Get Your FREE GoPlanetEarth Logo Luggage Tag

Besides being known for our FREE Fragrance oils samples that we include in orders starting at $30 or more, we occasionally include other FREE items. This happens to be a "just for fun" freebie that is ideal for anyone who travels. If you are traveling to one of the many soaping conferences held throughout the US, this sassy luggage identification tag will make it easy to spot your bag on any airline luggage carousel.

Front side of tag displays our GoPlanetEarth logo and the flip side reads "OMG! Stop grabbing me! Order $60 or more in product starting October 1 and receive one for FREE. Limited quantities, so order early to ensure one is included with your order.

Beyond Soap Making: Happy Birthday to Me!

It's been a whirlwind day. Between responding to the many wonderful birthday texts, FB posts, emails and deliveries.... I am ending my birthday with a big AHHH! It's so nice to be remembered. Pictured in this post is the cake and beautiful bouquet from my morning workers (Kristy, Chelsea, and Missy.... thank you!!!!!!!!)

My grandkids sent another lovely floral arrangement and many cards came by mail. It's been a crazy, busy day filled with so many grand surprises.

Melt & Pour Soap Making: BFF Weekend Soap Gifts

My daugther has linked up with her BFF college friends for the last 12 years. There are 10 BFF girls. They meet every year at some way cool lodge, house or resort for an extended weekend. My job is to come up with gifts for my daughter to present to each of her BFF gals.

After spending a weekend in Chicago and seeing all the Fall & Autumn displays, I found the perfect gift. An Autumn soap using our new Water Dissolving Paper.

I presented the idea to my daughter (we have some cool Winter ideas in the works as well) and she loved it. These soap leaves were printed on our GPE Water Dissolving Soap Paper. The template is sold on our web site. We used a color laser printer. You will want to be sure that the laser printer is cool before printing. If you want to print mulitple sheets, wait at least 10 minutes before inserting and printing the next sheet. You can also use an ink-jet printer, but you risk issues of colors bleeding. To help prevent this color bleed, you may need to spray with a fixative. Hairspray works well, but you will need to let the printed/sprayed paper sit for a few days. The laser printer does not require this step.

Cut around the edges of the printed leafs.

Melt clear soap base in the microwave. You will only need to melt enough soap base to dip each leaf. DO NOT OVERHEAT. Dip the leaves in clear melt & pour soap base keeping the temp to around 125 to 130 degrees. You can scent the soap base if you wish. For my daughter's event, I used Apple Autumn fragrance since my daughter will be purchasing an apple or apple cinnamon candle to compliment the soap leaves.

It took 3 of us to test these soap leaves. We took turns washing our hands until the soap dissolved. Our guess... you can use each leaf for about 3 hand washings before it totally dissappears. My staff had fun with this design and I must say, at the end of the day we all had very clean hands.

My daughter will be packaging these soap leaves in one of our glassine envelopes and creating a hand-made greeting card (with some kind of clever message) to present to her alumni friends. Once I've helped her create the packaging, I will post on my blog for inspiration.

Suiting up for the Season: We want to offer you the best!

It's that time of year in Michigan.... Autumn. I'm having fun decorating my yard for the season. I know many of you are gearing up craft shows, retails sales, or holiday gift-giving. Times are tough and each of us are trying to put our best foot forward and be sure that the money we have invested in supplies reaps some kind of benefit. That could be in $$$ or in a simple thank you from someone that receives your handmade gift.

This armoured knight is displayed outside my front door. It reminds me that I need to guard against complacency and treat my customers as if they deserve wine and flowers for every order they place. After all, my customers ARE MY BUSINESS!

And the yellow clogs outside my front door? A reminder that I'm wearing the same shoes as my competitors so I need to always find ways to make my company different. I don't want to be the brown shoes... I want our company to be the yellow shoes and stand out in the crowd.

My First Bee Sting!!

Believe it or not, considering my age, it's incredible that I have never been stung by a bee. Today was my day of reckoning with the bee. I stopped by a locally owned farm to pick up mums and some vegetables. In the midst of my purchase, a bee stung me on my finger. OUCH!!!

Oddly enough, my Mom had recently sent information on what to do if a bee stings you. I remember seeing this on the Net a while back, but gave it no credence. However, seeing my finger immediately swell, I decided to give it a try.

Supposedly, you are to tape a copper penny over the bite for 15 minutes. I did this using a band-aid to keep the penny in place. A number of individuals swear that the next day, you will find no signs of the bite. I can't confirm at this time. Howevver, I will say that after taping the penny to my finger, I find that the swelling has diminished. We'll see what happens in the morning.


EDIT TO THIS POST: Yes, it works! Can't tell you why or how, but the penny did draw out the bee serum and the swelling is completly gone. Incredible! I would never have been a believer.

Celebrating Grandparent's Day

It was a beautiful Fall day here in Michigan. Ideal temperature, sunny and an afternoon with grand kids, daughter and Mom. What better way to spend Grandparent's Day. Four generations of family! Our day included shopping and a stop at Michael's to pick out crafts projects for the kids and Fall floral items for myself. I'm doing a couple of floral arrangements for gift-giving and was like a kid in the candy store picking out containers and floral items. My mind was whirling with ideas of what I could do with this and that... and of course, 50% off floral items put me in a spending frenzie!

When we returned home, these were the lovely paintings that my two oldest grand kids presented to me in honor of Grandparent's Day. Miss O's painting is above and Carson's painting is pictured below. It was a wonderful day! Now... back to work for me. I'm trying to get a jump-start on Monday while working from home.

I just posted our two newest products, so be sure to take a peek.

Water Dissolving Paper and All-in-One Round Soap Molds.

I'll have pics and a brief tutorial on how to use the dissolving paper posted soon. How fun would it be to use artwork of kids (or grandkids) on the face of a soap? I just might have to give that a try with this new paper!

Costumes: Good Anytime of the Year

My grand kids are in love with costumes. They play dress up year round. However, this weekend was special. The Halloween costumes that I ordered online arrived yesterday. I always order them early to ensure they don't sell out and are available in their sizes (yes, I know that's anal, but that's how I am!)

They have been playing in these costumes all day, and if I had to guess... they'll be sleeping in them as well. Oh to be a kid again!

Miss O is Cinderella and was all about the tiara and wand. Oh... and let's not forget the blue neck choker. My little Fish wants to be a cowboy so the whole Woody attire was perfect. He loves the cowboy hat and the (goofy, but cute) spongy type boots that accessorize his ensemble.

And then there is Carson. As the 2nd grade big brother, he was all about something scary. His mommy and daddy are very careful about the kind of "scary" costumes he can wear. This one worked just dandy and didn't scare little brother or sister. So, that's how I spent my Friday night and Saturday morning. There was one exception. I treated myself and daughter to a pedi and mani this AM while the costume clad grand kids chased Poppy around the house. He was a real trooper.

Hope you are enjoying the weekend.

A Special Note of Thanks

A while back I posted about Kids Saving the Rainforest which is a wonderful organization that I firmly believe is worthy of attention. Well, as promised in my post, GPE did ship the free soap supplies plus some. Here is the email I received over the weekend:


Dear Denise!
Thanks so much for sending the soap making materials! We just got them when we got to Miami! They are absolutely wonderful! It felt like Christmas morning opening them. We are all so grateful and excited, we can't wait to get back to Costa Rica to start making them.

We will keep you posted as to how it goes and we can't wait to order more from you and pay for them!!! We are very grateful to you!

Thanks so much,
Jennifer and KSTR

To Jennifer, I say this. Your gratefulness is noted and it is refreshing to have someone take time to express it by sending a note of thanks. I hope Jennifer keeps all of us posted about the soap making endeavors of Kids Saving The Rainforest.

Emails like this (and many other wonderful emails we recieve from customers) is what motivates our company to offer the best possible service.

Save Over $111 on a FULL SET of Monogram Soap Molds

Unheard of savings. 55% OFF full monogram script mold sets. That's over $111 off!!!! There's only a limited number of sets available at this price. First quality, no seconds, no flaws. Snatch up a set ASAP. Monogram soaps make great gifts for the upcoming Christmas season. These are top notch plastic molds good for both MP and CP soapmaking.

Each sheet contains two cavities of the same letter and measure 3 7/8" x 2 5/8" x 1" deep (4 ounces per bar). Letters are deeply scripted and suitable for soap paints or dusting with mica powder. Any of our liquid gel soap colorants can also be used as soap paints. Finished soaps fit box size BO-7.

Happy Labor Day Soaping Friends!!

Whether you're taking a break from soaping, or finally have a day to do those fun soaping projects, I hope you ENJOY THE DAY!

I'm sitting in my home office writing this post and there is a distinct smell of Fall in the air. My husband is out back burning tree branches and the smokey smell reminds me of burning leaves evoking many childhood memories. Especially memories of my Dad. It's nearly two years since his passing and September is a month that stirs up memories. I'm not sure why Fall evokes such vivid mental pictures from my past. Maybe, it's the sound of high school football, the kids returning to school, hearing the marching band practice from the nearby campus, the turning of the leaves, the crisp smell of an Autumn morning, the excitement of carving pumpkins, cutting corn stalks, or raking leaves..... it's a mystery.

Fall will always be one of my favorite seasons and Autumn in Michigan is what helps me bear the miserable, cold Winters. Labor Day marks the last hurrah of Summer for us Michiganders. My husband spent the weekend working on an outdoor fire pit. I can't wait to use it and neither can our grand kids. They are fired up (no pun intended) about camping out in the backyard, roasting marshmallows and telling camp stories. We should get plenty of use out of the fire pit through this Autumn season.


Normal business hours will resume tomorrow. If you've placed an order over the weekend, bear in mind that we are going to be slightly behind due to the extended holiday weekend.

Using Mold Market's Tray Soap Mold

I happened up on Little Sparrow Soap Company Esty shop this morning. Once again, I see another unique way that someone is using Mold Market's 8-bar Rectangle soap mold (Items #79) to produce some awesome soaps. This retro soap design was created by Libby. Great job!

My Friday Fix: Dragon Dictation App for iPhone

The folks at Dragon have developed their own iPhone app that lets you dictate to your iPhone—and it works really well.

The app is a breeze to use. Just fire it up and press the Record button to start dictating. When you're finished, Dragon will put together its best estimation of what you said (I was surprised at its accuracy). If it's not quite right, you can edit the text with a keyboard or tap on individual words for alternate suggestions. When the text is just how you want it, Dragon can copy the text to your clipboard and optionally launch a new email or text message. If you're not a fan of the iPhone's soft keyboard, Dragon Dictation might be right up your alley.

Dragon Dictation is currently a free download, requires iPhone 3.1 OS or later.

For the record, one of my workers brought their niece to work today (she's going into 5th grade). She was the one that found and loaded this app on my iPhone. She's a whiz (aren't all kids these days) with iPhone and iTouch apps. She made my day. No more trying to get my fingers on all the right keys when texting. This app will save me SO MUCH TIME!!!

Sidebar: My husband wanted to know what this app would do with "naughty" swear words, so we had to try it out. I'm sorry, but our curiousity got the best of us. It puts a "*" to bleep out parts of the word. Pretty cool.

Hope you all enjoy the holiday weekend. We are closed Friday - Monday to enjoy the Labor Day weekend. It's last last hurrah here in Michigan before the Fall season. It already feels and smells like Fall.

Finally, the tutorial on how to use Mold Market's new 3-D soap molds. This tutorial shows you how to use the Popsicle and Oval Leaf molds. I'm in love with the Oval Leaf mold. It produces a classic soap that has a hand-milled look. PLUS... you can insert a soap rope in the pouring channel to make "soap on the rope".

Once the molds are prepped, they are good for many soap pours. All you need to do is align them, secure the two halves and pour. Each sheet mold produces one 3-D soap. You can purchase the molds at GoPlanetEarth.com. You'll find the Oval Leaf listed here and the Popsicle here. We're offering a limited 15% off introductory special on them right now; so, this would be a good time to make your purchase.
One tip when using these molds: Keep your pouring temp to around 135 to 139 degrees (Fahrenheit). A lower pouring temp will keep the soap from seeping out between the joined halves. I had no noticeable issues with soap seepage when pouring at a lower temp.