Local Yocal Ingredients - Special Soaps Using Special Ingredients

Using local ingredients adds a holistic approach when making handmade soap.  Not only does it feel great to use your own soap in the shower when you're supporting your local businesses or using ingredients from your own garden.  When someone purchases your soap with local ingredients, it adds an element that many who seek the pure, the handmade, love to see special ingredients added to a soap.  Why?  Perhaps it stops a piece of their vacation in time, like if you added sand to your soap and sold it where people typically come to escape the ice storms up north.  Then when they take it back home and use it, it brings them back to the town they loved so much and brings them a sense of relaxation.  I know when I visit an area that is new for me, I love to see local artisan's work, especially when they incorporate their immediate environment's elements.

We had a challenge called LocalYocals and it challenged all the soap makers to incorporate a local ingredients into their soap.  I thought it would keep people thinking about ingredients and how simple one local ingredient could transform a regular soap into a gem.

We had some great entries with unique ingredients!  Here are some to give you an idea of what YOU can do to spark it  up.


Curtis Hayden used multiple ingredients from his area in Charleston, South Carolina:

Basic Beach by Curtis Hayden

"This soap features a cold pressed juice from my local juice shop Huriyali which gets the majority of its produce from local farms. The juice is their "Aloe-Ha" juice consisting of raw unpasteurized coconut water, raw local honey, and much more! I don't see how I could get more local than that! But then I figured out a way to get even more local, I used sand from one of the local beaches I go to all the time on the bottom of the soap!! Scented with 3 different scents and made with a lot of love! The juice shop is actually featuring this soap in their store and the pictures I am featuring of the soap were taken at their store!"

Bhakti Iyata lives in Phoenix, Arizona and used her local ingredients:

Desert Flower Soap by Bhakti Iyata 

"Desert Flower Soap, made with Prickly Pear Cactus Extract (Prickly Pear Products, LLC Mesa, Arizona) and scented with Cactus Flower FO. Hand molded flowering cactus and little hummingbirds on top."

Leanne Timm-Chevallier lives in Southwest France and used THREE local ingredients!

Soap by Leanne Timm-Chevallier

 "Love this challenge ! For the Local Ingredient challenge, I used local organic french green lentils from a farmer down the road here in SW France.... I also used local Duck Fat.  Makes a nice scrubby soap. Colour is Chlorophyll powder."

There were so many good entries......great soaps, but I can only choose a few to feature.  Thank you everyone, for trying out new ingredients!  It always feels like you all take these challenges to heart and that makes me happy.  :D

We will be taking a break from Challenges until well after the holidays, but I'll be back with some beautiful pictures as I spot them.  So keep it real and send me pictures anytime!  Maybe YOU will be featured in my Soap Porn!  Send pics of YOUR soaps to me at joannaschmidt@live.com.  Leave your name, email, where you live and if you'd like to share, ingredients you used.   Have a great Thanksgiving holiday and stay clean!

xox Joanna

More Than Meets The Eye Soap Challenge Winner

I try never judge my insides with other people's outsides.  Meaning: never compare how you feel on the inside to what others LOOK like they feel on the outside.

A few days ago, a friend of mine from college killed himself.  He just couldn't take the pain anymore. "He was in a black place for a long time... for years", our mutual friend told me.  I can't help but think that Facebook and other social media had something to do with multiplying the inner turmoil when he already suffered from the abyss of depression.  Social media spits out mini mouthfuls of people's lives that they choose to share.  Someone's happy selfie could be the mask behind a deeper, darker truth.

I believe this Soap Challenge came at the right time in more than one way.  The challenge was to create a soap where the outside represents how you believe you're perceived and inside how you actually feel.

I want to thank everyone who posted their photos for participating, but I'd like to remind you that this was a challenge about making your soap to reflect YOU.  Inside.  Outside.  I don't think a few of you understood the challenge.  It's okay, though.  Moving forward --------

More Than Meets The Eye Challenge Winner 

Bethany Petri of Infused

Bethany tells about her soap:  

"I am very quiet in person. Some even see me as cold/dark. But once I get to know you, and you me, and I let those barriers down, there is a world of endless discovery! I also love to reuse and re-purpose. So this soap is a complete re-batch of older batches that I had laying around. Not one new soap was used. And I always wanted to make a planetary soap and finally did!"

AND FOR THE RUNNER UP!

 

Tanya Rasley of Canard Labs

Tanya about her soap:
On the outside: Loud, Colorful, Somewhat Organized, Extraverted
But inside: Beautiful Organized Chaos. A secret introvert (blue) surrounded by creativity (green), with a touch of beauty (white), kindness (pink) and joy (yellow)

 ~~~~~~~~~~~

Thank you for putting your heart into this one.  It was a heartache for me, even though I didn't get to show you my soap.  I left it with family.  I will update.....

Peace.  And until the next time.... be yourself and don't forget to say "I love you"

Today, I dedicate everything to Greg.

All of the challenge entry photos were posted here (with the hashtag #morethanmeetstheeye )