Soaperstar

Soap Sale Now On!

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Fri, 25 May 2012 17:45:00 +0000

Did you know we have a sale on? Yep, all our fully cured soaps are on sale now ... 12% off from now until Tuesday next midnight (GMT).

No code, no voucher needed ... all the prices are already reduced for you ... just find what you want to buy and order!

Why not go and treat yourself or your friends and family right now... http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/cat_549886-Available-Now.html is the link you'll need! So make sure to treat yourself and enjoy before next Tuesday!

Kokomo Joe - Pure Essential Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Mon, 21 May 2012 15:55:00 +0000

Here is another of my Pure Essential Soap collection ... this is called Kokomo Joe and it's made with Coffee infused with Coconut overnight, then liquidised and strained. Then I added in a whole fresh Banana, and Coconut milk and liquidised again.

I added the organic White Chocolate to my oils - Sweet Almond and Olive oils with Cocoa Butter and allowed everything to melt together. To the lye water, I added my Silk, as always. I used White Clay & Colloidal Oatmeal also because they are just stunning in soap and to them I added my fragrance of Coffee & Bourbon Vanilla CO2 extracts with a spiced background of warm Nutmeg.

As you'll see from the cut pictures, the soaps are a lovely coffee colour with lots of speckles from the vanilla pod seeds ... plus we sprinkled it with dried Coconut, just cos we could!

The soap is available for pre-order now on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2032605-Kokomo-Joe-PreOrder-Cure-Date-25-June.html but order quickly cos there are only 7 left!

We made a video for the Making Of... and Cutting Of... this soap so I'm showing you those too!

Making of Kokomo Joe:

Direct You Tube Link: http://youtu.be/Ies4xMeL404

Cutting of Kokomo Joe:

Direct You Tube Link: http://youtu.be/ZD9WA6LbxeQ

Cut Pictures (courtesy of Titch Holland at http://www.facebook.com/takenbytitch)

International Soap Swap - Sabons Carmeta & iamhandmade.com

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 20 May 2012 11:18:00 +0000

The wonderful Julia from the Soap Artists blog (http://www.soapartists.blogspot.com) organised a HUGE international soap swap and I was picked to swap with Carmen from Sabons Carmeta based in Spain. I was a little behind in sending out my parcel but I held off on my blog post for her soaps until she received mine. Then Titch and I did a video and Titch did a photo shoot of the soaps. They were all fabulous, the packaging (as you'll see in the video) was amazing and she even included her own, homegrown, lavender which will definitely be included in one of my soaps very very soon. She sent a wonderful selection of her soaps and they all smelt incredible .. check out the video for our reactions, we were VERY happy indeed. Below are the stills photos that Titch took, I think you'll agree the soaps look amazing and Titch's photos really brought out their natural beauty.

Check out Sabons Carmeta on http://www.sabonscarmeta.blogpsot.com if you would like more info about her soaps... her post about my soaps is there too (I can't seem to link the title I'm afraid, pity). If you'd like to see more of Titch's photos, check out her page at http://www.facebook.com/takenbytitch. All our soaps can be seen and bought on http://www.iamhandmade.com.

Thank you so much Julia for introducing us and thanks SOOOOOOOO much to Carmen for allowing me to experience and enjoy your soaps xxxx

Enjoy!

Lime Light - Pure Essential Handmade Irish Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sat, 19 May 2012 20:56:00 +0000

Here's another in our Pure Essential Soap collection...Lime Light - made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils, Aloe Vera, Wheatgrass, Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal, Lime Zest, Cocoa Butter & Pure Silk.

This incredible soap is fragranced with our own essential oil blend of lashings of zesty, Italian Sweet Limes, softened with herbal Rosemary & freshened with soothing Eucalyptus and a dash of Cedarwood essential oils and is coloured with a wheatgrass infusion. Topped with a generous sprinkling of Black Poppy Seeds.

Available for pre-order on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2027215-Lime-Light-PreOrder-Cure-Date-18-June.html. Thanks to Titch from http://www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her fab photos!

Cutting Lime Light:

http://youtu.be/mkQ7ccu2Bn0

Cut Pictures:

Lavender Rose Chocolat - Pure Essential Irish Handmade Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Fri, 18 May 2012 16:46:00 +0000

Here's another of my new Pure Essential Soap range (all handmade in Ireland). This is Lavender Rose Chocolat and it smells sooooooooooooooo good!

It's made with Organic Dark Mayan Gold Chocolate (we got a big bar and ate the rest!), Rhassoul Mud, Kaolin Clay, handmade Oat Milk made using Irish Organic Oatflakes, Colloidal Oats and Organic Unrefined Dark Chocolate Cocoa Butter. Whew!! The soap is a very dark brown, almost black even and I've no doubt that's from the dark chocolate and the dark cocoa butter... nom!!

It's fragranced with an essential oil blend of 5 Fold Orange, Bourbon Geranium & French Lavender with a drizzle of Dark Patchouli... just incredible. You get a slight hint of chocolate in there too, it's not mega chocolate soap but has the warmth that chocolate brings.

It's available for pre-order now on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2027232-Lavender-Rose-Chocolat-PreOrder-Cure-Date-18-June.html. Huge thanks to Titch for her fab photos www.facebook.com/takenbytitch.

We made a Making Of... video and a Cutting video too so I'm linking them both here as well, with all the finished images at the end. Enjoy!!!

Making Of Lavender Rose Chocolat

http://youtu.be/vGQDGn7tRF0

Cutting Of Lavender Rose Chocolat

http://youtu.be/Bu50vbBX6Ys

Final Images:

Hope you like!!!

Lemon Provence - Pure Essential Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Tue, 15 May 2012 20:16:00 +0000

Here is the second of the new Pure Essential Soap collection - Lemon Provence. This soap is made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils, Oat Milk, Manuka Honey, Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal, Cocoa Butter & Pure Silk. The colour comes from a little Tumeric which makes a lovely buttery yellow.

I made my own Oatmilk for this ... I took 4 cups of distilled water and 1 cup of organic Irish oatflakes and they sat, soaking, all night. The next day, I liquidised them together until they made a milk. I was going to sieve the milk to remove the oats but they were so finely mixed in that I decided to use them in the soap. It makes the soap very slightly exfoliating. I also love the little flecks the oats leave in the soap. The only thing I'd say about using full oatmilk for your soaps is that the lye doesn't mix in well with it - at my first mix, the lye clumped into very hard lumps so that had be carefully disposed of. For this soap, I made a 50/50 lye solution with distilled water and then used the oatmilk for the additional liquid values.. that worked perfectly.

Manuka Honey is a well known skin loving ingredient with anti-bacterial properties, Kaolin Clay is perfect for all types of skin especially sensitive and dry skin types and colloidal oatmeal just adds to the goodness the organic oats brings to the party.

The soap is fragranced with our own essential oil blend of lemony May Chang & soothing French
Lavender with a drop of deep Cedarwood to create a citrusy, relaxing divine scent.

It will be available for Pre-Order on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2027231-Lemon-Provence-PreOrder-Cure-Date-18-June.html. Many thanks to Titch Holland from www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her video work.

Enough talk ... here are the photos! Hope you enjoy them!

Zingara - Pure Essential Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 13 May 2012 12:50:00 +0000

With our Pure Beer soap collection creating a LOT of interest, and due to the things I learnt from working with beer and other additives, I decided I wanted to work on another collection of soaps.. this one is called the Pure Essential Soap collection.

Pure Essential Soap is going to be a collection (number as yet undetermined) of 100% natural soaps, all with additives that are proven to perform for your skin, with natural colours and all fragranced with pure essential oils. This was quite a challenge for me as, any regular reader will know that I LOVE my colours and I'm, what's known in the trade, as a complete FOHO (FO is short for fragrance oil and ho is... well, ya know). To move to work only with natural colours and essential oil (or EO) blends was a bit of a leap for me ... but YAY to that! Again, if you're a regular reader, you'll know I love a good challenge! I need to always push myself to do something different, something new, something a little out of my comfort zone... otherwise things get a little samey, a little too easy.

So how did I go about planning the Pure Essential Soap collection? In the intial stages, I thought "what would I like to see for sale .. if I could make any soap but within the 100% natural boundary, what would I want". That's always my own personal starting point. Then, once I had a few thoughts under my belt, the iamhandmade.com team had a meeting ... well, ok.. me and Titch and Malky were driving down to Cork one day and we did some brainstorming in the car but hey, that's a meeting right? We threw around more ideas and names and what might be added and came up with a plan, at least four solid ideas for soaps and ideas for more. I like that type of planning, it makes my brain go fizzing in all sorts of directions.

So ... the next set of blog posts will be about the Pure Essential Soap collection, the first being Zingara.

Zingara is made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils along with tons of creamy Cocoa Butter. We then added Goatsmilk, Pink and White Clays, Colloidal Oatmeal & Pure Silk.

As I'm using only natural colours and fragrances, I decided to try out two colours (yeah, why do one when you can do two?). The bottom layer of the soap is coloured using Pink Clay which came out a really lovely deep dusky pink and the top layer is coloured pale yellow using Tumeric - this was added to the soap at trace so it's given a lovely light speckle to the finished soap. The line dividing both layers is my VERY FIRST Cocoa Line which I actually hadn't planned but then, once the pink layer was poured, I decided to just go for it. I was a little nervous as I know that the soap can split along this line if the cocoa is put on too thickly so I was very careful. Hubs was fascinated by this and watched over me doing this. I wanted to shadow the use of this cocoa again in the soap so decided, at the end of making it and making the textured tops, to dust the cocoa, very sparingly, on the top of the soap, once made.

Whilst I use white clay in almost every soap now (great for all skin types, even sensitive and dry, and adds a lovely glide to the soap .. plus its great for use as a shaving soap too), I hadn't ventured very much into coloured clays until I started using them with the Pure Beer Collection.

Pink Clay is excellent for dry, sensitive & mature skin types and is just a lovely colour. It has a softening affect that refines the skin texture & provides hydration through moisturising properties. This delicate clay has firming and toning elements that improve connective tissue so it is perfect for more sensitive skin types.

I really wanted to use Goatsmilk in the soap as I'm a huge fan of it's skin loving benefits. It's packed with vitamins A, B6, B12 and E and is a wonderful natural emollient. The high content of capric, caprylic and caproic acids act as a natural AHA, exfoliating deal skin cells and balancing the pH of the new, healthy skin underneath.

When we were discussing colours and fragrances, I'd just taken delivery of stunning 5 Fold Orange and a Pink Grapefruit essential oils. I just had to use them. To deepen the fragrance and soften it, I added the Bourbon Geranium (which, any who buys essential oils lately, knows how expensive it's become) and I anchored the whole blend with some Dark Indonesian Patchouli - one of my favourite essential oils, it adds a depth and warmth to a blend.

So, do you want to see some pictures? Oh yeah!!! Here you go....

Zingara is available to pre-order now online, http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2027227-Zingara-PreOrder-Cure-Date-13-June.html, so make sure to order as soon as possible before these are sold out.

Where's the Summer?! Right here!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Thu, 10 May 2012 17:08:00 +0000

Ok I am sooooooooo tired of this weather... I drove to work this morning in the fog and rain and I drove home in the fog and rain (in between, I got mega frizzy hair from working to and from lunch in the rain too!).

So, in an attempt to lure the SUN (remember what that is?) here, I'm offering a discount code from right now, right this second, to midnight on Sunday ... put in the code Summer12 in the discount code box when you order anything in the store, and you'll get 12% of everything! Excluding P+P sadly, the Post Office isn't that nice to me.

So, lets try and start the summer right here, right now... Summer12 and gets 12% discount from now til midnight Sunday... Enjoy!!!

Pure Beer Soaps - Round Up

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Tue, 08 May 2012 20:14:00 +0000

Well, we've reached the end of our six pack of beer ... soap.... hope you enjoyed them all! Titch took some fabulous photos of them all together, I thought you might like to see.

Remember, they're all available for pre-order now ... check out http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/cat_582467-Pure-Beer-Soaps.html ... I'll post out any orders for these as soon as the full cure date is reached.

Thanks so much for looking!

Huge Huge Huge thanks to Titch of www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her stunning photography, she does these soaps such justice, and more. Make sure you like her page!

Black Magic Nectar - Final Pure Beer Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 06 May 2012 19:01:00 +0000

So, we've sadly reached the end of our six pack of beer (hic!).

Given I'm Irish, I figured it'd be almost unpatriotic of me not to make something with Guinness. So I did! And here is Black Magic Nectar... I used the Guinness for the water portion of the soap and added tussah silk to it (of course, I couldn't soap without silk could I?). I wanted a nice black soap with a nice white top so I basically made two soaps... the largest amount for the Guinness and the small amount I made with just water and coloured with a little titanium dioxide.

The soap is made with Dead Sea Mud, Activated Charcoal, Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal & Pure Silk. It's fragranced with a smooth, woody fragrance with top notes of orange and lemon, blended with black pepper and rosemary on a base of clove, jasmine, woods, patchouli, musk and amber. Smells fabulous!

Well actually, why am I telling you when I can show you? I did a Making Of and a Cutting video for this soap so watch and see what I did next.....

Making Of... Video

Cutting Of... Video

So, here are the final images for the soap ... I am really really happy with this, it's going to be one totally incredible soap for your skin and, oh my word, does it smell SO GOOD! This is available on pre-order now if you'd like to reserve one, check out the website at http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2010492-Black-Magic-Nectar-PreOrder-Cure-Date-6-June.html. Enjoy!!

Huge thanks to Titch at www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her video and photography work - she's a total gem! Make sure to like her page!

Orange Pippin Nectar - Pure Beer Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Thu, 03 May 2012 19:07:00 +0000

So, four down, two to go in the six pack of Pure Beer soaps.

The penultimate soap is called Orange Pippin Nectar. Made from Kilkenny beer which is a reddish colour pale creamy beer, I instantly thought of a fragrance blend of oranges and apples. I then needed to find something that'd tie them together and thought of the warm colour of the beer and what would warm both fragrances and immediately thought of ginger and cinnamon. I thought how would this work with the beer and what would I call the soap, and I came up with Orange Pippin Nectar ... there is a type of apple called a Cox's Orange Pippin, the pippin in the name would illustrate my apple note, the word orange worked with the 5 fold orange essential oil I used plus the name was just damn cute too!

I had recently ordered some new clays I'd not worked with before and when I saw the Australian Red Reef clay, I just knew I had to use it! What a luxurious colour it is and boy, does a little go a long way! I added my usual white clay as it's soooo good for all skin types and colloidal oatmeal as it's so soothing and has so many skin loving qualities. Of course, I used my favourite silk because it really adds a smoothness and luxuriousness to the final soap.

I am very very happy with this soap... my little tester bar produced a massive amount of lather and that was from a freshly made soap, imagine what it'll be like when it's fully cured.

The soap is available for pre-order right now on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2017608-Orange-Pippin-Nectar-PreOrder-Cure-Date-11-June.html and will be fully cured on 11 June.

Huge thanks, yet again, to Titch for her fabulous photos - make sure to check out her Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/takenbytitch.

Auburn Nectar - Irish Beer Handmade Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Tue, 01 May 2012 17:11:00 +0000

Auburn Nectar - I had a beautiful red tinged beer all ready and waiting to be turned into soap and the word "auburn" ran through my mind. So she had to be made, my Auburn Nectar.

So what do you fragrance "auburn" with? It was easy, let your mind go free and see what happens... what happened was an infusion of mystical Amber, sensual Sandalwood & deep, dark Vetiver... and, oh my, how good does she smell? Very, very good is the answer.

Along with the sparkling Irish Wheat beer, I've used Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal & Pure Silk... this is just one pretty auburn baby!

The soap is available on Pre-Order from http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2010457-Auburn-Nectar-PreOrder-Cure-Date-4-June.html and will be fully cured by 4 June.

Huge thanks, as ever, to Titch from http://www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her photos (make sure to like her page!)

Sunburst Nectar - Irish Pure Beer Handmade Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 17:21:00 +0000

The third of our Pure Beer handmade cold process soaps is called Sunburst Nectar.

This luxury soap is made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils, Irish Pale Ale, Kaolin Clay, Colloidal Oatmeal, Cocoa Butter & Pure Silk and between its layers of warm orange and deep cream, it's fragranced with a powerful, juicy citrus accord of Irish Pale Ale, Florida Orange, deep Frankincense, Cedarwood & Musk. Deep and wonderful!

This soap is available for pre-order at http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_2010460-Sunburst-Nectar-PreOrder-Cure-Date-4-June.html.

Huge thanks to Titch from www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her fab photography, make sure to check out her page!

Spiced Chocolate Nectar Pure Beer Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 16:30:00 +0000

This is the second of my Pure Beer soaps, Spiced Chocolate Nectar.

The soap is made made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils, Irish Chocolate Stout, Rhassoul Mud, Colloidal Oatmeal, Cocoa Butter & Pure Silk.

Rhassoul Mud comes from Morocco and has been used for centureies as a natural beauty treatment. It's rich in trace minerals, is highly absorbent, attracting oil, dirt & pollutants and helping to clarify the skin. It is very gentle and excellent for sensitive skin with its anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial qualities. Studies have shown that it helps to reduce sebum production, improves the texture and tone of the skin, reduces dryness, helps improve elasticity and is gently exfoliating.

Within it's dark chocolate and cream colour swirls, it's fragranced with the natural scent of the creamy Irish Chocolate Stout blended with an infusion of rich Warm Spices and Dark Patchouli, drizzled with luscious sweet Chocolate. I cannot tell you how good this smells... it's neither just warm spices or patchouli or chocolate but a combination of all three, working together to draw you in and capture you forever... utterly divine!!!

It's available for pre-order on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_1993072-Spiced-Chocolate-Nectar-PreOrder-Cure-Date-30-June.html and, as the link says, will be fully cured by 30 June (so any pre-orders received, will be sent out after then). Huge thanks to Titch, yet again, for her fab photography .. make sure to check out and like her Facebook page.

Enjoy!

Quick Soapy Competition!

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 15:14:00 +0000

Not from me (as yet, I am planning one soon) .. but from the lovely Rose at Lí Ban Ireland .. fab products, I've been lucky enough to use them myself, incredible.

You can win a goody bag right here.. .you have up to midnight tonight, Irish time.. get a move on! http://libanireland.blogspot.com/2012/04/li-ban-ireland-competition-time.html?spref=fb

Beer Soaps... Oh Yeah!

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 16:34:00 +0000

Well, it's all Amy's fault.

Yep, she started the whole challenge about soaping with booze. Beer is big in Ireland, there's no doubt about it. I couldn't find how many were actually sold in Ireland last year but I suspect it's lots... and lots, and lots and, probably, even more lots.

I don't beer, I never liked the taste of it at all. But I found myself becoming very interested in beer in the last few weeks. Again, it's all Amy's fault. I made a beer soap and then realised how much fun it was ... from prepping the beer to actually making it. Loved the bubbleage from the little tester soap balls I make from my trimmings, love the creaminess of the soap, just so much fun. So I decided I'd do six beer soaps, a six pack.. geddit? I wanted to make them with only Irish beers (cos I'm in Ireland, seems fair) and I wanted them all to be a bit different.. from each other and from other beer soaps you can get out there.

So here's the first one, Lemon Nectar. Oh I decided to call them all somethingsomethingsomething Nectar... it was the drink of the God's after all, seemed fitting. So this is made with Beamish Irish Stout which is my hubs favourite pint and it's from Cork, which is where we want to live one day.

I decided that I'd add some extra goodies in all these soaps so all the Pure Beer soaps have colloidal oatmeal that helps to calm sensitive skin, silk that adds an extra level of luxury and either clay or Dead Sea Mud for their skin lovingness.

So Lemon Nectar is made with Beamish Irish Stout, colloidal oatmeal, tussah silk and kaolin clay with Sweet Almond & Golden Oil Oils and tons of creamy Cocoa Butter and is fragranced with my own blend of zesty citrusy May Chang and deep and earthily sexy Patchouli. It smells incredible!!

Pics below... I'll show you the others in the next few blog posts. This one is available for pre-order right now http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_1993049-Lemon-Nectar-PreOrder-Cure-Date-28-May.html.

Temptress .... can I say divine?

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:06:00 +0000

Here is one of my latest soaps... Temptress. The name came about because a soaping friend called me a Temptress for showing so many soaping images... I thought, that's a GREAT soap name!

So here she is ... my Temptress. This luxury handmade soap is made with Sweet Almond Oil, Golden Olive Oil, Cocoa Butter, Coconut Milk, Kaolin Clay, & Pure Silk and is fragranced with a blend of sensual sandalwood, warm amber, a light spicing of ginger with a dash of cinnamon, a drop of darkest patchouli, all drizzled with dark chocolate. Drooling yet?

Available on Pre-Order now and fully cured by 24 May ... check out http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_1991582-Temptress-PreOrder-Cure-Date-24-May-.html

Enjoy!

Couture Cupcake Soaps - Now on Pre-Order

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 09:15:00 +0000

These were fun to make! And they're on pre-order right now too! All of them are made with Goatsmilk, Kaolin Clay & Pure Silk.

Enjoy x

Black Raspberry Vanilla:

Raspberry Lime:

Tangerine Tango:

Links for the pre-orders are in the titles of the soaps.... really hope you enjoy these! Happy Saturday! x

Guest Blogger on Love, Lust & Fairy Dust

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 11:47:00 +0000

Ohhh I was asked to be guest blogger on the fabulous Love, Lust & Fairy Dust blog recently whilst the owner, the lovely Jude who has an absolute passion for beauty products and skin care, is on a well deserved holiday.

I wrote about the value of Handmade Soap ... here's the link if you'd like to have a read. And why not add Jude's fabulous blog to your blog roll!

http://www.lovelustandfairydust.com/2012/04/handmade-soap.html

Blue Belle

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 21:34:00 +0000

Another new cold process soap... I cannot get to do enough soaping!

This is fragranced with the scent of Bluebell and Wildflower woods, dappled in the sunlight, after the rain. It's a beautiful floral with a lovely green background. I looked up images of bluebell woods and tried to recreate them in this soap.

I used my usual blend of Sweet Almond & Golden Olive oils along with lashings of creamy Cocoa Butter and also added Goatsmilk, Kaolin Clay and Pure Silk... a sheer treat for your skin.

This is available for pre-order on http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_1981933-Blue-Belle-PreOrder-Cure-Date-21-May.html. The soap will be posted ASAP after the cure date (21 May). Enjoy!!

Couture Pure Silk Handmade Soap

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 10:07:00 +0000

Couture - a stunning handmade cold process soap made in Ireland.

This is fragranced with sparkling top notes of ylang ylang & neroli, within a heart of exotic jasmine & soft rose on a warm sensual base of sandalwood & vetiver and is made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils, Aloe Vera, Goatsmilk, Kaolin Clay, Cocoa Butter & Pure Silk ... this is a complete luxury, designer soap! This will be fully cured by 21 March and is available for pre-order from http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_1981888-Couture-PreOrder-Cure-Date-21-May.html.

Huge thanks to Titch from http://www.facebook.com/takenbytitch for her photography work.

Enjoy!

More Cupcakes - Black Raspberry Vanilla

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 19:01:00 +0000

I've been making more cupcake soaps ... these will be called Couture Cupcake Soaps from now on. This one is Black Raspberry Vanilla, a stunningly fragranced blend of berries and creamy vanilla... it's one of our best sellers and has been a favourite since we started.

These are made with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive oils along with lashings of creamy Cocoa Butter, silk, goatsmilk, kaolin clay and aloe vera! Sheesh, that's a lot right?!

I coloured it with a blend of pink and purple which gave me a great berry colour and then added creamy white with glitter! Check them out.. these are just poured and piped.

As you can see, there's a slight lean on some of the soaps, too much topping? Or is there such a thing?

See the one on the top left hand corner? Definite lean going on there... not that anyone on my Facebook Page seems to mind!

Hope you like these! They'll be available online from 21 May and I need to ask Titch to take some pics of these and the Raspberry Lime & Tangerine Tango ones I've already made!

Soapy Cupcakes

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 21:18:00 +0000

I have finally caved and make soap cupcakes ... they've been doing the rounds for a while and I've never tried making them before but I got the urge and decided to go for it. I ordered some tips and an icing bag and off I went.

These are Raspberry Lime cupcakes made with cold process soap - I used my favourite formula of Sweet Almond & Golden Olive oils with tons of Cocoa Butter, Silk, Goatsmilk and Kaolin. They're fragranced with a blend of juicy raspberry and zingy lime - a perfect Summer scent.

Here they are in the mould ... I'll demould in about 2 or 3 days I think and, if I talk nicely to her, maybe Titch will do her magic with the photos!

Hope you like em!

These will be fully cured in 6 weeks time and will be available on www.iamhandmade.com.

Rum Runner

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 19:13:00 +0000

This is a remake of Rum Runner - a soap for men (but women will steal it, no doubt about that!). The fragrance is described as an exotic blend of Allspice, Cloves & Nutmeg drizzled with Sweet Orange on a bed of crisp Pine Needles nestled within a deep warm base of Patchouli & Vanilla. It honestly smells like the sexiest man in the Universe! Packed with Sweet Almond & Golden Olive Oils with tons of creamy Cocoa Butter and Goatsmilk, this is a total treat for the man in your life!

Available for pre-order from http://www.iamhandmade.com/ourshop/prod_1904217-Rum-Runner-PreOrder-Cure-Date-9-April.html

New Birkenstocks!

noreply@blogger.com (Celine Blacow) — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 18:22:00 +0000

I love Birkenstocks! I found them when I had mega foot problems two years ago - plantar problems are SO painful and I spent upwards of 500 euro trying to get the problem sorted but it didn't get rid of it. After leaving my physio and feeling poop about my mega painful left foot, I decided to buy some sandals as it was getting warmer and warmer. I got some on sale Birkenstocks and OH BOY, foot pain gone in about 3 days, I kid you not!

So, this winter, I was being cheap (hey, we all have to these days, right?) and got a pair of on sale Doc Martins... I love the things but they do not love my feet. After weeks of breaking them in (very painfully I might add) my left foot is now suffering hugely again - they just don't support my foot like I need. I'm horribly flat footed and I need the support the Birkenstocks give me. Plus I'm suspecting the bad foot is making me compensate with my right leg and now my right knee is giving me problems.

So, the other day, I said enough is enough... and went online and looked up Birkenstocks in Ireland and found www.littletreeshoes.com ... free shipping for anything over 39.99 euro too! And I bought these...

Aren't they pretty? They are SHINY, I like SHINY!! And they have diamante on the buckle... even my shoes have glitter!!!

They are sooooooooooooooooo comfy and I'm hoping they stop the pain as soon as possible.

Of course, now I'm looking these for the summer....

Me loves!!!