Bath Bombs and soap, originally uploaded by SoapChickAsh.

Hello! Hello!
We are still in the thick of soap and bath stuff making right now, so if I misspell a lot of words in this post, please just assume that it is the bath bomb residue on my fingers that is causing typing problems. I’m just taking a break from this flurry of activity to reflect on all of the work that Tiff and I have done these last few months. Whew…we’re beat!

Whenever we approach a show, usually the week or so before, the doubts creep in. Did we make enough of x, y, or z? Did we choose the right scents?Is that new scent going to be a good seller? Are these bath bombs going to crumble into a million pieces on the drive out there? Can my husband really remember to dress the kids before schlepping them off to school?

Well, enough questions. We have decided that we have one more week of stress, chaos, and mayhem and then we are going to have fun, dammit. Two wild moms hitting the road, leaving the kids and hubbies behind and blaring the tunes as loud as we can handle it. (I’m sure much chocolate and Cherry cokes will be consumed along the way.) And then we’ll work our collective bums off at the show, sell the be-jeezus out of all this stuff and hit up our friends the Farm Chicks for some cute necklaces and fun stuff to reward us for all of the hard work.

So, we are looking forward to one week from now when all this stress and doubt is behind us. In the meantime, I have more bath bombs to make.

I was going to write a new post today about all the soap we’ve been whipping up for the Country Living Show. But instead I’m going to post something I had written way, way, waaaay back in February when we were also in the middle of a soapmaking marathon. I just came across it…forgotten that I had written it actually…and thought well, hey, one less thing to do today. So here ’tis:

We have been whipping up handmade soaps like crazy this past week. We cannot keep the Sweetheart Baby soap in stock (and I’m so thankfull…..that is my absolute favorite of our soaps!) and the last Bergamot Lime soap just went skipping off our shelves, too. With all of the talk about phtalates, we understand that people want a natural alternative and we are happy to be providing one! Like that Doritos or Lays potato chips or whatever commercial says, “we’ll make more!” Happily make more, I’ll add.

So this Valentine’s day morning I was whipping up a batch while the chillun’s were at school of our Wild Child Honeybear soap. This soap is scented with a blend of essential oils and has the delightfully yummy scent of honey and almonds. We found some great molds in the shape of teddy bears that we decided to use in the soaps since our Extruder just wasn’t cutting it…see previous post “R.I.P” for more on that piece o’ junk). So we made the little teddy’s first and boy are they cute….cocoa colored with drizzles of honey in them. Once they had cured I whipped up a batch of the Honeybear soap with ground organic oatmeal, some honey and some sweet almond oil. Fabulous (I feel like Rachel Ray as I describe this for some reason. I need to throw an E.V.O.O. in there somewhere….)! But when I lined up the teddy bears in a little line in our soap trough, I forgot that pouring the soap over them would move the little guys. Boy did it…at the moment that I started pouring the soap, each one of the teddy bears tipped over this way and that way….it was a teddy bear melee. I couldn’t straighten them out before the soap that I just poured began to gel, or set.

So….the soap is now a curin’ and I haven’t cut it into bars yet. I’m afraid of what the soap will look like…it smells great, and I know it’ll do what soap is supposed to do (and do it fabulously!) but I’m afraid that I’ll accidently behead one of the bears when I cut the soap. Or worse…we’ll cut it and there will be a teddy bear backside facing out of the soap. OK that would be funny but I am still a little concerned and embarassed at my apparent lack of skills! Hopefully i’ll perfect this process so i won’t have a (novice) fiasco like this in the future.

Update: We no longer mess with those cute little bears when making this soap after all that…the little bears looked like piles of something unmentionable when we cut into the soap. No one wants to wash a baby with something that looked like..uh, that. But the soap is fabulous even without the bears! The scent is a little whiff of heaven.

soaps 3, originally uploaded by SoapChickAsh.

Hello! Hello!
We are happy to report that we’ve been working on bringing the Night, Night, Baby! soap back and oila! It’s here! See the cute little blue and white swirly soap in the bottom right corner of the photo?! Yep, that’s the one. It is the perfect soap to calm fussy babies (and toddlers!) and to send them off to baby dreamland. The gentle scent is a lovely, light mix of luscious lavender and calming chamomile and just a little bit of “ahhhhh.” Plus, there are absolutely no chemicals (phthalates be darned!) and just a little bit of ground organic oatmeal to keep baby’s skin baby-soft.

And best of all? It works on fussy moms and dads, too. (I know, because I am one.) Enjoy!

PS We’ll be putting the Night, Night, Baby on our website very shortly.

new display table, originally uploaded by soapchicka.

Hello! Hello!
We’re gearing up for the Country Living Show in Ohio this September and that means that my brain is in “booth-sprucing up” mode. So I dragged my whole family to the Lake Country Flea Market here in Illinoying last Sunday in hopes of finding that perfect something to display our soaps and such. The stars were definitely aligned that day because I found the cuuuu-test table for our booth. It just so happened to be painted a lovely robin’s egg blue and a kickin’ red and had that Grandma’s-old-farmhouse look to it. Even better…the little drawer was broken at some point in its past and the owner used a cigar box lid to hold the drawer together. So charming!

We’ll be writing more about the Country Living show over the next few weeks. Check out www.countryliving.com to read more about this not-to-be-missed show.

smiling soap, originally uploaded by soapchicka.

I think the photo really speaks for itself….our soap is apparently as happy to just be as we are happy to make it.

By the way, this soap is our new Coco-Almond coconut milk soap. Look for it on at our website soon! Same great price (our smiley faces don’t cost extra!)

Hi Everyone. Soapchix Ash here. If y’all wouldn’t mind indulging me for a minute I thought I’d share a quick story about my little one. Many if not most of our readers are parents, and those of you who aren’t can certainly appreciate the level of stress that the little havoc-wreakers can create. My two girls are no exception and I think that the stress of our recent move across country has manifested itself in some rather challenging (a nice word for it!) behavior. So dealing with these interesting kiddie hijinks (in addition to making a gagillion bars of soap) have left me a bit, oh, I don’t know…testy, on edge, annoyed, miffed…choose a word and it will surely apply.

But with the fits of whining (mine) and the emptying of my entire closet (them) all over the house come the moments that allow you to smile, take a breath and realize how truly sweet the little monsters really are. After a particularly long and frustrating afternoon, I took a break and excused myself to the flower garden for a few moments of quiet and a little weeding. I felt a little tug at my elbow and it was my 3 and 1/2 year old pulling me to the garage. She had a surprise for me and was so proud of herself that she seemed to hover over the grass as she led me to my car. There she pointed and said, “I did something amazing to your car…its so bew-teefullll!” I prepared myself for the worst….expensive car repairs or a long painful explanation to my husband about how I allowed our offspring to re-paint our car grape-soda-purple…oh, lordy. Instead I found that she had lovingly picked an echinacea flower and stuck it in my car ignition. She said “tah-da…I surprised you!” and I couldn’t help but sigh with relief and thank her profusely for her thoughtful gift.

It was such a sweet little gift even if it did require a thorough examination of the ignition switch. (I really, really didn’t want to explain to my hubby that 1. our daughter got into the car by herself completely unbeknowst to me and 2. the car no longer runs due to a foreign biological agent in the ignition.)

Enjoy the photos and have a relaxing, stress-free day.

Hello. Soapchix Ash here. I’m happy to report that there is a farmer’s market just a few blocks from our new place in Highland Park. I packed the kids in the burley this morning and rode my bike over there and am so happy that I did. It’s a small farmer’s market but has everything one could be looking for…except, and I’m happy to report this…handmade soaps. So, I’m thinking about setting up a booth there so that Tiff and I could expand our budding soap empire (Serendipity Bath Co., Chicago branch!) But it just wouldn’t be the same without Tiff AND I’m just terrible at dragging my sorry bum outta bed in the wee hours of the morning. Plus, my kids would be with me and hmmmm…that could be a disaster. Even though it doesn’t sound like it I really am considering it. Let me know if you think it’s a good idea….or encourage me to be brave….. very, very brave.

I’ve attached some photos for your enjoyment.

Hello Everyone! Soapchix Ash here after a few weeks (or months maybe) off. So here’s the scoop. Gosh I hate writing this….my family relocated to Highland Park, Illinois for my hubby’s job. There…I wrote it and no, it doesn’t feel any better. I miss Tiff, I miss her kids, I miss Colorado, I miss the front porch on my old house…so. So the good news is that Tiff and I have figured a way how to continue our beloved soap biz together and that makes me incredibly happy. The last few weeks/months have been one great big pain in my arse…selling a house (it can be done in this market!), packing, finding a new place to live in Chicago (OMG!!!), and let’s not even get into the 1,100 mile drive with two sad kids, one cat and a beta fish. Plus, and here is where I become a martyr: I did this by myself. Well, not the driving (because I’m not THAT crazy) but the rest of it. Wes was in Chicago working on geeky genetics stuff while I was home trying not to lose my religion (southern-speak for going bat-shit crazy).

Wes bought me an incredible new camera as my thanks-for-not-leaving-me gift. I’m always up for bribery so I accepted and happily snapped some shots on our long drive out here. One photo I took seemed to be projecting the thoughts screaming in my head as we headed into our new home state.

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As tough as this transition has been, I can honestly say that I feel really pretty lucky. I have the world’s best business partner. Tiff has been amazingly supportive during this whole thing. She has been the one minding the store, literally, while I’ve been dealing with the move and, well, to be honest, I did fit in a 3 week vacation to the beach, too! So I’m back and I’ll be updating y’all on what life is like here in Illi-no! Or Illinoying as we now choose to call it.

(I interrupt this long lull in blogging to bring you this entertaining snippet of my life as a Soapchix)

So, you know you’re a soapchix when…your 4 year old daughter, upon spotting some whipped butter set out on tables for a buffet–before you can restrain her–immediately climbs up on top of those tables, exclaims, “OH! It’s some SHEA BUTTER!” and scoops out a handful to rub all over her arms and legs.

The people watching this amusing scene of a little girl rubbing butter all over herself probably felt sorry for her complete lack of social etiquette or understanding of the concept of ‘butter’. Somehow, yelling out, “It’s OK everyone! I make soaps & stuff for a living! Honest mistake!” didn’t seem to be a great solution.

I once thought cleaning Crisco off the floors of my kitchen (same daughter, only at 3) was the hardest thing. Turns out, getting whipped butter off of a squirmy 4 year old is even harder!

One of the best parts of Serendipity Bath Co. is the chance it gives Ash and I to interact with cool, hip, amazing moms. We deal mostly with women (moms!) looking for safe, gentle, natural soaps for their kids. In true mom fashion, initially the focus is on Wild Child products for kids and babies…not for anything for yourselves. That’s why we put a little special sample and gift in every shipment–because we’re looking out for you moms, too! Because you deserve the same quality and gentleness in your bath products as your baby does.

This Mother’s Day we were so happy to see orders coming in from the fella’s, for all you hardworking moms. It was extra fun to fill the orders knowing that they’d be received as really special gifts on a really special day. We get giddy just thinking about how well deserved our pampering products are for busy ladies like you.

Happy Mothers Day from the Soapchix (and kids!)

The cowboys in back aren’t our kids, btw…they were part of a show we saw while in Moab…but this is the only picture I have with Ash and I and all our kids.