Soap, next step.

Last year, Christmas caught me off guard. I only opened my eyes behind my textwriting software on December 23rd, to realize I had basically not one single handmade gift at all. This is not happening again.We made these this morning and on one afternoon last week, so you see, it doesn´t take much time. Neither is it the peek of creativity, but it´s handmade, it entertains the children and it´s a gift that can be used and won´t go to waste. You need: Soap base (they sell these in blocks at hobby stores, both in transparent and opaque), fragrances, colors. Molds, of course. Ready made molds, but icecubetrays will work just fine, or we had lollipopmolds, or, if you close them with playdough, you could also use cookiecutters. We made a bunch of mini soaps from our rests, poured into icecubetrays: Maybe additional stuff like seashells, flowers or leaves, sand (from the beach in Callais, for a nice peeling effect) or even small toys. We also tried a photo, but that didn´t work:
So basically there´s nothing more to do than cutting the soap block into small pieces,
melting the pieces in a little bowl in the microwave (we were fine with 30 seconds, and then stir in foodcoloring or fragrances or whatever, before pouring the whole stuff into a mold. My girls did this for about two hours, using every little scrap of soap they could scratch from the table, getting all excited about those most beautifull colors ever they had mixed, experimenting with materials to include in their soap like a piece of fishernet Ronja found at the beach: Or, of course, Lavender: They dry pretty quick, after less than three hours you can allready remove them from their molds. We wrap them in plastic, to keep them from getting scratches, and store them cool and dry, and now we´re thinking about making boxes and labels for them, so we´ll have nice presents for all those grandmas and great grandmas and aunts.
One day, I´d also love to make my own soap, not that ready made stuff from the hobby store but the real thing, like in one of my favourite movies, Fight Club. Though, I wouldn´t go on a raid for fat :-) But from what I´ve read, that contains lye which can be pretty dangerous and unhealthy being used in a household with lots of chaotic people?

Onto something else:

Dana, thanks for your nice comment! I´d love to have that recipe, I´ve allready admired Domi´s birthday cake, unbelievable how many hours of work you put into it. But I can understand it was worth every minute of those eight hours, even if it was gone in minutes.

AJ, Thanks for asking, but I never published anything. I never even sent anything anywhere. I only started writing last year after a long break, and though I personally totally love my book, I feel like nothing I write is yet good enough to be sold to public. It´s in german, too. If it wasn´t, I wouldn´t mind sharing. But thanks for following my blog :-)

And to those people from Calais I see coming here: Let me just give you the warmest of welcomes to my blog. I loved your town!

My music for today is Ingrid, again:Somehow, I always skipped this song. I mean, the lyrics don´t appeal to me. If there´s one thing in the world I really do not want, it´s crawling back into my mother´s womb, so I was always done with the lyrics after that first line. And I also never felt a need to start over again - if I could, I hope most things in my life would just go the same way. Even those I didn´t like. But Ingrids music is just too magical not to cast a spell on me. That intro alone... so easy, yet so clever. And I love that rythm. This song makes me want to spread my arms wide open and dance in the garden.