A touch of sunshine

My Sunshine bar has had a face lift, normally it has a orange swirl through it, but I thought it was time for a bit of a change. This bar has finely ground oatmeal, apricot kernel oil and avocado butter added and carrot tissue oil and paprika.

I think it looks like it has little leaves on it, what do you think? It's a shame it has that white flecky thing happening, I might leave the oatmeal out next time. If you'd like to see what the original one looks like, you can see it on my website, well, till I get the chance to put the new one on that is:)

Reminder to myself - don't soap when upset!!!

Geisha Girl

I'd been planning Geisha Girl for a while and couldn't wait to make it. I had set aside a morning when I thought everything would be AOK to have a nice quite morning soapmaking:) The only thing I had to do was pick up a few essentials down the shop. Sounds easy? It didn't work out as well as I'd hoped.

I thought I'd get my bit of shopping done first so I'd have a nice clear mind. I've found that my soap always seems to come out better if I can relax, take my time and just concentrate solely on making them.

I got everything ready to make it so I could start when I got home and off I went to the shops. Everything was fine till I was backing out of the carpark, had the car turned almost all the way around ready to drive off, when someone decided to back out as well (young man with his girlfriend in the car) and hit me.

As you can imagine I was very upset. I went home unpacked my things, had a cuppa and tried to settle down. As I had everything ready to make soap, I decided to go ahead and make it, well, I find soapmaking relaxing and thought I’d be OK and it would be all right.

Well, I was wrong:( I got right to the end, had it in my soapbox and was quite pleased how everything went so well. Put the cover over the top and Oh NOOOOO! I found the last oil that I was supposed to add at trace. Panic, panic, I had to add the oil or the soap would be no good.

I was so angry with myself because I’d tried to be so careful, knowing that I was still upset and I wanted to get the layers the way I wanted them.

Luckily I’d poured at a fairly light trace so I just had time enough to stir the remaining oil though, I knew it was going to turn out plain now, so I quickly added some balls that I’d done ready for another soap to hopefully make up for my lost layers.

So the layers went out the window and this is what it turned out like.

Exactly the same oils, colours and fragrance as the top soap, but totally different look, thanks to the man who was more interested in talking to his girlfriend than watching where he was going and my inability to concentrate when upset.

So the very next day I was determined to have my layers and tried again, with the result of the top photo, now that's more like what I wanted:)

White Rose

Just made a new batch of White Rose, this is a very feminine bar of soap with the fragrance of, you guessed it, roses.

This bar was made especially for my Mum who only likes using plain white soap, but I just couldn’t resist adding the extra touch of pink:) but she doesn't seem to mind just the small amount of colour and I think it adds the finishing touch to this bar.

It contains Macadamia oil and Mango Butter, both excellent emollients, making it a really nice bar to keep your skin feeling soft and moisturised.

Lavender!

Lavender Fields

Love it or hate it, Lavender is here to stay. Lavender has a well-established tradition as a folk remedy and its scent is familiar to almost everyone.

Lavender oil is a natural antibiotic, antiseptic, antidepressant, sedative and detoxifier. It is especially successful in the treatment of burns and is used to encourage wound healing, it is soothing for inflamed skin conditions such as eczema, dermatitis and psoriasis and can be used as an antidepressant.

A few drops of lavender in a hot footbath has a marked influence in relieving fatigue and it can help to relax and bring a good night’s sleep. A truly indispensable fragrance!

Lavender & Mint

Everyone is impacted by Fragrance - Part 2

In my previous post “Everyone is impacted by Fragrance” Lara commented that maybe the super-sensitive nose some pregnant women develop, has the purpose to protect them and their baby.

I agree totally with Lara, I think she hit the nail right on the head, I think that is exactly why Mother Nature has given us this acute sense of smell at such an important time, when our babies are relying on us totally to protect them from any dangers that might stop them from developing properly in the womb . We know by extinct that strong smelling chemicals are properly not the best things for us to be using at that stage.

It’s a shame that it doesn’t continue for most of us after bubs is born. I was watching my son play football last week and was horrified by the number of times a Grand Mother was rubbing Hand Sanitizer on her little grand-daughter, this little girl looked to be about 2 or 3 years of age.

I was sitting right next to a lady who in the space of only one half of a football match, that’s approx. 30 minutes for those of you who don’t spend every Saturday watching their sons running around having fun, said, “come to Grand-Ma and wash your hands” three times. 3 times in half an hour and I was thinking about the amount of chemicals that little girl was having rubbed into her.

Whatever happened to good old fashioned “clean dirt”? now I know that sounds a bit silly, but once upon a time children were allowed to play in the back yard in the dirt and the mud having fun and getting exposed to germs that would allow their immune system to develop, which really is a good thing. Oh course, washing hands with soap and water after play and before eating is necessary, but a little bit of dirt isn’t going to hurt them.

When I got home I had to investigate the ingredients contained in the Hand Sanitizer she was using just in case I was wrong and there really wasn’t any chemicals contained in it, although I really didn’t think there would be much of a chance of this. So here we go:

Dettol Instant Hand Sanitizer:

Ingredients: Alcohol Denatured, Water, PEG/PPG-17/6 Copolymer, Propylene Glycol, Acrylates/C10-30 Alkyl Acrylate Crosspolymer, Tetrahydroxypropyl Ethylendiamine, Fragrance, Limonene.

OK, I really don’t know that I’d want to be rubbing this stuff on our children’s hands a couple of times a day, let alone 3 times in half an hour. What about the old fashioned way of just taking a plastic bag with a wet face cloth? Surely this is a lot safer to use on our children’s delicate skin.

I also looked up FRAGRANCE on the Cosmetics Data Base, as that’s what we have been discussing and they give it a score of 8 out of 10 for being a high hazard to our health, check it out yourself, it’s a great spot to type in any ingredient you’re not sure of and finding out exactly how bad or good it really is for you.

Come on Mums and Grand-Mums, let’s try and cut down on the use of chemicals we use on our children, for their health’s sake.

FREE Pressie

For the next 3 days I'm giving away a FREE gift with every order, yes, I did say every order.

Gifts will range anything from a hand soap to one of our All Natural soap bars, depending on the size of your order.

Freebies will finish Monday night at 11.30PM, so be quick!

Everyone is impacted by FRAGRANCE.

"When sprayed or applied on the skin, many chemicals from perfumes, cosmetics and personal care products are inhaled. Others are absorbed through the skin. Either way, many of these chemicals can accumulate in the body. This pollution begins in the womb and continues through life."

I've had another great email from EWG or the Environmental Working Group with important information about the dangerous chemicals contained in our everyday products we use. I think it's very important that we are aware of the dangers of using Fragrances, I know they smell wonderful, but do you really know what ingredients are contained in them? That's why you won't find any synthetic fragrances in AromaBeauty Natural Soaps, but read for yourself some of the nasties contained them.

"A recent EWG study found Galaxolide and Tonalide, two synthetic musks, in the cord blood of newborn babies (EWG 2009). Both musks contaminate people and the environment worldwide, have been associated with toxicity to the endocrine system (van der Burg 2008) and were identified in the majority of products tested for this study.

Similarly, a pregnant woman’s use of some fragrances and other cosmetics frequently may expose her growing fetus to diethyl phthalate (DEP), a common perfume solvent linked to abnormal development of reproductive organs in baby boys and sperm damage in adult men (Washington Toxics Coalition 2009).

The average fragrance product tested contained 14 secret chemicals not listed on the label. Among them are chemicals associated with hormone disruption and allergic reactions, and many substances that have not been assessed for safety in personal care products.

Also in the ranks of undisclosed ingredients are chemicals with troubling hazardous properties or with a propensity to accumulate in human tissues. These include diethyl phthalate, a chemical found in 97 percent of Americans (Silva 2004) and linked to sperm damage in human epidemiological studies (Swan 2008), and musk ketone, a synthetic fragrance ingredient that concentrates in human fat tissue and breast milk (Hutter 2009; Reiner 2007).

To make matters worse, FDA lacks the authority to require manufacturers to test cosmetics for safety, including fragranced products, before they are sold to consumers. As a result, people using perfume, cologne, body spray and other scented cosmetics like lotion and aftershave are unknowingly exposed to chemicals that may increase their risk for certain health problems.

New research also links prenatal exposure of DEP to clinically diagnosed Attention Deficit Disorder in children (Engel 2010). This analysis found DEP in 12 of 17 products tested, at levels ranging from 30 parts per million (ppm) to 32,000 ppm in Eternity for Women.

Numerous other products used daily, such as shampoos, lotions, bath products, cleaning sprays, air fresheners and laundry and dishwashing detergents, also contain strongly scented, volatile ingredients that are hidden behind the word “fragrance.” Some of these ingredients react with ozone in the indoor air, generating many potentially harmful secondary air pollutants such as formaldehyde and ultrafine particles (Nazaroff 2004).

People have the right to know which chemicals they are being exposed to. They have the right to expect the government to protect people, especially vulnerable populations, from hazardous chemicals. In addition to required safety assessments of ingredients in cosmetics, the laws must be changed to require the chemicals in fragrance to be fully disclosed and publicly accessible on ingredient labels.

Short of sending your favorite perfume to a lab for testing, shoppers have no way of knowing exactly which of the 3,100 fragrance ingredients may be hiding in their beauty products or even in their child’s baby shampoo."

Scary stuff! If you'd like to read the whole article, you can find it here. If you'd like to try some all natural soaps that contain NO Fragrance oils, only pure Essential oils, you can find them at Pure and Natural AromaBeauty.