Gift Bags from Envelopes... who would have thought?

Now who would have thought that an ordinary envelope could be used to make such an adorable mini-gift bag? Way cool and so inexpensive.

Here's a shout out to Jessica Jones at How About Orange for a great tutorial. A perfect gift bag for GoPlantEarth.com customers to package small soap favors or a bath bomb.

Hope you find this useful!

Easter Springfetti Melt & Pour Soap Slices

The Springfetti soap slices are a confetti tye-dye blending of colors. We were pleasantly suprised with the color effect once the loaf was sliced. It presented a wonderful splash of Easter colors, perfect for any Easter basket, or in our case, table setting.

We used our 2-pound wooden loaf mold which yielded 8 generous slices weighing 4.25 to 5 ounces per slice. We didn't use our mitre box soap cutter for this loaf project, otherwise the slices would have been more uniform in per slice weight. Instead, we opted to use a large chef's knife for slicing.

The tutorial shown below will walk you through the steps of making this colorful Sringfetti soap. You will find all of the supplies needed to complete this project at GoPlanetEarth.com, including the awesome wooden loaf. I do suggest that you melt more than 2 pounds of soap. In the end, including the colorful confetti pieces, we used closer to 3 pounds of soap. I would rather have more melted soap on hand, than not enough.

Finished soaps were wrapped with stretch wrap and labels applied to backside. I'm going to use these soaps as seating cards for Easter dinner. I've printed Happy Easter bunny placecards and taped to front of each soap (with double-sided tape).

How to Line a Wooden Loaf Mold for Easy Release

The new wooden loaf molds made by Mold Market are awesome. Soap is easy to release and, best yet, it can be used for Melt and Pour soap as well as CP soap. One key factor that contributes to easy release for melt and pour soap is that all four sides lift up off the base. It's a breeze to push the finished soap out of the mold. I just finished a melt and pour Easter loaf (which I'll talk about in another blog post) and it turned out beautifully. I was impressed at how well the wooden mold worked for melt and pour soap.

Another key factor for release, and VERY CRITICAL, is making sure the wooden mold is lined properly. GoPlanetEarth has put together a video tutorial (see below) showing the method we use to line our wooden molds. It has proven to work well for us and we've experienced no leakage around the base of mold.

If you are still concerned about leakage issues after lining mold, I suggest purchasing dental wax and push into the areas you think could be problematic. Dental wax is very pliable and easy to remove and reuse. You don't want an overkill with the wax. It could impede removing the top portion of the mold from the base and you won't be able to remove your soap.

Here's the tutorial. Hope you find it helpful!

This Week's Soap Making Poll

My Dad's Veteran's Flag Case Finished

This month marks the 6 month passing of my Dad. He died from cancer. My hubby has been working on assembling a Veteran's Flag Memorial case to honor the years my Dad served his country.

Tomorrow, we are presenting my Mom with this memorial. I think of my Daddy daily. I miss his smell, his laugh, his encouragement, his kind, giving heart and most of all his butterfly kisses.

EZ To Make 2-Buck Chuck MP Soaps

Melt and pour soaps don't get any easier than this. Our 2-buck chuck soap mold offers a generous 5 1/2 ounce bar of soap. We've even created printable labels for you to use in 2 buck, 3 buck and 4 buck printable formats.

These are perfect soaps for gift giving or resale. Very EZ to make, even for first-time soapers! GoPlanetEarth offers a great variety of soap colors and fragrance oils.

Last Week's Poll Results....

Last week's poll question was "Are you willing to pay additional $$'s for organic based soap supplies and/or green packaging options?"

54% of you said YES. The remainder was divided as follows:

27% voted NO
12% voted YES, but soap supplies only
8% voted YES, but packaging only

There you have it. If you're manufacturing bath & body product, you might want to consider offering "green" options.

This Week's Soap Making Poll~ March 2