Shave Soap

I made this batch last night.  I guess it is shave soap because I used bentonite clay in my recipe to assist in "slip".

I did not scent this one, although I am sorry I didn't because half the fun for me is smelling soaps!  The color "swirl" on top is soap mixed with blueberry fiber.  I just cut it, so we'll have to let it cure and then see how it performs.  Hopefully, it can help with my shaving dilemma.  I am still tending to a major gash from 3 weeks ago when I borrowed my husband straight razor.  That was like Psycho in the shower, blood everywhere.  I looked at the old fashioned bakelite razor to find a hunk of my leg still attached to the shiny blade.   Evidence of poor shaving skills. 

Sorry.  I just gave myself the willies, too.

Happy Mother's Day!

Motor:: Cat #2 - Final Cat Post

The totally crazy one.  

He picked us and that is the story and I am sticking to it.  About three and a half years ago, we went to the local shelter to find a cat to adopt.

We were at the pound and this medium sized black kitten meowed and cried and climbed right up my arm and sat on my shoulder, pushing his nose and face into my neck, as if he were trying to get closer than was humanly or feline-ally possible.  He was such a love, we decided it was meant to be.  He chose us.  Maybe our late Tiger wanted this cat with us.  To watch over us.  When you have kids, the impossibility of pre- child rearing beliefs become a possibility and magic can consume the tender hearted for a fleeting moment here and there.  Moms, don't lie!

devil  - demon  - kuckoo

ready to pounce the camera

Okay, so we took Motor home and he was instantly a handful.

We had a screen enclosed pool area.  He climbed it from the outside and proceeded to whine and cry until we could extract him and his fierce claws from his death grip from our second story bedroom window screen.  

When he wants something, he whines and cries big ugly cries.  Not a nudge or a wink.  A wail.  

He runs in front of me when I start walking, as if he is trying to race me and guess where I'm going. Half the time, I trip over him.  Yeah.  Funny. There is a lot of tripping and mumbling under ones breath over here with dear Moti. 

He wails to go out.  5 minutes go by.  He wails to come in.  (sigh)  This isn't something one can ignore, either.  He doesn't have a stopping point.  He'll just continue until pigs fly.

But there is the other side of the cat.  Motor rocks and we all love him.

He loves us like no other.  When one of us is feeling blue or sick, or is in pain, he'll come from nowhere and lie right on top of the pained one.  Directly on top of the belly or chest and won't leave until you get up or start feeling better.

His fur is like silk.

He purrs and meows a soft, broken crackling sound as if he has learned the barking skill from Sippowitz, but on a gentler side.  Sippowitz barks when he is hungry, Motor crackles when he is content and on someone who is touching him.

He sleeps at my feet every single night.

He sleeps on his back, fully outstretched (a total of two feet long, legs wide open and snores. Loudly.

He likes to drink the water at the bottom of the shower when I'm done instead of using the fresh water in his bowl.  Must be a ritualistic black magic thing.

He is good luck, despite what the books all say about a black cat crossing your path.

So there you have it.

Cat #1:  Sippowitz (aka Kitty or Fatty)  Adopted him in 1993

Cat #2:  Motor (aka Moti or Triangle Head)  Adopted in 2004

Cat #3:  Dot (aka Fot or Girlie)  Adopted 2006

My three cats.  I don't think one is considered a "cat lady" until many more are acquired, so I am good.

Product Radar:: Splish Splash Funky Soap

....shapes in soaps....

SPLISH SPLASH in Australia has some very cool, fun loving soaps.  They are all natural, not melt and pour (MP) according to their website.  I love the way they photograph their soap, a slice of soap alongside the loaf.  I always am interested by how both look.

Wish I had a few bars to cheer up my desk and ultimately my shower!

Very fun.  It cheered me up all the way over here from Australia. :)

Dot

Dot, sleeping poolside

Dot, cat #3.

Gentlest of all cats.  Sweet smelling head and neck.  

Likes to play with salamanders until they stop playing back.

Sleeps in awkward places and in the strangest positions. 

When she was tiny, she was full of mange with bald spots.  

Now she is soft and smells like perfume....?

Demands head lick kisses from Motor, cat #2.

She likes to sleep with the kids.  

Notice she is resting her head on "puppy" and resting her hand on Desi.

She likes all the soaps you all send.  True.  She smells them all.  :)

Cat In The Box

My first of three, Sippowitz (aka "kitty" or "fatty").  How is it that cats find the most uncomfortable places to snuggle up?

Bamboo Paraphernalia by Feito Fibra

These are all bamboo and steel and made in Brazil and designed by by Feito Fibra.  Wish I had the soap dish  So elegant!  You can find these at Nest.

As shown:  Bamboo Hook, Wall Soap Dish, Double Hook, Utility Cup and Soap Dish.

purdy

Pamplemousse

Pink, cream,rose petals and sea salt crystals...oh my!  I have received many many bars of soap to review and having made soaps myself, realize that it is hard to scent soaps. There are so many variables, heat, timing, quality of fragrance or essential oils, curing...  Also the taste in scents can be a huge positive or negative depending on the soap/soap maker.  There aren't a large number of soaps I have tried where I can't stop sniffing the darn bar.

This is one of them.

Pamplemousse Soap with shea butter

My nose and Pamplemousse had some alone time together.  Not only is this soap perfectly scented with pink grapefruit and a touch of rose, it is also so beautiful!  I love the texture combination, the color combination and the soap concoction that Heather so masterfully put together.

Mimosa Soap Cake

This Soap Cake comes in this beautiful box with a bow.  The "cake" portion is regular soap, while the "frosting" is also soap, but feels a bit softer, perhaps whipped.  Fantastic!  It smelled mimosa-ey and it was WAY too fun to wash.  I am going to have to get more of these, because my son might actually not fight me when I direct him to wash his NECK!

Heather is a stay at home mother of four children, lives in rural Vermont, owns Twin Birch Bath and Body and writes a blog about her life and soap making.  A multi-tasker, for sure.  It definitely takes a certain kind of person to even have four kids, let alone do anything else on top of that!  Wow!  Heather is very talented and creative and I urge you to purchase her soap and anything else she sells in her Etsy shop.  But that Pamplemousse?  I hope she never stops making it.  It is too good.

Product Radar :: The Cottage Bath

I found The Cottage Bath this morning and had to share.  These soaps look so inviting.  They are located in California and use goat's milk from their own goats.

French Vanilla Creme (vanilla + goat's milk)

Medieval Magic (beeswax + honey)

May day (mix of orange, tangerine, grapefruit + peach)

Freak Foam in Wales

"Cappuccino Coast: The day the Pacific was whipped up into an ocean of froth"article reprinted from the Daily Mail (link below)
By RICHARD SHEARS

From the Daily Mail from September of 2007:

Foam swallowed an entire beach and half the nearby buildings, including the local lifeguards’ centre, in a freak display of nature at Yamba in New South Wales.

One minute a group of teenage surfers were waiting to catch a wave, the next they were swallowed up in a giant bubble bath. The foam was so light that they could puff it out of their hands and watch it float away.

It stretched for 30 miles out into the Pacific in a phenomenon not seen at the beach for more than three decades.

Scientists explain that the foam is created by impurities in the ocean, such as salts, chemicals, dead plants, decomposed fish and excretions from seaweed. All are churned up together by powerful currents which cause the water to form bubbles. These bubbles stick to each other as they are carried below the surface by the current towards the shore.

As a wave starts to form on the surface, the motion of the water causes the bubbles to swirl upwards and, massed together, they become foam. The foam “surfs” towards shore until the wave “crashes”, tossing the foam into the air.

“It’s the same effect you get when you whip up a milk shake in a blender,” explains a marine expert. “The more powerful the swirl, the more foam you create on the surface and the lighter it becomes.”

In this case, storms off the New South Wales Coast and further north off Queensland had created a huge disturbance in the ocean, hitting a stretch of water where there was a particularly high amount of the substances which form into bubbles.

Bizarre, yes?