Handmade Soaps for a Good Cause

Posted by Hirono

My daughter’s pre-school is hosting a bazaar fundraiser this weekend and was looking for some handmade items to sell, so I donated a few handmade soaps that I already had on hand. They are the lavender-scented Olive Oil Soaps and Honey Soaps.

I always struggle with creative packaging ideas for soaps … but I decided to go simple this time and just wrap the soap in wax paper and decorate it with a lovely floral washi tape I purchased from this online shop in Japan called Cafe de Savon, which, by the way, is an amazing shop that sells the best acrylic soap molds E.V.E.R.

I hope people find them interesting and decide to take them home!

The Perfect Soap Drying Rack

Posted by Hirono

My friend D recently introduced me to this lovely café in Pasadena called Lincoln. We had an early lunch there after ~~running a lap~~ briskly walking and conversing around Rose Bowl one morning.

I thought about taking photos of the chic industrial restaurant interior, the colorful array of candies and pastries that fill the cafe, as well as breakfast and lunch served beautifully on simple, white ceramic plates and bowls with edible flower or two on top, but I couldn’t because my two-and-a-half-year-old daughter took hostage of my iPhone to watch cartoon during the meal (Mom of the Year here, I know). Instead, please do read Jonathan Gold’s Los Angeles Times article detailing all the delicious dishes it serves up!

So, why talk about the restaurant when I have no photos or stories to share, you may ask? Well, it’s because I found something perfect for my soap-making adventure there! How random, I know!

Next door to the café is an auxillary gift shop, where patrons can find hand-selected, Anthropologie-esque items such as books, candles, ceramics, etc. While browsing the shop, I came across a stack of wooden crates available for sale for $8 each. I picked one up and knew immediately that it would be perfect to complete my soap drying rack.

I’ve used shoe rack to dry the handmade soaps but I had to get rid of it once my daughter was able to crawl. I could not longer have anything on the floor where she can easily reach. I recently purchased three-tiered oven rack but couldn’t find anything that would fit. Then came these Loncoln-logo-branded creates! Yipee! I purchased two but went back two days later to pick up four more. The search for the perfect drying rack is finally over and I couldn’t be happier!

I’m currently drying Olive Oil soap with dried spearmint leaves on the top rack, and another Olive Oil soap scented with Eucalyptus and Lavender Essential Oils on the bottom.

Emotional Highs and Lows of Soap Making

Posted by Hirono

The incredible sense of euphoria I experience from looking at a freshly unmolded soap loaf with perfect edges and smooth surfaces, or soap bars sliced into individual squares and lined up perfectly onto a wooden crate to dry, convinces me that I’m officially a soap addict, and a slight obsessive compulsive.

But it’s easy for me to get really, really disappointed too when a loaf comes out with some sort of imperfection, like discoloration or uneven surfaces, and I even consider tossing it out and start over when that happens. The inner soap perfectionist in me (and this is not a compliment) can’t handle it! I don’t, of course, throw away an otherwise perfect handmade soap loaf, but I definitely experience extreme emotional roller coaster when it comes to soap making.

I experienced an unbelievable high when I unmolded two loaves of all-natural Olive Oil Soap the other day. They both came out so perfect, with beautiful cream color, perfect edges, and silky-smooth exterior, and I couldn’t be happier. Then I hit the lowest low shortly thereafter when I discovered that my two-and-a-half year old daughter got to them and made giant dents on, no only one, but both loaves, while they were drying on the dining table! Noooooo! 😥 😥 😥 I was in foul mood for the rest of the day.

Luckily, I was able to slice the loaves into individual squares and salvage most of them, with an exception of two with the imprints. So all in all, everything worked out fine at the end, but man, this soap-making thing is not good for my mental health!

I will share more information about the Olive Oil soap on a separate post. In the meantime, I’m going to go lay down and recover now.

#FirstWorldProblem … I know …