Gift Boxes

Ok, here are the pictures of the finished products. You can choose a gift box or a gift bag, it comes with the gift tag, so all you have to do is to write your message and you're done!

Gift Sets Pictures

Here are the pictures of gift sets. Each set includes: 1 bar of soap, 1 bath bomb and 4 sugar cubes. It will be packed either in a gift bag or a gift box, so you don't have to do any work :-)

Each set is $12.

Sets can be customized, I can add more soap bars, bath bombs or sugar scrubs.

Gift Set #1 with Organic Almond Milk Soap

Gift Set #2 with Oatmeal, Milk & Honey Goat Milk Bar

Gift Set #3 with Sleigh Ride Goat Milk Bar

Gift Set #4 with Organic Mint and Chamomile Tea

Gift Set #5 with Christmas Spice Goat Milk Bar

Gift Set #6 with Relaxing Lavender and Tangerine Bar

Christmas Gift Sets

Are you looking for a nice personal gift for Christmas? Look no further! I created a little gift set that has my latest soaps, new bath bombs and sugar cubes.
Bath Bombs are great if you want to take a relaxing bath and enjoy the pleasant aroma. Fragrance or essential oils can be custom made to suit your taste and preferences.
Nice thing about Sugar Cubes is that they are absolutely mess free. You can keep them outside of your shower and just grab one cube and use it right away. I add a little bit of Shea butter to nourish the skin, but they don’t feel that greasy feeling as other sugar scrubs do.

Wine, soap and more...

Do you like to explore the world of good wine? How about a pleasant bath with natural, smooth, leathery aroma of a soap bar, so delicious that you can almost take a bite?

Then come to the winery for a unique, unforgettable soap-making experience!

What does wine have to do with the soap-making process? Surprised? Intrigued? Would like to find out? Then my class is for you! Sign up now and become a part of this mystery. Learn something new, sip wine and relax…

When: September 7th, 2011 at 5 p.m.

Cost: $15 per person (includes glass of wine, bar of soap and handout materials)

Where: O’Neil Creek Winery, Bloomer, WI
http://www.oneilcreekwinery.com/

Contact me with any questions!

New Summer Collection 2011

Grapefruit and Bergamot

Tangerine

Lilac, Rosemary and Sandalwood (who says you can't have a spa in your bathroom???)

Lemongrass and Green Tea

Bay Rum (reminds me of the Holiday time)

Got some new bars (actually Wayne made most of them). They look amazing; I think we got few very good recipes that our keepers now. Bars have all good oils such as olive, apricot, peach kernel, coconut and etc., essential oils, vitamin E and of course fresh goat milk!

Why Goat Milk?

I have a lot of questions from people - why do you use goat milk? Why is it so good for your skin? What makes it so special?

Well, to answer these questions I need to explain what the goat milk does for the skin, and what the benefits are.

Milk soaps in general are more creamier bars and contain whey protein and lactic acid. I'm sure you've all heard about Cleopatra, and her legendary beauty secret - milk and honey baths. Honey is a great antiseptic and milk helps to moisturize and soften the skin.

However, not all milk is the same, though, and when it comes to making natural skin care treatments goats milk has several unique properties that give it the edge over cow's milk.

First, goat milk has better moisturizing abilities due to the nature of its fat and protein structures. If you've ever smelled goat milk that was old or improperly processed, you know it has a very distinctive odor. (Properly processed goat milk does not smell any different from cow's milk, by the way.) The unique odor comes from the significantly larger amounts of three medium-chain fatty acids, known as capric, caprylic and caproic acid.

Because goat milk has a much larger number of these smaller fat molecules, it is more readily absorbed by the skin. Goats milk protein structures are also shorter than those of cow's milk. The increased accessibility of the fat and protein from goat milk helps leave skin smooth and supple.

Finally goat milk is rich in vitamin A, a fat-soluble vitamin that acts as an antioxidant and is important to maintaining skin health. Goat milk provides up to 47% more vitamin A than cow's milk. Furthermore, goat milk contains vitamin A in its final form--ready to use--while cow's milk contains the precursor form, beta-carotene, which our bodies must then convert to vitamin A.

We went pro

It is official - we are in the business :-)


I just got registered with the state as EZ Soaps, LLC. It looks simple, but I'm sure there are some things that are not obvious to me yet. I'm working on purchasing insurance, setting up with the state, thinking how am I going to sell my soap. Thousands thoughts are running through my head. But I'm excited, soapmaking is fun and I enjoy doing it. There are a lot of things to do yet, and I'm at a very beginning. Hopefully, it is going to be fun and interesting journey in my life.

New Soaps

We were playing with soaps all past week, and here what we’ve created:
Organic Goat Milk Soap, smells amazing! I can't wait to try it!

Beer Soap.. Yep, you heard it right, it is made with a real Leinenkugel Beer. All in all I live in Chippewa Falls - home of Leines :-)

Organic Tea Soap (all herbs came from my garden).

Red Wine Soap. I was just curious after the beer soap, my mind went "what if" road...

Organic Calendula and Honey Soap. It has real honey in the recipe, and it suppose to be bubbly.

I'm home...

I’m finally home … for another 24 hours … tomorrow I’m heading to Chicago for another interview … Busy!

KDV Internship had been a great experience. What a wonderful people work there, I enjoyed every single day! It was amazing how interesting and challenging it was. Some days I just couldn’t wrap my head around the client’s situation, but all other friendly staff would help me, or just guide me in the right direction. I can’t even count how many “aha” moments I’ve had in the past three months. I’m just so satisfied with my experience, and I know for sure that public accounting is where I want to be. I’m also thinking about law school in the future, that would be interesting too, but we’ll see…

New soap… Wayne and I just made a batch of the Tea Soap. But you’ll have to wait for the pictures. He was bugging me to make soap with him so much; he was like a kid literally! But it is so fun to work with him, I really enjoy that I can share this wonderful hobby with him!

New Orders Coming Through...

Well, I guess I'm up and rolling!

Geraldine, my wonderful host mom, asked if I could make 10 bars for her and 35 bars for Ashley. At first I was a little bit worried - my first order, is it going to be easy, are bars going to turn out ok, what if I'll screw up? Millions and millions questions run through my head.

But than I started to put the recipe together, what color I want, what smell, what design, and it just came out naturally - orange and lavender for her, and some whimsical swirls for Ashley... and here they are:

Finished look for Ashley's soap - all princesses, buterflies and cute flowers are soooooo pretty!!!

New soaps, news and more.

Yes, I was bad... I didn't update my blog for a very long time. Between school, work and occasional soap making, I didn't have any free time to sit down and write something. Well, I'm currently an intern in St. Cloud, MN. I work at KDV and I absolutely love it here! Except the weather, this is even worse than Chippewa Falls, WI. I know for fact, that I was born to live in a wormer climate, somewhere closer to the ocean... I hope to find more time and write about my new job and new people that I've met. But for now, here are some of my new soaps:

Ginger Pear with Walnut Seeds:


Chai Tea with Semolina & Cocoa:


Cherry Coconut with Poppy Seed:

Honey Oatmeal with Cocoa:

Hot Chocolate with Coffee Suds:

Minty Christmas:

And... my recent fail: (Forgot to put Olive oil... oooooopsy)

Sugar Scrub

Yesterday I made a sugar scrub. Nothing fancy, just some clear M&P base, grape seed oil, sugar, apple fragrance oil and colorant. But, it is sooooooo cool! I used it in the shower last night, and it doesn't leave that greasy feeling after you used it (like some scrubs from the containers). I think it has something to do with a little soap in it. I still need to play with the amount of fragrance oil and probably use different type of sugar. I used just simple white sugar, but I'm thinking to use raw sugar in the next batch.

Sugar scrubs are also great for the "garden" hands. Last night I went to pick some tomatoes and other vegetables from the garden and didn't put on gloves. Well, if you have a garden you probably know that after you harvest your vegetables, your hands have that nice greenish - brownish color that is very hard to wash away. I just grabbed a little piece of the sugar scrub, and my hands were white and squeaky :-)

My Favourite Thing from Bramble Berry

I'm relatively new to the soap making, but I love it. The other day, when my husband helped me to get the soap out of the mold, he told me: "You know, I'm at that point that I'm ready to make soaps too!" :-)))
So far, my favourite (and my husband's too) fragrance oil is Applejack Peel. It smells so delicious, and I couldn't believe that I made that soap with my own hands. It is awesome!
The other thing that I love about Bramble Berry is their customer service. In my last order I ordered a pound of walnut seeds to try them out in the recipe. I've noticed that the packet was too small for a lb, it was only 1 oz. Well, I understand that it was probably a mistake so I wrote an e-mail to BB, and within just few hours I've got a reply saying that they are very sorry for this mistake and they're sending me the rest of the seeds. I didn't even hope for that, but for sure it was a very nice thing to hear!
Thank you Bramble Berry for being such a great business that respects their customers. It is always a pleasure to have a business with you!

Chocolate - Coffee and Apple - Walnut Seed

I was playing in the kitchen last weekend with my soaps and here what I've created:

1. Chocolate - coffee. Smells soooo delicious and has a real ground coffee in it

2. Apple Jack - Walnut Seeds. Smells even better and has a real walnut seeds in it. It would be a great scrubbing soap.

Now, the hardest part - I have to wait for 4 weeks before I can try them out... auuuuu...

Little Anniversary

Today is exactly 4 years since I landed in Washington D.C. It seems that it happened just yesterday... Lufthansa lost my bag (with my make up supplies!!!)... Met Anna at the hotel and spent two days learning CPR and how to become a good nanny... Couldn't call Wayne from the hotel just because didn't have enough guts (I even picked up the phone and started to dial the number :-) but hanged up)... Flew to Reno, NV to meet Scott, Geraldine and little Ashley... Spent about two weeks in Canada (saw the most beautiful mountains and the OCEAN)... I'm so happy to have such wonderful memories that can warm me up!

My First Cold Process Soap!!!

Yay! I did it! I made it!

Well, it was supposed to be swirls, but I whipped it too much and have layers instead :-)

Now, I have to wait for 4 weeks before I can use it. And I already have an inspiration to make another batch. There are so many awesome soaps on Etsy. OMG! I wish someday I make such a perfect loaf of soap!

Fresh Herbal Tea

Continuing Tea Topic, I made a herbal tea yesterday from fresh herbs that I have in my garden. Delicious!
I add mint, sweet leaf (stevia), lavender, lemon grass, eucalypt, lemon and dried hibiscus flowers. Sweetened with some homemade maple syrup, yummy!

Ice Tea Recipe

In my country it is a tradition to have a tea after a meal time. When people get together it is 100% that there would be tea involved (especially if we’re talking about girls get together) with some sweets and chocolate. There are so many different kinds of teas that everyone can find something tasty and pleasant.
I used to drink hot teal all the time, usually black with all kind of herbs and flowers. In America people don’t drink that much of a hot tea. Well, not a lot of people drink tea at all. My husband used to drink ice tea (you know that Lipton ice “tea”) before I came into his life and showed him how the real tea looks and tastes like. Now he loves it! In winter we do drink hot tea. When it is cold and snowing outside it is so nice to have a cup of hot tea with spices and a cookie, sitting next to each other and watch a movie… But in summertime when it is hot I learned how to make an ice tea, and I’d like to share with you.
1. Make your favorite tea (put some loose leaf tea in your tea pot – I use French Press; boil hot water – if you’re making green tea make sure it is not boiling when you poor over your tea; let it steep for 5-10 minutes).
2. Fill a pitcher with ice. If you like sweet tea you can use sugar, agave syrup, maple syrup (my favorite), just have some in a separate glass.
3. Pour your hot tea over the ice (reserve a little bit to mix with sweetener).
4. Stir well reserved tea with sweetener.
5. Enjoy!

Book give away at women-prenuers galore

I just found this blog: http://women-prenuergalore.blogspot.com/2010/06/new-book-giveaway-3-day-cleanse.html and it has a lot of interesting onformation. Also they have a giveaway of a 3 Day Cleanse book. Leave a coment and get a chance to win!

Give them a kiss and a hug

You know how some times you don’t appreciate things until something happens and makes you realize how little you need to be happy? It’s good to have money… You can buy a lot of things, the more you have, the more you can buy. Money can make you warm. They can pay your electric bill… You can buy a new blanket… or a tea pot to make a hot tea… But it won’t feel the same as the warmth of the hug of your loved one. Money won’t give you that comfort feeling when his (or her) arms lay around your body and you drift away in the dream. It won’t be the same joy when you wake up in the morning and don’t see his sleepy face and have that first kiss. Now, does it really matter who has to do dishes tonight, or pick up dirty socks, or something else. I would give anything right now just to have a hug. Anything…