Along with the usual skin hydrating factor, I have also added pure Coconut Oil, which has been called the healthiest oil on earth - it has incredible abilities to moisturise your skin and is particularly good with dry or mature skin. Oriental Crush is fragranced with a blend of zesty lime & mandarin, leading to a base of basil with warm accords of precious woods & amber. To match the scent perfectly, we've used glistening brightly coloured spots of glycerine soap in co-ordinating colours. The soap is wonderfully citrusy with a herbal background - a very beautiful blend and a perfect oriental influence. This really is a wonderfully fresh and zesty soap and will gently scent your skin throughout the day.

I hope you're enjoyed a glimpse of our two new soaps ... I just loved making these (even if they took ages to make!) and I LOVE LOVE LOVE the fragrances.  If you are interested in purchasing either of these soaps, or in fact any in our ever extending range, don't hesitate to check out our online store at http://www.soaperstar.com/ - we'll be delighted to see you!!!

10 Reasons to check out our Soaperstar soap

I've been spending time thinking about all the good things about Soaperstar and our soaps and I thought I'd share these with you ... Soaperstar and our soaps are our passion and it's important to us that our customers understand how much we want to produce the very best quality soaps so that we can share this passion with you.  Here are 10 reasons why you should check out our Soaperstar Soap:

1. All our soaps are wonderfully fragranced using only the finest quality fragrance oils sourced from EU suppliers 
2. Our soaps are completely suitable for use by vegetarians - we do use goatsmilk in our products because we find the soap it produces is of such a high quality and is exceptionally kind to your skin   
3. None of our products are tested on animals - we deplore such practices.  We do test on guinea pigs though... human ones of course!!!!  
4. Our products are fully safety assessed by a qualified cosmetic chemist - you can be assured that they are entirely safe for you to use  
5. We source all of our raw materials from the highest quality suppliers only - lots of time (and money) has been put into finding the best suppliers so that we can categorically say our products are of the highest quality 
6. We are continuously testing and experimenting in order to bring you new types of soaps - we love to come up with new, creative ideas to present to you!  
7. All our soaps are fully compliant with EU regulations regarding the correct labelling of cosmetic products - unlike some companies, we do not fudge our words in order to make you think you know what's in the soap, we just tell you what's in the soap!  
8. We use only the finest quality soap safe colourants, and, in substantial quantities, natural mineral micas in order to colour and add a wonderful glisten to our soaps  
9. We can categorically say that our soaps will help to clean, soften and hydrate your skin.  We add eithers butters or oils to all of our soaps and an additional skin hydrating Ecocert approved ingredient to ensure that your skin is as soft and silky as it deserves to be.  Since we opened for business last year, we have received only positive feedback and compliments from our customers  
10. We are totally committed to providing the best customer service ever - we keep in touch with our customers via email and always confirm delivery.  

We love designing, making, producing, wrapping, labelling, photographing and selling our soaps - this business is our love, our passion and we wanted to share this passion with all of our customers!  I hope you enjoyed this and, if it's given you inspiration to check out our soaps, please do not hesitate to visit our website at http://www.soaperstar.com/. 

January Special Offer from Soaperstar!

To help celebrate a New Year and a new decade, we're introducing a special offer for January 2010 only!

Buy 4 of our luxury handcrafted glycerine soaps and get a 5th, mystery soap for free! That's right, entirely free!

Just place an order for 4 or more soaps between now and 31 January 2010, and I'll include a free bar of soap with your order!

What a great offer - we've lots of choices of our fabulous luxury handcrafted goatsmilk and glycerine soaps on our website at http://www.soaperstar.com/ so come and choose your favourites today!

Soaperstar appears in De-Stress Magazine!

Soaperstar has been featured in the Winter edition of De-Stress Magazine, produced by Catherine Connors-Bevalot, a holistic and stress therapist based in Paris.  In a true reflection of how important online networking can be, we met via Twitter and Catherine kindly offered me a spot in the Winter edition of her magazine.  At the time of asking, I hadn't even opened the online store and the thought of being featured was scary but very exciting at the same time! Check us out on Page 6!!!

The magazine contains fantastic information about how to de-stress for Christmas and how to avoid those stressy pitfalls we've all experienced over the Christmas period.  Check it out - great articles and tons of information suitable for everyone. 

Catherine's company is called Stress Solutions 4 Life and her website can be found here http://www.stress-solutions4life.com/.  Thank you Catherine!

All the soaps featured in the magazine are available to purchase via our online store http://www.soaperstar.com - drop by and make your Christmas shopping experience a joy!!!

Restocking of two favourites!

We have restocked two of our customers favourite soaps! As with all handcrafted products, each time you make one, it's slightly different each time.. that's the beauty of them, you get a totally unique item every time!

So, introducing (again) our Twilight Haze soap - a handcrafted luxury cocoa butter & glycerine soap with added Apricot Kernel Oil, skin hydrating factor, and our Twilight Haze Fragrance Oil - a unisex blend of pomegranates, raspberries, plums & pink peppercorns on a base of frankincense, patchouli & dark spicy woods.  This soap is totally SLS free also!

And our Chunky Choc Delite, a handcrafted luxury goatsmilk & glycerine soap with added Apricot Kernel Oil, skin hydration factor and our Chunky Choc Delite Fragrance Oil - a richly decadent milk chocolate scent on a vanilla cream base.

 

Both are now available to purchase in our online store at Soaperstar's Online Store - http://www.soaperstar.com - drop in soon!!!!

Sorry no posts lately!

We've just come back from London on a short trip which was over the weekend, which, as regular readers will know, is my soaping time! So now I'm itching to get back into it and just wondering what type I should make next? And I'm thinking that I need to do some restocking.. so what about making some more Chunky Choc Delite, and some Twilight Haze too? And I really need to work on that soap for men ... I've been asked to think about a scrubby element in that ... hmmm I need to think about that, what would be best I wonder?

So it's restocking time for Soaperstar - which is great because it shows just how popular those soaps have been!

Now the interesting thing will be if I can make them so that they look just like this again! That's the great thing with handcrafted items, one piece never looks the same as the next so you know that you are truly buying a special item!

Check out Soaperstar's Online Store for all our soaps ... we'd love to see you there!! Soaperstar's Online Store!!!